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I slid off the bed to kneel on the floor with him, winding my arms around his neck. I felt his solid warmth against me, real and here. I took in a shuddering breath, burying my face in his neck as a whine escaped me.

Because they knew.

And we couldn’t pretend they didn’t. Not anymore.

We got to exist in each other’s arms for longer than I expected.

Jihoon’s phone vibrated in his pocket, and we broke apart only as far as needed for him to pick it up. His free hand held mine, pressing it to his chest where I felt the steady and reassuring thump of his heart.

He spoke with someone from ENT, a manager, a legal counsel, maybe both for nearly an hour, but neither of us moved from where we sat together on the floor.

When he finally hung up, he turned to me and pulled me closer, pressing his lips to mine, like this was more important than talking about the call, the photos, anything. I kissed him back just as fervently.

We had already decided weeks ago that we were going to figure this out once the tour was over. That decision, that agency, had been stolen from us. We had to act now, but that didn’t mean we would allow ourselves to be backed into a corner.

“What do you want to do?” Jihoon asked me, his voice rough around the edges.

I already knew the answer, even if the reality of it frightened me. “I don’t want to deny it,” I said, even as I felt slightly light-headed as the words tripped off my tongue.

“Neither do I,” he agreed.

“I didn’t want to do it like this,” I said with a weak smile.

Jihoon ran his thumb over the backs of my knuckles as he listened. “What do you want to tell them?” he asked.

I shrugged. “Surely there’s some kind of industry playbook for this kind of thing,” I huffed. “What’s the normal thing to say?”

“I do not care about what the industry wants us to say,” he said in a low voice. “I asked what you wanted to say.”

I blinked up at him, brow furrowing. “Joon, I’m a little out of my depth. What do you think?”

Jihoon’s eyes were soft as they held mine. “Kaiya, I told you last year. I would go public with you the moment you wanted it. I do not care about how or when. I will stand beside you. The world already knows who I am. Now they know who you are. This needs to be your decision.”

I thought about this for a moment, and while my immediate reaction was to bury my head under sheets and pretend the world didn’t exist, it very much did, and now, instead of setting the stage for how we were going to do this, we had been pushed into the spotlight, and our reaction had to change.

“Okay,” I said eventually. “Can we still get away with not announcing anything until after the end of the tour? I’m not suggesting we deny it, but…” I bit my lip as I looked up at the ceiling and tried to blink away the moisture that gathered at the corners of my eyes. “Hana already stole the timing from us. We were going to do this eventually, but we don’t owe the world everything.” I looked back down and let the tears fall. There were only a couple, and Jihoon raised his hand to wipe them away, making no comment about them. “So we wait. We don’t deny it. We finish the tour. Then we confirm it. Tell them as much as absolutely necessary, but everything else belongs to us. They don’t get to pull apart our relationship.”

“They’ll do that anyway,” he said quietly.

I nodded. “I know. But even if we gave them a detailed road map from Pisces to now, people would find ways to invent details, anyway. At least this way we get to keep what’s real.”

“Okay,” he agreed. “I will tell the company we will issue a response after the tour.”

“As simple as that?” I asked.

He let out a small laugh. “No. Nothing will be simple for a while, I think. But let them worry about that. I only care what you think.”

I blew out a breath and leaned forward. Immediately he wrapped his arms around me, pulling me into the shelter of his body, warm and comforting.

“I’m scared,” I admitted.

“Me, too,” he said, running a hand down my back.

I pulled back as a sudden thought occurred to me, and I stared at Jihoon in dismay.

“Jagiya, what’s wrong?”

“The other members,” I groaned. “They’re going to hate me. Oh fuck!” I pushed my hand into my hair. “How is this going to affect them?”