Karina approaches Ryujin and she links their arms together. Karina and Lia exchange gazes. Lia bows slightly to Karina as she tries to get away as far as she can from the couple, but she was stop by someone.

“What’s the rush princess?”

“Giselle…”

“Giselle?”

Both Karina and Lia said in unison.

“Eyy…what a reunion!” said the girl named Giselle when she noticed that Karina is there too.

Winter who came looking for her cousin stops on her track when she saw Giselle, the Japanese conglomerate heiress is there with her cousin and her ex. Winter gather all her courage and continues to approach them.

“Unnie.” She called for Lia and Lia quickly go to Winter’s side.

“Oh hey, look it’s Minjeong!” Giselle greets Winter.

Winter gives her a bitter smile and then her gaze turns to Karina who is seems to be stunned at the moment.

Ryujin who sensed the tension tries to break the silence “Umm…Karina, may I know who is this?”

Giselle offers a handshake and Ryujin accepts it without hesitation. Giselle introduced herself as the heiress to Japan car manufacturer company.

“Karina and I used to date…and I can’t believe that even Winter is here too…what is this dinner for? Exes reunion?” Giselle joked but her laughter turns to a serious tone when she saw Karina’s expression.

“Exes?” Ryujin questioned.

“Yeah…Winter is also Karina’s ex.” Giselle added and it seems like she added fuel the the fire that is already burning in Karina’s heart.

Winter was piss at Giselle carefree attitude and when she noticed Karina’s expression. She grabs Giselle by her shirt collar. Lia tries to stop her cousin but Winter refuses to let go.

“If it wasn’t for you, Karina and I would still be together!” Winter hisses at Giselle.

“If you listened to Karina and dump your bff Ningning, Karina probably won’t come to me for comfort!” Giselle fired back.

“Ningning is my best friend and there’s only platonic relationship between us, you should have known better because Ningning is your fiancée!”

Lia tries to intervene by stepping in between the duo. She tries to separate them but Giselle was too strong for her to handle.

Ryujin was a little surprised at the revelation and the scene. She turns to Karina and she saw that her fiancée is in verge of crying. She sighs and she let go of Karina’s arm which made the latter gasps. Ryujin steps in between Giselle and Winter to stop them from fighting.

“Please do this outside, don’t embarrass my father in front of his guests.” Said Ryujin calmly.

Winter let go of Giselle’s collar and she hisses as she walks away. Lia tries to call for her cousin but Winter did not even look back at her. Giselle clears and straightened her shirt.

“She never changes.” Giselle remarked and then she turns to Karina.

“You too.” She said to Karina before she bows and walked away.

Ryujin turns to Karina and saw that her fiancée is crying now. She takes out a handkerchief and hand it to Karina. Karina shoves Ryujin’s hand away and run out.

“Karina!” Ryujin calls for her fiancée.

Ryujin stood there as she watches Karina leaves. Lia urges Ryujin to go after Karina but Ryujin said she does not know what to do when it comes to comforting people.

“Just go, she needs you by her side. I’ll handle Winter and Giselle.”

Ryujin thanked Lia and she runs out the restaurant to find her fiancée. Ryujin exited the restaurant and she saw her fiancée crying by the bus stop next to the restaurant. She approaches Karina and sits next to her.

“Care to tell me what was all that about?”

“If I tell you, will you hate me?”

“It depends.”

“…”

“I want us to come clean before our wedding.”

“I used to date Winter in high school…then when I attended university, both of us growing apart. Winter prefers to spend more times with her best friend and not me. I got so lonely…then Giselle came…”

“You cheated on Winter…?” Ryujin finishes Karina’s sentence before the latter could.

Karina nods in silence as she tries to muffles her cries. Ryujin sighs deeply and she scoots closer to her fiancée. She pulls Karina closer to her and Karina rested her head on Ryujin’s shoulder.

“It’s all in the past…let it go.”

“I know but...I…”

“Shshh…” Ryujin shushes her fiancée and she gently taps on her shoulder to comfort her.

They stay silent in each other arms, but a figure was staring at them from inside of the restaurant.

“I see you still have feelings toward her.”

“What are you saying unnie? I’ve buried my feeling for her for so long.” Winter replied.

“But your eyes say otherwise.”

