Chapter 10…

Shh!

Da-hee quickly withdrew her hand and asked hesitantly, unusually timid for her.

“Would it be okay if I borrowed it just for a moment?”

At that, Geon-woo tilted his head at an angle, and something changed in his gaze.

“How should I put this? Isn’t that kind of trick a little outdated?”

“Huh? What do you mean…?”

“Well, trends do come back around, so I suppose it’s refreshing in its own way.”

“What exactly are you talking about?”

“You’re curious about my phone number, aren’t you?”

“What? N-no, I’m not!”

Crash!

The chair she had been sitting on toppled backward. To make matters worse, Da-hee jumped to her feet and let out such a loud cry that everyone turned to look at her, including Geon-woo and the pedestrians passing by.

Flustered by all the attention, Da-hee’s face turned bright red. She covered it with her hands and lowered her head.

“What is it, then? If you’re not asking for my phone so you can get my number?”

“Loca…tion…”

Geon-woo couldn’t hear her quiet mumbling, so he slipped his hands into his coat pockets and leaned forward.

“What was that? I can’t hear you.”

“I was trying to look up the location of my meeting place!”

The moment Da-hee raised her flushed face, she came face-to-face with Geon-woo, whose eyes were level with hers. She jumped in surprise.

They were far too close. His forehead was practically touching the brim of the cap he had put on her head.

Looking steadily at Da-hee, who had frozen like a block of ice, Geon-woo asked again.

“So, you were trying to look up the location of the meeting place you mentioned earlier?”

Da-hee quickly took a step back and nodded slightly.

“To be honest, this is my first time in this neighborhood. I did arrange to meet someone nearby, but I can’t remember the exact location.”

“What about your phone?”

“I don’t have one. I dropped it in water, and it broke. So I brought this instead, but I fell earlier, and now it’s like this.”

Da-hee took out her tablet, its screen cracked and completely unresponsive, and showed it to him with a troubled expression.

The moment Geon-woo heard that she had brought this enormous tablet instead of a phone, the image of the woman falling from beneath the bridge flashed through his mind.

If he hadn’t rescued her before the emergency responders arrived, she might have died.

Her phone had probably broken during that incident, and she must not have had the time or the presence of mind to get a new one since then.

Looking sympathetically at the tablet’s badly cracked screen, Geon-woo asked, “Where are you supposed to meet?”

“Blue Moon. It’s a café around here.”

After listening to Da-hee’s answer, Geon-woo nodded slowly. Then, without saying another word, he went back into the convenience store.

What’s with him?

Da-hee blinked in confusion at Geon-woo’s utterly unpredictable behavior. A moment later, he came back out.

She wondered if he had bought something else, but his hands were empty.

Geon-woo straightened the chair Da-hee had knocked over and dusted off his hands.

“Let’s go.”

“Where?”

“I’ll walk you there. To your meeting place.”

“…What? Why?”

“Because I know the way. Come on.”

“??”

Geon-woo’s faint smile was reflected in Da-hee’s wide, round eyes. With his hands in his pockets, he strode off ahead of her.

“Are you coming or not? It’s almost time for your appointment.”

“Oh! I’m coming, I’m coming.”

Scratching her cheek, Da-hee hurried after him.

Geon-woo glanced back at her, then slowed his pace and shortened his stride so they could walk side by side.

Da-hee seemed lost in deep thought. She was so distracted that she didn’t even notice him watching her, and there was something strangely vacant about her expression.

Unable to watch any longer, Geon-woo stopped.

Da-hee, who had walked a step or two ahead of him, belatedly stopped and turned around. She glanced around as though wondering if they had already arrived at the meeting place, then looked at Geon-woo.

“Why did you stop?”

“I hope I’m wrong about this.”

“About what?”

“Your meeting at the café.”

“I’m not lying! It’s real!”

At Da-hee’s emphatic response, Geon-woo folded his arms and asked in a low voice, “Then who are you meeting there?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“Because I think you might need my help. Answer honestly, and I’ll help you. If you don’t, then forget it.”

“Excuse me, what exactly are you trying to say…?”

How can someone be this oblivious?

Geon-woo swallowed the thought and shook his head.

The café Blue Moon was just around the corner, about ten meters ahead. Geon-woo had a good instinct for these things, and he had started to suspect something was wrong as soon as they approached the café.

Several vans were parked in a row along the roadside, where vehicles normally weren’t allowed to stop. People carrying various pieces of equipment were moving busily back and forth. At a glance, they looked like reporters from different media outlets.

What seemed suspicious, however, was how carefully they watched their surroundings as they moved about.

“Are you planning to hold a press conference at the café?”

“Huh? No. The person I’m meeting is the manager from my former agency.”

“Hmm. Maybe I’ve got it wrong.”

