69.

Author's Note: Okay guys, I really love this chapter and I hope you will all too. I hope it wasn't cliche :( but please enjoy and as always listen to the music <3 OH and Happy Thanksgiving to you all, I'm thankful for having such wonderful readers and supporters.

(Author's POV)

“He’s still seriously in love with this kid!?” HyunRi scowled as she threw all of the photos pertaining to Kris and YunHee onto her carpeted floor. The photographer shook his head and simply held out his hand, telling her that he wanted his pay.

            HyunRi clenched her teeth but handed him a thick envelope. “If I call you later on tonight, it means I want these photos on every magazine and news cover by tomorrow. But if everything goes according to my wish tonight, I have other plans in mind for that girl.”

            “What are you going to do?” the man questioned, curious.              

            “Test out how much Wu YiFan loves Jeong YunHee.” She answered smirking. “It’s his own fault for choosing everyone else but me. And now she will have to suffer the consequences for his poor judgment skills.”

…

            “I’m home!” Kris announced, grinning as he removed his jacket and slipped out of his shoes. He glided into the living room to find his baby sister hurled in a blanket, holding a tub of vanilla ice cream in her arms as she watched Wrong Turn 4. Immediately he frowned since he was aware that she behaved this way only when she was upset. He sighed and walked over to her, blocking her view.

            XiaZi hadn’t even realized her brother’s presence until she was no longer able to see the movie. When his tall figure stood between her and the movie, her eyes quickly shot up to his face. “Yah! Move!” she growled, kicking his legs. Kris winced at her brashness, falling onto the couch right besides her.

            “Yah! Why did you just kick your Oppa?!” he snarled, snatching the ice cream from her grasp. XiaZi’s mouth fell open as she leaned over, trying to retrieve the dessert. Swiftly, Kris got onto his feet, marched over to the trashcan and disposed of it.

            The moment Kris released the bin, she leapt out of her seat but unfortunately she was too late. XiaZi stared down at the ice cream tub which was still a third full. She turned back to Kris and glared at him. “What’s wrong?” Hearing him ask that, her face softened.

The incident from MyungSoo’s birthday a week ago was still getting to her. Ever since that day she had been trying to avoid him but it was no use since she saw him every time he went and fetched TaeLa from the university. And he did that everyday.

When he saw her, he would smile and hold his arms open for her. The first time he did that, XiaZi wanted desperately to run into his embrace but when Maerah rolled down the window and waved, she stopped.

            She stopped caring, crying, hurting and loving. Well at least that’s what she led herself to believe. But seeing Maerah and MyungSoo so close again made her recall Hoya’s words. Although she didn’t want to stop loving him, she was aware that she had to. What good was it going to do anybody if she kept it up?

            XiaZi stared at Kris with eyes filled with sorrow and pain and he knew that his sister’s heart was breaking. He didn’t know why or what happened, but he knew that much. He pulled her into a hug and her hair. “You must have been lonely with me being gone for a week, mianhe. Do you want to tell me what happened?”

            “Gwenchaniyo,” she pulled away and wiped away her tears. “I’ll live through it.”

            “Are you sure? You know you can tell me anything.” He assured.

            “What’s there to tell, nothing. I’m just stressed with school that’s all. Studying to become a doctor is hard work! If I knew that I would have majored in something else!” XiaZi pouted.

            Kris couldn’t help but let out a laugh, “Nothing in life is ever easy, you have to work hard for it if you really want it. And if it’s worth it, you’ll be able to do it.”

            “Oh are you a philosopher now? Tch, why do you seem like you’re in a good mood? You just returned from a business trip, you hate business trips.” The younger Wu pointed out. When her question had reached his ears, Kris grinned wider than the Cheshire cat. Honestly, he couldn’t wait to tell her the great news. He led her back to the sofa and sat down.

            He inhaled through his nose and exhaled out through his mouth. He squeezed onto her hands and nodded. “Yunnie forgives me.” He finally managed to say and to him it felt really good.

            It had taken XiaZi a minute or two to compute what was going on and when she got the message, her eyes doubled in size. She yanked her hand away and stood up. “Bo?! Unnie forgave you?! Since when?! How?! You— you were off in a different country for a week! How could she have forgiven you unless it was like over the phone or something.”

            “Or she was there with me?” Kris smiled.

            “You didn’t,” XiaZi gasped.

            “Oh but I did.”

            “I’m so proud of you Oppa! You put Unnie before business. It’s about time!” she cheered, punching his shoulder.

            “I’ll put her before anything,” he declared.

            “Even me!?” Kris snapped out of his thought and looked at his sister before walking away. “Yah, yah! We’re family!” he heard her whine.

            “Says who? For all we know you could be adopted!” he shouted.

            “I’m going to tell Unnie you said that to me!” XiaZi threatened.

            “Good, you’re just giving me more time to spend with her!” Kris rebutted, shutting his door. When it was silent, he knew he had won. “I hope you feel better XiaZi.”

…

            “Appa, Ahjumma mianhe.” YunHee apologized, standing on her knees. “I— I didn’t mean to treat you guys the way I did, I didn’t mean any of those things I said either. I was just thinking about myself and getting revenge.”

            Mr. Zheng and Ms. Kim exchanged  worried glances until they transformed into smiles. Mr. Zheng walked over to his daughter and helped her up. He stared at her and then pulled her into his embrace. “I know you didn’t sweetheart, I was just waiting for you to realize that.”

