There's a lot of buzz in the Intensive Care Unit: Yoon Suk has a very difficult „crisis,” the monitors deafening scream, the nurses rush, entering and exiting the ward in order to fulfill doctor Kion’s „commands” who seems very preoccupied with the „patient’s” situation which is about to „die.”

Actually, it was so because Mina took care to transform Yoon Suk into a perfect „walking ghost”: the dark circles around his eyes were terrible looking, his lips were purple as if he stood underwater for hours, the cheeks were so white as though being painted while his nails: well, Yoon Suk took care to squeeze them so hard that looked worse than his lips.

„Sin Hion! My dear brother! Oh, Sin Hion, fight for your life! Do you hear me? Don’t give up! Sin Hion, please, don’t go!” A Rim was crying so hard and pretending to suffer so much as though she’d been an actor for her entire life and not just a simple worker in the prosecution.

Spotting the „intruder” lurking on what was happening with Yoon Suk in the Intensive Care, A Rim started to cry even louder, that two nurses had been forced to take her out of the ward by force and even to splash some water on her face because A Rim seemed to suffer much more than the patient itself.

Then, while sitting on the cold floor and crying her „pain,” A Rim saw the guy approaching the door, secretly taking a picture of Yoon Suk, and hurrying up later out of there.

This was what A Rim was waiting for: the guy to vanish from in front of her. When the door closed behind the guy, she crawled toward the door, opened it a little bit and looked through to see where he was, and spotted him exiting toward the door that was leading to the stairs. Only then, A Rim dared to take the phone out of the pocket and dial a number: „ Inspector Yu, he’s heading toward you! He finished his round of checking here,” she said, talking so quickly that she was barely breathing.

„Alright then, I’ll take care of him from now on,” Yu’s voice was heard in the receiver, and the sound of the ended call powerfully resounded in her ear.

„Old goat!” A Rim mumbled furiously. „I’ve been so kind to tell him that he’ll have guests, and he hangs up the phone without even saying thank you?! Well, inspector Yu, you'll beg me to tell you more good news, but I'll do the same as you did: the user is out of service,” and she put the phone inside her pocket with quick movements, showing her anger.

„Did he leave?” a nurse asked A Rim, after half-opening the door.

„Yeah. Just what. We can end the „show,” A Rim said, standing up and heading again toward the ward.

***

Slowly whistling, Yu looks carefully toward the hospital entrance door while standing next to his parked car, found not that far, in the parking lot.

Seeing the suspicious guy exiting the hospital, Yu practically threw himself to the ground and, sneaking next to the parked cars, he managed to approach the guy a lot and to make a few photos with his mobile phone.

Then, the inspector spotted a motorbike approaching at full speed the parking lot and because of this he was forced to hide, finding a damn bad idea to be found spying on the other one: it could have been the end of the whole operative because he knew, from his big experience of work, that such guys, especially those working with human traffic, aren’t stupid at all and they could have immediately made the connection between him, sneaking around the suspicious one, and the rest of the police involved in that investigation.

When the moto passed by in front of him, heading in the opposite direction from where Yu was, the inspector saw his „fellow” on the same moto and, not to lose them, he ran toward his car, got inside it practically in a jump and pressed the gas pedal to the brim, intending this way to tempt the luck and to see if he can find out to whom the other one will report.

But, despite the late hour in the night, Seoul City streets were crowded and the traffic jam could be seen all over because it was a Friday night when a lot of people go out to meet friends or simply to relax after a hard-working week.

Yu managed, in the end, to bore through the cars that were practically advancing bumper to bumper and could this way to get not that far, behind the motorbike. Still, he preferred to keep the distance between them not to be spotted.

However, nobody was advancing for about 5 minutes already and the red light was so off-putting and this made angry the moto driver who decided, in the end, to break another rule and to cross over a shorter path, but when to turn right and to cross over a beautifully arranged greensward that was serving as a secessional band between the two opposite directions to move, the two idiots were sighted by the police patrol that was checking the area.

The policemen turned on the flashing lights and used the ration to demand the moto driver to stop. But …he wasn’t that stupid! When the traffic light turned green, he simply pressed the gas pedal to the brim and passed at full speed onto the narrow path between the cars, sending a kind of „catch me if you can” message to the police.

