Page 23 of Gumiho Kiss
“Would you like me to send someone to go find Mr.Park?”
“No, it’s fine.I’m sure he’s busy.Actually ...”She whirled around and met Ah In’s eye.“Don’t bother telling him I’m feeling better until tomorrow.He can have one last day before he resumes his normal guard duties.”
“That’s ...very generous of you, my lady.”Ah In excused herself with a nervous bow.
Chin Sun pressed a smile to her lips and sauntered out to the courtyard.“Dongsaeng, may I join you?”
Sang Mi’s eyes lit up as she turned.“Unni!”She ran over and squeezed Chin Sun in an embrace that was slightly painful before pulling back.“I take it this means you’re free to go wherever you’d like again?”
Chin Sun nodded.“I don’t suppose you’d like to join me on a walk through the market?”
“Oh, yeh!”
The cousins locked arms and wandered out, one jabbering away about how she wanted to look at the fans while the other toyed with the fox sketch hidden in her sleeve.
She hoped Min Joon wouldn’t be too angry with her for missing the stakeout on the magistrate.If they met up tonight—after midnight when Mr.Park was sleeping—she could apologize properly.
And tell him they had far bigger problems than Magistrate Hong.
* * *
Slipping out of the city came almost as easily as breathing now, and before long, Chin Sun was stalking up to the hut she and Min Joon had deemed their “hideout” back when they were children, innocent to the evils of the world.Little had they known how accurate the title would become.
The house was in shambles, clay walls covered in fingers of ivy she’d traced with her eyes dozens of times.Chin Sun swept past the brushwood gate rendered useless long ago and stepped inside.
“I wasn’t sure you’d show,” came a harsh voice.Min Joon leaned against the far wall, arms crossed.
Chin Sun grimaced.“Min Joon-ah, I’m sorry I couldn’t make it before.What happened with the sulfur?”
“I was so worried about you that I lost Hong in the woods before the exchange happened.So, you better have a good reason for why you didn’t meet me.”
“I would have, only—something came up.”Her gaze darted away.Why was it so hard to admit she’d gotten into more than she could handle?
He pushed himself off the wall and closed the distance between them, bending down until they were at eye level.“Something came up?That’s your reason?”
She wrung her hands.“No, it’s ...”She sighed.As much as it pained her to tell him, protecting the people of Sokju was more important than her pride.“After I left you here last time, someone attacked me on the road.He was—it didn’t end well, and I had to make a run for it.I?—”
Min Joon waved his hand.“Wait, wait, wait.What do you mean, ‘it didn’t end well’?Did you get hurt?”
Chin Sun’s cheeks bloomed under his scrutiny, but she nodded.“Yeh, but that’s not the worst of it.”
She told him how she’d run off to the forest, how she’d thought she’d lost her pursuer after shifting into fox form—and what had found her in the darkness.
“A goblin?”Min Joon’s brow furrowed.“I thought you’d never come across any other creatures of magic.”
“I hadn’t until then.But that’s what it was, I’m sure of it.”
“But you said you were injured.How did you fend off a goblin on top of that?”
She shook her head.“That’s the thing.I didn’t.When the goblin appeared, I was so weak I couldn’t stop him.He nearly killed me.Nearly stole my bead.”
Her chest went tight at the memory.She’d never been so terrified in all her life.
“But he didn’t?”Min Joon pressed.
“The man who attacked me found us and fought it off.”
“So you didn’t lose your bead.”The relief in her friend’s voice was palpable.
