Eun Ah stared at the ring in astonishment.

"Wh-what are you talking about?" She took a small step away from him, to create distance in between. They both shivered at the loss of heat.

"You need to marry me." His face was void of emotion as he lifted her small hand in his and slid the ring on her finger. He brushed her ring finger tenderly before she ripped her hand away.

"What the hell is wrong with you? I don't need to marry you. Why on earth would I do that?" She moved her body further away from him and stood in a hostile position, a complete 180 from when they were dancing.

He watched her eyes freeze over and her body stiffen defensively.

"It's the only way any of these people will help you. If they think that we're married than they know that you're important enough to protect. They'll think that you're here to stay for good."

Eun Ah just stared in shock. How could he talk about marriage so casually? She shook her in disbelief.

"Do you hear yourself? Do you hear how bat- insane you sound? You expect me to get married to you?"

He kept his eyes trained on her, taking in her every move. "No, I don't expect you to get married to me."

She crossed her arms and glared at him, "Then?"

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper and held it up to her. "You need to already be married  to me. This is a marriage licence, I already signed it, all you need to do is sign your name beside mine and it'll all be done. I have a friend that can fudge the documents to look like we've been married for a year already."

Eun Ah grabbed the paper and saw his crisp signature and today's date, dated exactly one year ago written beside it.

"No." Her voice was barely above a whisper. "No, I'm not going to sign this, this is ridiculous. It was one thing to force me to live with you but you are crossing the line with this. I don't want my life, my future, to be decided like this."

"I'm not giving you a choice. I can easily get those documents forged with your signature, I'm doing you a favour by letting you sign it yourself before I take matters into my own hands."

"Oh, I'm sorry, am I supposed to thank you? This isn't just some game plan, this is marriage, this is our life, how can you take it so lightly?" She shoved the paper into his chest before taking off his blazer and pushing that into his chest as well.

He  narrowed his eyes and took his jacket from her. "Stop being dramatic. It's not a real marriage. We just need to keep this up until we can take Ryu down and your safety is secure. After than we can annul the whole thing and pretend like this never happened."

Eun Ah scoffed, "Never happened? This isn't just some embarrassing moment that I can try to forget. You're a sociopath. You just manipulate people with no concern about how it might affect them. There's no way I'm going on board with this."

"Do we need to have this conversation again? Do I need to reiterate who's after you? I feel like we've had this conversation a hundred times. You could die if you don't get all the help you can get."

Eun Ah started pacing around the balcony, "Is that why everyone was treating me differently? Because they thought I was your wife? Is that what you've been telling them? You're acting all high and mighty by doing me a 'favour' but you just went out on your own, doing whatever you want and told everyone that we were married anyways! Speaking of which, if they already think that, then why not just let them continue to do so? I'll just flash the ring around so it'll confirm their beliefs. Then there's no need to actually put it in official records."

Yongguk sighed, he knew she would resist but he found himself getting irritated. He didn't want to fight with her about this. Why couldn't she see that this was for the best and accept it?

"Need I remind you that the people in that room aren't stupid? They can easily check official records, if they all weren't so drunk, they would've done it by now. Which is why I need this signature as soon as possible.  Look, you don't even need to tell anyone about our marriage except these people. No one else has to know. And if you're worried about the guy you're going to marry in the future, don't be. He won't even have to know this thing ever happened."

His cavalier attitude got her blood boiling. He had no right to act like she was being an annoyance after springing something like this on her. No wonder he was so nice to her tonight, he had an agenda all along.

"You don't have a choice Hwang, I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. So try to recognize your lack of options and sign the damn paper."

She couldn't stop herself when her hand swung up and struck him on the side of his face.

"When I told you that you don't own me, I meant it. If you want me to sign that, you'll have to get it from my cold dead hands." Her words were covered in ice and her eyes were no different.

Yongguk stood there reeling in shock. He had never, never been hit by a woman. He never put himself in a position where a woman would feel the need to do so.

He had taken beatings from gangs, been cut across the cheek, punched, choked, hit, but never slapped like this.

And for some reason, it hurt more than all of those previous things combined.

