Chapter 9

The rain was lighter than that morning, but it was still falling. The smell of wet earth and damp wood left a rich, lingering fragrance deep in her lungs.

Blades of grass heavy with rainwater brushed against her hands and cheeks, but she chased after Hayden without even feeling the cold. The place he arrived at was the building that had burned down yesterday.

Perhaps thanks to the heavy rain that fell overnight, the fire was completely out. However, the exterior walls of the building were already thoroughly blackened.

The tail of a helicopter was resting upside down on the roof. It looked as though the fire, caused by the helicopter crashing through the rooftop mechanical room, had spread inside the building.

For that matter, what kind of purpose was this building constructed for? Unlike the stone house by the lake, it looked like a recently built structure, but….

She felt like she could find some clues if she went inside the building. She was also curious about what that iron mass she had been trapped in yesterday actually was.

Still, why had Hayden come here alone? Stepping carefully, Lee Soo followed behind him and gazed at his solid, well-toned back.

He looked like a vacationer relaxing at a beach. With his appearance clad only in underwear resembling shorts, and his leisurely gait, he certainly gave off that impression.

Right then, he suddenly turned around. Feeling as though she were about to be pounced on by a large beast, Lee Soo backed up and ended up sitting down hard.

As she did, she stepped squarely on a stone protruding from between the weeds. The sole of her foot burned with a sharp pain, as if it had been torn.

“Ah!”

A large shadow fell over the top of Lee Soo’s head.

“You slipped because you were sneaking around like a misbehaving cat.”

It was true that she had sneaked after him, but she had no malicious intent. Brushing the dirt off the sole of her foot, Lee Soo propped herself up on the ground.

“I just followed you in case I could be of help.”

Hayden softly mirrored Lee Soo’s polite phrasing. “Stumbling around with weak legs isn’t going to help at all.”

Her legs weren’t weak in the least. She just didn’t have any shoes.

“If I ever manage to find some shoes, I’ll show you how to climb a tree.”

Casually brushing the weeds and dirt off Lee Soo’s pants, Hayden replied, “I came to look for anything useful. It might collapse, so don’t follow me inside. If I see any shoes, I’ll bring them out for you.”

His ingrained manners were impressive. Yesterday he had handed over his clothes to a complete stranger, and today he was brushing the dirt off those very clothes while telling her to wait nicely.

However, Lee Soo couldn’t let him go alone. His existence was far too precious to leave behind in a dangerous building just to get trapped and die.

Sensing that he would go in regardless of what she said, she spoke up in a hurry. “If it collapses, you’ll die.”

He raised one eyebrow, lowered it again, and replied as if soothing a child. “There’s no need to state the obvious, so just wait here.”

“No, if it collapses, you’ll die too, Mr. Hayden. Then what am I supposed to do?”

She had no idea why she had said such a thing. She was surprised herself by the raw, unfiltered truth that had suddenly slipped out.

The truth was, thanks to this man, she was clinging to life, and among a group completely desensitized to racial prejudice, she was actually being treated like a human being. Just imagining him disappearing left her with a feeling of sheer hopelessness.

Yet, alongside that despair, a different kind of sensation was welling up. Her chest felt a stinging ache, and a profound sense of pity washed over her.

Why was she investing so many emotions into a man she had met only two days ago? As Lee Soo stroked her flushed cheeks, Hayden stared right at her.

Silence hung heavily for a single moment.

For this specific moment, she was glad it was raining. If not for the sound of the rain, they would have heard nothing but the sound of each other’s breathing.

Instead, as if eager to hear that very breathing, he stepped right up close to her. A dark shadow fell across her brightly lit field of vision.

Lee Soo stared at him in a daze. His sculpture-like, flawless face broke into a soft smile.

“Would you be sad if I died?”

The corners of his eyes curved slightly, turning strangely deep and soulful. Just as she thought that expression looked remarkably stunning, he reached up and pushed back his rain-drenched hair.

“In that case, I’ll assign you the duty of standing out here and crying if I die. Don’t follow me.”

He turned away with a cold, decisive air and headed toward the building.

Once his shadow vanished, raindrops began to fall on Lee Soo’s face once more. He was walking further away.

Lee Soo hurried after his fast-moving back. He had told her to stand here and cry if he died, but there were plenty of other people back by the lake who could do that.

A building with compromised structural frames could collapse at any second, and that was a fact. Therefore, if they wanted to salvage any supplies, two people working quickly would be better than one.

Pushing through the drizzling rain, Hayden entered the building first.

