“Are you crazy!” This stranger in a suit is arm twisting her for real and Sakura doesn’t even know her name. She claims to be a bodyguard and given the position she is in, Sakura now believes her.

Yet another person who judges me by my looks. Eunbi rolls her eyes. “Miss Sakura, will you tell me where you are going now? It is my job to know that to keep you safe."

“I don’t feel safe right now with my arm twisted behind my back!”

“You asked me what can I do so I showed it to you. Plus I am not really holding you very tightly so it shouldn’t be that uncomfortable.”

Sakura slowly turns her head around and indeed while her arm is behind her, it is not firmly forced against her back. Frustrated, Sakura whips her arm from Eunbi’s grip. “It was just a statement I don’t mean literally.” She rubs her right arm.

“What is going on here?” The new voice in the room snaps the two out of their situation. Eunbi straightens up and Sakura recognises this person. Finally a repeat face.

“Nothing Ma’am. I was asking Miss Sakura where she is planning to head to when she asked who I am and what I can do. I told her I am a bodyguard and demonstrated an arm twist to make my point.”

Sakura mutters under her breath, “Demonstration? Yeah right.” Chief Ka Eun, whom Sakura recognises from their earlier meeting this morning, starts walking towards them.

“Eunbi was the one I was referring to when I told you this morning about the protection. In fact, I am just about to gather everybody for the introduction. Since you know, we will be working together from now on.” Chief Ka Eun does not speak loudly, yet her tone naturally carries authority and listeners instinctively incline to heed her words. With her tall slim figure and youthful looks, the title ‘Chief’ makes her hotter - Chief of what? Sakura can’t remember. Chief of the bodyguards? Sakura moves her sight to the other person in the room. Chief of hot bodyguards? Sakura mentally dismisses her thought. Would be hotter if she didn’t arm-twist me on purpose. I know you did it on purpose, woman-in-suit.

Eunbi spots Sakura eyeballing her with tension in her stare. Yet Eunbi keeps her neutral expression on, staying professional despite what she thinks. Minjoo’s new stepsister is sure not going to be easy.

As Minjoo enters the living room with Chaewon following behind, she sees her father sitting on the couch chatting happily with her new stepmother. She still remembers the day her father broke the news of his new relationship; it had been around five years since cancer took her mother away. She initially heard rumors from the bodyguards but it was hard to believe as her father was taking it really hard when her mother passed. He buried himself in work to numb himself from the loss. His increase in workload took him away from home most days, but in turn the company’s reach just continues growing. Although work was the on surface reason, Minjoo long suspects and believes that her father is intentionally avoiding her because she looks a lot like her mother. It breaks her heart to think this way but she simply cannot find reasons not to. For most of Minjoo’s teenage years, she was not surrounded by family members but instead, staffs in all form - she is given the best protection, best cooks and best of everything, just not her parents.

Minjoo stops in her tracks and stares at the two adults on the sofa, oblivious of her presence. It is clear that they are smitten with one another like young lovers in love. Chaewon stops beside Minjoo and stares worriedly at the stonic Minjoo. Minjoo briefly glances over at her bodyguard before returning her gaze back to the two. I used one of my trusted staff members and nearly got into serious trouble but I couldn’t even get much of your attention back here. Yet this woman swoops in and now you are perfectly fine and whole again? Back to Korea, living like a family again? Too little too late, father.

The aforementioned woman senses and turns at Minjoo’s direction. Honestly contrary to popular belief, Minjoo has no strong opinions about her father’s new wife; but do not expect her to feel good things about the woman who is here to replace her mother.

“Oh Minjoo, you are here! Come join your father and me for some tea.” The older woman gets up on her two feet.

Minjoo politely puts on a smile and walks towards them. She can be rebellious but Minjoo knows when she play her cards for she stands to gain nothing being childish.

“Thank you.” Minjoo takes the tea cup with both hands and sits on the sofa opposite them.

