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"ᴍʏ sɪɴ ᴡᴀs ɴᴏᴛ sᴘᴇᴄɪғɪᴄᴀʟʟʏ ᴛʜɪs ᴏʀ ᴛʜᴀᴛ, ʙᴜᴛ ᴄᴏɴsɪsᴛᴇᴅ ᴏғ ʜᴀᴠɪɴɢ sʜᴀᴋᴇɴ ʜᴀɴᴅs ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴛʜᴇ ᴅᴇᴠɪʟ.
ᴛʜᴇ ᴅᴇᴠɪʟ ʜᴇʟᴅ ᴍᴇ ɪɴ ʜɪs ᴄʟᴜᴛᴄʜᴇs.
ᴛʜᴇ ᴇɴᴇᴍʏ ᴡᴀs ʙᴇʜɪɴᴅ ᴍᴇ."
The young man in the high office chair, slowly let the book in his hands slide down, until it was touching the massive oak desk in front of him. The quote was one of his favourite, making him read it over and over again, when he somehow managed to find the time. Of course, he had memorized it ages ago, but reading just had a different…taste to it.
His work was busy these past few weeks, making him stay up until morning hours, grabbing some black coffee and naps here and there. He let out a big sigh as if it would make the tiredness or the bags under his eyes magically disappear. But magic did not exist, hot black coffee on the other hand did. "This is your fourth coffee in the last five hours, sir.“
The words from his left made him let out an even heavier sigh. The unfamiliar voice was hesitating, unsure if he should have spoken up at all probably. This made the other one smile in return. And here he thought, he would be bored before his first appointment. What had this man been told, before being put into the same room as his boss? Had they warned him?
“You, step forward.“ He waited only a moment, until he could see into the face, that was kept in the shadows until now. As expected, he didn’t know the man. It was not surprising to see new faces here and there since their personnel had gone through many changes and even shrunken nearly by a fifth. The man in front of him looked uncomfortable in his position. How amusing.
“Who appointed you to my office?“ He traced the rim of his coffee mug with his index finger, looking overly bored. He could nearly hear the other one breathing. "Mr. Wang, sir. He told me to take care of y-“
He interrupted him with a hollow laugh, surely loud enough to make his right-hand man outside hear him. "What? 'Take care of my health?‘ Mr. Wang seems to have forgotten, that I can take care of my myself pretty well. I am an adult.“ He spit the last words.
“Please excuse my thoughtless words, sir. It was not my place to speak up at all. I apologize for my incompetence.“ He bowed deeply, staying in place. The boss clicked with his tongue, disapprovingly. He hated, when people backed down without a fight.
The warm taste of coffee felt disgustingly bitter on his tongue, when he grabbed it firmly in one hand. The sound of the mug shattering on the opposite wall was deafening in the silence as it flew less than ten centimeters by the head of the still bowing man in front of him. No reaction.
In less than a second, the door flew open, three men in suits and with raised guns bursting through it. The man leading them was his his right-hand, barking: "What’s going on?“ After a short glance at the scene and the crushed mug, he relaxed right away. He gave a hand sign for the other men to drop their guns.
His boss was wearing an innocent smile on his face, which turned into an interested one as his eyes fell onto the still bowing man in front of him. He hadn’t flinched at all since apologizing. The man in the office chair spoke up nonchalantly: "Leave, all of you, except for Jackson.“
A minute later, he was let alone with his secretary, behind a closed door. As soon as it was shut, he spoke up: "What the actual fuck, Park Jinyoung?“ The younger one shook his head: "Your big mouth always gets you into trouble, Jackson. Shouldn’t you learn how to control it by now?“
He leaned back, annoyed: "Nah, I am fine. Thanks for worrying. I want to know, what that was supposed to be? You know I am having trouble recruiting new guys without them turning out to be moles and here you are: trying to kill them off or at least scaring the hell out of them. So, why?“
Jinyoung was unconcerned. If the people working for him could not put up with his temper, then they were at the wrong place. Needless to say, he easily lost his temper. “Did you get, what I had tasked you with? Show me what you got." Jackson raised an eyebrow trying to look surprised, but Jinyoung saw the underlying smug smile, when he pulled out some folded papers from his jacket pockets.
