Yoora curses inwardly when she hears her phone's alarm rings through the room. Reaching for the blasted thing, she curses again when she sees that it's already past 9. In quick and trained motion, she jumps off the bed and dashes to the bathroom, careful as not to wake the sleeping man beside her.

Fifteen minutes later, she's all set with her jeans and t-shirt from last night, her wavy red hair neatly tied up. Reaching for her bag and boots, she spares a glance at the black haired-man on the bed, appreciating his toned muscle. With a smirk, she approaches him and plants a quick kiss on his lips.

"Thanks for the night, dear stranger. I had fun. Too bad we will never meet again."

And with that, she turns on her heels and leave without looking back.

***

"Are you on position, Ruby?"

She clicks her tongue in annoyance, and purposely fixes her red lipstick first before answering. "Of course, and will you finally tell me what the is this mission I'm in?"

There were silence, until the monotone voice in her earpiece says, "I'm sorry Ruby. But this is a top secret mission, and so..."

"It will be better if I know nothing so they won't get anything out of me if I get caught. I know, I know," she snorts. "Forget it, I'm going in."

"Remember, Ruby, your mission is just to the target to the VIP room number 7 in the 15th floor, and make him sit facing the window. The rest is none of your business, understand?"

"You've been repeating the same thing six times in the last one hour. Of course I understand," she sneers. Inwardly, she curses the living hell out of the higher-ups who made her works with those smarty pants in HQ instead of her usual team. Even if that means she got to travel to Macau and stay in Wynn Macau all by herself without Hyojin and Sena to mother over her or Soohwa and JaeIn to keep an eye on, this arrangement still leave her no chance to have fun because those stuck up es at HQ insisted to control her movements.

Glancing at her reflection in the mirror, she makes sure that there's no creak on her red cheongsam and she arranges her black wig so that all of her fake hair falls on the left side of her face, reaching her s. Seemingly content at her flawless looks, she walks out of the bathroom and instantly put on her persona as one of many escorts in the building.

She barely has time to sit on the couch when the front door opens and a group of people walk in. She immediately recognizes the raven haired man with lean postures and shades on as her target. Crossing her legs, she purposely flicks her hair and smiles coyly at her target. He glances at her and checks her out from behind his shades, and Yoora knows she succeeds when he nods.

Elegantly, she stands up and walks closer to him. "This way, sir," she softly cooed, letting him wrap his hands around her waist as she guides him and his group to the said VIP room. Inwardly, she holds back her laughter when she realizes that her tall posture and the heels she’s wearing make him barely an inch taller than her.

"You seem familiar, have we met before?"

The question from one of the group's member catches Yoora off guard. Still on her role as an , she turns her head slightly and smiles as she says, "I don’t think so, mister...?"

Her voice got caught in when her eyes meet the large - almost froglike - brown eyes, because it belongs to a very familiar man.

It was the man from this morning.

"Elias," he says, flashing a quick smile and she swears her heart skips a beat because of the damned smile, the way it did last night. "Are you sure? I don't think I will remember it wrong when it comes to someone as beautiful as you."

Gulping down, she tries her best to stay calm and put on her shy smile. She's about to answer when her damned target cut them off, and she's half grateful for the interruption.

"We're here for business, Elias. And you, I don't remember giving you the permission to flirt with my men."

Whatever thanks she had for him went straight out of the window, and she would like nothing more but to kick him on the shin. She holds the urges back, however, and mutters a soft apology that he ignores completely.

Damn, I hope this mission involves you getting killed, you prick, Yoora thinks as she make her way to the VIP Room number 7. She's quite surprised when her target glances at Elias and says, "Wait here."

Deciding to ignore the peculiarity since it helps her mission, she quickly closes and locks the door after the prick walks in. After making sure that he is in position, she excuses herself, saying that she's going to prepare his wine and makes her way to the other side of the room.

Right when she turns her back, she hears a gunshot, and she let herself chuckles in satisfaction.

The laughter dies shortly after, however, when another gunshot rang out and a bullet nearly crushes her face. Missing her by a few millimeter, the bullet still manages to grazes her cheeks and her instinct told her that it was purposely done.

"Put your hands up and turn around," the prick commands, and Yoora obeys. Her heart beats wildly when she sees that he's still alive, even though the left hand part of his white shirt is drenched in bloods. Yoora guesses that the cause is a gun wound on his left forearm, and she curses the amateur sniper that her agency sent because that amateur missed by a huge margin, and that damned amateur does not even try to make amends! Turning her gaze back at her target, she can sees from his pale expression that his wound is worse than how it looks and he's losing quite a lot of blood.

"Don't you dare," he says through gritted teeth. "I can still shoot you dead right here and now."

