Forever Waiting, Forever Hoping - A HanJay AU

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When JL receives a series of anonymous calls, ruthless Hannie drags him into lockdown—three days in a penthouse fortress where silence says more than words ever could. No demands. No explanations. Just Hannie's watchful gaze and the way his hands linger a second too long when he checks on him each night.

But safety is an illusion.

The moment JL lets himself believe in it—trusting Hannie's quiet care, craving the heat of his body between JL and the world—the Ghost strikes. A photo. A taunt. Proof their enemy has been closer than anyone realized, watching from the shadows Hannie's wealth can't illuminate.

Now, with the fragile peace shattered, Hannie's control snaps. His protection was never just about safety.

It was about ownership.

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Three Days.

Seventy-two hours of silence. 

Not the peaceful kind, but the heavy, coiled kind—the quiet before a storm. JL had been living in it since that call, the one that slithered through his phone like a whispered threat. Now, his old device was nothing but a drowned piece of metal, courtesy of Hannie. A new phone, a new number—no more flinching at every unknown caller.

He hadn't even told Hannie about the call itself—just the drunk stranger at the bar, the one who had lingered too long, eyes sharp and scary. 

But Hannie knew. Of course he knew. 

JL sometimes wondered if the man had eyes everywhere, if every shadow on the street worked for him. It wouldn't surprise him. Hannie didn't do things halfway—if he decided JL needed protection, it meant security cameras, tail cars, maybe even a sniper on a rooftop somewhere. The thought should have unnerved him. Instead, it settled something restless in his chest.

That was why he didn't argue when Hannie all but dragged him to the penthouse. No "I'll be fine", no stubborn insistence on going home. JL just followed, because home wasn't safe anymore, and Hannie's space—high above the city, all reinforced glass and silent alarms—was.

And in those three days, something between them shifted.

They hadn't crossed that final line since that BBQ night party, but it didn't matter. The way Hannie's hand lingered at the small of JL's back when he passed him in the kitchen, the way JL leaned into his space without thinking—it was intimacy of a different kind. Trust, not just in words, but in the quiet. In the way Hannie would watch him from across the room, gaze dark and unreadable, and JL would meet his eyes without fear.

Three days. That was all it took for the tension to change, for the air between them to crackle with something new.

JL wasn't afraid of phone calls anymore.

But he was starting to fear what it meant that Hannie's protection felt like the only thing he needed.

"JL. Hey—earth to JL."

Woongki's voice snapped him out of his daze, fingers snapping inches from his face for emphasis. The sound echoed softly in the secluded corner of the library where they'd claimed a cluster of worn leather armchairs, far from the usual foot traffic. Sunlight streamed through the high arched windows, painting golden stripes across the mahogany tables, but the air was thick with the scent of old paper and the restless energy of four boys who'd been sitting too long.