The space next to Raon is empty when she wakes up in the morning. She sighs once she feels the cold space where Baekhyun occupied last night before sitting up and stretching her arms. It is eight in the morning so she should be preparing for work soon. She lugs herself out of bed to the bathroom first to get ready. When she makes her way to the living room, but she doesn't see her boyfriend anywhere at all. The place is quiet.

"And he said that he would stay..." Raon stares at the dining table, where the only trace Baekhyun has left of himself is the breakfast prepared on the table. She wonders what time he left because there are no messages from him either. Something should be wrong here but she decides that he is just busy with whatever he is doing.

While she is having her breakfast, her doorbell rings. She gets up in excitement, hoping that it is Baekhyun, but she is greeted by unexpected visitors.

"Yoyo, morning!" Jongdae greets and behind him are Boyoung and Hyojoo.

"W-wait, what are you you guys doing here " Raon is genuinely confused at how they know where her new place is when she just moved in yesterday. She doesn't remember texting them her address yet.

"Of course as your close friends, we had to come here and brighten your day in this new, lonely, luxurious place Wow, this place is really big..." Boyoung has agape, looking around the place.

"We figured that we should go to work together. We brought some drinks," Hyojoo holds up a plastic bag of cold drinks from a cafe. "We'll get you real housewarming gifts when you have one."

"I'm taking dibs on buying her toilet paper," Jongdae says.

Boyoung scoffs. "Of course you'd pick the cheapest gift to buy."

"Hey, it's not going to be cheap if I'm buying her a two packs of twelve!" Jongdae reasons and turns to Raon. "By the way, are we your first guests?"

"Well, no..." She replies, remembering last night. "Not really."

"Jongdae, are you seriously asking that?" Hyojoo shakes her head. "You're forgetting that she has a boyfriend."

"No, I didn't forget. I was just asking," Jongdae shrugs, "should've figured that we weren't the first. Baekhyun was the one who gave us the address here in the first place. He said that you moved and told us that we should visit you."

"That was pretty sudden though. I wonder why he sent it so fast," Boyoung wonders.

Raon is puzzled too, since she doesn't remember Baekhyun mentioning of it. She slings the strap of her handbag over her shoulder as her friends are gathered back at the hallway waiting for her. She checks the messenger application on her phone and frowns slightly once she sees that he hasn't even seen her messages at all. Is it just her or is he acting strange?

"Baekhyun?" Joohyuk stares at the male standing in front of him.

This comes as a surprise to him. Baekhyun is holding Mongryong in his arms and he has a suitcase beside him. This is the first time he has shown up outside Joohyuk's apartment like a child who has run away from home. Though Joohyuk doesn't understand why he would need to because he is back to living alone now. It isn't as if he has been kicked out so he wonders why Baekhyun is here.

"Can I stay here?" Baekhyun is embarrassed to ask this of him. "For a few weeks?"

"What? Did you break up with Raon or something?"

"No, it's just that... I feel like I shouldn't involve myself in her life, for her sake."

Joohyuk has no idea why Baekhyun is so pessismistic all of a sudden. He met him a few days ago and he was doing fine then, but now this Baekhyun is far from the personality of the one he is used to. His eyes are downcast and there is a permanent frown on his face. Joohyuk is afraid that bringing anything up about Raon will make him cry, even if he isn't sure what happened between them. He should ask so he can help him.

"Why?" Joohyuk grabs the handle of Baekhyun's suitcase, bringing it in. "You're in love with her, I never imagined that the two of you would need space away from each other."

Baekhyun sets Mongryong on the ground and the corgi heads over to socialise with Joohyuk's own dog. "Yeah... this is my fault. I'm the jerk here. She doesn't know why I'm doing this, heck, she doesn't even know that I'm distancing myself from her and it ing hurts me that I have to do this." He takes a deep breath, taking a step closer to Joohyuk and staring at him dead in the eye. "Jung Yunho, I met him the day before yesterday. He told me that I was there when his father murdered Jeon Taehoon. That was before I got the gun pointed to my head."

"So what? What does Jeon Taehoon have in relation to you and Raon?" Joohyuk thinks. Jeon Taehoon... Jeon... Jeon... His breath hitches and from the umpteenth sigh Baekhyun has let out in his five minutes of being here, he can tell. "Jeon Taehoon... was Raon's father, wasn't he?"

Baekhyun nods once. "But I really tried to help him, I wanted to. I just didn't think it was right to kill him, they were the s who conned him in the first place. I didn't know they were going to point a ing gun at me and threaten to kill me. Do you know how much it to hear those words from the person you looked up to? The next second I tried to retaliate they already shot him. If she finds out what I did, and then the reason as to why I was there... She'll never want to see me again, Joohyuk."

"Then what do you want to do? Quit now? I'm sorry hyung, but you and I both know that it's not going to be easy for us to quit at the moment even if we want to," Joohyuk is serious now, his voice hard and cold. "What I want to say is that it's not your fault Raon's father was murdered, you were just at the wrong place at the wrong time. That, she may be able to forgive you, but we're con artists. Sungkyung doesn't even know what I do late at night, she'll react just like Raon when they find out we swindle people."

"Why can't we just believe that they're different than others? That they won't act like how we expect them to act. We don't swindle innocent people anyway. And you know we'll have to tell them," Baekhyun clenches his fists, holding back his tears.

"You really love her, huh?"

"What do you think?" More than anything. "Woobin will leave us alone if she doesn't have anything to do with us anymore, right?"

"I don't know... but at least he doesn't know where she lives."

"I guess so. As long as she's not with me, she'll be safer."

Joohyuk places a hand on Baekhyun's shoulder, squeezing it in hopes to at least let him know that he is not against him, and that he understands his situation.

"Fine, hyung. Let's find a way to quit. You, Taehyung and I," a small smirk finds it's way to Joohyuk's lips. "But let's finish our careers as swindlers with a bang. In three weeks, we've got something. What do you say?"

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