A/N: I probably won't update again for three weeks because I will be gone on vacation, and I fully intend to do absolutely nothing productive during that time. But I'm super-excited that people want me to write more on this, so here goes. Enjoy? this chapter. Hopefully you won't hate me too much for leaving you with this type of cliffhanger…

Guilt had finally gotten the better of her.

That and maybe a bit of embarrassment. After all, she was the one who had made him take his tie off in the first place. He had probably realized she still had it once he had gotten home…and expected her to return it to him…and would only mock her for holding onto it like a lovesick fangirl.

Despite that, she hadn't heard from him or tried to contact him since the night he had walked her home the week before, figuring that if he wanted to see her again before he left he would find some excuse to do so. However, it was now the night before his departure date, and she hadn't even heard about so much as a going-away dinner until this evening when she had received a text message from Yi Jeong.

The message read: Hey Ga Eul, Woo Bin is throwing a private going-away party for me at this address. Give them your name at the door, and they should let you in.

She had tried to call him right after she received the message, but he never picked up, so she had taken a cab to the address he had sent to her. Now she stood in front of a high-end club in Cheongdam-dong, clutching a gift bag that contained Yi Jeong's tie and some cookies she had baked earlier that day. A slender woman in a tight black miniskirt and Louboutins entered the establishment just as Ga Eul reached the front entrance. Several couples dressed to the nines entered behind the woman, followed by a group of several women around Ga Eul's age sporting similar high heels and high-end evening bags. Ga Eul recognized one of the expensive labels—Louis Vuitton—but not the others.

Glancing down at her own scuffed black pumps and almost knee-length gray skirt over black tights, Ga Eul seriously doubted her ability to convince security that she belonged there. Clutching the bag tighter between her fingers, she took a deep breath.

Ignoring the line snaking around the building and taking a few tentative steps toward the security guards, Ga Eul called out, "Excuse me, but my name is Chu Ga Eul. I'm a friend of—"

"Yes, you're expected in one of the private VIP rooms," one of the security guards answered nonchalantly, as though they had been expecting her. "Yeon Ryu will take you there." The security guard gestured to a woman standing just inside the entrance, the same woman Ga Eul had seen go inside when she first arrived. Giving Ga Eul a quick once-over, the woman turned on her heel and strutted off, leaving Ga Eul to catch up to her as she walked into the inner quarters of the club.

Inside the club, hip-hop music pounded out of loudspeakers at an ear-numbing decibel. Multi-colored strobe lights stretched out over the huge main dance floor, flickering over the faces of those stylish partygoers who had already had one too many and those who were just getting started. The layout of the club looked similar to the high-end one Yi Jeong had taken her to once before, although this one featured purple and black décor and alcoves stretching almost all the way around the building on the second and third stories. As the model led Ga Eul through the thick crowd of gyrating dancers and cryogenic smoke, Ga Eul couldn't help but notice how people paused to stare at her—though not intensely enough to appear as though they cared who she was. Sometimes they briefly whispered to the person next to them, their lips turning up in an amused smirk not unlike the one Yi Jeong often wore. Other times, someone's gaze drifted lazily over Ga Eul before flitting on disinterestedly to the lady next to Ga Eul or to someone else Ga Eul couldn't see. Scantily clad waitresses dressed in designer heels, tight white blouses, and black miniskirts passed Ga Eul, carrying fancy drinks to the carousing businessmen upstairs. Ga Eul thought her guide might lead her up the stairs, but instead she found herself directed into a guarded elevator at the opposite end of the club from where she had come in. Getting into the elevator, she noticed that the building had five floors, and she was headed to the fifth one.

The elevator opened up a moment later to reveal an even wilder crowd in an open space that reminded Ga Eul of a penthouse.

This penthouse featured plush sofas in shades of purple and gray on the end closest to Ga Eul, a magnificent open bar in the center, and a glass wall on the other side that overlooked the city of Seoul. In the dim lighting suffused with more smoke, she saw through a gap in the crowd a huge platform on the end of the room furthest from the elevator where several women danced seductively around metal poles. A DJ was set up on a platform just behind the dancing women, where he bobbed his head in time to the electronic music.

No one seemed to notice Ga Eul's arrival. The partiers making out on the sofas were too preoccupied with one another, and everyone else seemed too preoccupied with something that was happening on the far side of the room.

A chorus of raucous laughter and catcalls erupted just then, and Ga Eul stepped a little bit closer to see what was going on and to see if she could spot either Yi Jeong or Woo Bin, although her hands were already trembling with fear at what she might find.

The crowd parted, and just like that she had found it.

Had found him.

Seated in a chair on the pole-dancing platform while a particularly tall, sexy—foreign, Ga Eul realized—blonde danced around him, rubbing her hands across his chest and down his torso and then circling around him to give him a lap dance.

The whole spectacle might have taken about five minutes if Ga Eul had been counting, which she wasn't, but it seemed like it took an eternity while her eyes stayed locked—frozen—on the blonde's fluid movements. Then an equally beautiful Korean woman took over, eventually drawing Yi Jeong out of the chair and over to the other dancers.

He pulled her closer and whispered something in her ear. She turned her back to him and rubbed her body against his while his hands roamed all over her—her slender arms, her waist, her prominent breasts and butt…

Then the gap in the crowd closed, and Ga Eul couldn't see anything anymore.

It was just as well.

She felt like throwing up.

Or cannon-balling into a pool of freezing cold water.

Or scrubbing her entire body with a pumice stone until her skin turned red and burned.

Then somebody—a waiter—bumped into her, knocking her back into her senses.

She had to get out of there.

Getting back on the elevator, she frantically pushed the close button before anyone could join her.

The worst part was knowing that this moment would replay over and over in her head after she went home, like some sick movie reel, reminding her of how stupid she was for thinking he would change for her. For thinking he cared anything about her childish feelings.

Compared to those women, she was a child after all. Even as dressed up as she had been the first time he took her out, she would never be the most interesting woman in the room—not to a guy like him.

Once she reached downstairs, she quickly pushed her way through the mass of people, her eyes trained on the red exit sign. About halfway across the main dance floor, Ga Eul remembered Yi Jeong's words: If you're going to leave after this, you shouldn't have asked for a date.

What had he been doing making that promise to her—taking pity on her?

And now what? Was this his cruel way of reminding her what happened the last time she trusted him?

Well, she didn't need his pity, and she certainly didn't need this.

Stuffing the bag holding his tie into the nearest trash can, she hurried past the security guards and out into the cold night, feeling as empty as the bottles littering the tables inside. From there, she walked and walked for what seemed like hours, her heels scraping raw against the backs of her shoes, not knowing where she was going, only knowing that she wanted to be gone.