1 In The End We All Crash And Burn

And in the end, we were all just humans, drunk on the idea that love, only love, could heal our brokenness. —Scott Fitzgerald.

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•Chapter One•

Namgung Eun-Ju was going to die.

Every beat of Eun-Ju's heart thumped harshly against her ribs, knowing it could be the last. Sweat trickled down her face and mingled with the tears soaking the gag in her mouth.

The cold steel of a handgun pressed to her temple aggressively each time the man above her spoke. His demands were inaudible against her chaotic mind, scrounging, praying to the universe to give her a chance to stay alive.

Although the thoughts of wanting to live were centered around herself, Eun-Ju couldn't help but stare at her father as he kneeled against the carpet, rubbing his hands together—begging.

In her entire life, she had never seen her father beg. Their family was prideful and rich, and her father was so used to being on the top that he never looked down to heed the seriousness of his enemies.

His dark hair hung messily in his face. Blood stained his white dress shirt, and his tie hung loose and twisted out of place.

"What do you want?" Her father croaked out hysterically and Eun-Ju felt her heartache at the wrong-sounding notes of his broken and defeated voice. The very depiction of a man that saw death and was helpless to do anything about it.

Kung Yeong-Hwan, the crime boss over the city of Seoul Korea, had his back turned to them. He wore an expensive leather jacket with studded metal over each shoulder and matching jeans. His slicked back, black hair glinted in the light filtering through the open door of her father's balcony that led to his study.

Dozens of skull tattoos peeked from beneath his white rolled-up sleeves. They littered Yeong-Hwan's arms like an overfilled canvas begging for a drop of white, representing each of his kills.

Eun-Ju managed to wiggle the gag from her mouth and thick strings of slobber hung. "Leave him alone!"

The courage came from her deep want for her and her father to live.

All of this happening; the begging, the pleas of someone desperate for the sake of their daughter's life and what did he do?

Yeong-Hwan poured himself a drink of wine—only the finest bottle in her father's costly collection—into a fancy glass as he stirred the liquid in a circle with his hand and wrist.

Eun-Jun wasn't shocked. This was the Mafia Business. To him, he probably saw them as an end to the chapter of yet another life.

He turned on his heels to look at them both, sipping his glass and letting the flavor linger before finally speaking. "Now, Namgung Kyung-Mo, you know exactly why I'm here. You owe me fucking money and it's been two years of you hiding under the radar."

In search of words, her father's mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water.

Yeong-Hwan didn't give Eun-Ju's father a chance to explain before he signaled two of his men to drag her father over to his computer.

They slung him down in his office chair.

"Type the password in." Yeong-Hwan told her father in a steel-cool voice.

This was Eun-Ju's fault. Although she blamed herself, she knew her father would say otherwise. Seven years ago when her brother was dying, her father spent most of his time in the hospital with him the same way he had told them he'd done with their mother.

But all the time spent making sure the last moments of his life was filled with peace and joy, meant more time away from his restaurant business.

Not even a few months later, they plunged into financial debt. Mortgage loan letters had filled their kitchen table right along with her brother's medical ones. She remembered he came to her the night when she was sitting on their front porch beneath a blanket of glittering stars, laying her hopes and dreams on each one.

He told her he was going down to the Gangseo District—the most crime-populated area in South Korea— to make a deal with the Chilsung-pa.

Eun-Ju heard about them back when she was in middle school. Bad teens that stumbled into the wrong crowd spread horrid tales. The Seven Star Mob.

They were devils made in human flesh.

"Type it in!" Yeong-Hwan yelled and both Eun-Ju and her father jumped in place. "I gave you everything and this is how you repay me?"

Her father stared down at his keyboard with a pain-stricken facial expression.

Yeong-Hwan was right. He had given Eun-Ju's father everything since the moment he walked into Yeong-Hwan's office to strike a deal. Ever since then, Yeong-Hwan gave her father money in exchange for his loyalty.

Drug runs. Money laundering. Anything he asked of her father, her father did.