Because of the heavy traffic, the patrol advanced very slowly and, at a moment, trying to detour a line of cars, they imperceptibly got caught in the toils because everybody seemed to „rush” that night, looking for an open place through which to escape. So, it didn’t last long until a pile-up took place.

Peeps… swearwords… shouts… threats… people getting out of the cars and yelling at each other while showing their clock and trying to make others understand that they are in a rush: well - a real madness could be seen all over.

Yu yawned, staring at that bunch of „rushing people” who were the only ones guilty for looking for trouble. „I could have stayed in the ward and had a nap, instead of this madness,” he mumbled and yawned once again, rubbing his eyes. „Anyway… I’m stuck here and I can catnap now because I won’t escape from here for a long while,” and he was right. Because of the accident in front, the traffic was blocked and this meant hours of staying in place and waiting for at least one smart guy to be found among those idiots who provoked the accident to move his car aside and to leave the others to pass by. But… it was only a nice dream.

***

Listening to Captain Lee’s speech that was explaining the „rules of the game” to the others, DooSan looked around, but he saw nobody from his team. „Where did everybody go when you need them?!” DooSan mumbled and looked at the watch: it was 4.30 in the morning, and he didn’t sleep a wink.

Actually, he had badly slept in the last few days because he was weighing on what happened in the past, especially on what happened between him and SolHi, trying to remember at least something about the night they two spent in the motel because those memories that he had at that moment were incomplete and dim.

Then, there was the case on which they were working on: something that he had never faced by then, even if he worked in the Prosecution for about 3 years already, and this had meant days together without sleep or normal rest because DooSan was a responsible guy: as the complicated was the case as less he was sleeping, looking for evidence, witnesses, hints to help him to win the case because he swore when he started to work as a prosecutor that he mustn’t lose more than 1% of the cases assigned him, and if possible not to lose none of the cases then it would be better.

He awoke from his daydream when detective Gi approached him and gave him a coffee and only then DooSan had heard the rest of Captain Lee’s speech: „two days from now, we’ll have a very important strategic and it must end by having the target in our hands. So, gentlemen: we can’t afford to sleep or to relax. Especially we must cater for any important detail. Any mistake on our part can turn into victims because the place where the operation will take place will be crowded with people that have nothing to do with what we’ll look for. That’s why it had been decided to work in two teams to assure our success: ALFA team will work under prosecutor Han DooSan’s command and they will look for Kim Ha Na who’s missing for about a week already and this means that there are only a few chances to be found alive. Even so, we must do everything humanly possible to find her alive, even if it means to rake out through any peace of trash or to look in the mousehole.

DELTA team will be under my command. Our target is to rifle the „cargo” and to safely transport it to Hanil Hospital because it had been decided that if we do this then it must at least save someone’s life. However, we mustn’t lose our main target: the delivery men haul - Gu SilGi and Park Yu Ra. I want these two alive and unharmed because with their help will find the rest of the organization. So, gentlemen, it’s time to put our business in order and not to allow innocent people to suffer. But: I must warn you - no heroic deeds. I don’t need collateral victims and more on our part. Did we all agree on this?”

„Yes, sir!” the detectives and the militaries that came with Captain Lee said in one voice.

All the militaries were masked and full-rigged because even if the operation wasn’t yet started, the main rule of the Special Department of Organized Crime was not to reveal the identity of none of its members, especially of the agents. An exception was allowed only to their leaders or to the mediators between their group and the rest of the police.

„Where is SolHi?” DooSan asked detective Gi because even if he looked around for minutes, he couldn't see her anywhere.

„Detective Ian? I think she left the building. Aaa, right. She said something about buying some food.”

„Probably. None of us have eaten anything since morning. Only with tea and a croissant all day long it’s not enough. I’ll look for her,” DooSan said and rushed toward the exiting door, leaving Gi staring behind him, confused.

„Only with tea and a croissant? Since morning?! These two what: are they living together to know so well what the other one had eaten?! Ia, Kan, come here,” Gi called Kan, seeing him passing by.

„What?” Kan asked dryly, yawning because of tiredness.

„Do you have new pair in your team?”

„A new pair? What the hell are you saying… aaa, you mean detective Ian and prosecutor Han. Well… I have no damn idea. So, be a good boy and just do your job,” Kan said demandingly and turned his back to Gi.

