Chapter 29 - (2.3K Words)

"What do you mean?" You asked, your throat going dry. "You've been watching me since I came here. I have nothing to do with the disappearances."

"Listen, we're not blaming you. You may not be causing them, but the disappearances might have something to do with you," Jin said, leaning forward in his chair. "It answers a couple of questions that didn't make sense before."

"Like what?" You asked, defensively crossing your arms over your chest and leaning back in your chair.

"Jackson came back on the same plane as you, right?" Namjoon asked, and you nodded in reply. "Why would he try coming back to Korea if he knew that we were waiting for him?"

You thought about it, and it didn't make sense. Jin and Yoongi had followed him to America, which meant he had to get away, but then why come back to Korea? There were hundreds of other places in the world to go, but he chose to come back to South Korea in hopes of evading them.

"It's like he had everything all planned out," you said. "All he had to do was make sure that there was no way you could get to him."

"Exactly. If someone had been waiting for him at the airport, they could have easily left way before we did," Jin said. "They could have left while we were off searching through the plane cabin, which makes sense as to why we couldn't find him."

"But, there are hundreds of different countries that he could have gone to," you said. "It seems like he was ready for you to follow him to America and it looked like he had a plan for coming back to Korea. Why not go somewhere more secretive?"

"We think that part is somehow linked to you," Hoseok nodded to you. "The only reason that he might go to America instead of anywhere else is because of you."

"But we're not exactly sure how it involves you," Namjoon added. "The only thing he did was deposit the money and leave the country. He didn't try to contact you until the plane ride, which doesn't help us to figure out the connection."

"He could have disappeared long ago, but he only went missing after he came back to Korea," you added absentmindedly. "None of it makes sense unless someone here is protecting him."

"I agree, but it just doesn't make sense how or why the money disappeared," Jin shook his head. "Jackson was the only person who had access to that account, and there's no way he could have left the country and emptied the account in the past two days."

"What if he didn't set up the account?" You asked, suddenly curious with what was going on. "Could he have given the money to somebody else?"

"That's not possible," Namjoon said, immediately shooting down your idea. "We would have known if somebody else had the money. It's very hard to lose track of anything over half a million."

You were about to say something more about the money, but you decided against it. You figured it was about to get you in trouble, and that it was better left unsaid. You held your tongue while you thought of something else to say.

"What about Mark and Yugyeom?" You changed the subject. "I didn't know that they had disappeared."

"We didn't either," Hoseok replied, "we didn't hear about it until one of our informants said something about it."

"Apparently they were picked up very late last night by an unknown person driving a black SUV, and nobody has seen or heard from them since," Jin said.

"It's highly possible that they're all being protected by the same person," Namjoon said, holding his chin in his hand. "Because they went missing only after they interacted with you."

"That's what connects it to me," you firmly stated. "Jackson was on the same plane as me, so he was taken away and protected. Mark and Yugyeom spent a day with me in Daegu, and they were taken away, too."

"That's the same conclusion we came to, but we have no way to prove it," Namjoon sighed. "It's all speculation based on a single testimony."

"Can you trust the person who told you?" You asked, raising one of your eyebrows.

Namjoon's eyes quickly flicked from Hoseok to Jin, as if he was unsure about his answer. Hoseok looked away from Namjoon's icy gaze, while Jin nodded as if to reassure him. His eyes came to rest on you, and you bravely held his stare.

"(Y/N), can we trust you?" Jin asked.

You shouldn't.

"Yes."

"Can you trust us?" Hoseok asked.

I told myself that I wouldn't.

"Yes."

All of the men in the room stood up, and suddenly, you felt very small compared to them. You shrank back in your seat, and your courage suddenly left you. They all slowly started walking towards you, and you realized that Namjoom had something black in his hands. He stopped in front of you, and then held the black piece of fabric out to you.

You all trust me just as much as I trust all of you.

"Do you want me to tie it, or would you rather tie it yourself, Princess?" He asked, holding it just in front of your eyes.

"Can you tie it?" You asked, taking your glasses off and handing them to Jin, who was standing just beside you. "I might accidentally make it loose if I have to tie it."

"That's what I thought."

Namjoon stepped behind you, and draped the cloth loosely over your eyes. You shut your eyes, and Namjoon pulled the fabric tight. His long fingers easily shaped the cloth into a knot, and soon enough you were completely blindfolded.

"I can lead you there," Namjoon said, letting his hand rest on top of yours. "As long as you're willing to cooperate with me."

"Okay--"

"Are you sure you want Namjoon to guide you?" Hoseok asked, not giving you a chance to reply. "I can guide you instead."

"I'm okay with Namjoon," you kindly retorted. You could hear the sweet sting in your voice, and you felt a little bit proud of it.

Namjoon won't lie to me. He hasn't lied to me yet.

"Besides, you two need to go in there and calm him down before either of us can go in the room," Namjoon said, stroking the back of your hand with his thumb. "There's a large chance he'll freak out if he sees either of us."

"That's a good point, we have no idea how he's going to react," Jin agreed. "We should be in there first, and be ready to control him if we need to."

"Fine," Hoseok grumbled, clearly upset by the unanimous decision. "Then let's get going."

