"Bee tee dubs are you guys gonna rejoin us tonight or should we just keep going without you?"

... She is torn between operational efficiency and also how incredibly, fundamentally unappealing and soul crushing that sounds. And how nice being fussed over by Tae-gun is. She's a little afraid that the minute they are exposed to his friend group again, he's going to go back to jumping to conclusions and forgetting she exists failing to properly emote caring at her in favor of the many other social things being in a large group of people involves juggling.

It really doesn't take a social genius to notice her reaction, especially with how he's paying most of his attention to her specifically right now. "Probably not tonight, sorry."

Thank you Tae-gun she appreciates you Tae-gun.

aaaahhhhh he used to hate that smile and now he doesn't anymore aaaaaahhhhhhh

"Yeah, no probs. You got an office or somewhere more comfortable for us to keep going? Not that your dining room isn't lovely but a guy is getting a crick in his back."

"...I have an office upstairs, and you can get futons in the guest bedrooms?" He does not want to go fetch those for his friends right now even if that's "being" "a" "bad" "host" or something.

"I'll show them around, don't worry about it hyung."

"Thank you Woo-young-oppa. ... Though possibly they should have the living room and we should go elsewhere?"

"Hope your room has good soundproofing. Unless you want us to hear everything, of course, I'm not against that."

"...am I still allowed to teleport him back wherever he came from?"

"Just say the word!"

... That wasn't even an innuendo! She was just thinking that a living room is really more built for a larger number of people than an office!!

"Yeah, how about we move out of the living room where someone can already eavesdrop and add commentary whenever he likes."

"Yes, let's." They're done with their bingsu so it is not very difficult for him to manoeuver Hye-jin into a bridal carry so he can bring her upstairs.

Eeeeeee~!

"Message us your ideas in the morning," he says as he starts making his way upstairs. He considers also telling them they can sleep over if they want to but Hye-jin would probably rather not have to deal with socialising in the morning so he refrains.

"Roger that!"

She does not want to deal with socializing in the morning, no.

(She's not even sure she wants to do dungeons tomorrow, and it's a confluence! As before, it's not the dungeons themselves that are the problem. It's just that closing them involves the media and the public perceiving her, and she super, super does not want that at all. No answering questions about how she feels after having been shot, thanks.)

...but anyway his room is soundproof and after he closes the door he can kiss her with a teensy little bit¹ more passion than he'd been doing up until now.

¹ This is a severe understatement.

!!! Hye-jin gives a small delighted laugh, and is perfectly amenable to this sequence of events.

Responsibilities of operational efficiency have been handed off, and she and Tae-gun kind of need to show each other that they care about one another right now, and, well. ... This is a very nice (and efficient! With his backlash!) thing to be doing.

(She does have the presence of mind to make sure the door's locked, though.)

He places her on the bed and gets on top of her to keep kissing her there. "I like you, Hye-jin-ah," he says breathlessly in between kisses. "I like you so much."

"I like you too," she murmurs into his skin. "I'm - sorry I've been bad at communication and - generally bitchy -"

"I'm sorry I've been bad at showing that I care about and trust you," he replies, stopping with the kisses to hide his face in her neck. "I'm—happy we can talk and—figure it out. I hope we always can."

"Me too. I think we've got a good shot if we - keep trying to? Does that make sense...?"

(Her hands are trailing under his shirt.)

(He pulls away just enough that they can get rid of his shirt.)

"Yeah." I love you. "It does." I love you. "I trust you." I love you. "So please trust me, too."