Page 127 of XOXO

“We shouldn’t have let you leave,” I said, hugging her. “My agent got into⁠—”

“Oh, my god, Ru!” she exclaimed as she pushed me back. “He was in on it and told Lorenzo’s PI where we were.”

“Excuse me?” I stepped back like someone had slapped me.

“That fucking asshole,” Matteo snarled, looking at his phone. “Lorenzo said he was using a PI. I’m going to get his name, and Minsoo is going to fucking pay.”

Matteo lifted his phone to his ear, walking away from us.

“I didn’t know how to get ahold of you, my phone shattered and⁠—”

“It’s ok,” I said, grabbing her hand as a million things went through my head.

“I think we should head home,” Levi said, looking over my shoulder at Matteo who was talking rapidly on his phone in Italian.

“No, Vi needs to eat,” I said, helping her from the car.

“Ru we can go to the rental,” Vi said, as I shut the door.

“No, you need to eat and I need to calm down before I do something stupid,” I said, leading her to the door. “I’m hungry too.”

“No, we need to go home.” Violeta pulled me back to the car and I didn’t have enough fight left in me to argue. “I can make something there.”

“No, we can order something.” Levi said, as we got back into the car.

Levi drove while Matteo was on his phone scrolling through something. The car was tense like any moment we were waiting for a bomb to go off. This wasn’t how our reunion was supposed to go. The rental was quiet as we arrived, but something felt wrong as we entered the home.

“Grab your things. We are leaving,” Matteo said, looking around.

“Wait, are we sure that’s the right thing to do?” Levi asked, as Violeta pulled me into my room to pack.

“Sit down, Beautiful. I got this,” I said, bending down to grab my bag and put it on the bed.

She watched me as I threw things on the bed, my hands shaking as I tried to fold my clothes. Vi helped me in silence, glancing around every few minutes like she didn’t know what to expect. My eyes stung from the betrayal as I went through everything that had happened yesterday. Matteo was right, the rental was under his name, so how did they know I was there?

“I’m sorry,” Violeta said, as I zipped my luggage.

“You have nothing to be sorry about,” I said, taking a deep breath. “The people we trust the most shouldn’t do this to us, and if it hadn’t been for my agent, we would never have been in this mess. No one knew where I was, other than my family, and they would never sell my location.”

My phone rang and I saw my mother’s photo. I was about to hit decline when Violeta stopped me, pressing accept instead.

“Nae-saekki,” My mother’s voice made me want to cry. “Are you ok?”

“Yeah,” I said, sitting next to Violeta.

“I’m buying four tickets and you are getting on the first flight here,” she said immediately.

“Four?”

“Oh, Nae-saekki, don’t be obtuse. I know she’s with you and I know that is all of you in the picture with her,” she said quickly.

Violeta smirked.

“How dare those photographers catch photos of her like that?” she scoffed. “How dare they do this to her and why haven’t you made a statement? They are saying horrible things about her.”

“We are trying to be careful,” Violeta said. “We didn’t want the guys to suffer any backlash from this⁠—”

“Hello, Darling. I hope you are ok,” my mother said so protectively. “Backlash? Those boys better be protecting you. I hope you are not going to let her take the fall for you.”