You heard the door to the office open and people shuffle out of the room. Namjoon grabbed both of your hands, and pulled you to your feet. He made sure that you were balanced before carefully guiding you out of the room.

"So, where are we going?" You asked, keeping close behind Namjoon.

"We're going to and meet an old friend of yours, if you can even call him that."

* * * *

"Alright, here we are," Namjoon said, letting go of your hand. As he let go of your hand, a feeling of dizziness swept over you. You quickly reached out for something to grab onto, but you couldn't find anything. You felt somebody reach out and grab your shoulders to steady you. They pushed you backwards until your back hit a wall.

"I didn't really think you would be this dizzy," Namjoon laughed, making sure you were leaning securely against the wall. "I'm going to take off the blindfold when we go in to talk to your friend. We just have to wait for Jin and Hoseok to come back out and tell us that we can go in."

"It's disorienting when you can't see and somebody takes you on a walk," you chuckled, rubbing your temples through the thick piece of fabric that was covering your eyes. "You should try it sometime."

There was a moment of silence between the two of you, and you kept massaging your temples through the fabric. You could hear Namjoon shift from somewhere else in the room. He seemed as though he was annoyed, or stressed about something, but you weren't sure what.

"(Y/N), can I ask you something?" Namjoon asked.

"You just did," you smiled, taking your hands away from your head.

"I'm being serious," Namjoon said. "I have a couple things I want to talk about with you, while we're..." he trailed off.

"While we're alone?" You finished his sentence.

"Yeah, while we're alone," Namjoon said, lowering his voice. You heard him move towards you, and you stiffened. He stopped right in front of you and put his hand on the wall just above your shoulder.

You gulped, and realized that he was being completely sincere. You could feel how close he was to you, and it bothered you. You could feel the heat rush to your face, and you hoped that Namjoon couldn't see the clear and obvious blush covering your cheeks.

"(Y/N), what happened with Jimin?" Namjoon asked, keeping his voice attractively low.

"W-what are you talking about?" You asked, trying to defend yourself. "Nothing happened between--"

"Listen," Namjoon said softly, placing one of his fingers on your lips. "I already know the story. Jimin came into the office looking for you. He gave me some details, but not too many." You gulped, and Namjoon's finger slowly left your soft lips.

"I'm not angry at you, okay?" Namjoon said, trying to reassure you. "I just want to know what happened, alright?"

"He...um...tried to force himself on me," you said, trying to keep the words from falling out of your mouth all at once. "He threatened to bring you into it unless I went down to the pool with him, and that's where it happened."

"That's what happened?" Namjoon asked, genuine concern staining his voice. "Are you okay? He didn't end up doing anything to you, did he?"

"No, no, Hoseok interrupted him before he could get too far," you shook your head. "He kissed me, and that was all that happened."

It was only my first kiss...

"I thought you said that you couldn't swim very well," Namjoon said, recalling your conversation from the other day.

"You're right, I can't," you said, confirming his statement. "He was threatening to push me into the deep end if I didn't--"

You quickly stopped yourself, because you felt the tears start to form in the corners of your eyes. You couldn't blink or wipe the tears away because the piece of fabric was in the way. You shook your head at yourself, and a weak smile played at your lips.

"Hey, it's okay," Namjoon cooed softly, pulling you in close to him. "I won't make you say anything more about it."

You let yourself relax as Namjoon held you close to his chest with both of his arms wrapped around your waist. You could feel his heartbeat rhythmically beating powerfully through his chest. As much as you didn't want to admit it, standing like this with Namjoon was strangely calming.

"If he ever tries anything like that again, I want you to come and find me," Namjoon whispered into your ear. "Because I will not stand for anything that tears you apart like this, whether it breaks the rules or not."

Thank you.

At that moment, you heard a large door open. You jumped and tried to pull away from Namjoon, but he took his time in releasing you. After he had let go of you, he grabbed your hand again so that he could lead you around.

"Alright, he's fairly calm," you heard Jin's voice echo off of the walls. "I wouldn't bet long-term on it, so let's hurry up and get done with this."

Namjoon carefully pulled you forward, and you held out your other hand to make sure you weren't about to run into anything. You felt the atmosphere around you change, and the room around you became a few degrees warmer than the one you had just been in. The large door closed loudly behind you, and you felt a rush of cold air come over you from behind.

"Okay, let me take that blindfold off," Namjoon said, his fingers lacing around to the back of your head. In almost no time at all, the blindfold was hanging loosely around your neck. You were faced with Namjoon, who was gazing around you at the door behind you, making sure there was no way you could get out.

This room is made entirely out of concrete--there's no possible way out except for the only door in.

"Alright, do you want to come and talk to your old friend, (Y/N)?" Hoseok asked, popping around the corner. "Just a warning, there's nothing separating us from him, but he is restrained."

You carefully nodded your head, and walked around the corner that separated the door from the rest of the room. When you stepped out into the main part of the room, you saw a man sitting in the middle of the room in a small wooden chair.

The man looked up at you, and you almost immediately realized who he was. It didn't help that he had new cuts and bruises littering his face and body. Judging by the sly smirk on his face, he seemed to remember who you were, too.

"Well, I'll be," he said, lazily straightening himself up in his chair.

"Lim Chaeyeon, is that you?"