Entranced

Midnight Rendezvous Part 2

"No."

"Yes."

"I told you, no!"

"Oh, yes, Princess."

"No, no, no, no, Woo Jiho, what are you getting me into?" Hyejeong cried in frustration as she peered out of the window, looking at questionable neon signs outside a series of equally questionable businesses.

Fun House. Evoke Place. Pleasure and Pain.

"We're not going there, of course," Jiho said, deadpanned. "Like I would ever insist we go to such places."

Hyejeong's response was equally saucy. She threw up her hands. "Oh, why not, let's just go to a strip bar just because your friend called me a paid seducer."

Jiho laughed out loud, genuinely amused. "You could have just said a prostitute, Pincess," he told her, "It's not a bad word, you know."

"Well, I feel like it's a bad word. These women deserve better-"

"What if they can't do any better?" he interrupted, looking at her through the rearview mirror, "What if this life, here, at the red light district, is all they know and is all they've got?"

She shook her head. "It's not. I refuse to believe it."

"Then you still don't know the world," he said, "These girls are controlled, from the very moment they were brought here or volunteered to be here, their lives were already controlled. You can't just go up to them and say, Hey, look, you shouldn't be here! It doesn't work that way."

He slowed down the truck, and jerked his head to the left, asking her to do the same.

She turned, where a slim woman was talking to a rotund man with a big belly. He was slapping the woman's shoulders, holding out a hand.

"That's a pimp. He's the guy who controls her earnings and gets some in return," Jiho explained, "Basically, he controls her very existence. I've had to go through one of those before."

Hyejeong turned back to him. "When you saved Jinye?"

Jiho looked at the road grimly. "Yeah. When I saved Jinye," he said softly.

She leaned forwards. "Did you fight with him?"

He whistled. "I think I killed him."

"Oh."

"Yeah," he agreed thoughtfully, "The girls at the boardhouse can't escape while he lives."

She bit her lip. "I see what you mean." She gingerly placed a hand on his shoulder. "That was crazy, but it was also noble of you to rescue them."

He raised his eyebrows, surprised at her touch. "I had to do what I had to do, Princess. There's nothing noble about it," he grumbled, "And your beloved thought so too. I had the worst lecture in history."

Hyejeong blushed. "Beloved?" she asked, although she knew from the annoyed tone in his voice that he was referring to his brother.

He met her eyes. "Yes. Beloved. You know, the one you made out with."

Hyejeong slapped the back of his head. "All right, I know. You didn't have to say that," she muttered.

Jiho smirked, slowing down the truck at a particularly heavy intersection. "We'll be here a while," he said, "This part of town has the most big-name clubs." He adjusted the rearview mirror, so that he could see her clearly. "So how about we talk about that kiss, hmm?"