CHAPTER one

Our Meeting

Boa fully awakes to a shimmering lake view under a strong moonlight, sitting as she did before atop an old motorcycle, but now they were over a cobblestoned bridge in the middle of an enchanted-like forest.

“You’re living in your very own fairy tale now,” that same alluring voice captivates her undying attention. Boa rapidly retracts her arms away from that white leather-clad body she had been holding and swallows softly.

“You’re the princess,” the man continues, his words falling into a song as he throws his legs off his ride and finally takes off his heavy, damaged helmet, revealing himself at last.

“But who’s your prince?”

Boa’s heart stops briefly at a flawless face.

Her hero, with tousled golden hair shining under the moonlight, pure brown eyes that twinkle despite its dark shade, smiles at her – ever genuine, ever honest, ever wonderful.

The man tilts his head at her, amused at her adorable, surprised expression. At this angle, he can see the young maiden past her bridal veil but he lifts it over her head anyway, tearing away the wall between them.

He smirks, watching her gasp, and delicate hands flying up to protect her puffy-eyed, tear-stricken face, but he stops it all – all with a firm kiss, square on the most plump and most delicious lips he’s ever tasted.

Boa shrieks and pushes the stranger back with all the strength in her small body.

“Wh-what kind of person are you? What do you think you’re trying to do to me?!” she questions in haste and wipes her lips with the back of her hand.

He gives her a smug grin and traces his index finger along his lower lip line with his blonde bangs casting over his eyes.

“I’m surprised that you didn’t ask this earlier, Boa-ssi.”

“H-how do you know my name?!” she shrieks, stumbling off the motorcycle and backing away until she is stopped by the handrail on the bridge.

The handsome man crosses his arms casually and takes light steps toward his target, looking at her with a boyish gleam in his eyes.

“Curious now, are we? My name is Jaejoong.”

Boa responds with a blank stare and wonders where she had heard that name before. Other than that, this Jaejoong was extremely good at avoiding her questions.

“You’re thinking that I haven’t answered any of your previous questions, aren’t you?” Jaejoong adds with a light chuckle.

“Well,” he sighs and leans on the railing with his backside, elbows propped up upon it.

“Just take it as I’m an extremely, painfully bored person, with nothing better to do with his life, so I decided to help a cute damsel in distress escape a horrendous situation in the nick of time, right before she was about to make the worst mistake of her life, and ruin the beautiful future she could potentially have otherwise.”

Boa parts her lips slightly from shock, but Jaejoong cuts in once more. “Oh, and I may have heard your name from the minister. When he was asking you that super important question about richer or poorer, older and younger, black and white, something like that.”

She coughs, holding back a laugh that she knew she wasn’t supposed to let out at a moment like this. But other than the fact that this Jaejoong stranger liked to mess around, he didn’t seem like such a bad guy.

“You are so…” Boa stared him ever seriously, and Jaejoong had his hopes up for a compliment. “Weird.”

His million-dollar smile falls in a bit of a surprise. Jaejoong threw his head back, gazing up towards the sky and lets out a laugh in a voice clear as water. “You are too interesting, Boa-ssi.”

She juts her chin out at him and pouts like a kid. “I’m not that familiar with you so don’t just call me by my name like you know me.”

Boa bites her lip and knits her eyebrows together when he smirks devilishly again.

“Ahem, well- thank you for, you know, helping me and all but- but now I will find my own way,” Boa claims and hikes up her dress with both of her little hands.

Jaejoong turns on his front side, leaning over the rail as he watches Boa in amusement. She glances frantically around the dim-lit forest, looking left and right, up and down, only realizing now that there was no way she could find her own way.

“A little lost, princess?”

Boa snaps at him, flabbergasted and girlishly embarrassed at the intimate address. “D-don't call me that!”

Jaejoong sighs with a dramatic flair, leaning the side of his head on the fist of his right hand, staring. “You won’t let me call you by your name.. you won’t let me give you a nickname.. what do you want me to say?”

“Nothing! Call me nothing! I’m not interested in your help anymore. Just leave me alone, please!” Boa shouts, and continues searching for an exit with her doe-like eyes.

Jaejoong shakes his head with a twisted smile as he approaches her, a nonchalant stride in his feet. “I can’t,” he says with a serious intonation. Within seconds, he’s close to her and surely isn’t shy to invade her personal space.

“It’s too late, Miss Nothing,” he whispers, his breath warm at her neck. “You’re my prisoner now.”

Boa’s characteristically large eyes grow even bigger. Nerves tingle down her back.

Forget it,  he is just as bad as she thought he was.