eighteen.

LUNA

I was currently with Felix, he told me to go out to eat dinner with him. I don't know why I followed him, my body just move to follow him outside the room before I can even comprehend what I was doing.

When we went in the kitchen the scent of the perfume in the kitchen greeted my nose. It was a nice smell.

Felix looked... unwell. It looked like he had stayed up all night doing whatever he's doing. My attention never left his back as I watched him aimlessly going through the drawers and the refrigerator in search for food. He looked like a zombie opening the drawers.

Seeing him like that in front of me made me annoyed for some reason. I stood up and put my hand on his shoulders to let him face me. His eyes were drowsy, it looked like it could close any minute, and I can see how tired he looked.

"What—"

"Why are you like that?" I asked. He didn't respond and only stared at me, "Did you not get any sleep? What are you staying up all night for?"

"Work related stuff..." He says, eyes avoiding mine. I furrowed my eyebrows at him.

"And you're doing it alone? Where's Ren?" I say, looking around us but not a single dead looking soul of Ren, who's always glaring at me, could be found. There were only the servants giving assistance.

"I fired him."

My head immediately jerked towards him, eyebrows raised in shock. "What?"

He sighed, closing his eyes as he rubbed his temples "We got into an argument and he said something that I didn't like so I fired him."

My jaw dropped to the ground. "Are you fucking stupid?"

Ren might've been a jerk to me but I couldn't deny that he's a professional when it comes to his work. He's like a 100 butler in one body, where would you even find another person like that?

Felix sighed. He really looks tired. "Let the maids do that" I reached my hands to his arm but he avoided it. "Why are you being so stubborn right now?" I couldn't understand him. I was even too occupied with worrying for his current state to realize that this was the first time I've seen him actually going to cook something.

"I..." he let out.

I stopped, waiting for him to finish what he's about to say. He had his eyebrows furrowed, his face is flushed, and he was avoiding eye contact.

"I wanted to cook for you."

"..."

There it is again, those damn butterflies tickling inside my stomach.

I observed his face, he was totally flushed right now — too flushed actually.

My hands quickly went to feel his forehead, making him look at me, and closing the gap between our bodies.

"Why are you so hot?" I asked, shocked when I felt the heat from his forehead. He has a fever.

"Pft, yeah. I know. You're already one of the thousands of women who told me that I'm hot."

"No, you idiot. Your body temperature is so hot! You're sick!" My eyebrows knitted at him as I scowled at him. This man — how could he even still be a dick when he's sick.

He gently removed my palm on his forehead and patted the back of my hand, "I'm fine. It's just a slight fever, I won't die." he says, shrugging it off.

Slight fever my ass.

It's obvious that he couldn't even walk properly because he isn't feeling well but he's still forcing himself to cook.

I grumbled. I couldn't just idly sit by and watch him pathetically struggle to make a single dish because he isn't feeling well. I snatched the spatula in his hands.

"I'm cooking."

"But—"

"Sit."

He looked like a defeated little chick when he went to one of the kitchen stalls to sit down and wait for the food. I huffed the strand of stray hair that was blocking my face in frustration of how Felix was acting.

After a few minutes of cooking, I had finally finished and was ready to serve the dishes that I've cooked for him. He was patiently waiting for me. Despite being in a sick state, his eyes still lit up in joy when he saw the food I made for him.

"I wanted you to taste the food that I make but I guess this is alright." He says. I snorted, raising an eyebrow at him.

"It's more than alright." I corrected him, as he chuckled.

Hm, am I having an actual normal conversation with him right now? We actually sound like normal human beings that's only conversing, well, normally.

This isn't bad...

"Ah, serve us some juice" Felix ordered the maid who was close to us. The maid bowed and went to make the juice Felix wanted.

Long silence erupted between us. I wasn't planning on speaking first nor was I planning to be the one searching for a topic we can talk about. I like the silence when eating but it's different when I'm not eating alone.

"Aren't you gonna ask me what Ren and I argued?" Felix starts to break the ice between us. I shrugged at him.

"It isn't my place to ask, isn't it?" I say, shoving the spoon in my mouth.

"You're right, but it's okay for you to ask if you're just curious. I'll answer any of your questions." He smiled at me.

Those annoying butterflies are acting up again. I gulped the food down and cleared my throat, "Well, uhm..." I adverted my gaze elsewhere as I tried to compose myself. "Did you and Ren grew up together?"

"Yeah, he was with me when I got sent to Australia by my parents and also when I went back to korea but he didn't stay with me for long because he needed to go to Italy. His family is in italy so, it was a family emergency. Then, I went here to..." he paused as he thought of something very deeply, "discover things..." he continued.