„Manipulative psycho!” Gi murmured unsatisfied. „I report him about everything and he couldn’t tell me at least this?! Of course: his men are much more important than me. But… wait, Kan, I’ll turn you this favor,” Gi added feistily and sat down at his desk, mumbling something unpleasant.

***

SolHi got out of the car, opened the rear door, and took a few bags with shopping: almost all the restaurants were already closed, so she had to make do with what she could buy in the supermarket only to take the edge off her appetite that she was feeling so well recently, even if in the past she could work for days without eating or feel the hungry at all.

Now instead, since she was living with DooSan that wasn’t wasting any chance to eat, she also started to have regular meals and this was felt so intensely: if she wasn’t eating, she was feeling how her stomach was sticking of her back and she couldn’t work further without having at least a snack.

Climbing the stairs toward the entrance door, she measured noses with a group of detectives that were working in the Kanam police station and with whom SolHi was at odds. Especially, she had a bad relationship with one of them that she was hating even more than she hated DooSan ever: Nam Yun Ho.

„Oh, detective Ian, what a surprise to see you here,” Yun Ho told her in mockery and SolHi had to stop because he blocked her passing.

„Get out of my way!” SolHi demanded him and tried to pass by, but he blocked her way again. „Did you go deaf recently or what? Wasn’t it enough with being stupid, now you are deaf too?!” she said grinning, but she only managed to make Yun Ho angry who pierced her with his devilish glance and took a step toward her, keeping his hands in his pockets.

„Stupid, you say?! More stupid than you are?”

SolHi smiled. „Are you setting against me now?! Well, not that I’m too surprised, but… yet, you should have at least dignity if you don’t have a brain.”

„Dignity?! I have it, don’t worry. I can’t say the same about you: working with the brother of the one to whom you blew his brain… well, you must have a strong stomach for this. Aren’t you feeling nausea? At all?”

SolHi took the left step between them, let fall the bags from her hand, and stared into Yun Ho’s eyes: „Ia, stop it! Here isn’t nor the place neither the moment to do this.”

„Why not? I think that it’s a perfect time. More if to accept to „play” a little bit,” Yun Ho told her and touched her face, trying to caress her neck later.

„Hands off me!” SolHi hissed.

„Why? Do you feel uncomfortable with me?”

„Yeah. Being touched by a disgustful beetle as you are, makes me sick.”

„I see that you sharped your tongue too, detective Ian,” he said with irony. „Is it because of the nights spent into prosecutor Han DooSan’s arms, paying with your body for leaving him an only child?”

SolHi grabbed Yun Ho’s shirt with her right hand, intending to punch him with the left one. But she stopped, shaking like hell and barely breathing while gnashing her teeth as strong as she could. „Did you see this to say these stupid words, idiot? Did you see me spending the nights with Han DooSan to say something like this?”

„The whole country saw you, not only me. So, I don’t get why are you playing the innocent: this is something you use to do - sleeping with everybody, except with me.”

These words hurt SolHi a lot because even if she heard it from an idiot like Nam Yun Ho that wasn’t worth a penny, it was reminding her about a time in her life that she would have loved to forget. „Damn you are!” SolHi murmured.

„Maybe, but at least I’m not a sham like you are. Yet: I can change my opinion if you do me a favor… one of those favors that only you can do… and you can do it well,” he said, winking. Then, he imitated a kiss and an indecent movement. After this, he gave her the card of a motel. „You have to only write the time to me. I’ll take care of the reservation while the rest will be for free,” and his words made the other detectives loudly laugh.

„As if I sleep with worms like you. What can I say?! You have my permission to rave as long as you wish: I’m immune to idiots like you. Garbage!” she said and Yun Ho rewarded her with a painful slap over the face.

SolHi didn’t react for seconds, continuing with her head turned left, after the slap. This didn’t calm the detective instead, who suddenly held her hair and squeeze it, approaching her face of his and yelling at her: „two penny prostitute! How dares a woman like you call me trash? Did you miss being behind the bars or what? You don’t know what can I do to you if I’m furious. So, don’t provoke me or I can do so to live everything again: the time spent in the jail, the offenses, the blows. I can take care to be even worse than it was earlier.”

She finally stared into his eyes, fearless, and murmured: „what did you stop till now? I don’t think that it was your consciousness.”

„Of course, not. Only because you are a woman, I control myself not to beat you as you deserve.”

