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Our relationship is over now.
It echoes in her ears and sinks into her bones, chilling her from the inside out until the sinking pit of ice in her chest is all she can feel. It's everything that she is.
She knew it would hurt. But it would have hurt the worse if Mr. Kang was the one who said it – and so Ha-ri chose the safer pain, the knife in her own chest instead of those smug, despicable words that Mr. Kang is so good at wielding against her.
"How can I let you leave like this?" he demands behind her, nearly shouting, exactly like someone who's upset. And all Ha-ri can think is this:
She should have paid him more for his acting. He's better than she gave him credit for.
No more debt, Ha-ri reminds herself, lifting her chin. No more contracts. No more sweet looks with false feelings underneath like rot at the core of the apple – no more revenge.
Because he won.
Ha-ri closes her mouth hard, feeling the strain of it around her lips and in her cheeks, so that she won't be tempted to reply. What is there to be said? Maybe she's in the wrong – maybe this is all her fault, all the way from the beginning, from that very first blind date – but she still has her pride, and Ha-ri would rather die and be resurrected ten times before she tells Kang Taemu that he went and made her fall in love with him.
She shakes her head and pushes her hands into her pockets, turning her feet toward the subway entrance. Some part of her knows that Mr. Kang won't let her go that easily, so she's not surprised when she feels a large hand land on her elbow.
Ha-ri stops. His grip grows softer, more gentle, though now he's tugging on his hand very slightly, urging her to turn around again and face him. Her shoulders are very stiff – she can feel them climbing up toward her ears.
Breathe, she reminds herself.
"Please let me go," she says quietly without turning around. The street in front of her is nearly empty, dark, lit only by the streetlights and the dim neon of shops that have long since closed their doors. They might as well be alone in this city square, with the tall buildings around them leaning in with their blank windows like eyes, watching Ha-ri's every move...
His hand tightens on her arm again, and for a second Ha-ri thinks that he's going to drag her around by force and make her look him in the face and say it all over again. And she's not sure she can do that.
But then he sighs and lets her go, his fingers slipping away from her arm with a reluctance that even she can feel. And so, even now, even at the end of them, Ha-ri has to be grateful to him, because he didn't make her say it out loud.
She can't blame him. He has every right to be furious with her. She and Yeongsuh lied to him and made him look like a fool. Ever since that first night, their fates have been intertwined by Ha-ri's stupid decisions, and now she's reaping the fruits of those lies and those decisions; if they're bitter, then whose fault is that?
Ha-ri walks away into the cool Seoul night, and the silence behind her is louder than anything Mr. Kang could have said.
Congratulations, Mr. Kang, Ha-ri thinks, wiping the tears from her face when she's far enough away that he might not see her hand move in the shadows. You got your vengeance, after all.
———
That night Ha-ri walks into their family home and Hamin takes one look at her face and springs off the couch. "What the fuck happened to you?" he demands, coming over to her and forcing her to look up at him, examining her face with a dark scowl.
When did he get so tall? Ha-ri wonders.
"Nothing," she says, pushing his hands away gently. "I'm tired... Tell them I went to sleep, okay?"
Hamin brushes the fringe from her forehead and scowls even deeper when he sees her red-rimmed eyes. "I'm serious, Ha-ri! What happened? Was it Minwoo?"
She stares up at him, her eyes wide, and she wonders when Minwoo faded so far from the center of her heart that she'd almost forgotten that he existed until someone said his name. She'd very nearly asked who? like an idiot. Minwoo, Minwoo, Minwoo – her best friend, her crush, but he never made her feel this way, as if someone scooped out the heart of her and replaced it with dying a thousand deaths every second.
"No," she says, smiling at Hamin with only her mouth. She reaches up and pats him on the cheek – even for that Ha-ri has to reach further than she remembers – and then neatly side-steps around him to head for the stairs.
"Between you and Yeongsuh I'm going to get a ulcer!" Hamin shouts after her. "Why won't you let me beat them up?"
"Because you're twelve and you've got noodles for muscles!" Ha-ri screams back, jogging up the steps.
He slams his bedroom door closed instead of answering her, and Ha-ri slams her door, too, letting the conversation come to a satisfying conclusion. She drops her purse and lets it lie on the floor, shedding shoes and coat the same way in a meandering path toward her bed, and then she flops face-first into the comfort and haven of her bed.
