3. Kang Yunkyung

At that moment, a cold wind struck Yunkyung’s face. Unable to withstand the sharp attack, clear tears flowed from her delicate eyes.

“…No.”

Avoiding Dohun’s gaze, Yunkyung answered.

“I don’t know.”

“If you don’t even know what kind of tree it is, why were you staring at it like that?”

The wind whipped Yunkyung’s hair aside, revealing the face that had been hidden behind it.

And the tears flowing down her cheeks as well.

“Anyone would think you knew it well.”

Yunkyung had been avoiding his gaze just moments ago, but now she raised her head and looked at Dohun.

He wasn’t the kind of person who went around talking to strangers.

Especially not about something as trivial as this.

“I heard this road is supposed to be really beautiful when the cherry blossoms bloom.”

“…Then I guess it must be a cherry blossom tree.”

“It’s an apricot tree.”

Yunkyung couldn’t understand what Dohun was trying to say.

“Apparently, it’s an apricot tree that doesn’t produce fruit or something.”

Dohun said he had never heard of such a tree either, then took his gaze away from the apricot tree.

It was as though he had taken back the brief interest he had given it.

“The security team leader on the first floor told me. Since you seemed like you didn’t know.”

“…Ah, thank you.”

It was something she already knew, but Yunkyung watched Dohun carefully and thanked him anyway.

“…?”

Yunkyung glanced at Dohun.

She thought she had just heard a small laugh.

Was she imagining it?

As Yunkyung continued looking at him, Dohun’s gaze lowered toward her again, and she hurriedly looked away.

Why would he laugh in a situation like this just because something was funny?

While Yunkyung was blaming herself for having such a foolish thought, Dohun’s gaze moved past her.

A black sedan was coming out of the parking lot.

The car stopped in front of the two of them—or, more precisely, in front of Dohun.

Yunkyung had wondered why he was here alone.

Now that she knew the reason, she adjusted her bag and increased the distance between herself and Dohun.

Dohun watched Yunkyung as she hesitantly backed away with small steps, checking his reaction, then opened the rear door of the car.

“What kind of company doesn’t even pay overtime?”

Yunkyung’s shoulders flinched.

“Don’t foolishly stay late. Leave work when it’s time.”

Dohun’s gaze turned toward Yunkyung.

“You need to be in good condition for your work efficiency to be high.”

Her large eyes, filled with confusion, couldn’t keep up with reality.

“……”

“…Yes.”

Dohun continued looking at her without getting into the car.

Thinking he was waiting for an answer, Yunkyung responded a beat late.

“…Thank you.”

Yunkyung didn’t understand his behavior, but she awkwardly lowered her head.

The movement was as unnatural as that of a rusty robot, though she herself didn’t notice it.

“See you next time.”

Yunkyung raised her head in surprise, but he had already gotten into the car.

The sedan grew smaller in the distance until it became a tiny dot, and then even that disappeared.

Yet Yunkyung remained standing there.

‘Ms. Kang Yunkyung.’

His words had been swallowed by the closing car door, but the name that had come from his lips had definitely been hers.

“How…”

Yunkyung’s voice trembled weakly.

“Thank you for the meal, Vice President.”

Kyungmin bowed politely to Dohun as they left after paying.

The two men had just finished dinner at a Korean restaurant in the basement of the company.

Dohun told Kyungmin that he would go up to the first floor first and left him heading down to the parking lot before making his way upstairs.

“Some warm-up.”

The work Dohun had been assigned immediately after returning from the United States was ‘KD Health.’

More precisely, it was the ‘warm-up’ assignment among his responsibilities that was giving him the biggest headache.

Dohun questioned whether the sales figure his father, Bongjin, the CEO of Kwonseong Group, had presented could even be achieved within six months in the first place.

“This is what happens when you put someone with no qualifications in charge of a company.”

Dohun irritably opened the stairwell door.

He desperately wanted the cigarettes he had quit before leaving the United States.

“You’re leaving late again today.”

Dohun’s gaze turned to the side after reaching the first floor.

The male member of the security team standing by the gate was speaking warmly to someone.

Dohun quickly lost interest along with his gaze, but then he turned his head back toward them after noticing the back of a woman who looked vaguely familiar.

Where had he seen her?

As he thought for a moment, he recognized her only after noticing the tumbler in her hand.

‘Are you acquainted with Secretary Kim?’

‘Ah, she’s my junior. My university junior.’

