Chapter 6
Woojin confirmed in his calm, matter-of-fact tone that Sua had not misheard him.
Trying desperately to make sense of this bewildering situation, Sua soon shook her head.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t understand. Why do I have to live with you, Young Master?”
She needed to make it clear that this was unacceptable.
Even if Woojin had been living abroad, it wasn’t as though he had nowhere else to stay in Korea. He could stay at his parents’ house, in an apartment he owned, or, at the very least, in a hotel.
His request to live in the house where his sister-in-law was left alone simply didn’t sound normal.
“I don’t know what improper thoughts you may be having.”
As if he could read every thought running through Sua’s mind, Woojin continued calmly.
“But this is a process to verify that you’re truly innocent, so I ask for your understanding.”
“What… exactly does that mean?”
Woojin clicked his tongue softly.
“To be honest, I don’t completely trust you yet, Sister-in-law.”
Sua was left speechless by his blunt words.
So she hadn’t imagined the sharp look in Woojin’s eyes earlier after all.
“The only way for me to clear my suspicions about you is to keep an eye on you from up close. That’s why I can’t show you the evidence I’ve gathered yet. If anything, shouldn’t you be the one to show me that I can trust you? After all, the person who lays their cards on the table first should get something in return.”
Woojin’s argument was so meticulous and reasonable that there was hardly any room to refute it.
Having seized the initiative, Woojin relentlessly backed Sua into a corner.
“And my parents, along with everyone else in the family, still don’t know that I’ve returned to Korea.”
“Why? Wouldn’t it be easier to clear up your suspicions with your parents’ help?”
“I believe the person who killed my brother is someone in our family. That includes you, Sister-in-law, and even my parents.”
It was one shock after another.
Sua had to cover her mouth to keep herself from screaming.
The horrifying hypothesis she had never even imagined was being laid out by Woojin without the slightest change in his expression.
He sounded almost emotionless, as though he were talking about someone else’s life, someone completely unrelated to him.
Perhaps that was what made it sound even more unreal.
“Does this make my request sound less unreasonable from your perspective?”
“Do you even realize what you’re saying right now?”
“It’s a hypothesis built on sound evidence.”
Ah.
She couldn’t take it anymore.
Despite all her efforts to hold herself together, Sua’s delicate body finally gave way under the shock, and she collapsed onto the floor.
Woojin’s gaze followed her downward.
“When I’m certain that I can completely trust you, I’ll show you the evidence.”
It might have been easier to believe that he was a ghost.
The sheer eeriness of him left Sua feeling as though she were about to be devoured at any moment.
Woojin looked at her with something akin to pity.
“I hope my hypothesis is wrong, too. But if I’m right, shouldn’t we find the culprit all the more urgently? If only for the sake of my brother, who’s dead.”
She had thought that once the funeral was over, she would finally be able to leave this family behind.
But everything had gone completely off course.
A problem far greater than her husband’s death now awaited her.
If it came to light, it would be more than enough to send shock waves through the entire family.
“If I were to start staying long-term at some hotel in Seoul, word would inevitably reach my parents within a day. But if I stay at my parents’ house, where everything I do would be reported to them, I’d be heavily restricted.”
Ironically, the safest place for the younger brother who suspected that his older brother’s murderer was someone within the family to hide was the dead man’s own house.
It was the darkest place beneath the candlestick—the perfect place to conceal his identity.
—No matter what happens, protect this house. Then everything that’s been turned upside down will return to where it belongs.
For some reason, Ha-jin’s final words suddenly came to mind.
Those words, which had somehow become his last will and testament, pierced Sua’s heart one by one.
“If living with your brother-in-law makes you feel as though you’re committing a sin, then keep this in mind. Your husband is no longer of this world.”
“I don’t think Ha-jin being no longer of this world gives me the right to do anything shameful to him.”
Sua shot back sharply as Woojin tried to drive the point home.
She had often resented the rigid nature of her grandfather, whose uncompromising character had driven the family into a corner.
But in the end, Sua had inherited that same blood.
Blood that demanded she live honestly, in a way that would never make her ashamed of herself.
For the first time, Woojin faltered, seemingly caught off guard.
Then, all at once, the fierce determination that had blazed in Sua subsided.
The change was as sudden as a lamp flame being struck by a torrential downpour.
“But… there really isn’t another way.”
Even so, Sua knew.
“If we’re going to catch the culprit…”
Even after learning that Ha-jin’s death had been a murder, there was nothing she could do on her own.
