“Mr. Byun, conference room 3 is ready for you.”

Baekhyun pressed the button on the telephone to respond to his assistant. “I’m coming, I’m coming.”

He was in no mood that day to run the big meeting his father forced him into, but what choice did he have? It was either this or his father would cut him off the family—leaving him outside on the streets with no money. Baekhyun pulled open his bottom drawer to retrieve the manila folder that he required for the meeting. Something underneath it caught his attention. He picked up the stack of photographs with careful hands.

On top was a candid photo of Byul that he had forgotten about. From the spot of green in the corner, it was suggested that the photographer was hiding behind some leaves. Byul was entering her apartment building with a small, carefree smile on her face. Behind that photo was a shot of a black Audi in front of the apartment building. The Private Investigator that Baekhyun had hired informed him that a man in the black Audi dropped her off home that day.

“Oh Sehun,” Baekhyun hissed under his breath. That good-for-nothing slacker who had yet to give evidence of a certain dead body. What was he doing giving her rides home instead? Was he wasting his time befriending her first before killing her off?

He ran his thumb over the image of Byul’s smiling face. Why did she look so happy? She was happy? Without him in her life?

Impossible. Baekhyun wouldn't allow it. She broke his heart and then cost him thousands in money. The latter he could forgive, but breaking his heart… Unacceptable.

How dare she be happy.

“Mr. Byun, they’re waiting for you—”

Baekhyun slammed on the button. “God dammit, woman. I heard you the first time.”

“M-My apologies, sir.”

“Pack your things and be out by lunchtime. You’re fired.”

“But sir—!”

He hung up abruptly on the girl. Baekhyun drummed his fingers on his desk while he stared at his cellphone across from him. It was as if he was expecting it to ring. As if Oh Sehun was about to call him and finally tell him that the job was done.

Baekhyun wondered for a moment if there was something he could do to encourage Sehun to make his move sooner…

If there’s a will, there’s a way, he liked to tell himself. Baekhyun felt a smile creep on his face while he withdrew a certain calling card from underneath his keyboard. He had a few tricks up his sleeves, and in the end, he would always get his way. He would make sure of it.

With the manila folder tucked under his arm, Baekhyun left his office for the meeting, leaving the photographs to the depths of the drawer again.

Sehun tightened the bandages wrapped around his knuckles before he took several swings at the punching bag again. Chanyeol pushed against it to keep it in place. That morning, they ended up in Sehun’s basement after meeting with a client earlier. Chanyeol was complaining the whole time about a hangover from Kyungsoo’s party, but Sehun told him to it up.

“Where’d you go after last night anyway? I can’t believe you let me use the bat. You offered Kyungsoo all those things and you didn’t even stay to watch me break the piñata open. It was spaghetti and frickin’ meatballs!”

“Something came up with Byul. I had to leave.” At the thought of Byul, Sehun’s next punch faltered a little.

“What happened?”

“The electricity in her building went off. She thought it was somebody, but it was nothing in the end.”

Chanyeol peeked around the punching bag to narrow his eyes at him. “You know, you don’t always have to come to her rescue.”

Sehun shrugged. “I know.”

“But you went,” Chanyeol pointed out. “And missed the piñata.”

“I know,” he repeated in the same monotone. His arms were starting to become sore, but he endured the ache.

Chanyeol laughed, shaking his head in disbelief. “You are so whipped. She’s got you wrapped around her finger.”

Sehun only shrugged again. It seemed he was short for words that day. He expected himself to deny everything Chanyeol said and defend himself, but he didn’t seem to care too much about what Chanyeol thought anymore.

“Do you like her?”

Sehun paused to stretch his arms over his head, buying himself time before he had to speak. He didn’t dare mention the kiss to his friend. Sehun could tolerate Chanyeol making fun of the idea of them together, but telling him about the kiss made Sehun feel like he was handing over evidence and exposing himself.

“I don’t know,” he answered. “Do I?”

“What do you mean? You actually don’t know?”

“Urgh.” Out of frustration, Sehun threw a particularly hard punch at the hanging weight in front of him that made Chanyeol take a step back. “Why is this so complicated?”

Sehun didn’t know how everything had led up to that. He’s never thought about Byul romantically before, though he knew that those feelings—no matter how small—were always with him somehow. Really, it only took him until then to realize them. Sehun wondered where it all began. It must have branched out from the second he decided to protect her. Or maybe the feelings were ancient and were from the times when Byul was his saviour and he was a short boy dangling above the river turning blue.

The kiss was purely his body reacting by itself. Sehun barely knew what he did, but a part of him must have wanted to kiss her. He had always been a reckless guy after all—never thinking twice about doing things, never thinking about the consequences.

Instead of laughing and pointing like Sehun expected Chanyeol to do, he offered him words that didn’t end in him mocking Sehun. “Maybe you just don't know because there’s a part of you that doesn’t want to like her,” he said.

Sehun stood quietly, simply taking in those words. Was that true? Was there a part of him that didn’t want to get Byul tangled up in his life in that way? He thought about the side of him that she didn’t know about—the stone-cold killer, the hitman. Sehun could hear it in his head. That part of him was warning him to not get too close to Byul. It was dangerous. It was—

“You know what you should do?” Chanyeol grinned at an idea, interrupting his thoughts. “I think you should just go up to Byul and say exactly what’s on your mind. Don’t even think about it. Don’t even care about how stupid you might look. Just say what’s on your mind.”

Just say what’s on your mind.

Byul told Sehun those exact words once too.

He figured it was time he took that advice.

Byul’s body was on autopilot. It was a miracle she even got out of bed to work and didn’t show up late. It must have been ten minutes since she was stamping the price sticker on the same box of toothpaste. The logo on it was barely visible by then.

A tapping sound beside her made her look up. Byul’s manager stood over her threateningly while tapping his shoe, not looking pleased at all.

“Ms. Seo, what are you doing?” he asked, hands on his hips.

“I’m just testing out the sticker dispenser,” she lied.

“You didn’t figure out that it works after one sticker? You had to go ahead and make a hundred more?”

“I—”

The dispenser was snatched out of her hands. “You can go home right now. I think you need to get your head straight. Your shift is over in thirty minutes anyways.”

Byul didn’t mind leaving for work early, so she didn’t make a huge scene and instead just let it be. When the manager had his back to Byul, she stuck out her tongue at him. Shrugging off her vest, she crumpled it into a ball in her hands.

“Byul.”

She thought that she might get another lecture from some other manager, but turned and saw Sehun instead. The vest fell out of her hands and landed over her shoes. Byul hadn’t spoken to him since that night after the kiss. How was she supposed to face him so soon?

The kiss.

They kissed.

The thoughts that reminded her poked her brain.

“You told me to just say what was on my mind, right?” he asked instead of an explanation as to why he was there like she was expecting.

“...I did,” she said in hesitance, vaguely remembering she even said that. Byul was confused about where he was going with everything. What did he have to tell her so badly that he had to show up in the middle of her work? Was it about the thing they did?

“Listen.” Sehun crossed his arms to look more assertive, making his grey shirt stretch tightly over his chest and arms. “I like you.”

“Um—”

“And you like me.”

When Byul looked away from him for a second, she noticed that people were starting to stare. Sehun didn’t seem to notice because he continued to speak like it was just the two of them in a room.

“If that’s the case, we should just make us a thing. That is what is on my mind,” Sehun told her, finishing his little speech.

Byul nervously played with her bracelet. “Sehun, can we talk about this somewhere else?”

“Shh.” Sehun put a finger to her lips, effectively shutting her up. “I have to say this all now because I know I won’t have the courage again.”

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