She'd expected to cry when she got home, but instead, there's nothing inside of her but the ache that's taken up residence in her heart. Her eyes are dry.
Sleep is nowhere to be found, even after she shoves off the rest of her clothes and climbs into her most comfortable pajamas; Ha-ri tosses and turns for hours, days, years, every second stretching into an unfathomable millennia in which all she can think of is the tender affection in Mr. Kang's eyes when he asked her if this is how she wants him to look at her...
During the darkest moments of that night, Ha-ri wavers in her resolve. No one is that good an actor, she argues with herself, even if Kang Taemu is perfect in every respect and very, very motivated to take his vengeance on her.
But Yeongsuh's right. What else would a man like that want with someone like Ha-ri? And hadn't Mr. Kang told her himself? Hadn't he warned her that day he drove her to the subway? I will find her, and I will punish her, he'd said as his hands tightened on the steering wheel, very like someone wringing an imaginary person's throat.
In retrospect, Ha-ri wishes she'd taken the warning, instead of having so much faith in the poor shield of a lot of makeup and a pink wig to hide her identity.
She drifts off into an uneasy and shallow doze sometime between the moon setting behind the high-rises and dawn.
At precisely six o'clock in the morning, her phone rings.
Ha-ri cracks one bleary eye open and reaches for it to make it shut up before a lightning bolt of adrenaline crackles through her veins at the name displayed on her screen.
Kang Taemu (CEO)
Ha-ri rejects the call instantly and the room falls so silent that she can hear her heart beating fast and furious in her ears. She stares at her phone in her hands like it's a snake, praying for it to stay silent – for it to ring again – for Yeongsuh to magically hear the prayers that Ha-ri is arrowing her way and call right this very second to save her from the unbearable pain of hope.
Instead, her phone chirps once before falling silent. A text shows up on her lock screen:
Kang Taemu
Shin Ha-ri, we need to talk.
Ha-ri stares at the notification while her heart shatters all over again. She's said everything that she needs to say – and she doesn't need to hear him fire her, she thinks. She swipes away the notification with a convulsive gesture of her thumb. There's no more texts, even though she waits for fully fifteen minutes, staring at her own wide, hesitant eyes in the black screen of her phone.
She ought to block him. Ha-ri knows that. Kang Taemu is a man who's very used to getting his own way, and until he understands why she stopped their arrangement, he's going to keep asking. But closing the door on her last way of getting in touch with him feels like closing a door that was never supposed to be open to begin with, and that might rip her apart into a thousand pieces.
Tomorrow, Ha-ri decides. She'll do it tomorrow.
That brings her to the other problem. Today is Friday, and Ha-ri is supposed to leave for work in an hour. She bites her lip and texts her manager that she's sick; that will buy her today and the weekend, but she's only got one more sick day left after that, and she doesn't think her manager will let her stay home because she's scared of running into their CEO.
She can't do this for long.
Ha-ri looks down at her phone again, debating with herself, but there's really only one way out of this that won't doom her to seeing him every day for the rest of her life. She schedules an email to Jeong sunbae for near the end of the working day, asking him to print off the file she's sending him without reading it and put it on their manager's desk for her to find on Monday, and then Ha-ri writes up her letter of resignation, attaches it, and sends the whole thing without allowing herself room for second thoughts.
How she's going to pay back the loan with no job and no prospects, she doesn't know. Maybe Yeongsuh can get her a job at her father's conglomerate, or pay off the loan so Ha-ri will have some room to breathe and hunt for a new job. Ha-ri has never tried to take advantage of Yeongsuh's family before, but this is a special occasion, and anyway, it's half Yeongsuh's fault in the first place.
It's only half past six when she's done. Ha-ri turns over to watch the sun rise over the high-rises, breathing long and slow, her phone clutched to her chest like a stuffed animal. She can stay in her room and become a zombie for today, she decides. Her parents won't expect her in the shop if Hamin covers for her, and he'd better, if he knows what's good for him.
No. Today, Ha-ri is going to lay in bed and allow herself to feel all of the heartache and betrayal that's simmering under her skin where her temper usually lives, and maybe if she's very lucky, Yeongsuh will bring beer and ice cream over later and they can cry about boys, just like they did in college.
