The man who stepped out of the black car wasn’t Jungkook’s father.
It was Min Yoongi. Jungkook’s second-in-command. The only person in Black Lotus Jungkook ever trusted.
Yoongi didn’t knock. He picked the lock in ten seconds flat and let himself into the apartment above the flower shop. Found Jungkook with a kitchen knife in his hand and Taehyung behind him, violin case clutched like a weapon.
“Put that down,” Yoongi said, nodding at the knife. “You’re gonna hurt yourself. You’ve always been shit in the kitchen.”
Jungkook didn’t lower it. “You here to kill me?”
“If I was, you’d already be dead,” Yoongi shrugged. “I’m here because your father put a price on both your heads. A big one. Big enough that even I thought about it.”
Taehyung stepped forward. “Then why didn’t you take it?”
Yoongi looked at him, then at Jungkook’s white-knuckled grip on the knife, then back at Taehyung. “Because this idiot burned the whole syndicate down for you. Figured I owed him a warning.”
*The Choice, Again*
“Run,” Yoongi said. “Tonight. Far. Don’t use your names. Don’t touch your bank accounts. He’s got eyes everywhere.”
“And you?” Jungkook asked.
“I’m going back to clean up the mess you left. Someone has to.” Yoongi paused at the door. “He’s not gonna stop, Jungkook. Not until you’re dead or you take the throne back.”
After he left, the apartment felt too small. Too loud.
Taehyung set his violin down and walked straight into Jungkook’s arms. “We run,” he said against Jungkook’s chest. “Together.”
“I can’t keep dragging you into this,” Jungkook said, voice breaking. “I love you. God, I love you, and that’s why you should go.”
Taehyung pulled back, furious. “You don’t get to decide that for me. You chose me once. Let me choose you back.”
*The Hit*
They didn’t get the chance to run.
They hit the apartment at 3AM. No warning. Just glass and shouting and the sound Taehyung’s violin made when a boot crushed it.
Jungkook moved on instinct. No gun, so he used his fists, his teeth, a broken chair leg. He was bleeding before he even registered the pain. All he could see was Taehyung, cornered, holding the splintered neck of his violin like a blade.
“Jungkook!” Taehyung screamed.
Jungkook turned, and that’s when the knife went in. Right under his ribs.
He dropped.
The world went quiet except for Taehyung’s voice, wrecked and screaming his name. The last thing Jungkook saw before the black took him was Taehyung driving that splintered violin neck into the man’s throat.
His innocent, sweet violinist. Covered in blood. For him.
*The Aftermath*
Jungkook woke up in a hospital. Stitches, tubes, and Taehyung asleep in the chair beside him, hand locked around Jungkook’s like he’d never let go.
“You’re an idiot,” Taehyung mumbled when he felt Jungkook move, not opening his eyes. “You promised you wouldn’t die.”
“Didn’t,” Jungkook rasped. “Still here.”
Taehyung finally looked up. Eyes swollen, lip re-split, dried blood in his hair. He looked like war. He looked like love.
“We can’t run forever,” Taehyung said. “So we stop running.”
Jungkook stared at him. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying,” Taehyung whispered, leaning in until their foreheads touched, “if your father wants a war, we give him one. But you don’t do it alone. Not anymore.”
He kissed Jungkook then. Soft, careful, right over the hospital band on his wrist. A promise. A vow.
The mafia took his violin. But they gave Taehyung something else.
A reason to fight.
_To be continued…_
