Dragon's Butterfly (Hiatus)

Pawn 016.1

Park Sandara

All the things I’d watched in action movies and the scenes I’d read on mangas and novels couldn’t hold a candle on this situation . . . where I currently am.

The place now smelled of blood and death, thanks to all the bodies around here, and I had to swallow back a gag.

Oh my God. . .

If this is a nightmare, please, please do wake me up.

I’m literally in the middle of the room, tied up in a chair, dead men around me. Jiyong’s men stood impassively at them, while TOP and Seungri were avoiding my gaze. Jiyong was standing in front of me, still frozen.

TOP broke the silence by barking orders to the men, and they scampered and dragged the bodies out, leaving me and Jiyong behind.

“Ji,” I finally said. It was softer than my usual whisper. It seemed to thaw him a bit because he knelt and untied the ropes around me. He helped me then to sit up, and then proceeded to check on my legs, arms, and finally my face. His face was pale as he stared at the bruise on my lips.

“S-Sandara,” he whispered, and then his frozen mask vanished. His face betrayed every emotion—pain, horror, shock . . . vulnerability. I gasped. I’d never seen Jiyong looking vulnerable before.

“Jiyong,” I whispered, my voice now thick with tears.

He held me tight all of a sudden in his arms, his face burying in my hair. His breathing was erratic as he smoothed my hair with his hands.

“Goddamn it,” he whispered brokenly. “I thought . . . I thought I lost you again, Sandara.” I felt him kiss the top of my head. “I thought I was too late.”

“Jiyong,” I whispered his name again. “You’re really here.”

“Yes, butterfly,” he murmured, caressing my cheek gently and looking into my eyes. “Yes, I’m here. You’ll be okay. You won’t get hurt. I’m sorry if—I’m sorry if you saw all those things. Don’t worry, it’s over, okay? It’s over now.” He seemed to convince himself with these words, not me. I’d never seen Jiyong looking . . . terrified. But why? He looked deadly as he shot most of the gangsters here, but not when he stared at me . . .

“Jiyong . . .”

His eyes never left mine as he caressed my face, my arms, and my hair. It’s as if he’s trying to tell himself that I’m still alive and breathing. “Yes?”

“Do you . . . do you mind taking me home?”

Dara’s head was spinning as she tried to process what was going on—and what happened earlier. She was sitting at the opposite side of the car, Seungri driving it and TOP on the passenger’s seat.

Cold silence filled the car as GD gazed outside the tinted windows, wondering how on earth this shitstorm happened. One minute he was busy scanning at the files Taeyang sent him, the next he was giving orders to his men, barking at them to prepare and wipeout Jung Il Woo’s gang after a tip told him that they had taken Sandara. Unexplainable fury and panic had filled him as images of her in the middle of lust-filled, blood-driven men, wanting to kill her because she’s a primary target of the gangs . . .

Or is she really? He rubbed his nape, trying to calm down. Yes, she might be a Park, but that does not necessarily mean that she could be Park Ji Soo’s missing heir.

But why was she targeted? As far as Taeyang told me, she’s a primary target of three major gangs in Beijing, and now being hunted by the Yakuza.