While she was thinking about who to call first, her phone started ringing with a number that she had never seen before. She stared at it with an atavistic dread. Given the circumstances, it was not only understandable to nearly be expected. She looked at her phone in horror, thinking who it might be, and what they might want. Could it be the Bad Guy making a threat? Could it be the guy wanting her to extend her car’s warranty on a vehicle that she no longer had? Or worse…it could be her mother.

  Seulgi decided to be brave and answer it. “Hello? Who? No. No, sorry. Yes, you have a wrong number. Thank you, have a good night.”

  It was a good thing that she was already sitting down. She sagged around her bones and colpsed in her seat. Then the giggles came. Earthshaking giggles left not only her but her friends stunned.

  Nayeon grinned at her in sympathetic relief. Yeji just ghosted a smile at her antics.

  After a bit, Nayeon came over and lightly swatted her on the back of the head to get her to calm down. Strangely, it worked. A moment ter, she was done gulping breaths and was back to as normal as she could get under the circumstances.

  Once back in control of her facilities, she started thinking about who to contact next. Yeji and Nayeon were here. Bhuwakul was over at Gillian’s. That left Soo-Young, Joo-Hyun, Katie, and a few other people. Let’s start with Katie, she thought.

  She sent a text to Katie asking if she was avaible. Since she didn’t know when she’d get back, Seulgi started writing a wall of text to send Wendy at the same time. She got Wendy caught up on all the goings on, leaving dinner with Bhuwakul out. After seeing the unholy glee that Nayeon cooked up, she didn’t want to tempt her recuperating friend into a paroxysm. There was a fifty/fifty chance that Wendy would fangirl over the notion of her and Bhuwakul getting dinner together. There was that word again. ‘Together’. Hmm.

  She tidied up the message, censoring some of the more personal things, and then sent it. Did she need to censor herself? Probably not, but she wanted to keep things as tame as possible for Wendy. She didn’t need to get excited over non-issues. Well, to her they were non-issues. Weren’t they? Of course, they were.

  She shook herself back to focusing on those who needed to be contacted.

  She sent the same text to Soo-Young and JooHyun: Text me when it’s OK to call back.

  She didn’t *think* that she needed to contact the Twins as she would see them tomorrow.

  While contempting this, there was a knock on the door, and Yeji went to answer it. The conversation was not quiet, but it was not loud enough to disturb the neighbors. Suki went down the entryway to supervise Yeji. She knew that the girl was more competent than most of her Idiot’s friends, but it was a near thing. It was best to make sure.

  Tail waving like a fg, the cat walked down the hall. She pawed Yeji’s leg once, demanding admittance to the conversation. Yeji, like a dutiful servant, lifted her into the crook of her arm. The detective was about to say something, but the gre from both dies stopped that comment stillborn. They continued working as if the cat was not there.

  Suki knew that important stuff was going on, so despite the gentle ministrations by Yeji, she refrained from purring so they could concentrate.

  Photos were taken from every angle. There were even a few taken of the girl and cat, but strictly for a private collection. If this was ever found, there was going to be some possibly permanent pain. Tiger Cw or Housecat Cw, will both hurt.

  There was a quiet ringing from inside the apartment. After a moment, Seulgi called to Yeji. “Yeji! They are sending up the fsh drives. Keep one, give the other to the detective.” Yeji didn’t answer, she didn’t have to. She was already expecting it. But, the notice did keep her nerves from jumping when the elevator door opened a few moments ter.

  Seulgi’s phone chirped at her. It was a text from Katie saying – I am free now. What’s up?

  Seulgi dialed her number and called. They chatted about some non-serious things for a bit, before the serious topics came up. Seulgi listened to the younger woman speak. About her day, work projects, exercise routines, things like that.

  Seulgi updated Katie on her goings-on as well.

  Then the serious came up. Katie was expecting it, and Seulgi delivered. She brought her as up-to-date with the pertinent things as she could. Jackson is forced into assisting his own kidnapper. The detective’s badge was in her doorway that evening. She did leave out the bck band as that was just an assumption at this point.

  They made some more operational notes as to how to better protect themselves. Katie promised to be extra vigint. She knew that Seulgi was, in her own way, not trying to scare her, but taking care of her. Wendy was not there to mentor her, so Seulgi stepped up her game.

  They had a pleasant few more moments before they disconnected.

  She had already sent texts to Soo-Young and Joo-Hyun, so she was waiting for a response from them. She figured that Soo-Young would be busy for a while as it was in the middle of her normal work hours. She expected Joo-Hyun would respond fairly quickly and she was not disappointed.

  She had a very simir conversation with Joo-Hyun as she did with Katie. It was odd how different they were, but they were also just alike in other ways. One of the ways they are different is in voice. Joo-Hyun should be reading books for Audiobooks for a living. She had that perfect AMSR voice. Katie had a beautiful voice, too – that was undeniable. But Joo-Hyun just that that extra something to go from special to pure gold.

  Soo-Young’s voice was in a league of her own as well. She had a voice that sounded like how a hug should feel. She was all warm, tender, and just enough mischief to be even more interesting.

  Wendy’s voice was a whole league unto herself. There was no competition with who was the best singer in all of the groups.

  Still, while talking to Joo-Hyun, Seulgi let her ramble on for a while, just listening to the other woman’s voice. She felt pleasant straight to her bones. Still, she had to take over the conversation and bring Joo-Hyun up to speed on the goings-on. She needed to be aware of the happenings to make sure she was still taking the extra precautions. No one thought that she would be involved with these goings on, but no one expected the detective to go missing either.

  As their conversation wound down, the detective came in with Yeji. Seulgi ended her call with Joo-Hyun and gave her full attention to the detective. He was momentarily taken back. Yeji is a beautiful woman in her own right, but Seulgi was Seulgi. Nayeon was present, too. She walked over to Yeji and took Suki as well. So, this detective was used to dealing with the scum of society, not with these three people, four with the disconcertingly intelligent cat, like this.

  However, the detective was also very well trained and he had a job to do. So he handled the situation with aplomb and went on to take statements from both Seulgi and Nayeon. Nayeon being Nayeon asked if he wanted a statement from Suki, too. He shot back only if she was more detailed than Nayeon was. She huffed a response back. Yeji and Seulgi softly chuckled at her consternation.