Hate You, Love You. | Jenlisa

84

Jiwon's World is scarcely populated once the clock hits seven. It's just like Aunt Jiwon said, the crowd is better in the mornings, gets fewer in the afternoons and then less in the evenings. Currently, we have about 5 people in the bakery and they've all been served.

"Why don't you take a break? I don't think anyone would come in anytime soon." Aunt Jiwon suggests. I nod and say my thanks then make my way to the table where Hyejun is seated making a phone call.

I slip into the leather seat opposite to him and raise a brow because he's stress talking on the phone.

I guess that's partially my fault because he has to babysit me till nine.

"...I'll call you later." He responds gruffly. "Thanks for the update."

Not knowing what to say, I start. "Do you want a cookie? I could get one if you like."

"No, thank you."

His lips meet the edge of his cup of lemonade before putting it down with a sigh. "That was Officer Bohyun."

Oh.

"What did he say?"

"That you were right. The 2 letters aren't a match."

"I was actually right?" I'm a little surprised. There was always this possibility that I could be wrong and I was reading into things a little too deeply but now that I'm right, I can't help but feel relief and dread.

Relief that I'm right. Dread that my worse fears may actually come to reality.

"You were," he affirms. "We got it analyzed by forensics and even had 2 handwriting experts examine the 2 letters. They were a 20 percent match."

Which means there's an 80 percent chance that someone is trying to fuck with us.

Hyejun runs his fingers through his hair. "Someone is trying to throw this investigation off course. They know we're looking and they're trying to hide something." I swallow a lump in my throat.

"You may not like what I'm about to say but if someone wrote this letter pretending to be Kai, then there's a very high possibility that whoever it is kidnapped Kai or is holding him hostage somewhere. That someone may have also been the one who caused the shooting at Lakedale."

"And we can't track them? There's no trace of DNA or anything?"

"We can't necessarily get the DNA of a person off a letter. If we had the pen the culprit used, a hair sample, saliva, blood sample, it'll be easy to run it in the database but we sadly don't have that." His voice is full of regret. "This person, whoever it is, is one step ahead of us."

"Hey, don't be like that." He raises my downcast chin up with his forefinger. I'm forced to meet his eyes and he has what seems to be a reassuring smile on his face. "We will catch this person or persons. This is a small town and whoever is playing these mind games still lives here."

"But what is Kai is dead?" Sometimes, I blame myself for what happened that night. If he hadn't offered to drive me home, this shit-show wouldn't have happened. If we hadn't gotten into an argument in the car, maybe we would have been aware of who was following us.

"At this point, I don't even know. I can't give you false hope and tell you he's alive because hostage situations–if this is a hostage situation–never end well."

That's the scary part.

"Also–"

"Hold that thought." I say and stand up when I see a couple enter the bakery. They take a seat at the far right side, next to the ice cream machine and I make my way to them.