Chapter XXVII: Payback

The press conference concluded shortly after Dara’s awkwardly cute and whimsical execution of an aegyo. Every person: the press, the fans and the other spectators, who all witnessed the interview, were quite satisfied and delighted with the statements given by the couple. A few of them were even swayed by Dara’s uncanny demeanor.

“She was very different from how the ignorant bashers would negatively comment about her. She was not a fame- nor was an inch close to a flirty .” A reporter expressed his thoughts about the interview. “Attorney Park was rather a woman of modernity: stoic yet humorous, y yet very smart and most of all she is an eye-candy! Better take a good care of her, Mr. Lee!”

A lot more of other positive appraisals were heard, all of which mainly expressed their admiration towards Attorney Sandara Park.

It can be assumed that the press conference indeed had a beneficial effect, just as how manager Yun had wanted it to be.

Well, it should!

He did not spend a gamut of money and effort just for nothing!

Worried by the inflating amount of hate and threats Dara was receiving; he painstakingly coordinated with all the invited journalists and sort of bribed them to make her image more of commendable, and to let the fans witness how incredible a woman she was, however, that one harsh question from Miss Choi came rather unexpected.  Nonetheless, she still managed to give a clever response.

Truthfully, he had his doubts at first, thinking that people might not be swayed by her beauty especially with the intimidating aura she always brought around her wherever she went, that the viewers might find it too scripted and might have the idea that it all was just a scheme. 

However, all his worries popped faster than a bursting bubble after the sight of the couple’s act of sweetness and affection. The two were just the perfect couple! He, himself was even considering to be part of the newly established shipment called ‘Darahae’ and then, he sheepishly laughed at the silliness of his own thoughts.

“Hyung, why in the world, are you maniacally grinning there?” Eunhyuk suddenly blurted out beside him and his focus was immediately brought back into the hallway. He coughed his laughter and willed himself to look serious. “Nothing. Don’t mind me.” Manager Yun responded as they were moving their way out of the studio.

Eunhyuk opened his mouth to talk but the voice of Donghae which never faltered after the interview, strained him from speaking and instead, he only watched the two figures in front of them with furrowed eyebrows.

 “Hey, babe...babe…babe!” Donghae whined, calling up to the girl who seemed deaf only towards his voice. He was continually poking her shoulders, brushing her back and even jumping in front of her, in attempt to grab her attention yet to no avail his efforts were ignored by the woman, who kept on walking with her arms crossed in front of her, face devoid of any emotion. 

  “Don’t be mad, please?” He blubbered once again, his voice ever so gentle and raspy that can make any girl drop and faint due to overwhelming appeal —any girl except for Dara. “You’re aegyo was truly the best I’ve ever seen! There’s nothing to feel embarrassed about,” he added and hastily regretted when Dara took a halt from her steps. She stared at him beneath lowered brows. She opened , pressed them back together, opened it once again but was interrupted by Kyuhyun’s sudden interference.

“ ‘The best?’ Seriously, noona’s aegyo was the weirdest of all!” He said and broke into a fit of boisterous laughter. Dara chewed on her lower lip, her face blossomed red. She whirled her head away from Donghae and continued walking past the guy.

Eunhyuk nudged the maknae with his elbow after noticing Donghae’s murderous glare towards their direction. He was also in the edge of cracking-up. The memory of Dara’s ‘aegyo’ was just unexpectedly too...cute, but he forced to swallow that laughter somewhere deep down inside him. An angry Donghae was always the worst, he thought.

“By weirdest, I mean the cutest, noona!” Kyuhyun altered his own remark as he muffled his laughter.

Dara remained ignoring them, sauntering her way out of the building but stopped when Donghae snatched her hand, intertwining it into his own hand. “There are people outside,” he whispered in her ear. She was to protest and retrieve back her hand but she relented, there were indeed other people beyond the doors of the hallway.

Hand by hand, they walked through the fans gathered outside of the building and into the parking lot. Dara felt queasy, she was expecting brash and rude treatment from the fans but to her surprise, they were all chee