Author's Note: Sorry it's taken so long to post this. I've had a bit of writer's block. It's been hard to process so I took a step back. Hopefully it will flow smoothly now.
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"You know they'll get mad at all of us if they find out we did this," Jan Di said as she and Ga Eul walked through the hotel lobby.
Ji Hoo and Kyu Lee had returned the same day as Jun Pyo and Jan Di. They had all met at Jun Pyo's and discussed what was going on. Jun Pyo had gotten angry instantly at the thought of Woo Ahn returning into his family's lives. He still remembered the day Woo Bin had beaten the hell out of him for what he did.
Ga Eul and Jan Di badgered the hell out of them to tell them what had happened. It had taken most of the night before Woo Bin had finally told them. He hadn't done it with a dry eye either. The pain his brother had caused him was still fresh in his memory, almost like it had happened yesterday. He pushed the tears that threatened to spill back, but that raw emotion was enough to make them all cough.
Eri and Kyu Lee had sat through it all and listened, making their own judgments about how things should actually be. They were having a silent conversation between themselves so it was hard to decipher the looks. They were getting way too good at that and it made their boyfriends nervous.
After spilling his guts, Woo Bin had escaped to his room with Bin Ji. Eri had disappeared to the kitchen, leaving the other three couples to figure something out. The guys were mad that Woo Ahn would suddenly come back and destroy his brother's newfound happiness. But after some thought, it suddenly made sense.
Woo Jun and Woo Bin had been working hard at expanding their business. With extra backing from the DeArgints, they had more money to make the newest fitness center they were working on even better. Woo Bin was set to be in charge of a new project if this one went well, and that meant he was going to get all the profits from it. It would pad his personal bank account and help him take care of his family. He would be like Jun Pyo and be one of the country's leading men.
Woo Ahn would be jealous. If he hadn't been disinherited, he would have been in the same position his brother was. He would have taken over right after college and would have risen through the ranks quickly. He wasn't as quirky as Woo Bin, but he was vastly intelligent. He could compute numbers almost as fast as a computer.
Was he trying to tear Woo Bin's family apart? Would he stoop that low as to hurt and mother and her child just out of spite? Would he hurt his brother like that? No one had the answers to that since thye hadn't seen him in years. They hadn't been around to see what he was like and how he treated people close to him.
So before they had gone to bed that night, Ga Eul, Jan Di and Kyu Lee had sat down and done some research using the name Soon Woo Ahn. His name had popped up immediately. First tabloids had posted about how he was doing after the lawsuit he had filed against his father. After that things had tapered down. After a lot of searching and light cursing at the screen, Kyu Lee had finally found out where he was living.
The next morning as the guys got ready for work, the women pretended to be involved in some serious talks about vacations. The guys had left and as soon as they were out of the house, the women jumped into action. Eri had watched them from the front entryway as they had piled into Kyu Lee's car and headed out. She was off and had decided to stay the innocent one of the three's manhunt, opting to stay home with her son so Jun Pyo's sister wouldn't take him over.
It had taken them nearly an hour to find where Woo Ahn was living. He lived on a side street full of company housing, but his apartment was in a different building. It looked more like a bungalow than anything else.
Kyu Lee took the lead and rang the doorbell to the apartment. Ga Eul and Jan Di grabbed hold of her arm. "What? You two weren't going to do it."
The door swung open at that moment. Woo Ahn stared at them, a huge frown creasing his brown and deepening the dimples he had inherited from his mother. He was not happy to see them.
Ga Eul stepped forward. "Woo Ahn, we've come to ask you something."
"If it's on behalf of Woo Bin then the answer is no. I don't want to have anything to do with him," he said as he started to pull the door closed.
Kyu Lee put her foot in the way. "I don't believe that for a second. You wouldn't have come back at the exact moment he started a family and was getting ready to pull in the account you were supposed to inherit. What's your plan?"
"We didn't come here to interrogate him," Jan Di reminded.
"Then what did you come here for?" he asked.
"We want to know if what the guys said is true, about you stealing Woo Bin's girlfriend when he was in middle school," Ga Eul continued.
He smirked then leaned against the door frame. Someone passing by might think it was a lazy stance, but the way he smiled at them told them it was far from it. He was planning something. It might have been a mistake to come
"What? Jin Jae? She was jealous that Woo Bin was seeing another girl instead of her. I just helped her out a little bit." There was no remorse in his voice. He was actually proud he'd done that. It was sickening. If he could do that to his brother's girlfriend then, what could he do now?
Jan Di's cell phone rang and she pulled it out quickly, gasping as she checked the caller ID. "Jun Pyo!"
They could hear him yell even thought she didn't have it on speaker phone. He wasn't happy. To their shock, Woo Ahn took the phone from her and hit a button. Jun Pyo's ranting could be heard through their silence.
"Are you finished, little brother?" he asked through the white noise.
"I'm not your little brother. You lost that right to call me that a long time ago," Jun Pyo seethed through the phone.
"You have a beautiful wife, little brother. It would be a shame for something to happen to her."
"You bastard! Don't you hurt her! If you lay a hand on her, I'll…" Woo Ahn hung up on him.
He tossed the phone back to its owner. "Tell my brother I'll be seeing him shortly." He stepped into his house and shut the door on them.
