Chapter: 06
“Jin Seo-ah!”
At a café in the city, the person who called Seo-ah with a bright voice was her cousin, Jin Se-yeon.
“Unnie.”
The moment she saw Se-yeon, Seo-ah stood up from her seat with tears welling in her eyes.
“How long has it been? Since the last time we saw each other was at your uncle’s funeral, it’s been a little over four months.”
“Yeah, I guess it has.”
After sitting down and checking Seo-ah’s condition, Se-yeon spoke.
“Are you eating properly? Why does your face look so thin?”
Se-yeon gently brushed Seo-ah’s cheek with pity.
Feeling that touch, Seo-ah smiled softly.
For her, Se-yeon’s warmth was a long-awaited “rest.”
When she was young, there were times when Seo-ah desperately wished Se-yeon was her real older sister.
And it was understandable.
Because whenever Seo-ah went through the most dangerous and difficult moments in her life, Se-yeon was always the person who stayed by her side.
From the memory of getting lost during a family trip at the age of five, to the unexplained bullying that began in elementary school, and even when she was seventeen and falsely accused of school violence during her trainee days while dreaming of becoming a singer.
Se-yeon had always protected her with a dependable presence.
“Our Seo-ah, my little sister Seo-ah.”
Her reliable older sister who stood with her back toward Seo-ah and shouted at the villains.
Even now, that warm way Se-yeon called her still felt vivid.
And today, more than ever, those words comforted her heart.
“I missed you so much, unnie.”
Se-yeon tightly held the hand that looked like it might drop tears at any moment.
“Yeah. You’ve been through a lot, my little sister. And I’m sorry I couldn’t go to Dong-ha’s funeral. I found out too late.”
“No, it’s okay.”
Seo-ah could not bring herself to say that she had only been contacted by someone who was not even a member of her husband’s family.
Wasn’t that too humiliating?
Even if she was only a wife in name, being treated like this was painful.
Hiding the ache inside her, Seo-ah looked carefully at Se-yeon’s face after such a long time.
But then……
‘Was unnie’s makeup always this heavy?’
When she saw her before her father’s funeral, she had not looked like this.
Seo-ah could not explain exactly what had changed, but Se-yeon’s strong perfume scent and bright red lipstick felt unfamiliar.
“But why did you ask to meet me?”
“Uh…… huh?”
Seo-ah, who had been staring at Se-yeon’s face, came back to her senses with a startled expression.
“I was wondering if something happened suddenly.”
“Ah.”
The reason Seo-ah contacted Se-yeon was because she could not forget the last unfinished conversation she had with Dong-ha.
“Don’t trust Jin Se-yeon.”
Even though she tried to forget it, that conversation kept coming back to her mind.
Eventually, she contacted Se-yeon first.
“Unnie.”
“Yeah.”
“Did something…… happen between you and Dong-ha oppa?”
“Something? What kind of thing?”
Seo-ah could not easily begin.
“That is…… my last conversation with Dong-ha oppa was strange.”
“Conversation?”
“Yeah. During our conversation, he suddenly brought up you. Out of nowhere.”
For a moment, Se-yeon’s brows narrowed, but they quickly returned to normal.
“What did he say?”
“That……”
A brief silence followed.
Was she making something insignificant into a bigger issue?
Seo-ah worried that she might only hurt Se-yeon’s feelings unnecessarily.
What should she do?
Should she just swallow what she intended to say?
But then she would continue wondering what Dong-ha had wanted to tell her at the end.
“It’s okay. Tell me. Looking at your expression, I think I need to hear it.”
Reassured slightly by Se-yeon’s reaction, Seo-ah carefully spoke.
“I asked him if he knew something about my father’s accident, and he told me not to trust you. Suddenly.”
“What?”
Se-yeon raised her voice so suddenly that Seo-ah was startled.
“U-unnie, sorry. Are you angry?”
Perhaps surprised by her own reaction, Se-yeon quickly softened her expression and answered gently.
“Ah…… no. It was just such an absurd thing to hear.”
“Right? I felt the same, but oppa left without telling me what he meant. That’s why I wanted to meet you.”
“That’s all?”
‘……Did I hear wrong?’
Se-yeon’s voice was so cold that Seo-ah flinched.
The strange feeling she had sensed moments ago suddenly felt less like a misunderstanding.
However, if someone accused her of something, Seo-ah thought she would probably react the same way.
She soon awkwardly reached out and gently held Se-yeon’s hand.
“I’m sorry for making you uncomfortable, unnie. I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
“I just feel a little…… strange about it. It feels unpleasant.”