Winter turns away from the window to face her cousin. The were tears in her eyes and Lia sympathize with her but there is nothing that Lia can do. Karina belongs to Shin Ryujin and there is no way for Lia to break them apart just for the sake of her cousin.

***

A couple of weeks after the disastrous meeting of the exes, Lia and Winter finally able to forget about the event as they were busy with Lia’s family café business. Now that the renovation is already in it’s 90% of completion, Lia decided to go there and do some inspection.

“Unnie are you sure you can go alone? If you can wait for a few more hours, I can be there with you.” Said Winter through the phone.

“It’s okay, Winter-ah, I’m just going to check on a few things and then I’ll go back.”

“Okay, please call me or Sinb unnie if you needed anything.”

“No problem. See you later alligator~”

Lia puts down her phone and she turns around to look at her new café. It was her grandmother’s old antique shop. Since her grandmother had passed away, no one wanted to take over the business so it closed down, until she proposed to her father that she wanted to turn the antique shop to a café and her father allowed.

Lia sighs, she was unsatisfied with the painting work that the contractor had done. She lodges the complaint to the manager but it seems like they are not going to repaint unless she pays extra. Money is not a problem for Lia, but she hated it when people do things half-heartedly. She decided to paint the wall herself so she ordered a paint delivery.

After she had done talking to the paint shop owner, Lia put down her phone and turns her attention to the big glass window. Something caught her eyes. It was the blue music box by the window. Lia reaches for the music box and dust it off. It belonged to her but then it was broken and she sent it over to her grandparents to fix but then she simply forgotten about it because her father bought her a new one.

A face on the glass window surprised Lia and she loses her balance and fall on her back.

“Ms. Lia!” Ryujin comes sprinting in to check on Lia.

She was strolling along the street to check out the abandon antique shop when she saw that someone was inside the shop. So, she decided to stares from the outside. To her surprise, it was Lia. She keeps on staring at Lia, because the latter beauty is very captivating, but she did not expect Lia to be so surprised to see her.

“What are you doing sticking your face to the window like that?!” Lia yells at Ryujin.

“I could ask you, what are you doing here in my building?” Ryujin retaliates.

“Your building?! This is my building!”

“I’ve just bought this building from the bank this morning.” Ryujin explains.

“What?”

“Yeah, I can show you the documents to prove it.”

“But..”

***

Son & Bae Associate

“There must be a confusion…” Lia’s lawyer explains to Ryujin.

“Miss Lia is the true owner of the building, there is no doubt on it, but since the mortgage hasn’t been paid for over a decade now, so the ownership is auto transfer to the bank, hence, Miss Shin is the rightful owner now.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that it was still under mortgage and it had been sold off to the bank in the first place?” Lia questioned her lawyer.

“There must be a confusion in the documentations.”

“How unprofessional.” Lia sighs.

Ryujin keeps her calms. She seated with her legs crossed. She takes a sip of the tea and finally she speaks “I don’t mind if you want to use the place.”

“Huh?”

“Take it as I renting it out to you. Your father is my father’s best friend. I don’t want to have any dispute with you. I bought the building is because I did not want the developer to demolished the whole street. There are too many historical architectural along that street, and it will be a waste to demolished it all.”

“…”

Ryujin knows that Lia is not happy with what she had said so she takes a deep breath and turns to Lia’s lawyer “I know Miss Choi doesn’t trust me on this issue, I would like you to come out with a contract, to change the ownership of that building from my name to hers. Do you think you can get it done?”

“I don’t need your sympathy.”

“I wasn’t…” before Ryujin could finishes her sentence, Lia storms out from the office. Ryujin gets up from her seat and follows Lia.

“Hey!”

“Don’t follow me!”

“What is your problem with me?!”

“Nothing!”

“But you act like something!”

Lia stops and turns to face Ryujin. Her fists were clench so tight that her knuckles turn white. There were tears in her eyes. Ryujin feels guilty all sudden.

“I don’t know what is wrong with me!” Lia bursts at Ryujin and it made Ryujin taken aback.

“I don’t know what is wrong with me. I was fine until I met you. I don’t know why am I feeling this way and I know I shouldn’t!”

