Chapter: 05
“Who? Who are you?”
A man with a handsome, delicate face at first glance.
However, in Tae-gyeong’s eyes, he looked nothing but dangerous.
Of course, that did not mean he intended to do anything to him.
He had simply acted on instinct because he thought the man might harm Seo-ah.
Seriously, how long had he even known her to be meddling like this again?
Without any answer.
When Tae-gyeong loosened the grip on his arm, Ki-young, who had been looking at him strangely, immediately ran toward Seo-ah.
“Seo-ah!”
“There he goes again! Let’s just go, Seo-ah.”
Dong-joo tried to ignore Ki-young, who was rushing forward without thinking, but he was one step faster.
“Noona, wait a second. I have something to ask Seo-ah. Please, just for a moment.”
Before anyone realized, Ki-young grabbed both of Seo-ah’s arms and desperately asked.
“Seo-ah, what was Dong-ha like in his final moments?”
“……”
“Didn’t he talk about me? Huh?”
“……”
“Please say something!”
Seo-ah only stared blankly at Ki-young’s face as he poured out question after question.
“Please, tell me what Dong-ha…… what he was like at the end.”
“……”
“Jin Seo-ah! Please!”
With her arms hanging weakly at her sides, Seo-ah only let out a quiet, empty laugh.
“Kim Ki-young, are you crazy? Have you lost your mind?”
Even under Dong-joo’s scolding, he acted as if he could not hear her.
He clung to the pitiful woman, begging and crying out like someone who had lost their partner.
To the point where it was confusing who was the wife and who was the lover.
“Our Dong-ha, my Dong-ha, what did he say……”
Slap!
The hand of Seo-ah, who had only been pushed around helplessly by his movements, suddenly struck Ki-young’s cheek with all her strength.
“Were you happy?”
Ki-young covered his struck cheek with both hands and looked back at her with disbelief.
“Were you happy watching me being fooled by your little act, Mr. Kim Ki-young?”
“……”
“The reason you acted like the tragic main character at my wedding was because of this?”
Now that everything had finally been organized in her mind, Seo-ah’s voice was clearer than ever.
“Seo-ah, let’s just go, okay?”
Dong-joo, feeling that things were about to get worse, tried to separate the two of them first.
“Why did you do it? You all knew it was a fake marriage except me, didn’t you? You all knew. Lee Dong-ha was yours anyway, so why?”
Despite Dong-joo’s repeated attempts to stop her, Seo-ah had no intention of stopping.
“Why? Were you afraid? Afraid that spineless Lee Dong-ha might sleep with me? Is that why you called him out every night?”
Ki-young’s face turned pale.
Perhaps because he had always intended it, but hearing those thoughts directly from Seo-ah made him remember his own pathetic feelings from that time.
Meanwhile, despite the sharp confrontation between the two, Dong-joo was only desperately trying to pull Seo-ah away.
As if she was trying to somehow escape this situation.
“Seo-ah, please stop……”
“Let go!”
Seo-ah’s furious shout made the surroundings fall silent.
“You’re the same too, unnie.”
Unlike her forceful voice, Seo-ah’s face was already completely broken.
What could describe this feeling, something beyond anger, something impossible to express with words?
To Seo-ah, those two people were already accomplices.
“Were Kim Ki-young and Lee Dong-ha the only ones who deceived me? Were those two gay bastards the only ones who fooled me?!”
She felt wronged and furious.
Still, Dong-joo was the only person she had believed was family.
The person she thought of not as a sister-in-law, but as an older sister.
Who could she complain to about the feeling of losing even that person?
“Se-Seo-ah, I’m sorry. I’ll tell you everything later. So please, just today……”
Seo-ah also knew.
She knew her sister-in-law needed time to grieve her younger brother’s death.
But where would her own life receive compensation?
Two months after marriage, she lost her father.
And after only six months together, she lost her husband.
And as if that was not enough, she discovered that her husband had not just another woman, but another man.
Although she was desperately holding back the anger boiling inside her, she did not have the room to consider anyone else’s feelings right now.
“Let go. Before I hit you.”
At Seo-ah’s cold and unfamiliar expression, Dong-joo could no longer continue speaking.
Six months ago, she looked like someone regretting too late that she could not stop her parents from forcing her brother’s marriage.
Dong-joo slowly released Seo-ah’s arm as if she had given up.
Ki-young was the same.
He stood there unable to say anything.
Watching him, the corner of Seo-ah’s lips rose slightly.
