?MY LIGHT IN THE DARK ? || JIKOOK ?

3.

We'd tried everything, but nothing we said or threatened
or pleaded, had any effect.

This man had pulled the trigger on hobi's father, and he refused to snitch on his employer, the one we really wanted.

I didn't blame him.

His boss was a scary motherfucker.

Miguel may have fired the
bullet, he may have held the
gun that day but it was Lee
Jiwoo who had ordered the hit.

We knew that.

Everyone in the station knew that. In fact, everyone in our town knew that but we couldn't damn well prove it without a confession from Miguel and
a motive. The confession was what Jih and I needed today.

We'd worry about the motive later and keep our fingers crossed that it would all come out in interrogation room two.

The station was so small that we'd moved the coffee pot into interrogation room one, which hadn't been used for anything but office bullshitting in years.

Hobi's crumpled face at his father's funeral haunted me as
I thought of the motive behind the shooting.

Eyes swollen from tears that my friend had tried to keep back, hobi's mouth in a thin line, unable to even attempt a smile for the guests vying for his attention in the mourning line.

Scowling, I thought of all I
was keeping from him.

Hobi's mother begged me to keep this to myself because of how depressed hobi had gotten after the funeral, at least until
we had something substantial.

I hated to keep things like today's victory away from hobi
or his mom but being a detective was my job and part of that meant not discussing ongoing investigations.

Knowing I had to follow the law didn't make it easier.

Lies of omission were still lies
and twice as bad when they
were directed at my friends.

Lying wasn't who I was on the inside and I worried how hobi would react when he eventually found out it was Tae who was meant to die, not his father.

Tae figured the situation out
after I asked him to check his voicemail.

The person on the other end
of the line had gloated about
his best friend's death and
promised him he was next.

It made sense.

Young had not been involved with the case against Lee Jiwoo at all but Tae was working as
the prosecuting attorney
against the crime boss.

It was no secret that Young
and Tae were good friends.

I would have been surprised if there wasn't a hit out on him.

But that day, the day Miguel the hitman had leveled his sights
and fired the bullet, Young
had been the target, not Tae.

My best guess was that Jiwoo was hoping to win his case
and a dead prosecutor would make him look pretty bad.

Jih gave me a strange look as I sucked in my breath through
my teeth.

How would hobi deal with all
this when it finally came out?

I hoped like hell I wouldn't be
in the room and I hoped even more that it wouldn't separate him from the people who were holding him together so tightly,
his mother and Taehyung.

Tae had been there for hobi
since his father had died and
had loved him long before that.

They were obviously in love
now and I hoped they wouldn't lose each other over something neither of them had any control over.