Chapter 2

The demonstration had gone off without a hitch, the order was closed, and the commemorative photos with the ministers were done, so Sa-heon climbed into the back seat of the black sedan that had been waiting for him.

“Let’s head to the hospital.”

“Understood.”

Nearly a week of barely sleeping seemed to be catching up with him only now. He kept his eyes shut and his head against the seat as he gave the short instruction to his chief of staff, Choi Kang-hoon.

“And buy a bouquet of flowers on the way.”

“Yes, sir.”

One word from Sa-heon, and the schedule changed. Ji-an buckled her seat belt and quickly reworked the itinerary in her head.

It was a long drive, but at last the car made it into central Seoul and pulled up at a flower shop near the hospital. Chief of Staff Choi Kang-hoon excused himself and was about to get out when Ji-an hurriedly undid her belt.

“Chief, I’ll go.”

“Ah, in that case—”

“No.”

Sa-heon cut him off without ever opening his eyes.

Ji-an froze halfway out of her seat, while Chief Choi bobbed his head as if he’d understood and scrambled out of the car in a hurry.

Which left her alone in the car with Managing Director Lee Sa-heon.

“…”

The awkwardness was more than she could stand, so Ji-an stole a glance at Sa-heon in the rearview mirror. His eyes were still shut when he murmured.

“What are you doing?”

“…Sorry?”

“Not getting out.”

“Do you mean me?”

“Who else is in here?”

Didn’t you just tell me not to get out?

She couldn’t bring herself to say it, so she just forced the corners of her mouth up. Sa-heon slowly opened his eyes and looked straight at her.

The moment she met those jet-black eyes, the back of her neck went hot, even though they’d hardly said a word to each other.

His unreadable gaze traveled slowly down over her reddened cheeks and the nape of her neck.

“Tsk.”

With that short click of his tongue he looked away, took his wallet from his inner pocket, and held out a credit card pinched between two fingers.

“Fifteen minutes by taxi from here to the office.”

In other words, go on ahead and get to work.

“I don’t see any need for Secretary Han to come along to the hospital as well.”

And don’t go scurrying around pointlessly, wasting time.

“Yes…? Ah! Of course. Yes! Understood.”

The card was unusually smooth and heavy. Ji-an fiddled with the raised engraving on its face and bowed her head.

“Wait.”

“Yes?”

Sa-heon pulled a black umbrella from the back seat and held it out to her.

“Take an umbrella.”

“An umbrella?”

She’d taken it before she quite knew what she was doing, and she looked out the car window, baffled. Now that she thought about it, rain had been forecast from late afternoon, and sure enough, the sky had clouded over.

“Thank…”

But even as she was getting her small thank-you out, he was already busy with his phone, his face gone indifferent again.

“…you.”

All at once she remembered how he’d looked only hours earlier, speaking boldly in front of all those people. That confident voice, that unwavering gaze. Now he was only checking his mail, an ordinary enough sight, and yet his cool features struck her as vivid all over again.

“I’ll head back ahead of you, then, Managing Director.”

“Do that.”

Only then did Sa-heon lift his head, and their eyes met.

His eyes seemed especially black today. The feeling was so strange that Ji-an hugged the umbrella to her chest and opened the car door in a hurry.

Chief of Staff Choi Kang-hoon, just back with the bouquet, watched her spring out of the passenger seat as if she had a spring in her, and asked.

“Secretary Han. Is something the matter?”

“Ah…! I’ll be going back to the office to write up the report.”

“That’s a fine idea.”

A rare, satisfied smile spread across Choi Kang-hoon’s face, which was usually as expressionless as an android’s.

He was in his mid-thirties, and whether or not the rumor that he’d come out of the special forces was true, he was a man with next to no emotional expression at all. Yet the words “I’ll go back and work” had gotten a smile out of him.

A madman works under a madman, they say. It was true.

The driver’s door shut with a clack, and the car pulled away without hesitation.

Ji-an bowed at the waist toward the receding car and straightened up again. Pat, pat. Right on cue, raindrops began to land on the top of her head, one by one.

She opened the black umbrella. Maybe because it was the one he used, it was unusually large and heavy.

He looked like the kind of man who would drop someone off on the street like this and not care in the least whether she got rained on. And yet here he was, looking out for her from somewhere she never would have expected.

…Honestly. What a strange, unreadable boss.

Something near her heart itched oddly, and Ji-an deliberately tightened her grip on the handle.

Sa-heon arrived at the hospital and gave a brief instruction as he got out of the back seat.

“I’ll go up alone. Wait here, Chief Choi.”

“Understood.”

With the bunch of lilies in one hand, Sa-heon strode straight for the VIP room without a moment’s hesitation.

He yanked the door open, and there was his second-eldest brother, Senior Managing Director Lee Jae-seong, lying in bed with both legs wrapped thick in bandages.

“Well, now. A mummy if I ever saw one.”

Sa-heon waved the bouquet and gave a smooth smile. Lee Jae-seong had been lying there with his eyes closed, but at that voice his head snapped up.

“You, you—! You c-crazy bastard…!”