“It is nice to see you again Minjoo. You still look pretty as ever.” Her stepmother smiles warmly.

“Thank you Aunty.” Minjoo promised she will never call someone else mom, for that her own mother was the last feeling Minjoo had to a real parent and she wants to hold onto that. “Your daughter is also a beauty herself. Will she be joining us today?”

“Oh right, did Sakura not know we were supposed to meet?” Minjoo’s father chimes in.

“Ka Eun told me she sent someone to get her so it wouldn’t be long.” Her Stepmother replies.

“That’s a relief, I was worried she would be lost.”

Minjoo obviously knew that this tea time is scheduled for the new ‘family’ to gather together since from today onwards, they are all living in the same house. Thus when the last member of this new ‘family’ has yet to arrive, Minjoo secretly hopes it continues this way. Like her mother, Minjoo initially has nothing against her counterpart. But unlike the older woman, her daughter was extremely apprehensive on their meetings, namely the first time the couple gathered them together and the wedding. This did not leave a good impression on Minjoo as she herself was trying very hard to keep a polite facade. Minjoo thinks the name ‘Sakura’ is extremely unfitting for the girl as Minjoo’s favourite floral symbolises demureness, fragility and the beauty of life. This girl on the other hand, presents herself to be thorny and cold, a cactus is more befitting.

Her dislike for Sakura is also exacerbated by the endless news reports comparing the two girls together. Minjoo has grown up under the spotlight as the heiress of Korea’s largest conglomerate, nicknamed as Korea’s princess - she knows how to deal and react to sometimes nonsense news reports. Yet ever since the dating announcement, she has constantly been compared to Sakura and she never encountered this before as the only child in the family. Needless to say, it took her father several tries for Minjoo to agree to let the mother and daughter stay at their place. The size of their place is one convincing factor - the house, or mansion as most people call it, spans over a wide area that makes it quite hard to bump into people. There are two annexes joined to the main building along with a wide outdoor garden. There is a bowling alley, a movie theatre and more features people cannot imagine having in their house.

Minjoo’s deviating thought gets interrupted by the entrance of the said girl. But to Minjoo’s surprise, her main bodyguard Eunbi follows behind. She also notices the head of their protection team Ka Eun with them but that is not as unusual as her own protection team member there. Minjoo watches Eunbi intently as the trio approach the sofa. Eunbi catches her glance and smiles gently, seemingly reassuring her. Seeing that, Minjoo decides to keep a mental note to ask the older girl what she was doing with her stepsister later. She isn’t usually this concerned about the people around her, but as most people can already tell, Eunbi isn’t just anybody - Minjoo has a crush on her and she can’t help it. Everything about the older girl draws her in, from her charismatic work self to her kind heart and motherly moments.

“Kura! You are finally here! Minjoo was just asking about you.” Her stepmother taps the empty spot beside her, gesturing for Sakura to sit.

Sakura obediently sits and drops her bag on her lap.

“Are you planning to head out, Sakura?” Mr Kim asks in English.

“Yeah after this.”

"You didn't tell me." Sakura's mother says in Japanese.

Since it has just been the two of them for most of Sakura's growing years, her mother is naturally protective of the girl. "I just decided last minute. Wanted to check out the PC Bang here." Sakura replies back in the same language.

While Mr Kim did not understand the conversation between them, Minjoo understood everything - both English and Japanese. Guess all the schooling came in useful.

"Cap, bet you did not understand what was just said." Yujin sneakily whispers into their shared comms while standing at the back of the room. Eunbi turns around and glares at her jokingly. KIS agents are not only trained physically, they also go through regular subjects like in school as part of their ongoing training. Languages are a norm there and it is a well-known fact that the ace Kwon Eunbi's greatest weakness is Japanese. This fact did not bother Eunbi at all until just a few minutes ago when her chief just broke the news to her.

Eunbi's new principal is Sakura.

Damn.

Not only is she worried about how to break the news to Minjoo, knowing very well that the girl will definitely kick up a fu