It seemed Baekhyun had brought something sweet. Lara was sitting on her bed while he went out to look for cutlery.

The mysterious room was still in her mind. The picture she couldn’t see, the locked door. And mostly, Baekhyun. Why was he there and how did he manage to enter without her hearing?

Flustered, Lara adjusted her messy pajamas. She winced when a sharp cold sensation cut through her skin. Baekhyun’s pendant was once again ice cold. She thought it was strange how her own body heat was never enough to warm the pendant, unnerving even. It felt colder with every passing day, as if it was getting away. She hated that feeling.

She would normally take it between her fingers and bring it to her lips, blowing hot air onto it.

But it would stay just as cold.

Days like that she felt her world crumbling. She felt the pendant was a little piece of Baekhyun she could always carry with her, even if he hadn’t visited for days. It was the little warm moments they had spent together in the Catacombs.

But if it was cold, she felt like that little piece of his soul died. She couldn’t afford that. Her fragile state of mind couldn’t afford having a useless piece of metal hanging between her collarbones.

The pendant was Baekhyun’s hugs, the human soul of an assassin.

Days like that she couldn’t bare the small piece being cold. She would take it off to clasp it between her palms, cold seeping into her milky skin. She would blow warm air and rub it carefully, muttering senseless pleas.

“What are you doing?” She jolted in surprise. Once again, Baekhyun had entered without her noticing. He had some pastel colored box in one hand and a ser of cutlery in the other.

She slowly parted her hands and showed him the necklace “It’s cold. It’s always cold, Baek. And I can never warm it”

Baekhyun put what he was carrying on the bed and sat beside her, thigs barely brushing. He grabbed the pendant form her hands and clasp it between his. She couldn’t help but look at his fingers. Baekhyun had beautiful fingers. Long and dainty, with a little freckle on his thumb and his nails always kept.

Carried by some instinct, she wrapped her hands around Baekhyun’s. It wasn’t about the pendant anymore; it was about him. About feeling him closer. Lately, Baekhyun felt different, like, although he was physically close, he was on a completely different place.

His hugs smelt different and his words didn’t sound the same, as if he would break any moment. Sometimes, it looked like he was struggling to smile. He was finely dressed, but Lara thought he looked in pieces.

Lara couldn’t help but wonder what Baekhyun did outside the Catacombs. He seemed to have an awful lot of free time to go and visit her, unlike Eunhee. Nevertheless, Lara thought someone had dumped the whole Universe’s weight on Baekhyun’s shoulders.

“I think this should do” Baekhyun said “Turn around”

Lara complied and put her hair to the side. She felt Baekhyun’s fingers barely skimming the skin of her nape while he clasped the pendant once again around her neck.

It was still cold.

Not icy, but cold enough not to be comfortable. She smiled anyways and thanked him with a soft smile.

Baekhyun had brought some sort of muffin with a glossy golden arrangement on top- It smell better than the hallways behind the Catacomb’s kitchen on M- Monday, she reminded herself- mornings, when they baked cinnamon muffins.

“It’s a cinnamon and apple muffin” he told her “You’ll like it”

Lara grimaced and stuck her tongue out. She hated apple and Baekhyun knew it. The apples she had tasted in the Catacombs were stiff and bitter. He would always tell her apples were juicy and delicious on the outside world. Red instead of green and sweet. She hadn’t forgotten all the times he had promised her he would treat her to some good apples once they escaped the Catacombs.

Lara never thought it could be true, that apples were actually delicious. In the first place, she never thought they would make it out of there. Out of the many warriors that could have escaped, she, the weak small girl, was one of the four lucky ones who had escaped. While many had died she was there, laying on a bed made of clouds.

Seeing her reluctance Baekhyun laughed.

“Baek I don’t think- “

“Have I ever lied to you? Apples are sweet and soft. Don’t you trust me?

“I do”

The muffin was indeed delicious.

The documents laying in front of her had more information than she could process. Baekhyun had barely let her finish her dessert before he was opening his worn leather suitcase to retrieve a lot of documents. The cursed paper sheets separated their bodies on the expanse of bed between them. Lara cursed not being able to move closer to him because she knew Baekhyun would definitely scold her if the papers were to crumple.

“Tomorrow is Wednesday, Lara. Do you know what that means?”

“That I will finally get out of here”

“This is your new identity. From now on you are Jung Lara”

He handed her a colorful little card with a picture of her (which she had no idea had been taken) and loaded with information. He then gave her a manila folder closed with a thin red string that seemed it would burst any moment because of how much documents it kept.