            “Aigoo this is so cute, let me get the camera!” Ms. Kim wailed as she fanned her eyes. YunHee and Mr. Zheng chuckled in amusement as they yanked her into a group hug.

            “Your Harabeoji and Omma would be proud of you right now.” He stated, kissing her right temple.

             “I know.” YunHee whispered.

            “So what brought upon the sudden change?” he questioned. YunHee stiffened at his question and awkwardly chuckled.

            “Long story short, YiFan tricked me.”

            “YiFan tricked you? You mean you’re talking to him again? Since when? How—I mean I knew for business matters you communicated with him, but that was it. What happened? Was it because of that trip down to Thai—”

            “I have to go now Appa! Annyeong!” YunHee exclaimed, dashing out of the house. Mr. Zheng quickly ran over to the door, laughing.

            “He really did it.” Ms. Kim nodded.

            “He brought our girl back.” Mr. Zheng added on, pleased.

            YunHee smiled to herself as she halted at a red light. She thought back to Kris and their trip down to Thailand. From the plane to the kiss in the forest, every detail was clear to her. As the lights altered to green, she was still in a daze causing the driver to honk at her.

            She shook her head and resumed driving towards home. It was only noon and not even five hours apart, she was already beginning to miss Kris. When she arrived at the driveway, she pulled out her phone, debating with herself on whether or not she should call him. As she exited the vehicle and fumbled with her keys, obviously not paying attention to her surroundings, a cloth smothered her nose and mouth.

            For a few seconds YunHee struggled, clawing at her assailant’s forearm but it was no use. The chloroform was taking its toll on her body. YunHee felt herself losing consciousness as her phone and keys dropped to the floor. Before she was out cold, YunHee heard a vaguely familiar voice ordering her to be thrown into the back of a van. And before she knew it, everything went black.

            Hours had passed by before YunHee regained her senses. When her eyelids began to open gradually, she saw nothing but darkness. It was then that she realized that she had a blindfold around her eyes and she was tied down to a chair. YunHee wanted to talk, ask questions, demand answers, call out for help but was concealed by duct tape.

            It was then did she put together the pieces. She had been abducted. Inside YunHee became frazzled and anxious, terrified of what the culprits would do to her. As she squirmed in her chair, creating some squeaky sounds, she could hear a door opening then closing. Next the sound of heels clacking against what sounded like concrete reached her ears. “Take it off.” She heard a female order.

            Hearing those words, YunHee shuddered because she wasn’t sure what they wanted to remove. Her body stiffened, fearing the worse but suddenly she felt the cloth around her eyes being roughly ripped off. YunHee examined her surroundings but could see nothing more than what was in front and besides her. She was in what looked like an abandoned building. The lights were dimly lit and it reeked of foul odors.

            Although YunHee had no one in sight she was aware that there were people behind her, they were just smart enough not to reveal their faces. Again the female voice spoke up, “Look at who we have here. Did you miss me?”

            That voice it was so familiar to YunHee, she was positive she had heard it before. But then again she met up with hundreds of people so how would she know. YunHee rifled through her brain for a name to go with that sultry voice but no one came to mind. “How’s Kris doing? I heard you were his biggest investor, what were you that desperate to gain his attention that you chose to buy it?”

            Oh how much YunHee wanted to argue back and defend herself but she had no power in doing so. Then it hit her, the way this woman addressed Kris caused a light bulb go off in her head, bells to ring in her ears. Now she was fully aware of her kidnapper’s identity.

Finally HyunRi revealed herself with her arms crossed over her chest. “Surprise.” She smirked and with one swift motion, she ripped the tape from YunHee’s skin. Not wishing to satisfy HyunRi with her cries, YunHee bit her tongue to hide the pain. When the pain lessened itself, she glared at the culprit.

“What do you want Park HyunRi?!” she snapped.

“Oh look you remember my name, I’m almost touched!” HyunRi cackled. “What I want is for there to be no Jeong YunHee.”

YunHee’s eyes widened and this small action caught HyunRi’s eyes right away. “But before that happens, I want to have a little experiment. They’re always so fun you know.”

“What are you talking about? Are you crazy? I haven’t seen you in over three years, why are you doing this?!”

Angered by her tone, HyunRi cracked and grabbed a fistful of YunHee’s hair, pulling her head back. She leaned into her ear before replying. “The problem is that you should have made sure that you’d never see me again.” She snarled, throwing her head forward.

She walked over so that they were face to face as she gripped onto her chin. “What does he see in you anyways that he’s been hung up over you for the past three years? From what I see you have nothing special.”

“That’s what you think and frankly no one cares about your opinion.” YunHee rebutted and this earned her a slap from HyunRi. Spotting the corner of her lip bleeding, and the new red mark on her cheek, HyunRi couldn’t help but laugh.

“If I were you, I’d keep my mouth shut!”

“Well if I were you, I’d check into a mental institution. Seriously you’re like a psycho, you were the one who broke up with him. It’s nobody’s fault besides your own that you don’t have YiFan anymore,” YunHee pointed out. Again another slap resounded in the empty building.

“You know you’re really getting on my nerves!”

“You know you have man-hands.” YunHee shrugged. Sure she should have been afraid but knowing now that her assailant was just HyunRi she didn’t worry as much. Suddenly HyunRi had kicked over the ch