But the older Eun-Ju got, the more she wanted to learn what it was like to struggle. To earn something with her own two hands instead of everything she gained being based on someone else's hard work and success.

Eun-Ju cursed under her breath as she felt more hot tears roll down her face. Now she could admit she was being naive and selfish. Living life on her own wasn't as easy as she thought.

Between her house bills, college, and loans; she ended up owing far too many people for her to count.

Her pride refrained her from confiding in her father, so instead she leeched off the money in his bank account, unaware a good portion of it belonged to the Chilsung-Pa.

"I'm not doing it. You can't kill her. There's always a price. An arm. A leg. A tooth." Her father's voice quivered, prepared to sacrifice limbs in exchange for her safety.

The Chilsung-Pa crime organization controlled others through what they loved. Some people cherished their lives, status, or money. But Eun-Ju was her father's entire world, and Yeong-Hwan was prepared to tear it apart.

Yeong-Hwan took another sip from the glass he held in his hand. He pointed at her father, his brow's upturned in amusement. "Aigoo. There's no point in taking a tooth, a leg, or an arm from you." He shrugged and scrunched his lips. "It'll never break you like killing her will."

Eun-Ju tried to be brave when she heard those words and tried to ease her father's mind. But she couldn't help the helpless high-pitched noise that left her as she imagined her brains being exploded all over the white walls of her father's office.

Her father's face was once more filled with desperation as he spat out, "If you kill her, I won't unlock the computer."

The leader of the Chilsung-Pa gang chuckled, tears pricking the corners of his emotionless eyes. "God you're killing me with that, you can't do this. You can't do that. I can and I will. You think I can't get one of my tech guys to get into your computer?"

Her father's mouth fell open in disbelief.

"I can. I'm giving you the chance to make it easy on my pockets considering this entire shit fest you started." Yeong-Hwan waved off the man that held a gun to Eun-Ju's head.

Her and her father sagged in relief. Though it was short-lived when Yeong-Hwan snatched the gun from his associate hand and decided to hold it there himself.

"I want this personal." Yeong-Hwan laughed and Eun-Ju felt something warm trickle down her legs. She didn't realize what it was until Yeong-Hwan started laughing at her. "Damn, she pissed herself."

"Please-" Her father started.

"Don't beg. That only works on people that have a heart." Yeong-Hwan then nudged Eun-Ju's head using the barrel. "You have any last words to say to Daddy?"

He was mocking her.

What was there to say? 'I love you dad, now blow my damn brains out?'

There was too much running through her mind and now she knew exactly what people meant when they said their life flashed before their eyes.

Eun-Ju remembered everything. Even things she shouldn't have. Her first steps with her mother and father holding her hand. She remembered when she was six years old sitting in the empty hallway of Seoul National University Hospital while her father wept for her dead mother.

That night Eun-Ju curled up in his arms and he held her as though she were the only thing left of her mother. She remembered cradling her little brother shortly after he was born. Them all playing tag in the backyard and falling over in a pile of burnt orange autumn leaves. Then she recalled the worst times. The arguing after her brother died. The constant fighting with her father.

The big rift between them because they didn't understand how to sit down and talk.

They were two wounded people trying to find a means to stitch themselves back together again. Now that time seemed wasted. Even if you could put something broken back together, the pieces never really fit the same. But even so, now she wished she had tried. Wished she attended their family therapy sessions for a mended relationship.

Her bottom lip wobbled and more snot dripped from her nose as she sobbed. Eun-Ju's sight was so blurry she couldn't even see her father anymore. He was streaks of colors mixed with the balcony's sheer billowing curtains.

"I'm sorry Dad." She gasped. Her chest was tight. "I'm so sorry about everything. You should've been blessed with a better daughter."

An Underling pulled the gag back into place.

Her father gasped, and Eun-Ju heard Yeong-Hwan begin to press down on the trigger.

•Bang•

She felt herself fall. The room spun in a thousand colors as she hit the carpet, hearing her father's heart-shattering screams for the only child he had left. And as Eun-Ju slipped into unconsciousness, she prayed her life would be better next time around. With her last breath, she whispered, "I'm sorry."