Se-yeon quietly pulled her hand away from Seo-ah’s thin hand and spoke.
It might have been a meaningless action.
But to Seo-ah, Se-yeon’s behavior felt as if it came from another emotion rather than simple disappointment.
She could not explain exactly what it was.
However, before Seo-ah could resolve that doubt, Se-yeon continued.
“Do you know that Dong-ha Motors released a product identical to Wonjeon Electronics’ product? Did Lee Dong-ha tell you about this?”
At that moment, Seo-ah’s heart dropped.
It was something she herself had struggled to hear from Dong-ha.
Something that had never appeared in even a single article.
How did her unnie know?
Why?
Seo-ah rubbed her unsettled heart with her hand and barely opened her lips.
“W-where did you hear that?”
One corner of Se-yeon’s lips slowly lifted.
“I didn’t think he would actually do it, but he managed to.”
“What…… what do you mean?”
“Hmm……”
Crossing her arms and leaning against the back of the chair, Se-yeon gently swung her crossed leg.
At the same time, she quietly looked at Seo-ah’s flushed face.
Seo-ah also looked at her cousin with an unfamiliar feeling.
What was Se-yeon thinking right now?
Her eyes were on Seo-ah, but it felt like Se-yeon was looking at something beyond her.
Then, for a moment, a mocking smile appeared at the corner of Se-yeon’s mouth before disappearing.
‘What was that just now?’
Seo-ah’s anxious heart could no longer wait.
“Unnie?”
At her voice, Se-yeon returned her gaze that had wandered elsewhere.
“Ah, sorry. I was just organizing my thoughts.”
Se-yeon corrected her crooked posture and looked directly at Seo-ah.
Then Se-yeon’s eyebrows slowly curved downward.
“Don’t tell me Dong-ha Motors’ successor said he didn’t know anything? If he wasn’t looking down on you, he wouldn’t have tried to cover it up with such an obvious excuse. Right?”
“……!”
Seo-ah’s eyes shook.
Just as Se-yeon said, Dong-ha had said he knew nothing.
He only said that he followed his father’s order to marry her.
But Seo-ah herself never truly believed that Dong-ha knew nothing.
The situation was too strange, and his words could not be trusted.
He was someone who had deceived her and even entered a fake marriage with her.
If anything, her distrust had only grown.
Nothing had been resolved.
While Seo-ah was lost in confusion, Se-yeon mentioned a name.
“Do you know Kang Tae-gyeong?”
“……Huh? Who?”
For some reason, the name sounded familiar.
Where had she heard it?
“Kang Tae-gyeong. The head of Taeyu Motors’ Future Strategy Office.”
“Taeyu? The company that suddenly notified my father’s company about contract termination……”
“That’s right. He is the head of the Future Strategy Office there.”
“……!”
Seo-ah’s hands began trembling.
It was a company she had heard about through Dong-ha as well.
“But why is that person……”
“I don’t know if telling you this will help, but there is a rumor.”
“A…… rumor?”
“Yeah.”
Afraid that Se-yeon’s voice would be drowned out by the sound of her own pounding heart, Seo-ah repeatedly swallowed dryly.
“Kang Tae-gyeong is the second son of Taeyu Group. After graduating from university overseas, he began receiving management training at Taeyu Motors six years ago.”
“Yeah……”
“But around four years later? He was sent away to an overseas branch. A demotion because of money issues.”
“Money…… issues?”
Se-yeon slowly nodded.
“Even if he is the third generation of a conglomerate family, do you think Vice Chairman Kang Min-cheol would have stayed silent if his son was secretly creating slush funds by taking company money? Since he was still his son, he just sent him overseas to cover it up.”
Seo-ah swallowed a shocked breath at the unbelievable story.
“But they say people don’t change their habits. Once he was overseas, there were no eyes watching him and no one controlling him. How convenient must it have been? While looking around for something profitable, he discovered Wonjeon Electronics.”
“Huh.”
At the mention of her father’s company, Seo-ah covered her mouth with both hands.
“Since his goal was money laundering through the overseas branch, he pushed aside a small company like Wonjeon Electronics and searched for a company to replace it. The purpose was probably a double contract. That would make it easier to move the slush funds.”
Seo-ah did not realize that the story which began as a rumor was gradually becoming something closer to a confirmed truth.
“The reason Dong-ha Motors was able to become connected with Taeyu must have been because of this. What other reason could there be? A company that did not even have an electric vehicle developer from the beginning.”
What kind of job did Se-yeon have to know all these hidden details?
How much should she believe from her cousin’s words?
The cousin who she knew worked at a small company in Seoul.
Seo-ah’s eyes became filled with confusion.
