Chapter: 01
“What do you mean by that?”
Seo-ah hurriedly grabbed the collar of her husband Lee Dong-ha’s clothes as he finished getting ready to go out.
“Don’t trust Jin Se-yeon.”
Dong-ha, who had been checking his appearance in front of the mirror, had suddenly said something strange.
What she wanted to know was about her father’s accident.
Four months ago, Seo-ah’s father had taken his own life two months after his daughter’s marriage.
It was something she simply could not believe.
The day of the accident had been Jin Seo-ah’s birthday.
What parent in the world would choose to die on the birthday of their only daughter?
Especially when a family dinner had already been planned.
It was a tragic accident, but the claims of the bereaved family that it could not have been suicide and the police’s claim that it was suicide had been firmly opposed.
In this situation, the only person Seo-ah could rely on was Dong-ha.
Because of their marriage, her father’s company, ‘Won Electronics’, and her father-in-law’s company, ‘Dong-ha Motors’, had recently begun frequent exchanges.
Then, could it be possible that Lee Dong-ha knew something?
She had waited anxiously through his long silence, secretly hoping for an answer.
But instead, her husband had unexpectedly brought up the name of her cousin.
It was unbelievable.
Se-yeon was the person Seo-ah trusted the most.
Dong-ha also knew that fact very well, so why was he bringing up such an uncomfortable topic?
“Oppa?”
However, even when Seo-ah urged him, Dong-ha seemed more concerned with checking his wristwatch.
“Dong-ha oppa!”
As Seo-ah’s voice grew louder, he frowned as if desperately holding back a sigh that had risen to his chin.
His expression was one of frustration toward a woman who would not know anything and had no way of finding out.
“Our marriage… Have you never thought it was strange?”
“……What?”
As if swallowing back the words he had intended to say, Dong-ha took a deep breath and shook his head.
“No. Forget it. I’ll organize my thoughts and talk to you again.”
Seo-ah could not understand why Dong-ha had suddenly brought up their marriage.
What connection could her father’s death possibly have with their marriage?
“I don’t know what is strange or what you’re trying to organize, but please. I want you to answer my question first.”
“It’s not something I can explain easily. About Jin Se-yeon and your father’s matter… First, I have to go to the airport and come back. Then we’ll talk.”
“Oppa!”
During the months she had lived with him, Seo-ah had never once seen Lee Dong-ha say something carelessly.
There had to be a reason why someone like him was speaking so incoherently now.
“Whether it’s about Se-yeon unni or our marriage, that isn’t what matters right now. And the airport? Why are you avoiding the topic today? I asked if you knew why my father died. That’s what I want to know!”
Seo-ah could not believe either the autopsy result saying her father had died from a fall or the police saying it was suicide.
Who could understand the feelings of someone walking through a dark reality where she could not predict even an inch ahead?
Even in this situation, her husband and his family treated Seo-ah completely like a stranger—no, even worse than a stranger—ignoring her and pretending not to know anything.
“Even if we aren’t a couple who share everything as a married couple… isn’t this wrong? He was still your father-in-law. How could you…”
“I’m not okay either. Don’t push everything onto me.”
“Really? Then tell me everything before you go.”
Seo-ah spread her arms wide and blocked the entrance to the room.
Dong-ha’s gaze landed on her determined face that showed no intention of stepping aside.
Jin Seo-ah was still dazzlingly beautiful, even at this moment with bloodshot eyes and dry, cracked lips.
Yet even with such a woman as his wife, Dong-ha’s gaze remained cold and sharp.
As if he only wanted to escape from this troublesome situation, he merely brushed back his neatly combed hair and narrowed his brows.
“It’s late. I’m leaving.”
The moment he looked down at his wrist again, Seo-ah snatched his wristwatch and threw it away.
“Jin Seo-ah!”
“I need to know! I need to hear it today, no matter what! What do you know? Why can’t you tell me?!”
At Seo-ah’s heightened voice, Dong-ha tightly closed his eyes.
He had intended to tell her everything anyway.
Because from the day he married her until now, he had not spent even a single comfortable day.
But for him to give her an honest answer, there was simply too little time right now.
“……”
The longer Dong-ha remained silent as if thinking, the more desperate Seo-ah’s eyes became.