Eun Ah wiped the tear threatening to fall off of her face and turned to walk back into the ballroom at the exact moment that a shot run out through the air and a bullet wizzed past Yongguk and headed straight for Eun Ah.

-----

Yongmi slid the note between Eun Ah's door and Yongguk's study before running down the stairs to meet the rest of B.A.P. by the door. They all had duffle bags slung over their shoulders.

Himchan walked through the door and stared at them in confusion as Jongup tossed him a duffle of his own.

"What's going on?"

Yongmi hooked her arm around him and dragged him outside. "We're going to stay at the city apartment tonight."

Himchan creased his forehead and looked back at the other members in question. "Why all of a sudden? We haven't been there in months."

They all filed into Daehyun's car and reversed out of the driveway.

Yongmi looked forward, not wanting to see his reaction when she told him the truth.

"I think we should let the newly-wed couple have some time for themselves."

-----

"HWANG!" Yongguk raced to her just as the bullet sliced her arm.

The girl stumbled back in shock and stared at Yongguk wide eyed as a steady stream of blood ran down her arm.

Everyone in the ballroom was thrown into chaos as gang members drew their concealed weapons out and civilian dates threw themselves down to the ground with a scream.

He held her gently by the shoulders and caught her as she slid weakly down the wall to the floor. Yongguk positioned his body so that he was blocking her from the direction that the bullet came from. Every bit of his instincts were telling him to run off in the direction it came for and find the son of a that had the balls to pull something like this at their event.

The son of a that took a shameless attempt at her life.

But seeing how shook up she looked, he thought better of it. He took off his tie and tied it securely around the wound until it undoubtedly pinched her skin. He didn't care if it hurt, he just wanted to stop the bleeding.

"Are you okay?" He cupped her face and looked into her eyes, trying to read her thoughts. She didn't look too damaged, but he saw the fear and felt her shaking.

"Yongguk!" Dara came running towards them. "Jiyong wants you to meet him."

Yongguk looked hesitantly at Eun Ah, he knew she was mad at him, very well hated him, but he couldn't just leave her alone after almost getting shot.

Eun Ah tightened her grip around his arm, to scared to say anything. Dara saw his hesitation and knelt down to her side.

"You go, I'll look after her, I promise she'll be in the best hands. Go, find whoever did this."

Yongguk draped the blazer that she had rejected on her shoulder and gave her one more glance before nodding and running off, his gun already pulled out.

"Come on, up you go." Dara helped Eun Ah stand and quickly moved her into the ballroom while someone closed the doors behind them and drew the curtains shut.

"Are you alright?" Chaerin came running to her side and sat on the other side of her.

All she could do was nod in response. She was alive, she shouldn't complain about that.

Dara shook her head. "How dumb could they be to try to take out someone with all these gangs surrounding the area. It's basically asking for a death wish."

Chaerin inspected the wound. "It looks deep, but not enough to do a lot of harm, you're really lucky that Yongguk was with you, I think he was the reason that the shooter missed."

"You sound like Youngjae." Eun Ah deliriously mumbled. The two girls concealed their giggles at her random statement and focused on her cut.

Eun Ah didn't move when her eyes locked on the 14 carat diamond wrapped around her finger. Her breathing was getting heavier.

Just what on earth was she doing?

First she finds out that every single person in this ballroom thinks that she's married to Yongguk, and then he actually expects her to get legally married to him and to top it all off someone, most likely Ryu, tried to shoot her.

She automatically started spinning the ring on her finger. Dara noticed the action and gently brushed the girl's hair out of her face.

"Don't worry, he'll be fine and he'll kill whoever did this to you with his own hands if he has to." She gave her hands a squeeze, "You married a good man, he'll protect you and I'm sure he'll love you just as strongly."

Eun Ah felt her heart weigh like lead. Her words would have normally been touching, if  her situation was normal to start with.

No. There's no love in this marriage. It shouldn't even be called a marriage. It's just a ruse. It's an act and you're all falling for it.

Dara stood up and replaced herself with Chaerin, "I'll go get something to fix the wound and ease the pain. Just stay put." She s