Chapter : 1
Not long before that incident.
The sound of someone humming outside the room naturally woke Yumin.
Who’s singing this early in the morning?
Before she could even finish the thought, the bedroom door flew open.
“Hong~ Yumin!”
Yumin frowned and sat upright.
Instead of looking at the face of Hong Suji, her cousin who was the same age as her and had barged into the room, she first checked the clock.
It was 7:30 in the morning.
By then, Suji had reached the bed and threw something at Yumin.
“Ah!”
Startled by the sudden impact, Yumin grimaced and looked down.
What had hit her chest and fallen onto the bed was the designer handbag worth tens of millions of won that Suji treasured so dearly.
“You can have that.”
Suji said it as though she were doing Yumin a great favor.
“What?”
“You said you’re going out today. Take that with you.”
At the age of twenty-five, the only place Yumin had to go was the neighborhood piano academy, where she worked twice a week.
The rest of the time, she stayed cooped up in the house, helping with the household chores while constantly watching the moods of Suji’s parents—her uncle and aunt.
There was no other choice. Her uncle’s family had taken care of the tens of billions of won in debt left by the factory fire her father had caused when she was young, as well as her father’s hospital bills.
“You’re not even going to say thank you?”
“Ah, what are you talking about? Where am I supposed to be going? Today isn’t even a day I work at the academy.”
“Why? Didn’t you say you were going to meet someone for a blind date at a hotel today?”
At the unexpected remark, Yumin frowned.
“…What? A blind date?”
“Yeah. From what I heard, the conditions are way too good for you. Fighting. Hehe.”
Suji gave her an unpleasant smirk before leaving the room.
Still half-asleep, Yumin was bewildered after being hit with a handbag and then being told she was supposed to go on a blind date.
She casually tossed Suji’s bag onto the bed and went downstairs.
As if he had been on his way to call her, she happened to make eye contact with her uncle Sanghun, who was coming out of the kitchen.
“Oh, you’re just in time.”
“Did you sleep well?”
“Yeah. Let’s eat.”
Following him into the kitchen, Yumin noticed four coffee cups on the dining table, all apparently emptied.
“Did someone come over?”
At Yumin’s question, her aunt hurriedly cleared the cups into the sink and began preparing breakfast for Yumin.
Before long, soup and rice were placed on the table. There were no side dishes.
“I only served you a little rice on purpose. You don’t look attractive if you gain weight around your stomach.”
“Pardon?”
What were Hong Suji and her aunt talking about today?
As Yumin stood there awkwardly, her uncle gently pushed her back.
“Yumin. The soup is going to get cold. Hurry and sit down to eat.”
With an unwilling expression, Yumin went over and sat down.
Her uncle and aunt sat across from her.
Feeling that they would keep staring at her uncomfortably if she didn’t eat, Yumin reluctantly took a spoonful of rice.
“Yumin.”
Yumin stopped as she was bringing the spoon to her mouth and answered,
“Yes?”
“A proposal came in for Suji. The man is the managing director of a private equity firm called Woomun Partners. I heard they manage assets worth trillions of won.”
“……”
“If you marry into that family, not only you but even your children will be able to live without worrying about money.”
“…I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.”
“What I’m saying is, Suji is still a graduate student. She’s already sensitive these days, so we need to let her focus on her studies for the time being.”
“Then you can just cancel the blind date—”
“You!”
At that moment, her aunt sharply cut Yumin off.
“Do you think you can throw away such a wonderful opportunity? Since we’re talking about it, let me say this. Your father has been in a vegetative state for ten years, you’re drowning in debt, and you dropped out of college. No, you’re only a high school graduate. Do you really think you can have a proper marriage? We practically begged them and managed to arrange this again after the blind date was almost called off—all for your sake!”
Perhaps because she was spouting such ridiculous nonsense as though it were perfectly reasonable, Yumin was left speechless.
“So stop complaining and go!”
“I’m grateful that you’re thinking of me, but I have no intention of getting married—”
“Ugh, you’re really getting on my nerves. If I were you, I’d hurry up and get married and at least pretend to repay the debt you owe us! Just your father’s hospital bills this month are going to be several hundred thousand won!”
Unable to do anything about her reality, Yumin bit down so hard on her lips that they nearly bled.
Secretary Kwon Yongil waited excitedly in front of the main entrance of Taehyun Hotel.
It had been five years.
Five years since he had last seen Seol Jaejun, the chairman’s precious only son and his longtime friend.
After graduating from university, Yongil had immediately begun building his career in the secretary’s office directly under the chairman. Meanwhile, Jaejun had earned his MBA in the United States and gained practical experience working in the operations planning team of one of the group’s hotel subsidiaries.