Still a prick even in this kind of situation, she scoffs in her mind. "Then why don't you?" she retorts, and for a fraction of second she thought he would actually pulls the trigger.

However, a shot suddenly hit his gun and he drops it, causing his attention to turned fully on the condition of his right hand as he curses. Right on cue, the door blasted open and the henchmen floods in with Elias in the lead. Yoora’s reflex kicks in and she uses the chaos to flee.

"ELIAS!"

She hasn't even gone more than a few steps when somebody yanks her hand backward and she spins, ready to lands a punch on her attacker's chin. Unexpectedly, he deflects her punch and utilizes her momentum to dislocate the hand he's holding. Without missing a beat, he tackles her and kneed her stomach when she lost her balance. Yoora falls to the floor, and she knows she lost when she feels a gun pointed at the back of her head.

Elias reaches for her wig, and he laughs when he sees her red hair falls to her shoulder.

"So I was right, we've met before. Rise up, darling," he nudges. "You owe me one for leaving me just like that earlier on."

Cursing her higher-ups in the HQ yet again, Yoora get to her feet and let Elias pushes her back inside the room. She can't fight when they handcuff her hand, but that does not mean she misses the body of the two henchmen that lies dead on the floor, each of them supporting a gun wound on their head. Furrowing her eyebrows, she let Elias drags her to face the prick that is her target. Despite being forced to kneels, she refuses to give up and bravely stares at that prick with hatred-filled gaze.

"Marcus-ge, are you alright?" Elias asks worriedly, and that's when it hit Yoora that she doesn't even know her target's name. His name wasn't on the information that the HQ sent her, and she curses her own stupidity because she should've realized it sooner.

Marcus raises his head and nods. "Max," he answers shortly, and from the corner of her eyes Yoora sees Elias nods in understanding.

"What about her then? She's not on the agreement," Elias asks again, and Yoora's heart went wild. A word, an order from Marcus and she knows Elias wouldn't hesitate to kill her. Her panic rise when she sees that she's stuck, with Marcus in front of her and Elias in her back. She can't possibly jump out the window, so the only way out is through the door and it's blocked by the henchmen.

Yoora hisses loudly when Marcus grabs her chin and forces her to look at his black orbs. "Name," he lowly says. "Give me a name."

To her credit, she just stares at him defiantly. Rolling his eyes, Marcus let her go and scoffs, "You're really willing to die for your organization? ing suicidal ."

"And you're one arrogant son of a ," Yoora retorts. She's going to die either way, so might as well going down swinging.

Unexpectedly, Elias chuckles at her insult and Marcus glares at him, annoyed by the behavior of one of his trusted man.

"She's right and you know it too, ge," Elias shrugs, earning him a sneer from Marcus. Unbeknownst to the two, Yoora silently feels her eyes sting because their interaction reminds her of her teammate, the five girls that always went on missions with her. , all this time she thinks that even if she'd die, she'd die in a mission with them, not with the smartass from HQ.

Speaking of which, she hasn't heard of them. Ever since she told them that she's with her target, they went quiet, as if the line went dead. Another odd thing that she just realized.

"Still keeping your silence?”

Scoffing to answer his question, Yoora tries her best not to smiles bitterly when the tip of Elias's gun once again touches the back of her head. Too bad she won't have the chance to ponder and find out more about the peculiarities. Closing her eyes, she's ready to face her fate when a very familiar song blasted across the room.

She opens her eyes in disbelief and stares at Marcus. "Sorry Sorry? You've gotta be kidding me!" she exclaims.

Ignoring her comments, Marcus raises his now bandaged left hand and signals for Elias to wait while he answers the call. "Is it done?" he asks. He frowns when he hear the answer, and asks again, “What do you mean by predicament, Max?”

Despite her own current predicament, Yoora found herself staring curiously as Marcus's face suddenly gets paler, if that ever possible. "," he mutters hoarsely to the phone, covering his face with his free hand as he listens to the caller. When he raises his head again, he looks extremely troubled and his voice trembles with emotion as he gives Elias his order. "Change of plan, we're keeping her hostage. Take her back, now."

Letting Elias pulls her to her feet, Yoora's brain whirs about as she think of his peculiar order. Especially when he shouts, "And treat her nicely!" as Elias drags her out.

Her? A hostage? Why? Has he lost his mind? She may be one of the organization's best agent, but those higher-ups would not bat an eye if she dies. So why would he keeps her hostage?

All of those question fills her mind along with the peculiarities of her mission tonight, so she only realizes that they have reach the basement when Elias instructs her to get in on the back of a black Audi. The last thing she remembers before she out is a pair of brown froglike eyes and the smell of chloroform.

Name: Shim Yoora

Age: 21

Codename: Ruby