Chapter 6

Calm before the Storm

Another cold winter day and Seonyul was on her way to the super marker for grocery shopping. She parked her car, went in and bought what she needed and on her way out, she bumps into someone, making her drop her bags on the floor.

"Damn it…"

She looks up and sees a familiar face that she hasn't seen for a while. "I'm so sorry!" She smiles at him, letting him know that it wasn't a big deal. "It's okay. It's Mir, right?"

"Ye-yea… Oh! Seonyul-ah!" He smiles, happy to have the chance to see her despite the circumstances.

As they were picking up what was on the floor, someone else came behind Mir and by the voice, Seonyul quickly recognized him as being her favorite so far.

"Oh… What happened here?" She gets back up and looks at him, shrugging her shoulders. "Not much really, just the casual bumps into someone making her things drop on the floor." The sarcastic tone used in her voice was left with a slight smirk on the corner of her lips while she laid her eyes on Mir who was looking with an apologetic look, back on the ground. "Yea… Sorry about that…" She chuckles and playfully ruffles his hair, reassuring him that what happened was okay.

"It's okay… So, what were you running away from anyways?"

"Running?"

"Yes, you  were running when you bumped into me…" She pointed at Mir glancing on both of the boys, waiting for an explanation that could make her understand the rush attitude the younger had just a few seconds ago. Mir looks back at her, scratching behind his neck and stole a quick glance to his friend. "I was just running away from… him."

She starts laughing seeing the discomfort of his answer and simply brushes it off, instead of making it worse. "If you say so… By the way, I was wondering. What are you doing this afternoon?" She looks back at G.O waiting for his answer while he gave a thought for a small second, not really having anything coming to mind. "Hmm, I'm not sure yet, why?"

"I was thinking of going back to the park and bring my dog with me and I thought that you could tag along and bring yours…" She turns to Mir and gently places her hand on his arms, giving him her smile as she asked for him if he would like to tag along. "I'd love too."

"I could use some free time"

"Good! So then it's set! How about we meet at the park around… two thirty?"

"We'll see you at two thirty."

After going their separate ways, Seonyul was heading home while G.O & Mir went back to what they were doing earlier: their mission. They were tracking down some shady business that was suspiciously going on for a while. They knew that their enemy was behind this so they needed to stop him if they wanted to survive. The wild pairing were this close to finding whatever it was but got cornered since they were, one, out numbered; two, in an alley and three, in the middle of the day, so as to not attract any attention or harm the public, they ran for it, thus bumping into Seonyul.

"Do you think she's suspicious?"

"Who?"

"Seonyul"

"I don't think so…"

"What do we do now? We probably lost them already"

"Let's just go back to the house. We'll talk about this with the others."

It was now two thirty in the afternoon and Seonyul was waiting for the boys to show up. In the meantime, since she was the only one at the park, she sat in a chair and played with her dog, given that there wasn't anything else to do, passing the time. A couple of minutes later, they finally showed up as she saw her dog running towards them. "Hey!"

"Sorry we're late"

"Don't worry about it"

"Have you been waiting for long?"

"No, barely ten minutes, top."

They each sat on the bench as they watched their dogs running around and jumping on each other, clearly enjoying the company. As time went on and as the three of them got to know more about the other, G.O suddenly felt as if they were being watched and not in a friendly way. He casually looks around but sees nothing. He turns back around with an anxious expression not being missed by Seonyul, who questions him about his discomfort. "Hey, is everything okay? You seem… worried about something"

"Hmm? Yea, I was just looking around"

"Oh… okay"

His answer may have fooled her, but not Mir. He knew what was wrong since had the same impression as his best friend. Someone was definitely watching them meaning that they had to be careful especially since they were out in the open, in an empty park adding the fact that they had an innocent citizen they had to protect. With this in mind and by a simple look between the two men, they knew what they had to do: get out of here as safely as possible.

Mir got up on his feet and stood in front of the two others, offering the chance to go back inside.  "How about we go back to our place? It's getting pretty cold."

To make it more convincing, G.O got up and smiled at Seonyul, hoping that his proposal could make her agree to the idea. "I could show you where I put the painting you gave me"

"And you could officially meet the rest of us!"

"You're lucky I'm free this afternoon." She chuckles at their excitement and didn't see anything wrong with the idea of spending the rest of her day with them since she didn't have anything special to do. "So, it's a yes?"

"Hmm"

"Good, so let's go!"

They went back to the house and as they were standing in front of the building, Seonyul couldn't hide her amazement. Even though she's been here before, it didn't stop her from gazing at their home, making Mir chuckle as he remembered how they first met.

"And I thought my house was big…"

They finally made their way inside and as the door opened, their dogs hurriedly ran inside barking while they were greeted by a butler.

"How many of you exactly live in this house?"

"Well, there's like 6 of us, plus our staff"

"You got to be kidding me!" She looks at Mir with her eyes ready to pop out and wide open, completely left speechless. "Sorry, but he's serious." G.O laughs at her expression and lightly pats her on the head as he walks past her, leaving the two others in the back. "Let's go to the living room. Mir, go tell the others that we have a guest"

G.O and Seonyul were in the living room, waiting for the boys to show up. She has already met three of them, so she was pretty nervous to meet the rest. To pass the time and to calm herself down, she looked around, paying attention to the way the room was styled which made her think about where could G.O would have possibly put the painting she gifted him.

"Seeing the kind of décor you have here, I would be really surprised to see where you put the painting…"

"Why is that?"

"Well, everything seems so… fancy?"