“Are you happy? Lee Dong-ha wanted to see your face one more time until the very end. How is it? Are you satisfied? Do you feel even more attached now?”
“……”
“You asked what Dong-ha’s last moments were like, right? This is my answer. So……”
Ki-young tightly closed his eyes.
“Please…… even for my miserable share of pain…… if possible, please live an unhappy life.”
Ki-young covered his face with his hands and burst into tears.
Seo-ah did not want to know or see what that meant.
She only wanted to remove this disgusting man from her memories as quickly as possible.
Seo-ah pushed Ki-young’s shoulder aside and walked past him.
“Get out of my life, Mr. Kim Ki-young.”
Perhaps he wanted to apologize.
Leaving behind Ki-young’s trembling voice as he mumbled through his tears, Seo-ah continued walking forward.
However, her trembling body was still tense.
She did not know whether it was the aftereffects of almost falling down the stairs or her anger toward her husband’s lover.
But at least, she did not want to collapse in front of them.
Seo-ah tightly pressed her trembling thighs with her hand and walked firmly out of the funeral hall.
Tae-gyeong, who had watched the entire situation, stared at Seo-ah’s back until the very end.
Then, with his eyes slightly narrowed, he smiled silently.
His instinct to stop Ki-young had been exactly right.
Watching them from a distance, he had once again been ready to step in, regardless of whether it was meddling or not.
Whether he had fallen for her or not was not actually important.
Because his instinct simply told him to do so.
However, she was unexpectedly a strong-willed woman.
He thought she was just a wounded, fragile person.
But she was not someone foolish enough to simply let others hurt her without fighting back.
Seeing that side of Jin Seo-ah sparked a certain interest in him.
He quietly muttered.
“Unexpected.”
“What is unexpected?”
Hee-jun, who had been watching him closely for some time, added.
“Please stay away. That person already has a very difficult life, so don’t make it more complicated.”
“How difficult is it?”
“You saw it and still don’t know?”
“Don’t tell me you know even that woman? What exactly are you?”
“Ah, what do you mean what am I? Just stop being interested and wait right here. I’ll bring the car around.”
Hee-jun firmly warned Tae-gyeong and turned around.
However, even while walking to the parking lot, he kept looking back.
Finding Hee-jun amusing, Tae-gyeong waved his hand, telling him to hurry up, and chuckled.
Yet even then, he could not take his eyes away from where Seo-ah had disappeared.
“If you ignore the appointment as Director again this time, I’m going to resign.”
After leaving the funeral hall, Tae-gyeong’s car was driving through the flat city streets.
While driving, Hee-jun finally poured out the complaints he had been holding back.
“I’m serious. Are you listening? I said I’m going to resign!”
Tae-gyeong, who had listened silently with his arms crossed, spoke in an annoyed voice.
“You’re the one who talks about resigning several times a day.”
“Wow…… How can you be like this? Don’t you ever think, ‘Ah, Hee-jun must be suffering so much to act like this’? I followed you to India, India! I endured two whole years there, and you’re still annoyed?”
Just as he said, Hee-jun’s skin, after enduring two years in India, was deeply tanned.
Unlike Tae-gyeong’s still-glowing skin, even though they had stayed in the same country.
Tae-gyeong was not unaware of it either.
It was probably the result of Hee-jun constantly running around to satisfy his difficult tastes.
Not only that.
Whenever Tae-gyeong was in a bad mood, he found fault with everything.
From personal assistance to endless research and preparation.
The things he had asked Hee-jun to do were countless.
“If you want to return to Korea that badly, then you become the Director.”
Ah!
Hee-jun removed one hand from the steering wheel and grabbed his own hair.
Making someone angry with only a few words despite receiving a storm of complaints was also one of Tae-gyeong’s talents.
Tae-gyeong, who had won the argument, raised the corner of his mouth in satisfaction.
At that moment, the car stopped because it caught a red light.
Leaning back against the seat, Tae-gyeong turned his gaze toward the window.
And then he saw her.
On the street where thin snow was falling, there was Jin Seo-ah.
Even though she was mixed among many people walking down the street, she stood out perfectly in Tae-gyeong’s eyes.
Could she be crying?
Her lowered gaze seemed to say so.
‘Should I get out?’
No.
What would he even do after getting out?
He did not know why his meddling instincts kept activating like this.
But right now, everything about her bothered him.
Especially the thin ivory cardigan she was wearing without even a proper coat.
He could not stop noticing it.
Only after the traffic light changed and the car started moving did Tae-gyeong finally regret it.
He should have gotten out.
Idiot.
