Chapter 07
The name on the screen was Kim Eun-jung.
She was the CEO of [The Heritage], the wedding dress shop where Harry worked as head designer, and Harry’s one and only close friend.
Harry hurriedly pressed the call button.
“Hello.”
āHey! Ban Harry! What the hell happened to you! Why haven’t you been answering your phone!
Eun-jung’s urgent, worried shriek burst through the receiver.
“Sorry, Eun-jung. I’ve been so swamped I couldn’t reach out.”
āYou said you were just going to watch the wedding and come backādid something happen? I saw the news, the bride collapsed and it was chaosā¦
Harry bit her lip.
She couldn’t tell the truth.
That the collapsed bride at that wedding was none other than herself.
“ā¦Nothing happened.”
āWhere are you now? Home? Should I come over?
“No. I’m not home. I justā¦ came a little far away to clear my head.”
āFar away? Where!
At Eun-jung’s persistent questioning, Harry swallowed a sigh and changed the subject.
“Eun-jung. I’m really sorry, but I don’t think I can come to the shop for a while. Pass the urgent matters to the manager, and I’ll send the design drafts by email. I’m sorry.”
āHey, Ban Harry! Something’s going on with you, isn’t it?
Eun-jung’s voice sharpened with suspicion through the receiver.
Just as Harry was about to hurriedly make an excuseā
Click.
With a heavy scraping sound, the firmly closed study door opened.
Tae-min, walking out with darkness at his back, fixed his gaze on Harry’s phone.
“I-I’ll call you later! Later! Sorry!”
Harry quickly ended the call.
Tae-min cut through the cool air of the living room and stood before Harry.
His languid face from moments ago, telling her to seduce him, was goneāreplaced by cold eyes meeting hers.
“Follow me.”
He spoke in a flat, commanding tone.
“ā¦What? Whereā¦”
As Harry hesitated, flustered, Tae-min bent down and brought his face close to hers.
Their noses almost brushedāa perilous distance.
The thick scent of him washing over her made Harry’s shoulders stiffen.
“Don’t make me say it twice.”
His threatening voice was enough to freeze her to the bone.
His dark eyes bound her, refusing to allow even the slightest rebellion.
Without waiting for her answer, Tae-min turned away without hesitation.
Overwhelmed by his presence, Harry had no choice but to follow that broad back.
*
The place they went was the outdoor terrace connected to the first floor.
Under the cascading moonlight, the white marble floor glowed elegantly.
Thin curtains fluttered in the night breeze from the garden, and a table was set with red wine and finger foods.
It was a romantic night.
At least on the surface.
But Harry’s expression, seated in her chair, was far from romantic.
She wore large sunglasses and chewed her lips in dissatisfaction.
“Do we really have to go this far?”
Sunglasses at night.
It was so dark she could barely see where the wine glass was.
“I can’t make you wear a mask while you eat.”
Tae-min sat across from her and replied indifferently.
“No matter how you spin it, eating dinner in sunglasses at nightā¦ people will think I’m crazy.”
Harry gestured with her chin toward the employees in the dining room.
“I don’t care.”
Tae-min chuckled and took a sip of wine.
“Jung Hee-sun was always an arrogant and eccentric woman. Acting normal would actually be more suspicious.”
Harry swallowed a sigh and gnawed on her thumbnail.
“Your nails.”
In an instant, Tae-min’s hand reached across the table, seized her wrist, and pulled it away from her mouth.
“Don’t show your anxiety. Everyone’s watching.”
“ā¦Who?”
“Over there.”
Tae-min’s gaze turned toward the floor-to-ceiling windows of the dining room.
Among the bustling employees, there was a middle-aged woman with particularly sticky, lingering eyes.
Her gaze was cold and unpleasant, like a snake stalking its prey.
“She’s someone Seo Young-joon planted.”
“Whyā¦”
“You know. What Jung Hee-sun and Seo Young-joon were to each other.”
Seo Young-joonāthe man who, on the day of the wedding, had rolled around like an animal with Jung Hee-sun, who was about to become his younger brother’s wife, in the bride’s waiting room.
“He’ll want to know what I’m doing with Jung Hee-sun here. Especially what we’re doing at night.”
“ā¦You’re insane.”
Disgust laced Harry’s low-voiced reply.
But Tae-min, with a relaxed expression, twisted his lips into a bitter smile.
“But aren’t you curious?”
Tae-min leaned forward across the table, closing the distance.
“What I’d have to do right here to make Seo Young-joon have a seizure.”
The thick scent of wine and musk mingled, constricting Harry’s breath.
“What are youā¦”
Harry flinched and pulled her head back, but Tae-min’s large hand gripped the back of her chair, blocking her escape.
“Stay still.”
Before Harry could answer, Tae-min propped himself on the table and pushed his face toward her.
The hot breath washed over her as the distance closed, and Harry froze like a statue.
“O-oppaā¦”
The title that slipped between Harry’s lips sharply scraped against Tae-min’s nerves.
The word “oppa” stimulated him more explicitly than any lewd moan.
“You only call me oppa at times like this.”
His gaze landed on the sunglasses covering Harry’s face.
“These are a bit annoying.”
Slowlyā
Tae-min’s hand slid the sunglasses off Harry’s face.
Her face, hidden behind the dark lenses, was revealed.
Meeting her finely trembling eyes, a sadistic impulse surged within himāto bind her even more cruelly.
Tae-min whispered in a low, commanding tone.
“Harry, tilt your head a little.”
“What? N-no, waitā¦”
Before she could finish her sentence, Tae-min’s grip on the back of her head tightened with force.
Before she could resist, her head was tilted back.
“Ughā¦!”
A searing heat radiated from the hand gripping her nape.
At the end of her forcibly twisted vision, Tae-min’s dark eyes glinted as if to devour her.
The moment she drew a breath, his face surged toward her.
“!”
Just before contact, he deftly twisted the angle.
Through the window, to the eyes of the watcher, it would look unmistakably like a deep kissābut in reality, only their hot breaths touched.
Yet to Harry, it was more stimulating than any physical act.
Close enough to count the number of Tae-min’s long eyelashes.
Their noses brushed, and their hot breaths mingled chaotically.
‘Noā¦’
It was more dangerous than what she’d imagined while looking in the mirror.
Her heart pounded as if it would burst, and the loud thumping seemed sure to reach Tae-min’s ears.
Tae-min’s gaze lingered on Harry’s moist lips.
Was it an illusion that he hesitated for the briefest moment, as if he truly might kiss her?
In that instant, the hand gripping the back of her head fell away.
“That’s enough.”
With a low voice, Tae-min’s face pulled back.
Behind him, the woman who had been watching them had also disappeared.
As if he’d finished what he needed to do, only cold rationality once again lingered in Tae-min’s eyes.
It was almost as if the hot breath that had been hovering near her lips moments ago had been an illusion.
“Let’s go in now.”
He left Harry behind and stepped away from the table.
Trembling, Harry gripped the table and barely managed to rise.
At the edge of her wavering vision, she saw his cold back striding into the annex.
The gentle voice that had tickled her ear.
The hand that had held such searing warmth.
All of it was gone, and the cold night breeze filled the empty space.
Harry unconsciously brushed her lips with the back of her hand.
Then slowly, she moved her steps to follow behind Tae-min.
[file content end]
