Three days. Emily has been gone for three days and Jiho would like to pretend that the gnawing worry has something to do with their upcoming promotions or their new album or something else but he’s always been pretty ty at lying to himself.

Everyone is worried, he can tell. The boys all check their cell phones constantly as if waiting to get a message or call from her, even though they all know Chanyong took away her cell phone and it’s pretty unlikely that she’s memorized any of their numbers. He himself has to force himself not to look more than once every fifteen or so minutes. He knows he’s not going to get a message from her, and that worries him even more.

But if he and his boys are worried, it’s nothing compared to how Chanyong is taking it.

“She’s never been gone this long before,” he says to Jiho, and his voice cracks, breaking. He sits there at his desk with his head in his hands and it seems like he’s carrying the weight of the whole world on his shoulders. His eyes blood-shot, shoulders hunched, suit rumpled. Jiho might even feel sorry for him if he wasn’t so damn worried about Emily himself.

Jiho just nods to show that he understands. He’s not sure what he’s supposed to say. He’s not sure what there is to say.

“So she just left the club with that guy? That Hyunseung guy?” Chanyong demands for the billionth time.

Jiho nods. He had, of course, relayed the entire evening’s events to Chanyong as soon as possible. He hadn’t like that guy, and he likes him even less now that Emily has been missing for three days.

“And what did they say to each other?” Chanyong presses, again for the billionth time. They’ve gone over the scenario over and over again, but it’s yet to make any difference.

Jiho sighs but indulges. “He greeted her like he knew her, said her name and everything,” he begins. “And she knew his name too, but she didn’t seem very happy to see him. Then he told her to come with him, and hinted at some pretty ual things, and she just left with him.”

Chanyong groans and puts his head in his hands again. “This is because of that stupid, horrible man,” he says, and even though he’s talking to himself, Jiho finds his interest piqued.

“What man?” he demands.

Chanyong looks up in some surprise, as if startled to find Jiho still there. “Man?” he echoes.

Jiho bites back his impatience. “You said that this is because of a stupid, horrible man,” he repeats. “What man are you talking about?”

Chanyong hesitates, but in the end he says, “My brother-in-law. Emily’s stepfather.”

Jiho sits stiffly on the edge of his seat. Despite his curiosity, this is the first he’s really hearing of Emily’s past.

“What did her stepfather do?” he asks cautiously.

Chanyong sighs, and he hides his face in his hands again. “What didn’t he do?” he demands, and his voice is shakier than ever, like he’s fighting off tears. “That poor girl…she’s had it rough, Jiho. I know she acts like a brat, but it’s a defense mechanism. Her whole life she’s had nobody to take care of her, nobody to treat her like she’s a human being. She’s just protecting herself.”

“What happened?” Jiho’s voice is louder and sharper than he’d intended. He knows he’s overstepping his boundaries – Chanyong is his superior in the company, after all – but he can’t find it in himself to care at the moment. He needs to know what’s going on, why Emily would have willingly gone with that scumbag from the other night.

Chanyong sighs again and meets Jiho’s gaze head on. “She’d kill me if she ever found out I told you, you know.”

“I don’t give a damn!” Jiho practically shouts. “Just tell me already!”

“He her,” Chanyong says simply. “Not just once. Fifty times? One hundred? No one really knows. She was so young when it began, you know. Just over and over throughout her whole life. She grew up thinking that she deserved it somehow, like she had been a bad child and this was just her punishment. It’s a horrible thing to happen to anyone.”

Jiho sits back with the horror of this revelation. “Why didn’t anyone do something?” he demands.

Another sigh from Chanyong. “It’s just not that simple sometimes, Jiho. Emily’s mother, my sister, has always been a selfish sort of person. She never married Emily’s father; I’m not even sure if she knows who Emily’s biological father is. And when she met the man she eventually married, she didn’t care about anything other than her happiness. I never liked it. The whole family warned her not to marry him, but she did anyway, and then she had nothing else to do with us. She disappeared with her husband and Emily and we didn’t hear from her again for a while. They ended up moving to America, where they had a daughter together. The abuse started sometime there. My sister was too self-absorbed to notice what was going on. If she did notice, she certainly didn’t do anything about it. And Emily’s stepfather threatened her to keep her quiet. He threatened her with so many things.”

Jiho swallows thickly. He feels like he’s going to throw up. “So what happened?”

“Emily got fed up. She went to the police,” Chanyong says simply. “She reported the abuse. It tore her family apart, of course. Her stepfather was arrested and, even after his bail had been posted, he wasn’t allowed near her because of a restraining order. You would think that Emily’s mother and sister would have been on her side, but they weren’t. They treated her like scum, like a liar. I’m sorry to say it, but they made her life almost worse than before she’d reported it.”

“And that’s why you brought her here,” Jiho says, understanding. “To get her away from all that.”

Chanyong nods. “I wanted her to know that there were still people in the world who loved her, who actually cared about her well-being. I tried to be the parent she never had, but I guess I’ve failed.” He hides his face in his hands again. “I looked it up, you know. A lot of victims of ual abuse lose all sense of self-worth. They think that no one will ever want them after they’ve been sullied in such a way, and so they go with anyone who will take them. That’s probably why she went with that guy.”

Jiho isn’t even aware that he’s moving until he stands up so abruptly that the chair he’s been sitting in topples over with a loud bang.

Chanyong’s head jerks up, and there are tear tracks on his cheeks now. “Where are you going, Jiho?” he demands.

“To find Emily,” Jiho replies grimly.