“This is your life. You need to memorize it. You can’t say you’ve been trapped for eight years in an underground training center”

Lara winced at the description. She only had a small notion about legality thanks to the few classes they had received on the outside world. Enough to know that what took place in the Catacombs was clearly far from legal. For starters, the inmates were held against their will.

“You’ll be under boss’ protection”

Baekhyun spat the word ‘boss’ as if it had burnt him and Lara wondered if the so-called boss was really such a horrible to make Baekhyun – as prideful and powerful as he was- talk about him with such disgust.

“He knows you’re a great strategist and he considers you a good addition to…” he hesitated for a second, looking for the right word “the business”

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Where are you going to be? You’ve explained a lot of things about the outside world to me, but nothing about you. What do you do in this world?”

Baekhyun bit his lip. “I can’t tell you yet”

“Why?”

Baekhyun looked discreetly towards the corner of the ceiling where there was a strange black gadget with a red blinking light. Lara didn’t need anyone to tell her to know that was a camera. She was watched 24/7. Baekhyun reached for her hand and pulled her to him, ignoring the crumpled documents beneath their bodies and the ones that slid to the floor.

He caressed har silky dark locks with one hand and her soft cheek with the other one. Lara’s ear was over his chest, feeling his warmth and the soft beating of his heart.

He used to do that back in the Catacombs. And she loved being held like that, so close to him that she could perfectly hear every single beat of his heart and every soft breath he took. When she shook with fear and couldn’t sleep, it was his soft voice and his careful caresses what would lull her. They made everything else vanish. There was no longer darkness or a wet and thin mattress. Nor fear or pain.

When his arms wrapped around her and his broad chest welcomed her small body, even cold vanished. If Baekhyun was with her then everything was alright. He was her lifeline, the one person that kept her steadily gripped onto life.

Lara liked waking up with a kiss on her forehead and soft and slow caresses all over her back. Baekhyun’s husky voice, those first words he said when he woke up, were one of her favorite sounds. The other one was his laugh when Lara moved to hug him and “accidentally” tickled him.

That time, as many others before, Baekhyun kissed her forehead. His lips felt like always: soft and full of a sweet kind of care she felt she didn’t deserve. Beaten, Baekhyun held her closer. Lara felt him tremble and she hugged him harder.

“Tell me why I can’t know Baekhyun”

He knew Lara was serious when she called her by his full name. Defeated, Baekhyun sighed and watched the camera once again while he bit his lip. In his eyes swam a ruthless storm with clouds of insecurities and conflicted lightning. Dark and wild.

He leaned into her, so close she could feel his breath fanning over her ear end his lips barely grazing it.

“Because you’ll hate me”

That night Lara couldn’t fall asleep. She had turned so that the camera wouldn’t see her open eyes. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Baekhyun with his firmly closed and his arms trembling around her while he hugged her tight. She saw him breathing deeply and she heard his voice as if he was still there, grazing her ear and telling her over and over again that she would hate him.

And she was terrified.

Lara couldn’t imagine a world where she would hate Baekhyun. Him, with that particular scent of his, his long slim fingers, his glossy eyes and his pink lips. With that soft voice that lulled her and soothed her as if it was massaging her soul and those cozy arms Lara liked to sink in. She loved to feel the warmth of his chest filling her cold body.

She was unable to grasp what was it that Baekhyun had done. Why was it so grave for him to decide she was going to hate him? What had made the all mighty Baekhyun shake while he held her close for dear life? She had always relied on him. Now that it was him who trembled in her arms and she had no clue how to react. She felt dazed and misplaced.

She knew Baekhyun was terrified too, but not why.

Lara heard four beeps, signaling someone had entered the room, and closed her eyes. She was planning on staying still until whoever had come to the room left her alone with her thoughts once again. But a familiar scent made her open her eyes wide.

Baekhyun

She didn’t dare to move until a dainty hand touched her shoulder and shook her gently while he called her name. Lara sat up slowly and looked at him with wide eyes. She didn’t care if he knew she had been awake all along.

Baekhyun looked towards the corner where the camera was supposed to be, but no red light blinked.

“Good” he whispered “You’ll be out of here tomorrow”

“Baek, what- “

“I need you to listen to me Lara. We don’t have much time. Let me tell you what I need you to know now. You can ask me whatever you want when you get out of here”

She nodded

“We are all but free, Lara. The outside world you imagined was not made for us. And I…” he paused and looked at his hands, fidgeting with his fingers in pure anxiety “I’m not the same”

“What are you talking about?”