Today. One day. Tomorrow, she can learn how to forget him. But just for today...
Ha-ri turns her face into her pillow to hide her tears.
———
Her parents go down to the shop early. Someone knocks on her door, but Ha-ri hears Hamin say something in a low voice, and then all three of them leave and the house grows quiet, and still. It's strange, but peaceful, and between loud crying jags and the soft and quiet kind where tears leak from her eyes like raindrops slipping down her face, Ha-ri manages to get a few more hours of sleep in listless naps.
At six twenty-three, someone starts pounding on the front door of the house so hard that Ha-ri shoots up in her bed, startled, her heart jumping in her chest. It only makes sense when she realizes what time it is. Twenty-three minutes is just long enough for Yeongsuh to get off work, dash into a convenience store to buy all of their beer, and race over here like she's driving on the circuit.
"Not everyone can afford to pay speeding tickets," Ha-ri grumbles, rolling out of bed and glaring at herself in the mirror. Her eyes are bloodshot, she's pasty, and her hair looks like a tornado went through it.
Whatever. Yeongsuh has seen her worse than this.
She throws on a hoodie and clumps her way down the stairs, muttering to herself the whole way, and opens the door to find Kang Taemu glaring at her, his eyebrows thick and dark slashes above steel-gray eyes that are trying to skewer her.
Ha-ri stops breathing.
"What. The hell. Is this," he growls, shoving a piece of paper at her.
My hair, a very small part of Ha-ri cries, too distressed to think about anything else.
Her lips are numb, and her fingertips, but the rest of her body is hot, like there's a fever boiling in her blood. Ha-ri looks down at the paper. It's been crumpled up and then smoothed out again, but she recognizes the careful words she just wrote this morning.
Ha-ri swallows. "It's my resignation, Mr. Kang," she says in a small voice. She doesn't look up again, afraid to meet his eyes. She already knows she's a coward. If he's judging her, Ha-ri doesn't want to know about it.
How did he get this? Jeong sunbae was supposed to put it on their manager's desk, not hand it directly to the CEO. Ha-ri's just an accountant. She's no one. There's no reason the CEO should care about her.
She's no one.
"Yes, I can read," Mr. Kang says, his voice thick with tension. "Why?"
"Because I no longer wish to work for your company." Ha-ri offers the the letter back to him with a bow deeper than required, but he doesn't take it. She glances up to see Mr. Kang giving her a look so frigid that it burns her down to the core.
He's been angry with her before, but that anger burned hot enough that Ha-ri knew it would pass, sooner or later. This time, this anger, it's different. He looks forbidding. Ha-ri can't imagine this man looking at her with tender affection and a faint, fond smile, like he did in the car...
She knew it was all fake, but why does it have to hurt so much to be reminded of it?
"None of that is a reason, Miss Shin," Mr. Kang says, fairly snapping the words in his anger. His voice darkens."You will give me a reason."
I asked for your reason.
Ha-ri prevents herself from grinding her teeth together only by imagining sinking them into his forearm. She's hurt, yes, but she's starting to get angry. This is very rude of him and inconsiderate of her neighbors and passers-by on the street. Ha-ri stomps down the stairs and shoves the letter at him, smashing it against his very firm, broad chest. "You said you can read," she snaps, looking up at him with a mutinous scowl on her face. "It's written in the memo. Personal reasons."
Mr. Kang closes his eyes, his hand coming up to hold the letter against his chest, a brief, intense flash of – something – crossing his face, something that almost looks like it could be pain.
Ha-ri shakes her head, turning away to climb the stairs again. He must be upset that she's ruining his revenge, of course; she expected that. But she can't make the mistake of imagining that he's reacting from the kind of real, deep-rooted feelings that she wants from him, because if she starts hoping for that, she'll never stop.
"Miss Shin," Mr. Kang says, his voice gravelly and deep. Ha-ri comes to a half instantly, closing her eyes against the swell of tears. "Ha-ri. Please."
And the insane thing is that Ha-ri can't tell whether he's really begging, or if she's just imagining what she wants to hear most in his words.
There's one fool-proof way to make sure that Mr. Kang will have no interest in chasing after her. Giving him what he wants will hurt her pride, but if he goes away afterward, it's worth it.
"You don't need to do this anymore," Ha-ri says quietly. "You've won, Mr. Kang. You made me fall in love with you. So don't you think you've punished me enough?"