Then are those people lying in wait to cover me rather than Do Da-hee?

It was also possible that the reporters were simply waiting nearby because they couldn’t enter the wealthy residential neighborhood, where outsiders were being stopped at the entrance.

Either way, Geon-woo had no desire to deal with the press. If photographs of him and Do Da-hee together were published, the fallout would be even more uncontrollable than it already was.

However, if his instincts were right, the reporters had been glancing in his direction—or, more precisely, Da-hee’s direction—for a while now. They seemed uncertain, as though they were trying to confirm something.

Deciding that he couldn’t let this continue, Geon-woo grabbed Da-hee’s arm, pulled her closer, and lowered his voice.

“Three men across the street on the left. One woman beside them. Two people inside the black van parked along the roadside. And two men with cameras at the entrance to the corner.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Wouldn’t you know better than I do? It looks like you’re the one they’re after, not me.”

“What…!”

“Do you still not understand? You’ve walked right into a trap.”

Only then did Da-hee grasp the situation. Her eyes widened.

“A trap? You mean the reporters have spread out all over this area?”

“That certainly seems to be the case.”

No way. Han Jun-sang… Did he tip off the reporters that I was meeting him?

Agreeing to the meeting so readily had been a mistake, but she had never imagined he would go so far as to set a trap and wait for her.

“I was being far too careless.”

Geon-woo gave her a look that seemed to say, You’re only realizing that now?

Reading his expression, Da-hee let out a deep sigh.

“What should I do?”

“Why are you asking me?”

“You said you’d help if I told you honestly who I was meeting.”

“Please help me. I’m begging you.”

As Geon-woo looked at Da-hee’s anxious eyes, his gaze narrowed and turned cold.

1:45 p.m.

There were only fifteen minutes left until the scheduled meeting.

Han Jun-sang had been anxiously waiting for Da-hee to arrive. But when he saw the number of reporters gradually increasing, he got up from his seat.

“Hey, Reporter Kang! What the hell is going on out there?”

“Well, sir, everyone’s desperate to get an exclusive. I think they found out that you and Do Da-hee were meeting here today.”

“Does that make any sense? Did you blab about it, Reporter Kang?”

“No, I didn’t. I have no idea how the information got out either… I warned them to stay farther away, but they’re refusing to leave.”

“I specifically told you to come here alone and keep it quiet! If she sees people openly walking around with cameras, do you think Do Da-hee will come inside?”

“I’m sorry. I’ll get them to clear out right away.”

Reporter Kang hurried outside to deal with the journalists from the other media outlets who were lingering nearby.

Unhappy with how things were unfolding, Han Jun-sang anxiously called Da-hee.

But her phone remained switched off, and she wasn’t replying to his messages either.

Could she have figured it out already and run away?

Just then—

“Hey, isn’t that Do Da-hee over there?”

“What? Where?”

The commotion outside the café suddenly erupted into a full-blown uproar.

Seeing the uninvited reporters hurriedly rushing off in one direction, Han Jun-sang could no longer contain himself and swore under his breath.

At that very moment, Da-hee was gripping the hem of Geon-woo’s coat tightly, her face tense with anxiety.

Just as Geon-woo had said, the area around the café was swarming with reporters. Going to meet Han Jun-sang now would be like walking unarmed into a den full of tigers.

And the only person she could trust and rely on right now was the man standing in front of her.

“Mr. Jang Geon-woo, please.”

Noticing how the hand clutching his coat trembled, Geon-woo narrowed his eyes. He let out a brief sigh and discreetly surveyed their surroundings.

Da-hee hadn’t noticed yet, but more and more people were beginning to look their way. Even the man across the street, who had apparently been unsure of their identities, was slowly approaching them.

If Geon-woo put the skills he had honed on the battlefield to use, he could easily take on a dozen or more people in hand-to-hand combat, even without a weapon.

But if he did that in the middle of downtown Seoul, the whole place would descend into chaos.

“My preference is to face things head-on rather than run away, but I suppose we have no choice this time.”

Before Da-hee could ask what he meant, Geon-woo casually wrapped an arm around her shoulders and spoke in a low voice.

“From now on, move quickly and follow my lead. Whatever you do, don’t look back.”

The moment Da-hee nodded, Geon-woo led her into the commercial building directly in front of them.

The building was somewhat run-down, and most of the shops on the first floor were either vacant or closed.

After quickly surveying the interior, Geon-woo immediately led Da-hee through an emergency exit with a staircase.

Just before he quietly shut the door, he caught sight of the group of reporters chasing after them.

“Looks like they’ve figured it out. That you’re Do Da-hee.”

“! Wait, did you know who I was from the beginning?”

“Yes.”

“Then why did you pretend not to know?”