Saved || A Jungkook fanfic

33.

Kai was a devil in disguise.

For weeks, he had found every possible way to get under my skin.

It wasn't just the winks he threw my way when Jungkook wasn't looking or the slow, deliberate way he dragged his tongue along his bottom lip, knowing I'd catch it in my peripheral vision. It was the proximity—the way he leaned in too close when reaching for something, his fingers grazing mine for just a second too long. The way he'd brush my hair off my shoulder as he walked by, murmuring something just low enough that I couldn't make out the words, but I could feel them.

It was the casual intimacy of his intrusions. The way he sat on the counter while I made coffee in the morning, his legs spread, arms folded, watching me with a lazy smirk like he was waiting for me to crack. The way he offered me drinks when Jungkook wasn't around, tilting the glass toward my lips as if daring me to take a sip.

Every time Jungkook was at work—forced to go now that his mother had sent Kai to "keep him in check"—Kai was there, attempting to lure me into his space.

"Come keep me company, darling," he'd say, draping himself across the couch like a king on his throne. "It must get lonely waiting for Jungkook all day."

Or he'd appear while I was swimming, sitting at the edge of the pool, dangling his feet in the water.

"The guest rooms are nice," he'd muse. "My bed is so comfortable. Want to test that theory?"

He never forced. Never pushed too far. He simply played a game of endurance, waiting to see if I'd slip first.

It had gotten to the point where I could no longer stand being home alone with him. Any excuse to leave, I took. I sought refuge at Jimin's apartment, dragged Taehyung out for late-night ramen, anything to put distance between me and Kai's relentless pursuit.

But he didn't just target me.

Whenever Jungkook and I managed to carve out time together, Kai would appear, smirking as he dragged Jungkook away under the guise of "important business." Jungkook loathed it, but he went anyway, knowing refusal would only bring consequences from their mother.

Kai claimed he was here for their family's sake.

But I wasn't stupid.

He was here for himself.

Jungkook and Kai had always been rivals. I'd suspected it had something to do with their upbringing—maybe their parents had pitted them against each other since childhood, forcing them to prove their worth, to outshine one another.

And that competition had bled into everything.

They turned the most mundane tasks into battles.

If one of them made coffee, the other had to make it better. If Jungkook threw darts at the board in the game room, Kai had to land them closer to the bullseye.

One time, Jungkook tried teaching me how to play chess. Kai waltzed in, plucked a piece from the board, and said, "Let's see if you've improved, brother." They played for an hour straight, neither willing to concede. The final match ended with Jungkook knocking over his king in frustration while Kai sipped his whiskey with a victorious smirk.

I'd never seen Jungkook so agitated over something so trivial. It wasn't just competition—it was a deeply ingrained need to prove something.

Kai saw it too.

And now that he knew how much I meant to Jungkook, he was fixated on me.

Not because he wanted me.

But because he wanted to take something from Jungkook.