“You must have been so worried about today’s order. I closed it successfully in your place, Senior Managing Director, so there’s nothing to worry about.”

“You madman! You psychopath! Sociopath! You absolute nutcase!”

Lee Jae-seong’s face had gone scarlet, and he was shouting as if in the throes of a fit, so Sa-heon set the flowers down beside the bed and pressed the button to call a nurse.

“Could we get a sedative in here? My hyung’s about to start foaming at the mouth.”

A doctor and a nurse came in at once, pinned the thrashing Lee Jae-seong down by force, and gave him the sedative.

“Let go! Let go of me! You— you people know who I am and you still do this! Let go! Aaagh! I said let go!”

“Tsk, tsk. What a shame.”

Sa-heon watched his second-eldest brother shriek at the top of his lungs and shook his head as if in pity. Yet his face was smiling, as though nobody in the world was having a better time.

“Lee Sa-heon… you…”

The resistance didn’t last long. Once the sedative was in him, Lee Jae-seong soon went limp and quiet, and Sa-heon looked down at him through lowered lids.

“So why did you go and have a traffic accident right before an important contract, Senior Managing Director Lee Jae-seong?”

“…You did this. Did you think I wouldn’t know?”

“Me? Now that’s a bit unfair.”

Lee Jae-seong swallowed and felt his tongue going numb. That is a sedative and not a veterinary anesthetic, isn’t it? It was an absurd thought, but the man standing in front of him was more than capable of having them inject something like that.

“It should have been me there… me…”

He couldn’t shake off the regret, and his voice trailed away as his eyes came to rest on Lee Sa-heon, standing beside the bed.

The hair swept neatly back, the clean line of the mouth, the dark eyes steeped in confidence. Even a stranger would trust a face like that. When he smiled he looked like a mischievous boy, yet with his face blank he gave off the coldest, most ruthless air of anyone.

Jae-seong took after his own mother’s side and was slight by comparison, but Lee Sa-heon had the solid build of an athlete, and on a body like that a suit fit as cleanly as on a model.

Only his brothers knew that a devil’s insides hid behind that perfect shell.

“Your devotion to the company is frightening. Spoken like a true Senior Managing Director, huh? A mere Managing Director like me has a long way to go to catch up with my hyung.”

Sa-heon adjusted the angle of the bed for him and wore a benevolent smile. He didn’t have to say a word for anyone to see he was in an excellent mood.

“Other people may not know, but I do. That this was your doing.”

Jae-seong’s eyes reddened at the injustice of it, and he ground his teeth.

His had been the bitter life of a second son, forever crushed between his eldest hyung, six years older, and the youngest, Lee Sa-heon, who was four years younger and the sharpest and most dangerous of the three.

That contract had mattered. It would have shored up a position that was neither here nor there, and it had been his chance to show their father he was the right man to take charge of the group.

“You knew I’d been preparing it! Every single day! For months…!”

“Had you? I didn’t know that.”

“How does a traffic accident happen exactly two weeks before the contract! How!”

“I know. Should we call it a trick of fate?”

“Both my legs are broken, too badly even for crutches! They say I’ll be stuck in this hospital for ages yet! How! How can this happen!”

“What a shame.”

His younger brother had stepped into that place perfectly, as though he’d been preparing for it a long time.

Sa-heon wore a picture-perfect smile and went on as though he understood exactly how Jae-seong felt.

“Father always said it, didn’t he? That the Chairman’s seat is decided by fate.”

Chairman Lee Gang-mun of the Hyeongang Group, father of the three brothers, believed that whoever took over the group needed judgment and decisiveness, but that he also needed inborn luck on his side.

And now, right before a crucial contract, an accident had left Jae-seong unable to move.

The Chairman was disappointed, of course. So in a way it was only natural that every eye had turned to Lee Sa-heon, who had taken the seat as if to make a point of it.

“Couldn’t that mean I’m the timber the group’s next Chairman is cut from?”

“Let me ask you just one thing.”

Sa-heon tipped his chin as if to say go ahead, and Lee Jae-seong swallowed dryly and asked.

“Don’t tell me… did you actually mean to kill me?”

Sa-heon had been tearing the wrapping off the bouquet, and at the question he shrugged as if it were nothing.

“Well, now. I hadn’t planned on going that far yet.”

“Want me to?” Sa-heon slid the lilies into a vase and smiled as he asked, as if he were making a splendid offer.

“If you’re going to go, you should at least stick around to see me become Chairman first. Right?”

So he wouldn’t have cared if I died. The devil…

“I’m allergic to pollen, you bastard!”

Jae-seong stretched out a trembling hand and hurled the vase of lilies at Sa-heon. It didn’t even graze him. It just hit the wall and shattered with a sharp burst of noise.

“Ah. Should I have let it hit me?”

Sa-heon had dodged it easily, and now he shrugged as if he regretted it.

“Try throwing it better next time. Nice and nimble. Hm?”

“You son of a bitchhh!”

Sa-heon left the shrieking behind him and walked out of the room.

“His fits are severe, so do keep a close watch on him.”

He made sure to leave that elegant piece of advice for the medical staff, playing the part of the deeply affectionate younger brother who cared terribly for his hyung.