And even then, she pauses at the top of the stairs, her ear cocked, desperate to catch any reaction from Mr. Kang, anything he might say or do to give her a reason to turn around again. To look at him one more time.
Maybe there's the faintest breath, a shocked inhalation, but then –
Silence.
What else did she expect?
Ha-ri shakes her head and goes into the house, closing the door behind her. She doesn't look back.
———
Yeongsuh shows up half an hour later with beer and soju and they get very drunk and talk shit about boys from Sungwoon.
"He's dead to me," Yeongsuh hisses, brandishing the soju bottle so unsteadily that Ha-ri gasps, afraid Yeongsuh's going to spill the last two inches left in the bottom. She needs those last two inches! Ha-ri snatches the bottle and clutches it to her chest, watching Yeongsuh warily. "The perfect secretary with no spine of his own – and the hobo CEO who feels nothing," she adds loyally. "They can have each other and rot, for all I care. You and I." She leans in to stare into Ha-ri's eyes, and Ha-ri leans in, too, to rest her forehead against Yeongsuh's, suddenly tired and drooping. "You and I deserve better than those rats."
Yeongsuh is still angry. She's been wronged and she's still mad enough to spit fire and rage at anyone listening. But Ha-ri –
Ha-ri is just tired.
She sighs, letting herself slump sideways onto her pillows, laying out as Yeongsuh continues to rant above her. Her voice grows distant, slurring the crisp pronunciation bred into the bones of the Youngjin princess, her words melting into soft comfort as Ha-ri allows them to usher her into sleep.
———
Over the next week, Yeongsuh and her secretary make up and suddenly Yeongsuh's all starry-eyed and happy again, which seems incredibly unfair to Ha-ri since this is all her fault in the first place. It's a lot of effort to be mad, though, and somehow Ha-ri just doesn't have it in her anymore, especially when Yeongsuh starts lending her the loan payments that are coming due.
But when Ha-ri tries to transfer the money to Sungwoon, the payment bounces back.
She tries twice more, getting more and more confused every time it doesn't work, and Monday morning she calls the Finance department at Sungwoon, obscenely grateful that the person she's transferred to is someone she doesn't know. "Your loan has been frozen, Miss Shin," the woman says after a minute of soft clicking in the background. "There's no reason for it here. Perhaps there's been an error. I'll investigate the matter and get back to you. This is the best number to reach you?"
Ha-ri confirms it and then hangs up, her heart sinking lower and lower into her stomach. She stares down at her phone. This is very, very suspicious, but she can't figure out why Kang Taemu would put a pause on her loan. If he wanted to hurt her, he would have called the whole thing due at once, which Ha-ri can't possibly afford. Mr. Kang must know that.
So why?
She has the horrible feeling that she's missing something about this situation. Something important.
Instead of thinking about it, Ha-ri throws herself into her job search. She goes to job fairs and sends her resume out to every posting in Seoul she's even remotely qualified for, checks in with her favorite professor from college and almost begs him to keep an eye out for her, and by the end of the week, she's even toying with taking one of those late-night delivery jobs to keep her occupied and earning money while the gears of the conglomerates grind her resume into dust.
Ha-ri is a good employee, but leaving Sungwoon with no notice is definitely going to hurt her reputation and therefore her job prospects. But there's nothing to be done about it. Ha-ri is just going to have to work twice as hard as anyone else to get ahead of her own mistakes. She covers her eyes with her fingers, pressing gently, sighing.
Ha-ri should be used to this, damn it.
She's not.
After a few minutes of self-pity, her phone beeps at her, and Ha-ri uncovers one eye to find a message from Yeongsuh.
Yeongsuh
Hey, do you have plans for tonight?Ha-ri
My plans include lying around on my bed in my pajamas drinking all of the beer you left.Yeongsuh
So, no?Ha-ri
Nope ^^;Yeongsuh
Good. I want to set you up on a blind date.
Ha-ri bolts upright, flinging her phone across the room like it bit her. She stares at it lying innocently at the base of the wall, her breath coming fast, for several long moments as she tries to calm her instinctive panic at the idea of another blind date.
No. She must have misread something. Yeongsuh wouldn't do that to her again.