And now, with Jaejun’s inauguration ceremony as vice president of Taehyun Hotel just a few days away, he had returned to Korea today.
Screech—
A luxury sedan came to a stop in front of Yongil.
Holding his breath nervously, Yongil opened the rear door.
The man sitting inside with an air of lofty elegance slowly raised his gaze toward Yongil before leisurely stepping out.
Watching him effortlessly step onto the ground with his long legs, Yongil was rendered speechless.
His already superior genes had been enhanced by an air of sensuality, giving him an elegant aura that was impossible to approach.
Beneath his refined features was a solid, muscular physique that subtly showed through his clothes, as though he had spent every day in America playing American football as a hobby.
Before studying abroad, he had been a handsome, fair-skinned rich young master. Now, he had returned as such a sexy man that Yongil could barely even think of him as a friend.
“Long time no see?”
Yongil, who had been staring blankly, stammered in response.
“Y-Yeah. Ah, no, Young Master, congratulations on returning to Korea after five years.”
“What’s with ‘Young Master’? That’s creepy.”
Jaejun chuckled, lightly patted Yongil on the shoulder, and walked into the lobby.
Yongil hurried after him and handed him a shopping bag.
“Here’s what you asked for!”
“Oh. Thanks.”
About an hour earlier, Jaejun had called him.
A flight attendant had been pouring wine on the plane when she accidentally spilled it on him, so he had asked Yongil to buy him a new shirt and bring it over.
Yongil had hurried to the department store, bought a shirt, and spent the entire trip cursing the careless flight attendant.
But now he understood.
Even as a man, Yongil felt his heart tremble just looking at Jaejun’s current appearance. He could only imagine how that flight attendant must have felt.
Watching Jaejun disappear into the distance, Yongil muttered to himself.
Talk about feeling distant.
Jaejun had changed his shirt inside a bathroom stall and was just about to fasten the buttons when—
“Hey! Didn’t your blind date get canceled?”
Someone entered the bathroom while talking on the phone using speakerphone.
“Hey, don’t even get me started. Apparently, instead of the girl I was originally supposed to meet, they said her cousin or whatever would be a much better match according to my fortune, so I told them to send me a picture first.”
“Then?”
“Heh heh. She’s freaking beautiful. Even prettier than the original girl. I only looked at her picture, but all my blood rushed straight to one place, you know?”
A faint crease appeared between Jaejun’s brows as he finished buttoning his shirt.
What kind of rude bastard makes a vulgar phone call like that in a public place?
He decided to ignore it, opened the stall door, and stepped outside.
A heavily built man who looked to be in his late forties was standing at the urinal, still talking on the phone.
Jaejun, who was taller than the man, unintentionally glanced at the man’s private parts.
A snort of laughter escaped him.
Why does it look like he has a pinky finger down there?
Perhaps hearing Jaejun’s laugh, the man frowned and abruptly turned around.
He looked Jaejun up and down, then cleared his throat and turned back around.
As though nothing had happened, Jaejun left the bathroom and headed toward the lounge café.
He intended to conduct a discreet inspection of the hotel before his inauguration ceremony.
Just as he sat down and was about to drink the coffee he had ordered—
Thump. Thump.
The floor shook.
The man Jaejun had seen in the bathroom was walking past him, dragging his heavy body along.
A moment later, he plopped himself down at the table directly in front of Jaejun.
Looking at the man’s back, Jaejun muttered coldly,
“What a grand welcome-to-Korea gift.”
Looks like I’m going to get a front-row seat to a filthy blind date.
Without even realizing that the crease between his brows had deepened, he lifted his cup and took a sip.
At that exact moment, a woman entered through the opposite entrance.
Jaejun’s pupils instinctively fixed on her.
Soon, his heart began pounding so violently it felt as though it were going crazy.
Unlike Jaejun, who had completely frozen, the woman hurriedly closed the distance between them and plopped herself down directly in front of the man from the bathroom.
“……”
The coffee he had not yet swallowed brought back even the bitter memories of the past.
His breath caught in his throat, and his anger burst out.
…Fuck.
“Senior. I’ll do all of our group assignment, including your part, so could you lend me just 1 million won?”
Back in college, she had promised to do his assignment for him, only to disappear with the money.
“Jaejun. Isn’t Hong Yumin, your group member, here? Then do it alone.”
“Ah… Professor. I don’t have the materials with me—”
“If you prepared it together, you should know it even without the materials, right? If you can’t do it, just leave.”
She was the junior who had disappeared after giving him the first F of his life.
“Ah, hello. I’m Hong… Yumin.”
She was his unbearably, unforgettable first love.
