To my fucking disbelief, I ended up getting thoroughly screwed over by that awful traitor again.
I’d always prided myself on having nerves strong enough not to even blink at ordinary betrayal, yet thanks to the very man who trained me through experience, I went through the same thing all over again.
Still, no new wounds were added.
I wasn’t hurt.
The pain was just my imagination.
I hypnotized myself with those thoughts as I collapsed face-first onto the floor again. At this point, the only thing I could really do was pathetically vent my emotions. I cried loudly and helplessly.
The moisture drained out of my body.
***
After crying for a long time, the place I headed to was Liam’s condo in Manhattan.
I pounded my fist against the door.
“Who is it?!” an irritated voice shouted from inside.
A moment later the door opened, and Liam appeared.
“How did you know I came back to New York—”
He stopped mid-sentence as he tried to snap at his unwelcome guest. Apparently, seeing my devastated face caught him off guard.
In the end, instead of slamming the door in my face, he let me inside.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Maybe look in a mirror before saying that.”
I passed the mirror by the entrance and threw myself onto the sofa. Two large suitcases were sprawled messily across the living room floor. It looked like he’d just gotten back from his trip and had been unpacking.
When I asked if he wanted help organizing things, Liam tossed me a handkerchief instead.
It was a tourist souvenir printed with the Hollywood sign, symbol of Los Angeles.
I rubbed beneath my nose with it. The tears and snot had already stopped, but my swollen face probably still carried every trace of crying.
Everything felt heavy and numb.
“I might’ve… practiced crying for Tamara White’s music video…”
My excuse lacked all conviction, and Liam scoffed.
“What kind of bullshit is that?”
“Don’t ask.”
“You burst into someone else’s house looking like that and expect me to keep my mouth shut? That’s asking a little much. And as you very well know, I’m not exactly a patient person. So I’ll ask again. What the hell happened?”
What happened?
Eden Reed, that bastard, messed me up.
It wasn’t enough for him to shake up my entire life—he slammed my mood straight into the ground too.
Everything became a mess because of him.
He broke me.
But when I finally opened my mouth, all that came out was vague mumbling.
“It’s just… just…”
I swallowed hard to soothe the sharp ache in my throat and couldn’t even finish properly.
Watching me act like an idiot, Liam demonstrated his cold, rational judgment.
“If you’re in that bad a state over ‘just,’ you should’ve gone to a hospital instead of here.”
“Why… why did you suddenly get smarter? It’s annoying.”
Shrugging, Liam started pulling laundry out of his suitcase. Watching the clothes fly neatly into the laundry basket one after another somehow helped calm me down.
Staring blankly at it stopped me from thinking about anything else.
“If my closet suddenly empties one day, I’ll know the culprit was you.”
Without warning, Liam accused me of being a future thief as he shook out the final piece of laundry—a T-shirt.
“Do I look like someone who steals other people’s clothes?”
“It’s believable. Anyone watching would think you’re in love with my clothes. You’re staring at them with your mouth hanging open.”
“Oh. You.”
I unconsciously moved my head following the hem of the shirt before suddenly freezing.
“This is just… for a change of thoughts.”
“Then either explain what thoughts those are or stop making it weird.”
“Well, you can’t deny my presence is extraordinary. I know. It’s impossible to resist. Of course people would pay attention to me. The more they do, the more mysterious I become—”
“Isn’t there an off switch somewhere? I’d love to turn off this damn radio.”
Liam gestured for me to shut up.
“What? What is it? Hurry up and spit it out.”
The moment I actually closed my mouth, he started pressuring me again.
Reluctantly, I sat up and flailed my hands and feet around. Naturally, meaningless body language didn’t work.
Liam’s handsome face twisted in irritation.
“Make something up if you have to. I seriously can’t imagine what could make you cry like this.”
“Tamara White’s music video…”
“Leave out the lies that obvious. At least put some effort into it.”
Choosing Liam’s place as a refuge had clearly been a mistake.
Apparently he’d learned persistence in Los Angeles, because he was being unbelievably irritating.
“I had a bad dream.”
“You’re not the type to be shaken by that. You’d just say, ‘If the dream sucked, reality must be great!’”
“Someone stepped on my foot while I was walking.”
“Then you’d say, ‘My foot got stepped on, but I’m still fine. My body really is amazing.’”
“The food I wanted for dinner sold out right in front of me.”
“Then you’d say, ‘It must be delicious if it sold out. I definitely need to try it next time. I’m excited to see what it tastes like!’”
Everything he said made so much sense that I found myself nodding along automatically.
“That’s all disturbingly logical. It was almost convincing.”
“You’re already convinced. So now put some effort in and come up with a decent lie.”
It was Liam’s way of saying he’d let me hide the truth behind a lie if I wanted.
That unexpected kindness from him was tempting, but I still didn’t want to explain things in detail, so I shortened it as much as possible.
“I thought I had a stalker.”
“A stalker? Wait, that stalker thing you mentioned last time was real? Did they catch him? Did he hurt you? Did you report it?”
“Are you even listening? I said I thought I had a stalker. But I didn’t.”
Apparently he wasn’t following me around because he was interested in me or hung up on me. Supposedly he was just treating me as a victim in his role as an agent.
Isn’t that ridiculous? Even movies wouldn’t use a plot like that. Why? Because it’s garbage!
I rubbed at my eyes while forcing down the lump rising in my throat.
“Then that’s a good thing.”
Thank god Liam responded in such a flat tone and lightened the mood.
Otherwise I might’ve started crying again.
“How is that a good thing?”
“It’d be weird if it wasn’t true. Do you want a stalker or something?”
“Well… that depends on what kind of stalker…”
“Don’t start thinking crazy thoughts. Looks like you cried so hard your brain snapped, but what’s the point in knowing what kind of person a stalker is? They’re all creepy criminals.”