At that moment, Mir stepped in the room followed by 3 other men. She carefully analyzed each one of them, making her in awe once again. As she was gazing at each one of them, her eyes stopped at the only one that made her shiver and made her heart beat fast. Her stare stayed on him, remembering the night where he abruptly kissed her out of the blue, making her cheeks blush at the sudden thought.

She snapped out of her daze when she felt G.O placing his hand on her shoulder looking at her with a small smile. She got up from her seat and greeted his friends with a small bow.

"This is Seonyul, the Cinderella I was telling you about"

"Wait… You talked about me?"

"They were curious, so I filled them in"

"Hi, it's nice to meet you."

"Seonyul, this is Seungho. This is Chansung, but you can call him Joon and this is Cheondung."

"It's nice to meet all of you"

After her trip to the mansion, Seonyul was back at home, finishing up with her shower and preparing herself for a little one on one to watch a good movie. She got herself some snacks and headed towards her living room where her dog was comfortably sitting on the couch. She prepared her movie and sat next to her pet, letting his head fall on his lap both of them ready to watch the movie.

Along the way, she could hear the rain from outside hitting her windows, which meant that the weather has gone bad and from the looks of it, it wasn't going to calm down any time soon. She ignored it, as she focused on her TV screen, peacefully watching the film until she heard the first thunderstorm of the night. Her dog barked and went into hiding, obviously afraid of the sound while she got up from her seat and went to the nearest window of the room, looking outside.

At that moment, another thud was heard making her slightly jump in her spot as she placed her hand over her chest to catch her breath. She closed back her curtain and walked back to her couch, resuming to her movie.

The weather outside wasn't stopping and only got worse when suddenly the lights went out.

"Oh great!"

Seonyul heard the cries of her dog and ran up to where she heard his voice only to find him hiding under the couch of the solarium. She called him out with a reassuring voice, calmly his head.

"Sorry, I forgot you were afraid of… thunder"

Cheondung…

Her mind went to the boy with the golden hair as she kept repeating his name on the tip of her tongue. Ever since the masquerade ball, all that ever went through her mind was the boy.

From head to toe.

But what hit her the most were his eyes. The way he was looking at her were giving her goose bumps. Even thinking about it right now was sending shivers down her spine.

Walking up the stairs and into her bedroom, she laid down on her bed, facing the ceiling, as she started to think about the event from this afternoon, especially how cold he seemed to be towards her. Her mind wandered to the way he was acting towards her, not giving a hint of care about her meeting them. But that cold stare, wasn't neutral, it simply wasn't friendly at all as if she was someone he put all his hatred onto.

From the looks of it, I don't even think he knows I was the one he kissed…

♦ - Seonyul's POV

After having a brief conversation with the rest of the boys, G.O guided me through their house, showing me around. Along the way, he started to tell me about some general information about his home, answering some questions I had ever since I first saw the mansion. A few minutes past and we were standing in front of the same room I was the night of the masquerade. Being light time, the solarium had a different view from the other night, noticing stuff that I wasn't able to see the first time.

I walked to the same spot where I sat, having the memory of the kiss lingering in my mind. From the corner of my eyes, I felt as if G.O was watching me as he leaned against the door entrance, his hands in his pocket. I turned my head and I was looking through the window, noticing the garden of the mansion and just kept staring in this direction.

From the door, he walked towards me and sat next to me, gaining my attention as I gave him a smile.

"Penny for your thoughts?"

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure, what is it?"

"Did I do something wrong?"

"What do you mean?"

"Why… Why does he hate me so much?"

"He doesn't… He's just like that, it's his character. He's like that with everyone"

"Even you?"

"Unfortunately, yes"

"Oh…

"You don't have to worry about him.

"It's weird, but I feel like I have too…"

From the looks of it, he didn't know how to respond to my last words. I looked back at the window and noticed that the sun was coming down. As I was watching it, I kept replaying the scene of the kiss, trying to understand what came over us that night. I remembered the way he was looking at me when I was dancing with another man, being the one I am sitting next too right now, and I couldn't help myself but stare back at him even though it was scaring me a little bit. The way he laid his eyes on me, as if he wanted to tell me something, or even was thinking about something that was, somehow, involving me in some way.

And this kiss… I don't even know why he did it, but I felt something coming from it… It's weird to say but that's how I felt. For being a stranger and coming completely out of the blue, I should've pushed him away but I wasn't capable too, as if something was stopping me.

Cheondung…

I want to know more about him… I want to help him, but then again, with the way he acts around me, I don't even think I'll have the chance to approach him…

Back at the mansion, G.O was in Ji-Hoon's office, telling him about Seonyul's visit to their home earlier this afternoon.

"You didn't tell her about -"

"No"

"And she didn't suspect anything?"

"Not from what I saw"

"Okay…"

"But Hyung?"

"Yes?"

"I think we should keep a close eye on her"

"Why?"

"Just in case. I think we've been watched today, that's one of the reason we brought her here"

" I guess I'm not doing a really good job." The older one let a tired chuckled as he rubbed his temps with his hand

"What do you mean?"

"I've been keeping an eye on her for a while now"

"Huh? For how long?"

"Longer then you've known her, actually."

At the end of the night, G.O left the office in direction to his bedroom, feeling the sudden exhaustion slowly taking over him. Through his walk in the hallway, he couldn't stop thinking about the last words his boss just told him. Luckily, it made him understand the reason to why he seemed to care for the stranger that was sleeping outside the night of the dance but at the same time, he felt as if he should've at least warn him about Cheondung and what he saw.

He has the right to know… I guess I'll be on duty tomorrow