They were quiet as they drove back to their residence. They were going to get yelled at. Jun Pyo had called Ji Hoo and Yi Jeong to tell them their girlfriends had gone AWOL. They had been warned to stay away from him and yet they had gone in search of him. Not only that, but he had left them feeling as if he would retaliate for them searching for him.
Eri was at the door when they pulled. The three Lotuses were parked in front of the house as well as Ji Hoo's Mini Cooper. The men were home and were to be in a bad mood. By Eri meeting them, she was going to act as a buffer. By getting the information first, she would have the knowledge to combat the men. None of them would stand up to her for fear of breaking her. She was their greatest weapon at the moment.
Speaking as fast as they could, they told her everything they had seen and sensed. She listened as she led them to the sitting room the four men had preoccupied. She cast them a quick glance over her shoulder and they instinctively crowded behind her.
As soon as the doors opened, Jun Pyo was on his feet. Bracing her hands on either side of her, Eri blocked his drive to his wife. He stopped dead in his tracks. Going through that wall forcefully was going to start a fight. Wisely he backed down, returning to his seat.
"Where's the baby?" Kyu Lee asked. Ji Hoo stepped aside to show Bin Ji sitting on the floor between Woo Bin's legs. When he looked back at her, his face was a mask. "Oh, come off it. You would have done the same thing."
"No we wouldn't have," Yi Jeong snapped. "Eri, bring them in the room. We have to have a serious conversation about this stupidity that seems to plague the four of you." The strongest and yet the weakest member of their group crossed her arms in stubborn defiance. "Now is not the time to do this! What you've done is something we explicitly asked you not to do!"
Woo Bin kicked his ankle. "Yelling isn't going to help anything. You need to remember how she acted after Georges. Yelling won't make her talk. You said those words yourself." His voice was tired and strained, like he had been through the ringer in such a short amount of time. He looked up at them. "He didn't do anything to you did he?"
Ga Eul shook her head. "No, he just scared the crap out of us."
Yi Jeong sighed and nodded. "That's always been his first step. He scares you to the point where you always watch where you walk. Your guard is up so much it makes you jumpy, but the moment you put it down he strikes."
"Is that what happened to your ex?" Jan Di asked.
Woo Bin nodded tiredly. "Yeah. Ji Hoo had been having a hard time with Seo Hyun dating another guy so I went to hang out with him almost every night for a few weeks. Woo Ahn saw her in a coffee shop one night and convinced her I was cheating on her. By the time I got around to asking her why she was so hostile against me, it was too late. They were already working their way through their twisted relationship. She broke up with me shortly after that, but since she was seeing my brother, I saw the effects he had on her. It completely destroyed her."
"Where is she?" Eri asked.
"No," he snapped. She raised an eyebrow at him, agitation written in her eyes. "I don't want you talking to her. She's finally at peace from what Woo Ahn did to her."
"I think you're mistaken when I asked for your permission."
"Eri," Ji Hoo said, his voice quiet, "it's for the best that you leave her alone. Years of therapy finally eased her suffering. She's happily married with two children. Just let her live her life."
Eri looked at Kyu Lee. "Did you catch that?"
Kyu Lee nodded. "I sure did. They're the ones that paid for everything."
The men sat flabbergasted at their girlfriends. They had gotten them to speak about things they had long buried in the past in a matter of seconds. Not many people could do that, but these four were so ingrained in their systems that they could easily.
"I want to understand him," Ga Eul said boldly. "I want to know why he is the way he is and what made him this way. You were raised in the same household with the same parents. Why did he turn it a creep when you are a decent and sweet person? What's the difference? How can two brothers turn into two completely different people?"
"It's very easy when the parents give up due to the child's lack of talents," Yi Jeong said. Ga Eul looked at him. "It happened with my family. My brother wasn't as skilled a potter as I was and he was bypassed as the heir to the gallery and studio. Woo Ahn had no compassion so he was disinherited. Now that's not all that happened but that's all for now. Promise us you won't ever go in search for Woo Ahn again."
Ga Eul nodded and glanced around. She noticed Kyu Lee and Jan Di nodded along with her, but Eri was staring at Woo Bin. There was no anger or sadness, but something was stirring in her eyes.
Yi Jeong strode forward and took Ga Eul's hand. He looked at her briefly before he led her from the sitting room. She pulled at her hand and succeeded in taking his. Yi Jeong smiled as he kept going forward. He was upset so he shouldn't let her see him happy over something so simple. He opened the door to their room and walked inside, dropping his hand as soon as he passed the threshold.
"I know you're angry," she started but he waved his hand to stop her.
"I'm not angry. I'm nervous. It won't take him long to figure out we're all here together. If he wants to get in, he will. He'll do it right under the noses of the staff and not think twice about it. As much as I'm sad I lost my brother, I feel worse for Woo Bin," he said. "Like you said, how can someone who was raised with the same parents as his younger brother turn out like that?"
"I want to know that too."
"But you can't go after him? It will only incite him to attack us all. Woo Bin's already dealt with that loss once. He won't be able to do it again. And I won't be able to stand losing you." He crowded her suddenly, his hands going to her face. "I fought myself over and over and over again about you. It took me five years to admit it and to think that I could lose you frustrates and angers me."
He had never been this open about his feelings before. She had known he cared for her but not to the point that he couldn't her live without her. Before she could stop herself, she pulled herself up and kissed him. His immediate reaction was to wrap his arms around her back and deepen it. No one saw them the rest of the night.