N0 B0DY, N0 CRIM3 | Bang Chan

Take me back to the night we met

Deep down, Chan knew it would hurt to fall in love. He knew love came with stipulations. It was filled with triumphs and challenges. From the very beginning, he knew there was a risk falling in love with Kiera Campbell. This was his biggest risk yet, sending the dove back to its cage. He found Kiera with broken wings and in some ways, they had mended. In others, she was still damaged. 

Some wounds were cut too deep. Words cemented into her heart and led her to believe the false words spoken by her parents. She was wrapped in layers of her parents' own insecurities. She grew up walking on eggshells and being coddled with neglect. Now Chan was agreeing to take her back to the place that broke her. 

He hadn't said it out loud, but it was killing him. Tomorrow morning, bright and early, they would take the trip over to Washington DC. Apparently, Kiera had some leadership skills within her because she had a pretty decent plan. It wasn't perfect, but it was the only thing they could agree upon that might stop Willie from killing his daughter. 

Chan hated vulnerability. He hated being left with two choices where both were a risk. Send Kiera back to her father and attempt to free Felix, Han, and Hyunjin. The other choice was to keep Kiera home and let the three suffer whatever fate Willie had planned. 

If Chan could go back in time, he'd follow his original plan. He would have tortured Kiera Campbell and killed her. His heart was shredding in his chest. This was greater than any form of torture. Perhaps, this was karma finally catching up after all those years of hiding his true identity from Felix. 

He tried to spend the day with Kiera as much as possible. It didn't hit him until now. This might be the last night he slept with Kiera. The last night he wrapped his arms around her body. The last night their legs tangled together. The last night he tucked her in, kissed her forehead, and slid beneath the covers beside her. This could be the end of everything. 

Everyone knew the plan, he explained it earlier. Not a single person objected to it, but he wished they would have. He wished someone would have put their foot down and stuck their neck out. He wished he wouldn't have taught them how important family was. 

He was selfish when it came to Kiera. Maybe it was because she was the first person he felt like he could truly open up to. He unveiled every rotten part of himself to Kiera, but she hadn't run away. She hadn't played with his feelings and she hadn't broken his heart up until now. 

Chan never believed in God the way that some people had. In his head, God was someone people looked up to and had faith in to make themselves feel better about their life choices and about life after death. However, that didn't stop him from muttering a prayer beneath his breath in the bathroom earlier. 

It didn't stop him from getting down on his knees and begging whatever higher power there was to keep Kiera and his men safe. With his head dug into the unforgiving cold tile, he poured his heart out. He begged for a miracle, but he wasn't sure if the heavens took requests from cold-hearted killers. 

Kiera had learned to read body language well in her household. She learned to tell the difference between the soft pitter-patter of her mother's steps and the heavier thuds of her father's. She knew the pursed look on her mother's face meant she was going to get an earful of her mother's disappointment. The furrowed eyebrows and shifty weighted steps of her father meant she was going to face his wrath. 

Chan's hurt was painstakingly obvious. He kept pulling his gaze away from her face while they talked. Every time she reached out to grab his hand, he jerked away. He dodged her kisses and side-stepped her open arms. Without realizing it, Chan was preparing for the worst case scenario and it bothered Kiera. 

It bothered her so much that when the two were alone, she snatched his hand in hers and held on tight. When Chan tried to jerk away, she shot him a glare and he quickly apologized. When she confronted him about it, he pretended to be absentminded. He pretended to be too wrapped up in tomorrow's plan.