Kasumi’s POV

Great. I’m busted. Now he knows about me, or at least he knows where I live. Now he knew I lived in an orphanage.

Kyung was hyperventilating. “You live in orphanage? Wait, but . . . why? I mean, how . . .? I mean —” he said, flustered.

“Shut up,” Zico advised.

He shut up.

Zico frowned, turning to me, before his eyes gazed over my house. “I didn’t know that you lived in an orphanage,” he started to say.

“You don’t know anything about me,” I snapped and immediately regretted. Damn that Kris for getting on my nerve this morning.

But he was unfazed. He just nodded. “True. But still . . .”

I set Yoogeun back down. “Go inside,” I said to him gently but firmly. “And do not come out again. At least, not without telling any of us, okay?”

He nodded. “Neh!” he said in his incredibly cute voice, beaming at me, before he ran off.

I turned to them. “Thanks for stopping him from running out on the road. He loves to do that all the time.” I sighed. I bowed a ninety-degree bow before I turned and started to go back inside.

But I was stopped by Zico who grabbed my wrist and yanked me back. “Invite us in,” he commanded. “Is this how you thank someone, huh?”

“Sunbae, with all due respect, I don’t really like inviting people I don’t know into my house, invading my private life, okay?”

He flashed a smile. “Even your boyfriend never had been here before? Awesome, I was here before him.”

I sighed. “Sunbae,” I said through gritted teeth.

Kyung smiled nervously. “Eh, I’m going to go now,” he spoke up. “I’ll see you later, Jiho. Bye, Kasumi-sshi!” He waved and took off down the street.

Zico turned back to me. “It’s the least you can do for running out on me the other day without any explanation,” he replied.

I looked into his eyes and saw that he wasn’t going to back down. So I just sighed and reluctantly nodded. “Fine.”

“Oooh, feisty,” he laughed as he stepped up nearer to where I was standing. “Where did the shy and quiet girl go?”

I just let him inside my house and walked inside the living room, where everyone was eating their breakfast in there. “Er . . . I have a . . . friend . . . over,” I said awkwardly. Was he really my friend? Or did I not know any other words to call him?

Well, technically, he was my tutor.

“Did you finally bring your boyfriend home?” Jongin snickered, not bothering to look up from his breakfast.

“No.”

Chanyeol walked up to us and literally looked down on Zico. He frowned. “I don’t recognize you from any of Kasumi’s pictures. Who are you?”

“Oppa!” I said exasperatedly. “Have you been in my room again?”

Chanyeol tilted his head to a side and grinned at me. “How else would I have known how your friends look like?” he asked innocently.

“Erm,” Zico blinked.

Kris came up to us and gave a subtle wink that only I saw. I turned around so Zico wouldn’t see me smiling. Kris may annoy me to no ends, but he could be protective whenever he wanted to be. “What business do you have here?” he asked gruffly. “Kasumi won’t bring any of her friends home without asking us first. How long have you known Kasumi to set foot into our home?” Despite the fact that Zico was a gangster — the leader of Block-B — Kris still looked scary, especially with that face and abnormal height of his.

“I’m her tutor,” he said, trying to look brave.

“Shouldn’t tutors strictly stay as tutors and only be concern with their tutee’s work, not their personal life?” Kris went on and I had to hand it over to him.

“It is if she runs out on me the other day without any explanation after asking what my real name was,” he snapped.

Kris turned to me and gave me a look. “That was a ty move, Kasumi,” he stated, shrugging helplessly. “I can’t help you anymore unless you can back yourself up with a perfectly good explanation.”

I scowled. “,” I muttered.

“Language,” Suho called from the living room, never once taking his worried eyes off me for a moment the minute Zico entered. He frowned disapprovingly. “Where did you learn such words from?”

“Huang Zi Tao,” I replied.

Kris’ head snapped to Tao, whose eyes went wide. Tao glowered at me. “Yah, what the are you trying to do?”

“Language,” Kris and Suho said at the same time.

Chanyeol and Jongin just snickered while Luhan covered Sehun’s innocent ears. XiuMin and Chen were absorbed in their own conversation that they didn’t hear what was going on. Lay, as usual, was blanking out.

“Hello?” Zico called out and everyone remembered what we were talking about.

Kris turned to me and I sighed. I turned to Zico. “Look, it was a misunderstanding. There was an emergency and I —”

“Bull.”

“How come you didn’t scold him for swearing?” Tao and I immediately fired up at the older guys, glowering at them.

“Because he’s none of our concern,” Kris replied.

Zico ignored them and faced me. “You’re only making up an excuse so you don’t have to tell me,” he said. He folded his arms across his chest.

I shot the twelve weirdoes a ‘help-me’ look but they were just as curious and shrugged, indicating that they weren’t going to help me. I scowled darkly. Thank you, you alien freaks. I can see how much you guys care for me. Not.

I knew that Zico wouldn’t back down so easily so I sighed in defeat and nodded reluctantly. “Okay,” I mumbled.

“Wait, what is his real name?” Suho suddenly spoke up, asking me only that now.

“Erm, he is right here,” Zico said loudly, frowning. “And it’s Woo Jiho.”

Luhan started speaking in rapid Chinese, glaring at me. Tao and Yixing frowned, nodding their heads in agreement with Luhan. Girls Generation gasped and ran back upstairs and soon we heard the sounds of closing doors. Kris tried calming the Chinese-speaking trio while Suho made Chanyeol, Chen, XiuMin, Sehun, Baekhyun, Kyungsoo and Kai go upstairs where the Girls Generation had gone to. Minho and Key immediately dragged Taemin up after them while Jonghyun followed them.

Soon, only Kris, Suho and Jinki stayed behind. They all glared at Zico. In fact, Kris actually wanted to go up to Zico and give him a punch in the face but Jinki and Suho held him back.

Zico turned to me and blinked, confusion written all over his face. “Do I have that bad of a reputation?” he asked exasperatedly, heaving a huge sigh in frustration. “First Amber, then now everyone here. Seriously, just because I am a gangster! For crying out loud, Amber is in an actual gang whereas I’m just in a school gang!” He paused. “Not that Block-B is lower than Amber’s gang.”

Speaking of Amber . . . now I understood just why Amber hated Zico so much. It made perfect sense.

“What’s going on?”

We all turned to see Leeteuk, Siwon and Donghae coming through the front door. They took one good look at Zico’s ‘gangster’ getup and immediately knew that something bad was going on. They sauntered over to where we were standing in the middle of the hallway and eyed him up and down.

“Who’s he?” Donghae asked.

“This is Woo Jiho,” Kris said nastily, as though Zico’s name was like a disease, leaving a bad taste in his mouth.

Zico threw his hands up in exasperation and for a moment, I felt bad for him. He didn’t seem too bad . . . unlike his dad. “I don’t get it!” he declared.

Leeteuk’s eyes slit dangerously close to each other. “What are you doing here?” he asked, not bothering to mask the contempt in his voice.

“I’ll lead him out,” I offered and began to usher him out of the house.

“No!” everyone except Zico and I growled.

Kris pointed to the door. “Get out now,” he said to Zico.

Zico glanced at me but Siwon stood in front of me, blocking his view of me. He folded his arms across his chest. “I don’t see why you have to look at her,” he said in a low yet firm voice. “Leave, now.”

Zico heaved a sigh and I heard him turn around. Someone, I think it was Suho, followed him out of the door before he closed