„This was the problem: the fact that I’m a woman. (She laughed.) It seems to me that you have forgotten: two years ago, at the party organized in honor of your ex-partner that was named the chief of the Security Department of the Government, you thought different there. Do you remember that night? You told me that you like me and that you consider me the perfect woman for you. You even proposed to me something… interesting, let’s say. Should I remind you what did you tell me then?”

Yun Ho ironically smiled: „that proposal wasn’t exactly for a lady.”

„Are you sure? This isn’t what I remember. Especially… the kiss. If one kisses a prostitute, he never does it as you did. To my way of thinking, if I would have accepted to enter your bed then, you would have crept in front of me like a dog and you would have done everything I would have asked you to do. Now isn’t late too: should we try it?”

SolHi’s lips were so close to Yun Ho’s and he looked as if being about to accept her proposal. But, spotting the others’indiscreet glances, he pushed her away from him and slapped her so hard that he threw her to the ground. While falling, SolHi hurt her palms and knees.

SolHi didn’t even manage to feel well the burning of her wounds when she saw Yun Ho throwing himself over her, grabbing her hair and trying to lift her by force from below, but a powerful kick on the side of his body threw the detective away from her.

Staring at the one who dared to kick Yun Ho, SolHi saw DooSan looking as if he was a mad bull seeing a red cloth in front of him and, in a blink of an eye, DooSan jumped on Yun Ho and started to pommel him so badly that the detective hadn’t even the chance to defend himself.

„Split them up! Why are you staying and looking at them like idiots?” SolHi yelled at the other detectives that were looking at the fight as if it was a game at the circus.

A kick in the stomach threw DooSan off Yun Ho, but he right away stood up and tried to jump again on the detective, but he stopped when he felt SolHi’s arms wrapping up his body while her chest touched his back and her voice was imploring him: „DooSan stop! He doesn’t worth it! Stop!”

This confused DooSan: he had never expected such a reaction from her. More to be hugged by her even if he wanted this for so many times, more after he started to live with her.

The other detectives finally reacted too, stopping Yun Ho to continue the fight because the detective stood up, yelling like a mad person that he’ll kill both SolHi and DooSan for the offense he suffered. However, he couldn’t approach them, being stopped by the others.

„Shut your mouth!” DooSan suddenly yelled at Yun Ho. „And listen to me carefully, idiot: if you touch ever one of my men, I swear that I’ll do so to be kicked out of the police, after spending a long way behind the bars.”

„I can’t believe what I’m listening to - prosecutor Han defending his mistress in front of everybody, more knowing that she’s the one who killed his brother. Idiot, one like her…”

„It’s not your business who she is. While she hasn’t anything to do with you… stay away from her or I swear I’ll break all your bones, so bad that not a doctor will be able to make you a whole again. Did you understand me?”

„Is this a threat, prosecutor Han?”

„It wasn’t the prosecutor who threatened you, but Han DooSan, the man. If it was the prosecutor, you would have been already behind the bars with a big file with evidence against you for threatening, insults, violence against the women, and attack, idiot. So, shut your mouth and get lost or I won’t respond if I get you one more time. Take him out of my eyes!” DooSan demanded others.

The other detectives pushed Yun Ho away from SolHi and DooSan, but even so, he kept yelling at them that he won’t forgive their insults ever and what they did to him and that if they meet again, he’ll do so to see them kneeled in front of him and begging for mercy.

„As if he’s God to kneel in front of him,” DooSan mumbled. Then, he touched SolHi’s face, analyzing the red mark on her right cheek: „are you alright?”

She took two steps back. „Yeah, I’m fine.”

„No, you aren’t. Just look at how you look (a hint to her hurt palms and knees). Follow me and not to hear a psss from you or I swear that you’ll pay for everything.”

Tightly holding her hand, he forced her to follow him toward the small park seen not that far from the police station.

SolHi said nothing to defend herself and she didn’t even try to stand against his will: she knew very well DooSan’s character and that it was useless to stand against him. More than that: she felt a strange sensation in her chest after realizing that it had been the first time when a man defended her so openly.

Anteriorly, when Nam Yun Ho was bothering her, Yoon Suk, detective Kan or even detective Gi were defending her, but only by words. Nobody ever fought with Yun Ho for her honor. But DooSan not only insulted Yun Ho, but he also fought with him, defending her and without even paying attention to what others can think about them. So, following him as if being an obedient child wasn’t that difficult for her to reward him this way for his help.