trigger warning: this chapter of the work contains themes of ual assault and suicide which may be triggering to survivors.

A/N: not going to lie, i was pretty nervous about updating this chapter and i thought about scraping it and writing some random fluff because i didn't want to write about some of these themes wrong but i also wanted to bring forward some serious themes, so here it is. i'm also not completely satisfied with their relationship and characterization but, last chapter, here we go

Park Jimin

Something was wrong. I could feel it in my bones and heavily in my gut. I turned around in Minah's kitchen and strode back into the living room just in time to see her reject a call on my phone.

“What did you just do?” I ask, stepping forward and taking my phone from her hands.

“O-oppa,” she stutters, turning around in her couch to look up at me.

“Whose call did you just reject?” I ask her, unlocking my phone and checking my call log.

“I- I don't know. It didn't have caller ID, it was probably a spam call.” Minah says, standing up and reaching for me. “I just wanted to have all your attention to myself, I just really need you right now.” She reached for my arm but I pulled myself away. I selected Hoseok's number and called him. I pressed the phone to my ear as I waited for him to pick up.

“Oppa-” Minah whispers.

“Lee Minah-ssi,” I say gently but firmly, leaning away as she reaches for me again. “I'm truly sorry for your loss and I want to help you, but I cannot help you in the way that you need me to. I can't be anything but the private investigator that took your case.”

Her eyes widen, growing larger with tears but only for a heartbeat before she wiped them away with a sour laugh.

“Is it because of that ? Lee Jaeyi?” She asks me, her voice poisonousness. Hoseok doesn't answer and I redial his number.

“Do not call her that,” I tell her, “she took your case when nobody else would.”

Minah laughs again. “She took my case because of you, oppa. Not because of me.” She takes a step back. “Do you remember that day, of the concert, when you bought that ticket right in front of her? And hours later she repaid you by coming between us? You know what she said to me after, we met in the bathroom of that cafe by chance. She was patching up a scrape on her shoulder. I'll never forget what she said.”

“What did she say?” I ask, letting the ringing phone drop from my ear in my hand.

“She told me that I was a manipulative  and that I shouldn't play with someone like that. She said she would protect you and if I ever approached you again me.” Minah throws her head back and giggles, wiping tears away from her eyes. “Can you believe her? That tiny thing, threatening me? And you know what, oppa? She was absolutely right. I was sleeping with other men, other women.” She took several steps up to me until she was just centimeters away from me. “And I'm so sorry, oppa. But I knew you would never leave me, how could you? I'm the only one that ever loved you.” She raises her hand, grabbing my chin with her sharp nails.

My breathing speeds up. Who would ever love someone like you? Words from the past bubble up, the sting from sharp slaps ring in my head. My mother's face, her grimace whenever she saw me, the smell of alcohol that always lingered on her.

“Who? Oppa?” Minah giggled again. “Who? But me?” She tilted her head several times, zeroing in on my mouth with a smug smile. I stayed frozen, the words locking my limbs in place as Minah closed the distance between us. I felt her lips on mine, her tongue sliding around my mouth like a worm. I wanted to push her away, but I couldn't. Her words immobilized me.

All the words that had hurt me as a child, the words that Minah knew hurt me as a child, she flung them right at me. Jaeyi was right. She was always right. I felt disgusting as Minah's hands slid up my body under my shirt and down to my belt. I wanted to push her away, I didn't want this. I didn't want her. I didn't want her touching me. Every place that her fingers went, I wanted to burn off my body.

I shut my eyes, still trapped in this torture, and waited for it to be over.

Lee Jaeyi. Her smiling face suddenly appeared in my thoughts. The way she laughed at even the stupidest jokes I made, the way that she had to rebuke me for everything I said, the way she talked her way in and out of everything. Lee Jaeyi and those beautiful words she'd said to me.

She was right, I'd let in the wrong girl in, again and again, every time I answered the phone and fell victim to her tears. I let in the wrong girl, and I pushed the right girl away.“You are the kindest man I've ever met. Everything you do so genuine. You work hard with people rather than trying to be perfect. You let in the wrong girl.” I'd hurt her, while she had been trying to protect me.