She needed to earn Woojin’s trust first—the trust of the man who possessed evidence she knew nothing about—so she could find out exactly what that evidence was.
“If you want to clear your suspicions about me…”
From the moment he arrived to this outrageous request, there wasn’t a single thing she could choose for herself.
After standing there blankly for a moment, Sua made a proposal.
“I’ll use the bedroom on the first floor that I normally use. You can use the bedroom on the second floor, where the guest rooms are.”
“As much as possible, let’s agree not to intrude on each other’s space.”
To outsiders, it would look as though they were simply living under the same roof, regardless of the circumstances.
But even within the house, they needed their own rules and boundaries.
They needed to draw a line that neither of them could ever cross, so that any unforeseen accidents could be prevented before they happened.
“Except when we’re talking about Ha-jin.”
With that, Sua tried to get back on her feet.
Woojin instinctively reached out to steady her.
But Sua avoided his hand and managed to stand on her own.
“And I believe your frightening hypothesis must be wrong, Young Master.”
Woojin stared down at the palm of the hand she had rejected.
“If it were true, Ha-jin’s life would have been unbearably tragic.”
Sua’s voice trembled precariously.
Woojin stared at her with an unreadable expression as she fought back tears for a husband she hadn’t even loved.
But Sua didn’t see his gaze.
She simply dragged her exhausted body toward the bedroom.
The moment she closed the door, she collapsed onto the soft bed.
It was still impossible to believe.
That she would never see the husband who had lain beside her every night ever again.
Sua gently stroked the empty space where Ha-jin had once been.
It still felt as though his warmth and scent lingered here.
As though if she reached out her arm, she could touch his body lying there in his usual neat posture.
A thick tear she could no longer hold back rolled down the bridge of her nose and fell.
Soon, her emotions grew even more intense, and Sua eventually sobbed silently.
She knew there was no way her crying could be heard all the way upstairs where her brother-in-law was.
Even so, she couldn’t bring herself to make a sound.
More than anything, she didn’t want Woojin to know.
If only I’d confessed to him.
Even if he’d rejected me outright, at least I wouldn’t have had any regrets.
As always, regret had come too late, and there was nothing Sua could turn back.
All she could do was uncover the truth surrounding Ha-jin’s death, if there really was a hidden truth, and allow him to rest in peace.
And so, without anyone knowing, the uncomfortable cohabitation between a sister-in-law and her brother-in-law began.
Her entire body felt as heavy as cotton soaked through with water.
She tried to sit up, but her body refused to obey.
Her head felt as though it were splitting apart, and she was chilled to the bone.
Without even realizing it, she seemed to have been moaning in discomfort repeatedly.
Every muscle in her body ached, much like after an exhausting workout.
It was harsher than she had imagined, but she had expected something like this to happen to some extent.
Her first experience of her husband’s funeral had been grueling in itself, and the emotional strain had been overwhelming.
Once the tension that had kept her body going finally released, it had collapsed all at once.
Her throat was parched, but she didn’t even have the strength to get water.
And even if she wanted to ask someone for help, her phone was lying all the way over on the table.
Sua exhaled a hot breath.
Just as she was having the silly thought that perhaps a person could actually die like this, a large hand reached out and touched her forehead.
Sua opened her feverish, dazed eyes.
“You have quite a high fever.”
A familiar voice spoke.
As her blurred vision gradually cleared, his face slowly came into focus.
“Can you get up?”
“…Ha-jin?”
Out of her senses, Sua called out Ha-jin’s name.
The man before her didn’t deny it.
So Sua wanted to believe that he was Ha-jin.
She reached out and embraced him, bursting into tears.
“I don’t know… what I’m supposed to do without you anymore.”
As Woojin looked down at Sua murmuring those words, he simply picked her up into his arms.
She was astonishingly thin, light as a feather.
It was almost unbelievable that someone so fragile had managed to endure the cold funeral.
Still trembling faintly, Sua instinctively burrowed into Woojin’s warm embrace.
Every part of her that touched him sent a strange tingling sensation through him.
After carrying the sleeping woman to his car, Woojin drove toward the nearest hospital emergency room, gradually increasing his speed.
For some reason, he suddenly felt pressed for time.
Sua’s head, damp with cold sweat, kept drooping forward.
Woojin slammed his hand against the steering wheel in irritation.
An unfamiliar emotion began to rise within him.
Just like the flush of fever spreading across her face.