When she scrambles out of bed and goes to retrieve her phone, she finds that Yeongsuh has taken her silence as anger and texted her a long string of messages:
Yeongsuh
Before you wring me out and use me for a mop, just listen.
I want to set you up with a nice guy because I feel bad for what I did.
I should never have put you in this position.
I was selfish and spoiled and I'm sorry. You're my best friend. I should have treated you that way.
I already know the man. He's one of Sunghoon's friends.
If you like him, maybe we can double-date sometime~ ^^
To sweeten the deal, I'll pay off the rest of your loan. I haven't touched the credit cards lately so my father won't even notice.
Ha-ri?
Are you on your way over to strangle me? ^^;;;
Ha-ri can't deny that she was thinking about it, but the thought of Yeongsuh giving her the enormous amount of money she needs to repay her loan is tempting. Ha-ri can then pay it back without interest and without the threat of her employment hanging over the whole thing like the stench of the sewers.
It's a lot of money for one blind date, but Yeongsuh must realize that's what it would take to pry Ha-ri out of her bedroom right now.
She doesn't want to do it. Fuck, she really, really doesn't want to. But the loan has been stressing her out for weeks, months, and especially now, Ha-ri would welcome being rid of it. Maybe she can take Hamin's place in the shop and let him concentrate on university. She could look into franchising the shop while she's at it. Maybe even make a career out of it.
What a good use of her econ degree.
Ha-ri sighs.
Ha-ri
I want the money in my account before I put one toe out of this house.Yeongsuh
What?! Really? 🤩
Of course!Ha-ri
And I want the dress you tried to give me last time.
You owe me.Yeongsuh
I know. It's already yours.
Don't worry about the guy. I promise, you're going to love him.
———
A bike messenger delivers the dress from Yeongsuh and Ha-ri traces one finger down the pale silver silk shot through with sparkle; between that and the beads scattered across the yoke, Ha-ri feels like she's wearing liquid stardust poured into the shape of a dress. It fits her perfectly. Ha-ri smooths a hand down her stomach as she looks herself in the mirror, smiling faintly.
Thanks, Yeongsuh.
Her hair she combs until it's shining and lets it pour loose down her back, and between that, her sparkly blue earrings and knock-off Louboutins, Ha-ri feels like she's done enough to make sure that she's wearing the dress rather than the other way around.
Yeongsuh's driver takes her downtown, crossing the edge of Hongdae's noisy and packed nightlife and then emerging again into streets that are less crowded and smoother; he takes her to a upscale coffee shop with a large, graceful overhang and spotless wooden columns lining the plate-glass windows. Ha-ri climbs out, makes sure she has her purse, turns, and freezes.
How did she not recognize it at first glance?
Are you, by chance, Jin Yeongsuh?
Like she's in a dream, Ha-ri drifts closer, her hands tightening around her purse. She can almost see Kang Taemu on that couch, wearing his dark overcoat, one elegant leg crossed over the other, his hands in his lap...
Wait.
Ha-ri takes another step closer, her eyes narrowing on that same couch.
She's not dreaming, after all. Mr. Kang is right there, waiting...
Waiting for her.
Ha-ri wants to scream. Instead, she closes her eyes and bites her lip as hard as she can, ignoring the impulse with all of the self-control that she has.
Why does she ever trust Yeongsuh? What is wrong with her? Ha-ri should know better by now, and yet she's still letting Yeongsuh pull this trick on her. This is the third time she's sent Ha-ri to meet the same man and somehow Ha-ri hasn't figured out yet that this is always how it's going to be.
There's only one answer. Ha-ri is the stupidest person on the planet.
She shakes her head and starts to turn before a faint flicker of movement draws her eye. Ha-ri pauses to watch Mr. Kang lift his wrist and look at his watch, his eyes pale and unreadable, and then he puts his hand back down, resuming his solemn stillness.
Ha-ri takes out her phone and turns it on to check the time. It's three minutes past eight, which means that Ha-ri is late.
But Mr. Kang is still here.
She tilts her head, looking at Mr. Kang again, and this time she notices the way that his mouth is pressed tightly together, as if he's holding back some kind of emotion that's too big for him, and his eyebrows are thick, dark slashes above his eyes – but they're not angry, not like before. She can't quite say what they are, but they're not angry.
Ha-ri knows that she should leave... but something is keeping her feet locked exactly where they are.