“What…what feeling?” Ryujin tries to keep her posture. She wanted to know if what she’s feeling is the same as what Lia is feeling. Over the past few weeks, Ryujin could not get Lia of her mind. Even when she is with Karina. She knows that she should not feel the way that she felt, but there is something that she does not understand at all. The feeling that she felt for Lia is different, she does not hate her, she does not know if she likes her but there is this strong longing feeling. She wanted to be with her, be there with her, touching her, kissing her. It took her weeks to finally understand that it is love. She is in love with Julia Choi Jisu.

“I…I don’t know…” Lia answers, confusedly.

Ryujin takes the initiative to get closer to Lia. She grabs Lia’s hand and leads the latter with her. They enter the lift and no words were exchange between them. Ryujin did not even let go of Lia’s hand and Lia did not even try to pry her hand away from Ryujin.

They walk to Ryujin’s car and Ryujin help Lia to open the passenger seat door and usher her to get in. Lia gets in without asking much.

The drive was silent. Lia did not dare to look at Ryujin and Ryujin did not even utter a word. Ryujin stops the car by the seaside.

“I don’t understand what happened. But the day we met, I felt something.”

“And?”

“I had a feeling, that was not our first meeting. I don’t understand it myself either…my heartache when I see you.”

“You have Karina, we shouldn’t feel like this!”

“…Karina…was not my choice…you know how being in the conglomerate family…everything needs to match with the status quo. My father and Karina’s father are friends…so they matched us. I…don’t feel anything for Karina…”

“……”

“I know this I wrong…but I can’t lie to my feelings. Lia…if…if you feel the way I feel…I…”

“We can’t.” Lia rejects Ryujin.

“…”

“I am not that type of woman…someone who wreck a relationship for my own selfishness, beside, we don’t even know each other that much.”

Ryujin’s grabs tightened on the steering wheel, she clenches her teeth, trying to hold in her feelings.

“I’ll buy the building from you, you don’t have to do the ownership transfer. I do hope we don’t meet again after this.” Said Lia and she exits the car, leaving Ryujin baffles.

***

AESPA Co. Ltd

“I told you, the launching had to be delay, our team found there is a bug in the gameplay, so we cannot afford to release the game and get backlash later. Fans had been anticipating for this game release for a year, we need to give them the best!”

“I agree with what Miss Karina said.”

“Well then…how are you going to explain it to the public?”

Karina sighs and she takes out her tablet “I need to have a meeting with the public relation department after this, brain storming ways to convey the delayed to our fans. Secretary Kim, can you help me to arrange the meeting with the programming solution company to afternoon?”

“Ugh…but ma’am…they are here already.”

Karina looks at her watch and sees that it’s almost 12pm, and she had promised to go on a lunch date with Ryujin. Looks like she had to cancel the date.

Karina walks out from the meeting room and she met Winter hallway. Her heart skips a beat and she almost abruptly stops in the midway and her secretary almost bump into her.

“Miss Karina?”

“Why is Winter Kim here?”

“She’s the director from the programing solution company.”

“What?”

***

Lia walks as fast as she could, but she flinches when the lightning struck. She looks up to the sky and it looks like it is going to rain soon. Lia looks around to find a place to shelter from the rain. She quickened her pace but she was too slow, the weather caught up to her. The rain starts pouring and she panicked. As she was about to dash in the rain, she suddenly feels the rain stops.

She looks up and sees the umbrella hovering on top of her. She turns behind and sees Ryujin, standing in the rain, holding the umbrella to shield her from the rain. She pushes the umbrella to Ryujin but Ryujin did not even move away.

“You’ll get sick!”

“You will too if I let you soaked in the rain.” Ryujin argues back.

Lia sighs and she grabs on Ryujin’s wrist, pulling her closer to her so that they both can stand under the umbrella together.

“Why did you follow me?”

“It was going to rain and we’re out of nowhere, there is no way I am going to let you walk away, alone.” Said Ryujin.

“You should have followed me with your car.” Lia chides with a scoff.

Ryujin’s smirks at Lia’s witty remark. She looks cute when she is sulking, Ryujin thought to herself. She stares down at Lia and she blushes when she noticed that the white shirt that Lia wore becomes transparent. Lia shoves the umbrella to Lia, to which Lia takes and stares at Ryujin confusedly.

Lia was more confuse when she sees Ryujin takes off her coat. Ryujin wraps her coat around Lia’s little frame. The closeness of their body warms Lia’s body and she blushes. The smell of Ryujin’s perfume is so fresh and clean that it made Lia wanted to nuzzle closers to Ryujin.