She was the woman who was Kyungmin’s university junior.

‘Korea University Business Administration?’

‘Yes. If you put it that way, she’s your junior too, Vice President.’

Dohun couldn’t understand from a practical standpoint why a woman who had graduated from the best university in Korea would be working at a company like this.

Even though it wasn’t particularly late, the company had been eerily quiet, and the employees’ terrible attendance and work habits had left him speechless.

So it was only natural that Yunkyung, who was the only one working overtime and leaving the company late, had stood out.

“May I ask you something?”

Dohun approached the security team leader who had been talking with Yunkyung and watched her leave the building.

“Yes, go ahead.”

“Does that employee often work overtime?”

“Who are you…?”

The team leader narrowed his eyes with curiosity and wariness toward the stranger.

“Let’s say I’m in charge.”

It wasn’t as though he actually wanted to take responsibility for a company like this.

Dohun swallowed the rest of his thought.

At his words, the team leader looked him over.

From his clothes to his shoes and even the watch on his wrist, nothing about him was ordinary.

The security team leader, who knew which company Yunkyung worked for, quickly concluded that Dohun must be a new manager who had joined KD Health.

“She works overtime a lot. Leaving at this hour is actually early for her.”

The team leader relaxed his guard and smiled warmly.

He was on the night shift and had just eaten dinner, so he was getting sleepy. This was a nice distraction.

He went on at length about everything he knew about Yunkyung—that she was diligent and had never been late even once, and that she occasionally gave snacks to the security team.

“There’s no one like Ms. Kang Yunkyung.”

Kang Yunkyung.

At the name spoken by the team leader, Dohun slowly nodded.

So it really was that woman.

Three years ago, when Kwonseong Group and KD Health signed the acquisition agreement, there had been a special clause in the contract.

If sales fell below a certain amount, it would be considered a crisis for the company, and all rights, including management control of the subsidiary ‘KD Health,’ would be delegated to the parent company, ‘Kwonseong Group.’

Whether they had included that clause knowing this would happen or had simply created a safety net in case something went wrong, Dohun didn’t know.

But because of it, he had become involved in this bothersome mess, so from the perspective of Kwon Dohun as an individual rather than Kwonseong Group, it was certainly not a welcome clause.

A month ago, he had collected and examined the laptops of every KD Health employee as one method of finding the reason the company’s annual sales had continued to plummet.

He expected strong resistance from the employees, but he didn’t care.

Rather, he wanted to know which employees reacted most strongly.

There was no need to investigate everyone individually.

He could simply filter out those people first.

He had wondered whether he would have to go through three full years of emails, but that wasn’t necessary either.

Just a few of the emails they had exchanged were enough to clearly reveal the atmosphere within the company and the flow of work.

It was an absolute mess.

The fact that the company had survived for three years in that state was impressive in itself.

That was why Dohun remembered the name ‘Kang Yunkyung’ all the more.

That name had stood out conspicuously amid the pile of garbage.

From writing emails to collecting information, organizing files, and preparing business proposals—whenever something was particularly clean and easy to read, her name was always there.

More than anything, what Dohun found hardest to understand was that every one of Yunkyung’s proposals had been rejected.

Most of the emails she sent had either gone unanswered or been thrown into the trash.

There had been some good ideas among the ones discarded in the trash.

There were even many that seemed worth pursuing—good enough that Dohun was certain the company’s sales figures wouldn’t have turned out this way if they had followed her ideas.

What surprised Dohun most was that her proposals were similar to the philosophy and business direction Kwonseong pursued.

As if she had worked at Kwonseong for years.

“But now that I think about it, everyone except a few people, including Ms. Kang Yunkyung, leaves work early. Maybe it’s because the CEO is young? They have flexible working hours and don’t work overtime at all. I guess the CEO trusts his employees.”

“Trust?”

That wasn’t trust.

What the CEO was doing was closer to neglect than management.

“Oh, she’s still not leaving. She’s looking at that again.”

Dohun followed the team leader’s gaze.

“She likes the apricot tree, apparently.”

Yunkyung’s back could be seen through the revolving door.

“This entire road is lined with cherry blossom trees, but that one is an apricot tree. But since it doesn’t produce fruit, people don’t know it’s an apricot tree. I wonder how Ms. Kang Yunkyung knew right away that it was one.”

Dohun walked past the team leader, who continued talking to himself, and stepped outside the building.