“Lara” he warned “I won’t be who you think I am. I can’t be that person anymore. I have a lot of eyes watching me and if they find out I love you they will hurt you. I can’t allow that.”

Baekhyun kept on talking. Something about an underground organization and the training they had received, but she wasn’t listening anymore. She was trapped in those little three words Baekhyun had said: ‘I love you’. Oh, how many times had she read those worlds in her books. After six years together it was normal for them to love each other but in what way?

Lara wasn’t sure is Baekhyun loved her as a friend- as she herself loved Eunhee and Yixing-, or as something else. She wanted, needed, to know if he too felt that intoxicating warmth that originated in her chest and slowly filled all her body every time they touched.

“What makes you think I will hate you?” she asked after too many unheard words.

Baekhyun looked at his wrist watch and looked once again towards the camera, still off.

“Please” he pleaded “let me spend one more night thinking you love me too”

“I do love you”

“I know. But I don’t know if you’ll still be able to love me after tomorrow”

When Baekhyun embraced her, she could feel how bad he was trembling. If she was scared, she could only imagine what he must have been feeling. His fingertips that skimmed the bare skin of her wrists felt almost as cold as the pendant nestled between her collarbones.

“I’m scared” he confessed “I’ve never been this scared before”

The little laugh that escaped his lips was so hollow and tired that Lara felt like she was going to cry. Hearing him confess he was terrified only made her expect the worse scenario. She went through a thousand possibilities in a single second. The only thing common, she concluded, was that the world they had to live in now was even worse than the Catacombs.

“I don’t want to lose you. I can’t lose you”

“I’m not going anywhere”

“Promise me”

Lara detangled herself from his embrace slowly. She found two exhausted, hollow eyes. Messy tangled hair and circles under his eyes so dark she was starting to worry. She traced his cheeks with her fingertips, barely grazing him, afraid she would break the man sitting beside her. She didn’t remember him looking so utterly tired that same afternoon. She had never seen him like that: so weak, so vulnerable. He always said he would never be one of those weak inmates who only knew how to kneel and beg for mercy.

“I promise, Baekhyun. I’ll always be by your side”

His watch beeped loudly.

“” he spat lowly “I only have one minute left”

Baekhyun cupped her cheeks with that particular gentleness he only showed Lara and leaned into her until his forehead was resting on hers. For a second Lara feared he would feel her heartbeat. But then she felt his, pulsing through the thin skin of his fingers, and smiled. He felt just like her.

“Do you trust me?”

Lara nodded slowly “Always”

It was then, after years of yearning for each other, that their lips finally touched. It was a soft caress, a sort of unspoken agreement between them they understood even when their eyes were closed. Lara felt she was floating in a cloud that smelled like Baekhyun and that its warmth protected her like one of his hugs.

A kiss, so this is how it feels…

It was much more than what she had dreamed, much more than what she could ever ask. She smiled into the kiss and let her arms move as her soul asked her to do: they slowly went up Baekhyun’s chest until they wrapped themselves comfortable around his neck while her fingers played with his soft hair.

Baekhyun’s lips were even softer than she had imagined. Feeling them between hers was completely different to all the sweet forehead kisses. They tasted even sweeter than the dessert he had given her that same afternoon and they told her much more than his eyes ever would.

It was the first kiss for both and they would never wish it happened different.

Baekhyun was the first to break the kiss, ever so slowly and only when he felt his lungs desperately screaming for air. Even in the dark he could see Lara’s blown pupils, her blushed cheeks and the moist gloss on her lips.

Without saying a word, he got up from the bed. Lara returned to her position quickly, facing the wall and arranging the covers around her now burning body. As soon as the door closed, she saw the faint red glow of the camera’s light painting the walls.

Author's note:

Hello everybody!

I am so so so sorry! It's been exactly a month since I last updated :( It makes me sad too. It's kinda frustrating that I have so many ideas for this story but I can't find the time to write them properly. School is really killing me. Even though I'm on the last days of my Spring break I have finals in two weeks and then the HUGE exam to enter uni... So I'm going to be honest: I don't know when the next update will come ;(

But going back to th story!! Next chapter Lara will finally be out and we will find out about this mysterious boss. Little by little but surely. 

I won't promise to update soon because I know I won't, but I've already started working on next chapter! 

- Chan