She watches him for a while, her arms wrapped around her waist; he's not moving at all, except for the looks at his watch every few minutes. Ha-ri is late. Mr. Kang hates having his time wasted. He has so little of it as it is, and for him to be waiting here, with no evidence of impatience or anger, is...
It's something. She can't quite put her finger on what, but it's something.
Ha-ri checks her phone to find that it's now fifteen minutes past eight. It's cooler now, the evening chill settling over her bare arms and legs, and before she quite realizes what she's doing, Ha-ri finds herself opening the door to the upscale café and walking inside. Mr. Kang's head snaps up the instant she goes in, and when their eyes meet, he looks at her like a man who's wandered the desert for a thousand years in search of water looks at the illusion of an oasis: desperately hoping that she's real.
She keeps walking, praying that her knees aren't actually shaking as much as they feel like they are, and waves Mr. Kang back down when he starts to rise to his feet. Ha-ri sinks down onto the same couch she'd occupied on that disaster of a blind date, sits back, and folds her arms over her stomach.
"Why am I here?" Ha-ri asks him, meeting his eyes squarely.
Because it's not hard to see Kang Taemu's guiding hand behind tonight's events. Yeongsuh wouldn't have chosen this, not after Ha-ri threatened to break off their friendship the last time.
(Fool me once, Ha-ri thinks with the ghost of a laugh.)
But Kang Taemu is the kind of man who always has a plan to get what he wants. If he pressured Secretary Cha, and then the pair of them turned on Yeongsuh... That would have been way too much for Yeongsuh's romantic little heart to handle.
Ha-ri loves her best friend like she's family, but she's not blind.
"I owe you an apology, Miss Shin," Mr. Kang says gravely; to Ha-ri's utter astonishment, he rises from his couch and bows to her, the angle absolutely correct for penitence and shame, and he holds it for several thundering beats of her heart before he straightens, his eyes locked on her face. "Please allow me to explain myself." She must look like an idiot, with her eyes wide and her mouth gaping like a fish, but Mr. Kang just smiles at her, so soft and gentle that it gives her another heart attack, and takes his seat again.
Ha-ri wishes he'd stop looking at her like he's still pretending to be her dedicated and sweet boyfriend. It's really messing with her head.
"You know that I dislike being lied to," Mr. Kang says quietly. He waves away her instinctive wince with a small, dismissive gesture that shocks her almost as much as the bow did. "I don't mean to belabor the point, but there is a reason for it. I have very little time for dishonesty and people covering their asses. I always find the truth eventually, and every moment that person has lied to me becomes a moment wasted, when I don't have enough of them to begin with." Somehow the look in his eyes becomes softer than ever. "But you... The only time I cared that you were lying to me was when I couldn't reach you. Suddenly, I was forced to realize that you could disappear from my life and I might never find you again."
The smile fades, leaving him more regretful than Ha-ri has ever seen him. "I manipulated you into dating me," he admits. "I justified it by reminding myself that you'd lied to me, and denied us a potential alliance with Youngjin, but I was lying to myself, Miss Shin. I had every intention of holding on to you in any way that I could, no matter how underhanded my methods were."
Ha-ri gives him a suspicious look. "From the very first date?" Maybe she was right all along, and Taemu Kang is secretly kinkier than anyone's given him credit for.
But to her surprise, Mr. Kang shakes his head. "I would have given up a long time ago if you were only that woman I met on the first date," he says with a wry smile. "Didn't you ever wonder how much time it would have saved me to just find someone else? It's impossible to deny that that woman was compelling and very sexy, though, perhaps, more adventurous than I was prepared for – "
Ha-ri's helpless against the tiny victorious wiggle she makes as she realizes that she was right. He did believe her, he did, she won the acting award after all!
There's a flash of white teeth as Mr. Kang grins, and then he continues, "But it was the Shin Kim I met on the second date at the café who fascinated me. She told me she wouldn't wait for me – but she did. Why? I couldn't understand it. When I looked at her sleeping face, I thought... maybe this is fate. And that idea didn't seem like a problem to be solved, like every other time I thought about getting married. It felt like possibility.