In the end, realizing he could not move on without saying anything, he opened his mouth.
“……Someone intentionally leaked confidential information from your father’s company, Won Electronics.”
“……What?”
The story that came out after a brief silence was something Seo-ah had difficulty understanding immediately.
But Dong-ha did not wait until she understood.
He seemed eager to end this exhausting argument and escape from his wife as quickly as possible.
“After that, on the day your father had the accident, our company released the exact same…”
Dong-ha’s words suddenly stopped.
As if even he could not believe the truth he was saying with his own mouth.
“Oppa?”
At Seo-ah’s voice, Dong-ha swallowed dryly and moved his lips as if he was about to continue.
“……The exact same product was released. Because of that, Taeyu Motors, which was a partner company, canceled their contract with Won Electronics, using confidential information leakage as the reason.”
For Seo-ah, it was one unexpected event after another.
“What happened?”
“It’s exactly as I explained.”
“Does that make sense? Why did your company make the same thing as Won Electronics’ product? Why?!”
“……”
“D-don’t tell me… your company did it on purpose? You said confidential information was leaked, and that’s why Won Electronics lost the contract!”
Dong-ha did not answer yes so easily.
Even he could not be certain about that.
“Answer me! I’m asking you!”
After her repeated questioning, Dong-ha slowly raised his head and looked at Seo-ah.
“Based on the circumstances, it might be true. But still…”
At that moment, Seo-ah remembered something.
The day when her father’s struggling company, Won Electronics, suddenly received an investment proposal from her father-in-law’s company.
The proposal had come with one condition.
Their marriage.
“Hah! Don’t tell me… you married me on purpose using investment as an excuse? Was this your goal all along? To steal my father’s company’s confidential information and do something else?!”
As if he had expected Seo-ah’s reaction to some extent, Dong-ha tried to maintain his calm despite her fierce expression.
“It may sound like an excuse, but I didn’t know our side invested in Won Electronics. One day, my father suddenly mentioned you, and I only agreed to the marriage.”
Seo-ah was speechless.
It was not a marriage born from a love so deep that they could not live without each other, but they had still spent six months together.
Even after spending enough time for feelings that did not exist before to grow, this man’s excuse remained cold.
“Let’s talk after I come back.”
Dong-ha passed Seo-ah and finally left the room.
“Where are you going?!”
As he entered the second-floor staircase and walked quickly, Seo-ah’s heart became increasingly anxious.
“No, tell me now.”
When she grabbed his arm and turned him around, Dong-ha’s expression was calm, but his voice trembled strangely as he spoke.
“Gi-young…… is leaving today. I’ll only see him off and come back.”
That name again.
The tips of Seo-ah’s fingers gripping Dong-ha’s jacket trembled.
Kim Gi-young and Lee Dong-ha had always been unusually close and strangely affectionate with each other.
Even so, at a time when there were so many things she needed to uncover about her father-in-law’s accident, she could not understand why that name appeared again.
It made her unbearably angry.
“You have the order wrong. Even in this situation, Kim Gi-young comes first? Is that person’s name really so important? Your family ruined my family, and my father died because of it!”
Dong-ha pushed away Seo-ah’s enraged hand and finally grabbed the front door handle without looking back.
“I’ll come back. After I return, I’ll tell you everything. I really will.”
The man who had never smiled at Seo-ah even once smiled at her for the first time, and as if he had foreseen the end, it was a smile that seemed like both his first and last.
“Oppa, Dong-ha oppa! Hey, Lee Dong-ha!”
And then.
Leaving Seo-ah’s calls behind him, Lee Dong-ha walked out of the house.
Two hours later, he died in a traffic accident.
It happened when she was still very young.
She was only twenty-six years old.
The last week of February, when the cold winds of winter still lingered.
At the funeral hall of a university hospital in Pyeonghan City, Gyeonggi Province.
A man’s shout instantly shattered the silence inside the funeral room number 5.
“Team Leader! Team Leader Kang Tae-gyeong!”
The desperate voice caused the atmosphere inside the funeral hall to become noisy in an instant.
However, despite his sharp calls, the man who had stepped out of the funeral room did not care and hurriedly continued walking.