"I guess my decision of coming here wasn't a bad choice." He looked at me with warm and affectionate gaze that almost put me in a trance as if it's hypnotizing me.

"Huh, good for you" I say, looking at my plate.

So Ren and him grew up together, maybe that explains why Ren was so protective of him. It wasn't just a sense of duty but also a sense of affection?

At first, it was difficult to read Ren. He is a very complicated but open book. But...

I looked at Felix who was enjoying his food, smiling to himself.

With that kind of face it wouldn't be impossible...

I shook of those thoughts. It's just a guess, I haven't really confirmed it yet.

The maid finally went back to us with a glass pitcher of orange juice in her hands. She poured some to Felix and then some to me.

"Good work" Felix says, lifting the glass up.

I stared at the juice.

I quickly sprang up from my chair and slapped the drink away from Felix's hand, the glass shattering as it came contact with the ground.

"Kiera?" Felix was shocked. I don't know if he didn't notice the drink was looking suspicious because of his current unwell state but the drink is definitely drugged.

"The drink... it's drugged." I glanced at the maid who was still standing on the corner, having her head low.

"You drugged his drink, didn't you?" I shouted at the maid. There was a long pause of silence as the maid slowly looked up at me with a blank expression.

"I don't know what you're talking about, ma'am"

"It's clearly drugged!" I argued back, my hands working it's way to the table behind me to grab the knife.

"Really?" She says, tilting her head. My eyebrows furrowed when I suddenly felt my hands go weak. I also just realized that the other servants around us did not budge a bit or even showed reactions to my claim that the maid had attempted to drug the person they're serving.

My gaze trembled when I looked at the maid who was now smiling like a devil as she opened her mouth to continue to talk,

"Is the drink the only thing that got drugged?"

She covered her mouth with her hands as she giggled.

When we went in the kitchen the scent of the perfume in the kitchen greeted my nose. It was a nice smell.

a nice smell.

My eyes slowly widened when I realized something. I should have realized it the moment I walked in the kitchen.

How could I have not noticed? The sweet scent of aroma in the atmosphere. It wasn't just a normal perfume or air freshener simply to give scent in the kitchen.

It was drugged.

My knees gave up on me as I tried my best to look at Felix, he was already on the ground, collapsed. He probably inhaled more of the scent than me, who went in the kitchen a little later than him.

Ah, fuck.

JISUNG

"DETECTIVE! DETECTIVE! WE HAVE A LEAD!" Jisung's co-worker scurried his way to Jisung and stopped, panting in front of jisung, trying his best to catch his breath.

"Dude, chill. Breathe." jisung says, slightly laughing at his co-worker's struggling state.

"We gathered a couple of the best of the best hackers in Asia just to track the owner of this earpiece. It was a lot of work. They said that the owner of this earpiece probably is a professional and talented hacker to be able to build a security wall inside the earpiece so it'll be harder to track them." he explains.

"So? Give me the location of where this professional and talented hacked is already so that we can arrest him." Jisung says, looking bored at what his co-worker told him as if it wasn't his first time hearing something like that or that he have already heard a lot more amazing things than that.

"It looks like they're camping at one spot only since the location doesn't move." he handed jisung a file as Jisung skimmed through it.

"Okay! gather a small number of people and let's go!" Jisung hopped off his swivel chair and grabbed his coat and went out.

-

"We have surrounded the perimeter, I repeat, we have surrounded the perimeter. Further orders?"

The voice from the walkie talkie as well as the crunching sound of a lollipop Jisung was eating collided with one another. Jisung pulled the lollipop stick out from his mouth and threw his waste properly in the trash bin.

He pressed the button of the walkie talkie to respond to the police who contacted him, "Close in the perimeter.   Prepare to engage in combat."

The police who were surrounding the white van in the mountains slowly closed in. Jisung walked to the door of the van and was about to open it while the police got his back to assist him whatever might happen. Jisung also has a pistol so he didn't worry that much.

Just as he was about to open the van door, it suddenly slide open itself — no, the person in the van opened the door. Revealing a man.

Jisung froze — not because he was taken aback by the unpredictable turn of events but by the man who opened the door.

He knew him.

He once worked for him.

Kai.

A/N:
yay! finally after a long hiatus i have finally updated this book. I apologize for the long delay it was really hard to move on from the sudden loss but it reminded me to cherish my loved ones more because you'll never know when they'll disappear from your life, forever. The universe can take someone away from you in a blink of an eye and you're forced to accept it.

Anyways! I'm feeling better but I have realized that I can never move on from the death of my dog. I do know and hope he's in a much better place now.