"I am very sorry for how I went about it," he says with a grimace that Ha-ri recognizes – it's the kind of self-flagellating impulse that she's so intimately familiar with. It seems alien on this man's face, but doesn't everyone have regrets? Ha-ri gets the feeling that she's seeing some of his, right now. "There was... a lingering thought that you and Miss Jin were conspiring to make me look like a fool, which drove me for longer than I want to admit, but that is no excuse for my actions. I should have had more faith in you. Now that I understand the pressure you were under – "
"Speaking of that, did you freeze my loan?" Ha-ri asks, narrowing her eyes. Some very small and mean part of her soul is incredibly satisfied that she finally got the opportunity to cut him off, like revenge for the times he talked over her and flustered her so that nothing she said made sense. It's petty. Ha-ri acknowledges that. She's learned to take her victories where she can find them.
But why is Mr. Kang simply letting her interrupt him, when she knows he would have frozen anyone else who tried down to their bones?
He gives her a cool look from under brows that are somehow darker and thicker than they were before. "Am I not allowed to set the terms of my company's loans?"
"It's my loan," Ha-ri says, frowning, her eyebrows drawing together. "I'll pay it back."
"Of course you may," Mr. Kang says, which surprises Ha-ri so much that she stares at him, her mouth open, blinking in confusion. She hadn't expected him to agree. He smiles sunnily back at her. "In 2123."
Ha-ri wishes very badly that the table between them wasn't there, so she could kick him.
Mr. Kang lets the smile drop, though the fierce and tender affection in his eyes still shines there for anyone to see. "Please let me do this for you, Ha-ri," he says, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. "An apology hardly seems sufficient. I didn't know that you knew that I knew who you were."
"Yeongsuh told me," Ha-ri murmurs. She swallows, pressing the heel of her hand against her stomach, which is fluttering wildly at hearing him use her given name – especially in that tone of voice, which is more gentle than she's ever heard from him before.
"Of course," Mr. Kang mutters. "Secretary Cha has much to answer for."
The loyal part of Ha-ri makes her nod fiercely. Cha Sunghoon broke her best friend's heart, and she has absolutely no qualms about getting him in trouble with his boss. Serves him right, she thinks, scowling.
Mr. Kang laces his fingers together and rests his chin on top as he watches her with a faint smile hovering around his mouth. "And now I'd like to hear a few answers from you," he says. "You told me you were in love with someone else. A college friend. Lee Minwoo, if I'm not mistaken."
Ha-ri flushes up to her hairline, her stomach twisting uncomfortably in regret about all the time she'd wasted thinking she liked Minwoo. In retrospect... "I don't think he was ever what I thought he was," Ha-ri confesses in a soft voice. She's ashamed of the way she put Minwoo up on a pedestal while ignoring all of his red flags: his constant string of girlfriends, the odd possessiveness of Ha-ri's time, ignoring her obvious feelings – because what Ha-ri has learned from this debacle is that she's not a very good liar unless her life is on the line. "I had feelings for who I thought he was, not who he really is."
The slow, delighted smile dawning on Kang Taemu's face is a beautiful thing that steals her heart and her breath at the same time. She wonders if he noticed that she'd used the past tense – and if that's why he's so pleased.
"Let me buy you dinner," he asks with tender appeal in his eyes. "No debts, no lies. Just you, Miss Shin Ha-ri, and me. Because I am very much in love with you, and I'd like to start over. If you'll let me."
Ha-ri's mouth falls open on its own. She's lost control over her body, an unbearable swell of hope clutching her in its greedy hands, twisting her insides into knots of terrible fear, of desperate longing, of pure shock and joy and the remembered feeling of his mouth on hers...
He's not perfect. Ha-ri knows that better than anyone at this point. Kang Taemu is stubborn and smug and he thinks he has all the answers, and what's even worse is that he usually does. A life with him would be a life of fighting to hold her own against the most affectionate of steamrollers.
Maybe something's wrong with her, but Ha-ri thinks that sounds like fun.
Ha-ri smiles at him; she wants it to be cool and seductive, but she's so happy that her grin escapes her grasp and she beams at him so brightly that her cheeks hurt. "I'm choosing the restaurant," she says.
Taemu laughs. "Of course."
She leans forward, echoing his perfect pose, and she's enormously gratified to see his eyes darken as he watches her crossing her legs. "Good," she says quietly, smiling at him with a certain amount of malicious pleasure. "Because I'm in the mood for Hanwoo."