“Did they put you through special training in LA or something? I can’t get used to you saying nothing but correct things.”
“I’ve always said correct things.”
Apparently Liam’s brain had snapped too, considering he’d completely forgotten how he used to show up at every party imaginable and fool around with whoever happened to be there.
We both scoffed at each other.
Since my nose had become exhausted from all the snot I’d cried out, Liam overwhelmingly dominated in terms of sheer scoffing power. After repeatedly snorting in disbelief, he shook his head.
“Don’t tell me you actually wanted someone to be your stalker. How does someone even arrive at a crazy conclusion like that…?”
“I’m not crazy. The situation’s trying to drive me there, but I’m not there yet.”
It’s not like I didn’t know stalkers were bad.
It’s just that, if I had to compare the two, they still seemed preferable to a secretive intelligence agent.
Someone following me around because of personal feelings instead of work would at least feel better for me.
It was a conclusion reached entirely while thinking only about myself.
I didn’t have the energy to consider anything else.
As my shoulders drooped and my head lowered, Liam sighed.
“Whatever it is.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re acting like someone who got dumped.”
Do people cry when they get dumped? Get angry? Have trouble breathing?
Even if the symptoms matched, this wasn’t heartbreak.
Wouldn’t love need to exist first for it to count as heartbreak?
I don’t know what love is.
“I didn’t get dumped. That’s impossible. We weren’t even that kind of relationship. We were nothing.”
If Eden and I had actually been something, this never would’ve happened.
To him, I was just part of his work. That meant all the time we spent together held no meaning for him at all.
Cruelly dismissing even the past should’ve been the victim’s role here, yet just like the saying that the guilty dog barks the loudest, the whole thing was absurd beyond belief.
“If you’re really nothing to each other, then your reaction makes even less sense.”
At that point Liam finally backed off.
Since my truth didn’t actually require his understanding, he was willing to let me cover it up with lies.
He definitely learned something in Los Angeles.
How did he suddenly become this smart?
“Maybe I should visit LA too. Improve my mental processing speed.”
“Your problem isn’t your head. It’s what’s below it.”
“My eyes? My nose? Are they still really swollen?”
“Lower than that.”
Liam pointed at my chest.
Meaning the source of the problem wasn’t my thoughts—it was my heart.
“No!”
“Denying it doesn’t change reality.”
“What do you know?!”
“I know enough. And the rest isn’t my business.”
“You know, getting smarter made you way more obnoxious.”
I collapsed sideways across the sofa. I offered once more to help Liam organize his luggage, but he rejected me again. Apparently I was annoying if I hovered nearby.
“I’m annoying?”
“The fact that you asked again is what’s annoying. Stop pretending you actually listen to people.”
“Do other people think I’m annoying too?”
“See? You really don’t listen.”
“How could someone as charming as me possibly be annoying?”
“Want to shut up, or do you want to get kicked out?”
“Don’t kick me out. I’ll leave on my own later.”
Still… Had Eden followed me here too? Was he parked somewhere across the street right now, staring up at the lit windows?
I glanced toward the half-drawn curtains and searched my pocket. There were no messages from him on my phone.
“How was your trip?”
“You think I can’t tell you’re asking about someone else’s trip because you want to distract yourself?”
“It’s half and half. I’m genuinely curious too. If my brain gets any worse than this, I might go to LA myself.”
Liam started complaining about Los Angeles, his actual hometown. Apparently he’d spent the whole trip stuck at home with his family instead of enjoying himself, and he seemed displeased that his grandfather—the man who controlled the finances of the entire family—hadn’t immediately agreed to invest in Liam’s business.
“Instead of a club, how about running a bookstore? It might suit someone like you who doesn’t party anymore and just reads books these days. Ah, wait. Is reading books the real reason your intelligence level went up instead of LA?”
“And the reason you keep saying stupid shit is because you’ve been bawling your eyes out.”
“I wasn’t bawling. I just… cried a reasonable amount.”
The definition of “bawling” is subjective.
If it only counts once you’re too exhausted to move afterward, then I didn’t qualify, since I still managed to make it all the way to Liam’s place.
Even if I had secretly wiped away tears inside the taxi.
When I smacked my forehead against the armrest for no reason, Liam shouted:
“Somerset! If that breaks, you owe me five thousand dollars.”
“Cheap bastard. I’m telling Noah what a narrow-minded asshole you are.”
“Go ahead. We’re just normal friends now anyway, so I don’t care.”
I was the one who got flustered instead.
Making fun of someone’s sincere feelings for another person? That made me trash.
“I’m joking. My mistake. I’m not gonna use that against you.”
As an act of repentance, I decided to leave.
Liam set down the toiletry pouch he’d been holding and walked me to the front door.
“You can stay longer if you want.”
“I know you don’t mean that.”
“I just got back. I’m tired.”
The dark circles under his eyes really did make him look exhausted. He’d already yawned three or four times earlier.
“Take care. I probably won’t come by for a while.”
“Don’t say stuff like that when you look like this. It makes me sound heartless.”
“It’s not because of you. There’s something I need to deal with. I’ll come visit after I sort it out.”
Coming to Liam’s place in a burst of anger had been a mistake.
As long as there was a group trying to kill me, I needed to be careful. If things went wrong, Liam might get dragged into it and end up hurt.
“You heading home? Want me to drive you?”
I stopped him before he could go inside to grab his car keys.
“No. I’ll go alone.”
Though the chances of me truly being alone were slim.
Because an intelligence agent—not a stalker—was following me around.
From the beginning, this was a spy thriller, and I’d just stupidly misunderstood the genre.
Before leaving Liam’s place, I turned around and asked:
“How does my face look? Is it really bad?”