“It’s your shirt, it’s soaked…I…I can see right through it.” Ryujin stutters as she tries to explain her action.

Lia yelps and she lets go of the umbrella in panic as she tries to cover herself up. Ryujin was in disbelieve when Lia let go of the umbrella and now both are equally wet and the rain is pouring even more violent now.

Ryujin gets the umbrella and shield both of them again.

“Here hold this…I’ll go get the car and you wait here.”

“Then you should use the umbrella.”

“No…you hold it…it’ll be quick.” And off Ryujin goes.

Lia watches Ryujin disappearing in the rain. Her heart skips like it is going to jump out of her chest soon. The closeness that they had earlier and the smell of Ryujin’s perfume. It still lingers around her.

Lia shakes her head when she realized what she was thinking. ‘She belongs to someone’s else Lia!!!’ she scolded herself.

***

Ryujin runs back to place where she parked her car and she realized that her car is missing. She looks around and there is no sign of her car anywhere. Then she saw the skid mark on the road. Ryujin looks up to the skies and curse loudly.

How are they going to get home now? Her phone and wallet are all inside that car. She is now completely wet, and she does not want to get sick by standing longer in the rain, so she runs back to the place where Lia is waiting for her.

***

Lia was expecting Ryujin to returns with her car but seeing Ryujin comes running toward her she frowns.

“Where’s your car?”

“Apparently…. someone stole my car.”

“What?” and then there is a loud cracking in the skies.

Lia startled and she falls back to which she slipped and falls off the slope.

“Lia!!”

Ryujin jumps and reach for Lia. She pulls Lia into her embrace and shielded Lia’s head from the stick and stone as they are rolling down the slope. The raining day causing it harder for Ryujin to grip on the ground to stop them from falling further.

Ryujin saw the big rock ahead of them and she tries her hardest to grab onto something. She managed to grab on a tree root but she can feel something snapped in her arm. She tries to muffle the pain by biting to her lower lip.

“You okay?” she asked Lia but Lia did not answer.

Ryujin looks down to check on Lia and she saw that Lia’s head is bleeding and she was unconscious.

Ryujin tries her best to pull themselves up. The pain is unboreable but Ryujin must keep Lia safe. She sees that the slop is not that steep anymore and they can stand without slipping. She slowly sits up and tries to wake Lia up but to no avail.

There is a small up on Lia’s forehead and it seems like it has already stop bleeding and Ryujin sighs in relieve. The pain in her shoulder and arm finally takes it toll on her. She winces in pain but she still needs to find a place for them to rest until she can get help. She then begins to search for Lia’s phone in Lia’s pocket and she realized, the phone must have drop when they were falling down the slope. Again, Ryujin curses.

She tries to gets up while holding Lia in her other arm. After she ensure that she can stand steadily on her feet, Ryujin moves Lia to her back and piggy back her to the nearby road. She sees some houses down the road and hoping that there is someone good willing to help her out.

Ryujin limps toward the first house. she knocked but now one answers. She then moves to the other house. Once again, she knocks and yells for help. The owner of the house turns off the light and Ryujin saw that they also close their binds.

The pain in her arm and shoulder slowly weakened her. Ryujin moves to the third house, before she can even reach for the doorbell, she falls on her knees and fainted right in front of the door. She could not bare the pain any longer.

***

“Siyeon-ah~ I’m going to pick Gahyeon from school! Can you help me to carry the trash out later?”

“Okie~ can you buy some food on your way back from picking up Gahyeon?”

“Yaaa! We need to be careful with our money! All thanks to you and Dami who bought that stupid gaming pc!” the short fierce woman scream back at her housemate.

She went and open the door and her screams can be heard from miles away.

“Unnie!!” all of her housemate came to her aid and they scream too when they see two bodies lying in front of door.

“Yah, what are you girls standing there for?! Carry them in!” one of the housemates said.

“Quick quick!”

***

Ryujin wakes up to a bright lighting shone to her face. She frowns as she opens her eyes and she was greeted by 5 strangers who are staring at her.

She jolts up and scoots back “Who are you? Where am I?”

“Chill, chill, we found you and your friend over there unconscious in front of our door, so we brought you in, clean your wound and your body. You’re in our Maison.”