"Of course, boss! It was not easy, but I got everything there was...I still don't get why we don't just send someone to kill them instead of all this... bureaucracy." He hated the word, pretending to gag on it right after. Jinyoung ignored his antics, grabbing the papers to unfold them, but Jackson was ready to recite the most important info.
“The police are not covering or investigating anything at all since they have handed all cases regarding us to their Special Forces. Which sounds kinda good and bad at the same time. So, we could be more in the open without even knowing. Kinda exciting, don’t you think?” Jinyoung sighed, the papers really only giving, what Jackson had already told him just now. He was getting irritated, Jackson normally did better than this: “Names, Seun. I need names to know who I am up to. These are just the usual detectives and prosecutors, nothing a little bribery can’t solve.”
Jackson smirked smugly at him, reaching for his sleeve, Jinyoung raised a brow, knowing that’s where he normally kept his knives, when he went: “You right, boss! I still have this ace up my sleeve!”
Jinyoung didn’t know if he should laugh or cry at one of his most talented men going as far as replacing his knives with a rolled up paper for the sake of his puns. Gosh, he really needed new people soon. Jackson had been with him for nearly two years, climbing up the ladder fast, after Jinyoung’s father had gotten a bullet between his eyes two years ago.
It was not surprising, since his father had started to reach out for more territory, more companies to conquer and even ignored all deals and agreements with his partners. Not surprising at all. The funeral had been short and tear-less, his mother had not stayed for long being glad someone took care of ‘that monstrous thing’, before she attempted suicide.
Again. She had broken up with Jinyoung after he had stated, that he would take over ‘the family business’ meddling with gangsters and criminals at the young age of 20, not caring about getting his hands dirty and selling his soul.
“Just like your damn father, Jinyoung. Whatever you decide on, I will be gone before that. Being tied down by one monster in my life is more than enough.” He had nodded at her, turning around with only a slight sting from within. This was how he was with people as close to him as his own mother, so what could anyone expect from him? Jackson came in half a year before all of that and Jinyoung would never admit it, but he was the closest he had ever gotten with anyone, borderline calling him a ‘friend’.
“And what is this ace you spent so much time to prepare for?” His eyes were fixated on the still rolled up paper, when Jackson opened it right into his face with only two words or moreover one name: “Lim Jaebeom.” Jinyoung just blinked at the picture in front of him, some little info printed underneath as he snatched it off Jackson’s hands. Lim Jaebeom, age 24, training received: unknown, former police detective: Violent Crimes Unit, current position: Special Forces, background: unknown., relations: unknown. “I know he is super hot, no need to stare that much, Jinyoung-ah.”
Out of his graciousness, the younger ignored him patiently, not looking up: “Jackson, there is this word I really don’t like, thrice, so tell me: why?” His voice was dropping low, making the other sit up a little straighter, when his eyes shifted away: “That’s all I could get. This took more than two weeks of research and this is all.” Now Jinyoung understood, why he had called this an ‘ace’. He knew every important policeman and woman, detective, every prosecutor of any importance and also had heard of that Special Forces team, but why had he never seen or heard of this specific person?
“He was not on your list.” Jinyoung pointed on the folded paper next to him Jackson had pulled out before. All important and mention worthy people were listed by rank and importance, even those of the Special Forces, but Lim Jaebeom was not on any of them. Jackson’s grin was back as he leaned over and put his finger right onto the picture’s face:
“Exactly. This handsome guy here has been mentioned nowhere before, like he tries to keep a low profile for a reason, or…” Jinyoung’s eyes snapped up, staring right into Jackson’s: “Or someone is hiding him on purpose, not wanting us to take notice. Interesting.”