Lee Jaeyi. Lee Jaeyi. Lee Jaeyi. Her name rang in my head like a mantra. Her laughter, her attitude, her beautiful moans.

I grabbed Minah by the arms and shoved her away. She stumbled backward, shocked.

“Don't you dare touch me,” I say, my voice acidic. “I let you in the past. I let you manipulate me with the secrets that I trustingly told you, I let you touch me when I felt disgusted by it, I watched you jump into the arms of other men. And for what? Because I thought nobody would love me because I thought that you had generously chosen to love a man that wasn't worth love.” I wipe her lipstick off my face. “Jaeyi was right, you are a manipulative and I wouldn't be surprised that you drove you Lee Tae Won to suicide.” I grit my teeth.

Her entire face changes at the sound of her dead boyfriend's name. She jerks forward, reaching for me.

“Oppa, he was murdered. I know it.” She says, pleading. “I'm sorry for everything, I'm sorry. But he was killed. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.”

I pushed her away, feeling my phone ring with a call. It's Hoseok.

“I need you to track Jaeyi's phone. And a number that I'll text you.” I tell him, disregarding all greetings. Luckily, he reads my tone.

“Got it,” he hangs up and I forward him the unknown number. I reach for my jacket, pulling it on and zipping it up all the way as I turn to Minah.

“We'll find the man that killed your boyfriend, but if I ever have to see you again-” I start.

She shakes her head wildly. “Never again. I'll never enter your life again.”

I turn, my movements stiff, and stride out the door towards Jaeyi. Towards the right woman.

Lee Jaeyi

He let me write for almost an hour. I wanted to leave as many clues as possible wrapped up in the letter.

I addressed it, my dearest Jimin.

I repeated exactly what Lee Tae Won had written in his letter, referring to Jimin as “babe” exactly as he had. Perhaps that had been what he was thinking, as he wrote the letter. He wanted to leave something behind that was meaningful, but would also stir up an investigation. He couldn't leave straight up evidence, Yeo Jingi would never let him, but he could leave behind clues.

His last words, he wanted Minah to remember him by them but he also wanted his death avenged. And now that I was writing mine, I understood.

I love you, more than I can ever comprehend. I ended my letter, signing my name with an apology.

“Finished?” Yeo Jingi asks from his living space where he was putting the finishing touches on a handmade noose. This time it was brightly colored jump rope, that he fashioned to the pipe in the ceiling.

“Yes,” I say. The fear had yet to hit me. These were my last moments.

“Wonderful,” he said, walking over to me, sliding the knife back into the groove of my throat. “Walk.” He ordered and I slipped off the bar stool, walking over to the chair that he had set up under the noose.

My limbs felt heavy, compliant. My heart stung with the fear of what was to come, but deep inside, the slightest bit of me felt comfortable looking up at the rope. If I conveniently committed suicide investigating this murder, the police had to re-investigate.

“I'll give a choice here,” Yeo Jingi told me, tightening his grip on the knife. “You can choose to resist, but I'm stronger than you with a weapon. Trying to get away will most likely end up with you being violently before your death.” My heartbeat spikes and my hand begin to shake. I press them to my sides.

“Sick bastard,” I hiss, refusing to show fear but tears had begun to spill over onto my cheeks. I have shaking now, dread and panic laced up my spine as my mind raced to find a way out of this.

“Or you can hang yourself by the neck, in which you will be dead when I do very bad things to your body.” He smiles at me, his eyes glint with a fervor that sends a shock of white panic through my veins. I didn't want either. I didn't want to die. I didn't want him to touch me. I didn't want him to defile my dead body. My only condolence was the phone hidden deep in the cloth of my jacket that was silently recording everything.

I stepped up onto the chair and reach for the noose with trembling hands. I slip my head through it silently. Yeo Jingi tightens it around my neck.

This was how Yeo Jingi had gotten Lee Tae Won to hang himself. Lee Tae Won had been offered something worse than death. I imagined Jimin. I didn't want to think about him with Minah. I