“Let me introduce ourselves, I am Sua, the unnie of this group, this is Siyeon, or should I said my wife.” The woman name Sua and Siyeon giggle when Sua mentioned that they are a couple but they stops when everyone glare at them.

“This is Handong, she helped you with your dislocated shoulder and you probably need to get your arm check later on, she thinks that you maybe broke a few bones in there. That blonde with black bang is Yoohyeon and then that short hair lady at the end there is Dami…and…” Sua stops and she looks around. Her face turns pale and she gasps.

“Where is my baby Gahyeon?!!”

“Weren’t you supposed to pick her up like an hour ago?” Yoohyeon reminded Sua.

“You should have told me earlier!! Oh my baby Gahyeon!! Omma is coming to you!!” and with that Sua is gone from sight.

“My friend…” Ryujin turns to Lia.

“Is she going to be, okay?”

“She’s fine, no broken bone anywhere, but it seems like she hit her head. It is better if you take her to the hospital to check.” Said Dami.

“But Dami…you are a doctor aren’t you…can’t you help?”

“I don’t have any equipment here…we need to go to the hospital.”

“Then we should go.” Said Handong.

“Who drive?” Dami questioned back and all of them realized that the only driver they have is Sua and she has gone to pick Gahyeon up.

“We are sorry, we should have called for ambulance but we panicked.” Siyeon bows and apologize to Ryujin.

Ryujin smiles softly at them. She tries to get up from the bed to check on Lia but the pain in her arm stops her. She tries to hide her pained look from her saviors. She gasps when she heard a moan comes from Lia who is lying beside her. She turns to Lia and sees that the girl is slowly opening her eyes.

“Lia…” she calls out softly to the girl.

“Where am…I? Who…are you?” Lia asked Ryujin.

“It’s me…Ryujin…”

“Ryu…jin?”

“Yes…are you feeling okay? Do you need to go to the hospital?”

“Who…am I?” Lia asked.

***

AESPA Co. Ltd

“Well…this is awkward…” said Ningning, Winter’s business partner.

“Same here.” Said Giselle.

All of them are exes to each other. Karina was Winter’s ex and Giselle’s ex, while Ningning was Giselle ex-fiancée and Winter’s fake ex-girlfriend. They used to fake they were dating just to make Giselle and Karina jealous.

how fate and destiny is playing games with them. The exes met again after a while. The hatred and the longing are still lingering around them. Winter still has feeling toward Karina, Giselle still in love with Karina, and NingNing, who still feels something toward her ex-fiancée.

“If I know that the company that we were collaborated with is belong to the both of you, I would have said no to the project.” Said Karina.

“It’s too late for you to say no now Princess…the project is already 95% completed. Beside, Sony had paid so much to get the game developed. We have investors from all around the globe.”

“And you think I want it?” Karina glares at Giselle.

Winter sighs and she closes the files in front of her “My company can back out because we aren’t big company like Sony and AESPA. We are only a small program engineering company.”

“No you can’t!” Karina said out loudly and abruptly.

“You know too much of the data and we don’t want it to be leaked before the initial release.”

“Well then, I suggest we find a way for all four of us to work without needing to have meeting with each other.”

Giselle scoffs and she says to Winter “As a boss, you should know when to display your feeling and when to put it aside Kim Min Jeong. You are not being professional now.”

“Oh I’m not being professional?”

Ningning slams on the table and it surprised them to see the sweet innocent girl suddenly erupted.

“Stop it! I don’t like us being like this! We used to be best friends! We were best buddies! I know we have dark history together but don’t you girls remember the good days?”

Winter saw the tears in Ningning eyes and when Ningning realized her tears too, she runs out from the meeting room.

“Ning!” the three of them shout for the girl.

To be continue…

AN: Terible sorry if the story is a bit short! I know I made a promise I will update the story frequently Teehee~ you have to forgive me, as a working adult, life is a lot busier than I thought, LOL. And CONGRATULATIONS for DREAMCATCHER FIRST WIN!! I’ve been following them from Minx era and can’t believe they finally won…it is so touching! Oh! Anyway, Lia has lost her memories, what will Ryujin do? What will happened to Ryujin and Karina’s wedding? That is coming soon~ Will Winter able to tell Karina how she really feels? Honestly, I am in dilemma whether I should paired Karina with Winter or Karina with Giselle, someone help please!!