House of Cards | Bulletproof book 2 | A BTS Gang AU

13: Baepsae

**Mature Warning**

The storm the morning Kai left was just a harbinger of more to come. Over the next few days, it rained and thundered so much, I half considered whether or not I should be looking for an old man with a boat and a lot of animals. The weather was so bad, business at the shop all but died out altogether.

I never did see who was following me that day in the alley, but several times when I was outside moving between my apartment and the shop, I smelled him. Despite knowing he was tracking me like quarry, the scent was familiar and comforting somehow. I hated how much I loved it.

Another week passed and nothing came of the hunter. I was so nervous, I started bunking with Minnie in her upstairs apartment. I didn't dare tell Kai about the problem, though. He had too much going on with Suho and the rest of EXO. He'd been right about Suho being mad and, while he didn't kill him, he did make Kai's life miserable for the secrets he kept and found every way possible to keep us from seeing each other. We all knew he couldn't keep it up forever, but Kai had the feeling he was at least hoping to buy some time. For what, neither of us knew.

We had talked several times, but not about the night and morning we'd spent together. I didn't regret what happened, but the more time stretched between that moment and the present, the more I wondered whether it should have happened in the first place. I cared about Kai and I knew he cared about me, but I couldn't give him what he deserved. The only thing I could give him was grief and the more I spent cooped up in the shop, the more I obsessed about that thought.

Finally, I got tired of being stuck inside the shop for days. Some people could handle isolation, but I'd had my fill of it. I didn't go crazy, but I just had to step outside for a few minutes. Still, it was more than I'd done in days.

Winter had finally released its grip on the city and the weather was warming up nicely. In fact, it was almost too warm, the air nearly stifling, but I enjoyed it. I hated the cold oppression of winter and welcomed the balmy afternoons of spring. I'd even borrowed a short pleated skirt and thin tights from Minnie to celebrate the seasonal improvement and try to knock myself out of the gloomy mood I'd been in.

As I stepped out into the back alley behind the shop, I tipped my head back and leaned against the ancient brick. Most of the buildings around were steel and glass, but this was one of the few remaining made from wood and brick. It was a comforting feeling to be next to something so old that had seen hundreds of years of humans pass by it. It gave me a sense of stability that I was sorely missing in my life.

Footsteps echoed down the alley toward the main road, but I didn't bother trying to see who it was. It wasn't uncommon for people to use that alley as a shortcut. That is, until the scent of earth and spice blew across my face, carried on the warm evening breeze. My heart seized in my chest as I struggled to breathe. With him so close, I remembered how I knew that smell.

"Morgan."

My eyes shot open, but it took a little too long for me to turn my face to him. I knew that deep voice and the warning that it carried. I'd heard it many times before getting my ass handed to me on the sparring mats.

Nobody but Gina had called me that name since leaving the mansion.

I rolled my head to see the outline of Jungkook's muscular frame standing at the other end of the alley. Even looking like a really buff ghost backlit by the streetlights as they flickered on around us, there was no mistaking who he was. I knew that body as well as I knew my own.

"Oh fuck..." I breathed.

"Don't you fucking do it," he warned even as his muscles tensed in anticipation.