Sang Hee felt her heart drop as she slowly turned to see Himchan staring down at her.

The pictures that Sang Hee was mailed were fisted in his hand as he stared down at her with eyes so foreign and uncaring.

"What are you doing?" He repeated, his voice frozen over without an ounce of emotion.

Sang Hee looked back down at her hands, holding the knife, and held it up, "I-Is this yours?"

His dark eyes darted to his blade and if anything, it made him lock up more. "Why are you going through my stuff?"

"I asked you a question." She snapped as she tried to stand up without buckling over.

His eyes narrowed as he stepped towards her, dauntingly. She could feel the dark, intimidating aura radiating off of him. "Yeah." He said lowly, "It's mine."

She gulped as she tried not to look away from his eyes, "Why do you have it?"

"Don't you already know?" He said with a dark smirk as he raised his hand to show her the pictures that he had picked up off the floor by the entrance.

It wasn't exactly what he had expected to see when he came home and when he went over to his bedroom and heard her whisper BAP's killer Kim Himchan, something inside him switched.

The thorns came out and he was looking for a fight.

His life was falling apart, he might as well do the honours of torpedoing it to the ground, himself.   

She looked down at the box where the picture of EXO and him was and knit her brows. His presence was suffocating all of a sudden.

"Is it true?" She asked softly. "BAP's Himchan."

He stared at her while his fist tightened around the pictures, "Why? Does it scare you? Does it scare you that you might've been sleeping with someone like that?"

"Have I?" She whispered, almost fearfully, "Have I been sleeping with someone like that?"

He blinked slowly before tilting his head back, his voice never breaking his calm tone, "BAP disbanded over 5 years ago."

"But is it true?" She asked with a voice that almost sounded irritated, "Are you part of BAP?"

He waited a beat before answering, "Yes. I was."

Sang Hee stared at the knife in her hands and started letting out loud, audible breaths as if she was on the verge of hyperventilating. Her eyes were filled with tears but not a single one had escaped.

"What about Yongguk and the rest of them? They're all part of it too aren't they?" She asked as her voice cracked.

He looked away at the mention of this family, "They were."

"I don't understand." She whimpered. "How could this be true? How could it be you?"

Himchan's face was blank, "They needed someone who was willing to kill and I had the skills that they were looking for."

"You--You're just like Ryu and the rest of them." Sang Hee said in awe.

He snorted and shot her a demeaning look, "We were a gang. We handled whoever Woon needed help with. We disposed of people who got in our way and sometimes we did it just to send a message."

"H-Handled?" She croaked with confusion and fear in her eyes, fear that he sensed right away.

Fear that resonated in his stomach that made him sick.

"We killed them…no wait. That's not true. I killed them." He clarified, looking her straight in her eyes and watched them fill with distrust and pain. "I always killed them. That was my job. So maybe we are like Ryu, but we were better."

He pulled his shirt up to showcase the scars on his stomach, the ones that he knew that she was always curious about but was too polite to ask about.

"These were from the few people that I kept alive long enough for them to fight back." He said, letting her eyes trail across the bruises before letting it drop.

He was so numb that he just wanted her to hate him. He wanted to keep riling her up until she slapped him.

Maybe then he'd feel it.

Maybe then he could feel his heart breaking along with hers.

He could blame Woon all he wanted to, but at the end of the day it wasn't Woon who killed dozens of men without flinching.

He deserved this.

He deserved to have the woman he loved look at him like that.

Because that's what he was. A monster.

No amount of good deeds could ever make up for that.

Hs selfishness finally caught up with him.

"You hid this from me." She said, breaking the silence. "You hid this and lied to me for so long. Why? Why would you do this to me?"

"Because I don't need you."

Sang Hee stilled. The world tipped on its side as she slowly looked up at him in absolute shock, heartbreak and betrayal.

"What?" She breathed out so quietly that she barely made a sound.

"I don't need you." He said simply, "Not enough to tell you the truth sooner and not as much as you need me."

He was delusional.

He was delusional and maybe if he could somehow get himself to believe that he didn't really need her that badly, it would all hurt less.

But even he knew that it was a weak lie.

He knew that when it came down to the truth, he needed her way more than she'd ever need him.

When he took another heavy step towards her, she stepped back on instinct and flinched. A new type of self loathing filled his system but he couldn't help but laugh.

"That’s right, flinch. Because that’s who I am. A dangerous person who hurts people every day of his life. A monster born to kill. I'm the type person that someone like you should stay the hell away from. I could hurt you.” He growled as his eyes hardened over.

"You can't hurt anyone. I know you." She said softly as her tears started to fill her eyes again.

She knew him.

She was in love with him.

He was hers.

He smirked and darted at her, slipping the knife out of her fingers and slammed her to the wall in one swift, graceful move before she could even gasp on impact.

"You don't know a damn thing about me. You don't know what I've done. The people I've killed, The laws I've broken. You know nothing so do the both of us a favour and stop pretending that you do." He snarled as he pressed her harder against the wall.

Sang Hee winced but she tried to hold his gaze, "I can't believe you."

He flipped the knife open while holding her to the wall and stared at the blade before raising it up and slamming it against the wall, right next to her head.

She flinched, again, and he leaned forward with a deadly look, "I have slit the throats of hundreds of men, killing them before the blood gushed out. I've shot people standing as close to them as I am with you, knowing full well that they have a family. I've poisoned people and watched them die while standing 10 feet from them. I've framed people for being drug mules. I've set buildings on fire knowing that there are people inside. Trust me, it'll be easier to just take my word."

Trust me.

"I-I don't think I can do that anymore." She said slowly as her voice got louder, her body shaking.

Himchan blinked, slightly thrown off as he let go of her and stepped back, "Do what?"

"Trust you."

It turned out that Himchan didn't need Sang Hee to slap him to feel pain.

If Yongguk was there, he would've been able to see the quills rise as Himchan started to protect himself. He would've seen the offensive player turn defensive.

He stared at her long and hard, trying to memorize the face that he had grown to love waking up to every morning and falling asleep to every night.

It was far easier to push her away.  

"Like I said…" Himchan muttered while yanking the knife out of the wall, slipping it into his pocket and walked out of the room.

"I don't need you."

And he left.

------

"I'm in the middle of a case right now. Why are you and Sang Hee begging me to play hooky today? Go call Dong Chul or something, he's still at home." Chin Hwae asked through the phone.

Himchan sighed as he stared at the glass of whisky set in front of him at a bar, "Don't you have something important to do?"

"You called me." Chin Hwae fired back.

Himchan hung up