The other leaned back with a nod: “I would say let’s do some more research, but there is not much left, we could look into.” Jinyoung perked up at that, crumbling the paper in his hand into a ball and trashing it next to his desk, he got up, pulling his jacket over as he made it to the door: “I will take care of this by myself. Tell Jisoo to meet me at my residence, this plan needs some special measures.”
The other’s eyes widened: “You really want Jisoo to disguise you?” He got a humorless laugh in return: “I just need to look less...like myself, so ‘disguise’ is rather fitting…”
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Jaebeom looked at his watch, cursing under his breath. It was nearly midnight and he had just gotten off, knowing well enough, that he had to be at work in less than 7 hours for the morning briefing and training afterwards. He was just strolling down the streets after leaving one of the local police stations for some files, when he heard yells and fighting not far from where he was walking. Without a second thought, Jaebeom started to run towards the noise trying to find out what was going on.
He rounded some alleys, until he made out movements in one of them. It looked like a couple of guys were fighting, heavily. Jaebeom stepped closer, calling out to them: “Yah, stop!” They ignored him completely, when he had finally come close enough to assess the situation.
Three men, bulky and dressed like thugs were fighting another one, looking like a university student for all he could make out. He was thrown down just then, turning and twisting, trying to fight back, when Jaebeom’s instincts finally kicked in, he ran forward pushing one of the three men aside, hard. The next one received a kick into his kidney, making him go down with a loud groan.
He reached the last one just in time to throw him off the person lying on the ground, who was just swinging back to throw a punch, Jaebeom catching his wrist with a hand, raising his other hand appeasingly: “Hey, I am not going to hurt you, okay? I am...with the police.” Well, he was not lying, he was a police detective some years ago.
But how should he explain someone, that he was from the Special Forces, which was also partly a risky topic. He saw the other’s eyes losing its fire until they were only simmering in the dark, dimly lit by the street lamps some meters away.
Jaebeom got the man up, helping him walk, his arm thrown over his shoulders as they left the dark alleys to reach the main street Jaebeom had come from. “Are you okay? Do I need to get you to a hospital?” He felt the other shake his head as they slowed down.
Jaebeom sat him down on the sidewalk, looking at him more closely now that the lighting was better. He froze for a second as his eyes found the stranger's. The man was young, probably even younger than himself, although it could just be his slender build. Dark eyes were watching him carefully under raven black hair, which had gotten disarranged by the earlier fights.
Jaebeom felt the urge to push his hair out of his face for some unknown reason as he watched him intently. “Park Jinyoung.” He blinked several times, before he cleared his throat, taking a step back, crouching down to get a better look, watching for injuries, of course. “Lim Jaebeom, police detective. You seem okay for someone, who fought off three thugs in a dark alley.”
The man, Jinyoung, shook his head with a tentative smile, making Jaebeom stare a little too long: “Hopefully, I tried my best to get away from them. I should have taken the main road home, even if it takes longer.” Jaebeom shook his head: “You are really careless, you know? It’s past midnight now and you decide to walk through dark alleys in this neighborhood?”
The other flushed red at his words, his ears tinted as well, making him look even younger...and cute. “I am sorry, work took longer than usual and I just wanted to get home to finally get to bed.” He looked down in embarrassment, making the elder sigh in defeat: “I won’t take you to a hospital as you wish, but there is a police station down the street. Let’s take you there to make a report and after that I will take you home, how does that sound?”
Jaebeom expected a wide range of reactions, from a frown to being cursed at, but the other looked back into his eyes: “Deal, Jaebeom-hyung.” A grin spread over his features making Jaebeom’s breathing slow down. He was faced with eye crinkles like a cat and sparkling, mischievous eyes, looking happier than ever.
Park Jinyoung would become a consistent variable to Lim Jaebeom for the next four years.
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