It’s not an easy task, of course, but Jiho has renewed vigor for it. He starts by going back to the club they had been at on Thursday, the one that Emily had left from. It’s not much, but it’s really the only lead he’s got.

He asks around, a few of the people who work there remember Emily, but none of them recall her leaving with a guy. Then, as the club gets more and more crowded, he finally gets some information.

“Hyunseung, right?” a broad-shouldered guy asks. “Lee Hyunseung? Yeah, I know him. He comes here every once in a while.”

The relief Jiho feels at that is indescribable. “Where can I find him?”

The broad-shouldered guy shrugs. “I don’t know.” Then he pauses. “But he’s friends with that guy in the blue shirt over there. He might know where you can find him.”

The guy in the blue shirt is chatting with two scantily clad girls and doesn’t seem at all happy when Jiho interrupts him. “What the do you want, bro?” he demands as the two girls sidle off into the crowd.

“Lee Hyunseung,” Jiho says darkly. “Do you know him?”

“Yeah. So what?” the guy in the blue shirt sneers.

Jiho is not a violent person by nature, but he’s got the guy pinned against the wall, his forearm pressed threateningly over his windpipe, in a matter of seconds. “Tell me where I can find him,” he all but growls.

“I don’t know!” the guy in the blue shirt squeaks out, hands clawing ineffectively at Jiho’s arm. “I don’t know!”

Jiho presses down just a bit harder. The guy’s face begins to turn blue.

“In Hongdae!” he finally gets out, and Jiho releases him. “He lives in an apartment building in Hongdae!”

“Address?” Jiho demands coldly.

The guy in the blue shirt hurriedly pulls it up on his phone and Jiho scribbles the address down on his arm. Then, without looking back, Jiho leaves the club. He hears the guy in the blue shirt call him a few choice names behind his back, but he doesn’t care much. There’s only one thing on his mind.

The apartment building isn’t hard to find. It’s nondescript like all of the other apartment buildings in the area, the bottom two floors taken over by boutiques and nail salons and restaurants while the top floors house the apartments. He’s too antsy to wait for the elevator, so he takes the stairs two at a time up to the third floor.

He reaches apartment 317 and bangs on the door loudly, covering up the camera with his thumb because he doesn’t want the jerk inside to know it’s him. When there’s no answer, he bangs again, as loud as he can. An elderly woman sticks her head out of an apartment further along the hall and gives him a disapproving look, but he ignores her and continues banging.

Eventually the door is opened, and he is faced with none other than Lee Hyunseung. The guy doesn’t look happy to see him; in fact, he’s pretty pissed off. But it’s nothing compared to what Jiho is feeling.

“Where’s Emily?” he says through gritted teeth.

Hyunseung squints at him for a minute, and then he suddenly seems to recognize Jiho. “You’re that from the club the other night, aren’t you?” He laughs, and it’s not at all nice. “You better get out of here before I call the cops. Emily came of her own free will. off.”

And then Jiho punches him. His fist his Hyunseung square in the nose and the taller male stumbles back, clutching his nose and crying out in pain. Jiho brushes past him into the apartment. He knows that he’s technically breaking and entering, but there’s very little that he can think about at the moment other than finding Emily.

He does find her in the apartment, sitting on the sofa with her knees drawn up, wearing an oversized shirt that must belong to Hyunseung and a pair of pink . Her hair is a mess and there is mascara and eyeliner tracked down her cheeks, a few new bruises on her wrists. She looks up in surprise when Jiho appears in the living room.

“Jiho?” she says, shocked. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Now that he has verified for himself that she’s alive and, as far as he can tell, reasonably safe, he is overwhelmed with anger. He’s angry with Emily for being so stupid and he’s angry with himself for caring so much and more than anything he’s angry with the who made her this way.

“Come on,” he snaps through clenched teeth, grabbing her arm and yanking her up. “We’re leaving.”

He supposes that he’s scared her, because Emily follows him without argument.

Hyunseung stops them in the hallway, grabbing Emily’s other arm even as one hand stays pressed over his nose. “What do you think you’re doing?” he hisses, but Jiho’s elbow to his face causes him to stumble back again and the two of them are leaving.

Outside the apartment building, Jiho hails a cab and directs the driver to his building. He catches the driver glancing back in the rearview mirror to look at Emily, so he quickly shrugs out of his long-sleeved overshirt and hands it to her. “Wrap this around your waist,” he orders gruffly.

Emily takes the shirt and does as she’s told, covering up the pink . She doesn’t say a word the entire drive.

The dorm is empty when they arrive, everyone else at the studio, working. It’s quiet and calm, and it seems the exact opposite of everything that has just happened.

Jiho makes Emily take a shower, after which he makes her eat and drink something. He tries to talk to her but she won’t respond; she just looks down at her hands and refuses to speak to him.

Once he’s got her settled in his bed for a nap, clean and fed and wearing some of his clothes, he phones Chanyong.

“I’ve got her,” he says stiffly into the phone. “She’s at my dorm.”

Chanyong’s relief is audible. “Oh thanks god,” he practically sobs. “Is she okay? Is she hurt or anything?”

Jiho glances back towards his bedroom, where he’s sure Emily isn’t actually sleeping. “I don’t know,” he admits. “She won’t talk to me. She hasn’t said anything since we left that guy’s place.”

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” Chanyong promises.

“I don’t think that’s the best idea,” Jiho points out, keeping his voice low. “She’s…not happy. I think that she just needs some time to be alone. I think it’s better for her to stay here for a bit.”

Chanyong hesitates, but in the end he agrees. Jiho promises to call him if anything changes or if Emily is ready to go home, but he’s not all that hopeful when he hangs up the phone.