Lee Soo stepped through the entrance a beat later. Hayden was nowhere in sight, having already vanished somewhere inside.

The interior of the building was pitch-black in every direction, blanketed in thick layers of soot. Thanks to the fact that it hadn’t completely burned down, it was barely managing to retain its basic shape.

There were benches and flower pots near the entrance, and a long hallway stretched out from the left center. Rooms lined both sides of the hallway in a face-to-face layout.

Poking around her surroundings, Lee Soo peered through the glass door of the first room.

The room served as an office. She could see desks, documents, chairs, and laptops that had been left partially burned.

The room directly across from the office was a control room. Inside, there were similarly half-burned and melted machines.

Uniquely, however, there were eight monitors sitting on top of a desk.

Seven of those monitors were completely blackened by fire. But the very last one, monitor number eight, remained intact for about two-thirds of its screen.

A green light was blinking rhythmically beneath the monitor. It meant electricity was still running through it.

If that monitor happened to be a computer, she might be able to find a clue about her lost memories.

As if spellbound, Lee Soo stepped into the room. The floor was sludgy and squelchy from water discharged by the sprinklers.

Filthy water rose up to the tops of her feet, but she didn’t care. With trembling hands, she pressed the button next to the green light. The monitor flickered with static before shifting to a dull grayish hue.

The main screen appeared. Thumbnail images resembling photographs were displayed on the screen, with dates written underneath them.

The background of every single screen showed the exact same room.

It looked like a laboratory. Against the background wall were shelves filled with medical supplies, and right in the center of the room sat an elongated, oval-shaped machine. A blonde woman was seated in front of it.

Was it a CCTV feed?

Lee Soo tapped the screen. Instantly, the video expanded and began to play.

The blonde woman was sitting in a chair as large as a sleeping recliner, jotting something down on a chart. Then, setting the chart down on a mobile desk, she pulled out a light-brown pack. The pack was as large as an IV fluid bag.

The woman unscrewed the cap of the pack and connected it to a tube leading directly into the oval machine.

At that moment, the door to the room swung open and a man wearing a suit walked in. Because part of the monitor was burned away, the man’s face was not visible.

Setting a briefcase down on the desk near the door, the man walked up behind the blonde woman and asked,

“Ella, have you been doing well?”

Although the speakers were heavily riddled with static, every word spoken came through with complete clarity. As if responding to the man’s gentle voice, the woman turned around.

“Yes, I’ve been doing well.”

The woman was wearing a clean white doctor’s gown over her clothes. She looked to be in her late twenties, and her smile was lovely.

The man walked over with firm strides, stopped right behind her, and began to stroke her hair. Then, sweeping her locks back behind her shoulders, he slowly lowered his upper body.

Because she blocked his front, the man’s face wasn’t visible. But just then, hair that looked close to a grayish tint and a military-short haircut immediately caught the eye.

The man pressed his lips against the nape of her neck and whispered, “I missed you so much I came secretly.”

The woman closed her eyes gently and tilted her head back. A moment later, the man pressed her for an answer.

“You missed me too, didn’t you, Ella?”

“Ngh….”

“Weren’t you itching because you wanted to eat my cock?”

Subjected to such a personal interrogation, the woman nervously glanced over at the CCTV camera. “I’m working right now. You shouldn’t do this here.”

The man grabbed a handful of the woman’s hair and blocked the camera with his back.

“Don’t turn me away today. You sent me back because of your ex-husband last time, too. Do you have any idea how much that hurt me?”

The man reached down, pulled the lever underneath the chair she was sitting on, and pushed the backrest all the way down. Then, wedging his knees between her legs, he looked down at her intently and said, “Ella, you need to apologize to my heart. It almost stopped beating that day.”

Though his tone was as polite as a nobleman’s, the aura the man exuded was ferocious. Sensing this, the woman averted her gaze toward the wall and only her lips moved.

“I’m sorry. But it was all so sudden for me, so I couldn’t help it.”

The voice coming through the speaker sounded pitiful. Seemingly stirred as well, the man bent his waist to face her and whispered, “Kiss me.”

Because the man’s build was so massive, only his broad back was visible. It looked as though the woman was kissing his lips and wrapping her arms around his neck.

After taking the kiss, the man let out a ragged breath and laid the woman back onto the chair. From the crackling speaker, a polite voice continued, sounding as though it were asking a mother for permission.

“I want to rub my cock against Ella’s body. Please give me permission.”

Perhaps permission hadn’t been necessary from the start. The man lifted the woman’s legs and draped them over the armrests of the chair, spreading them wide.

He savored the woman’s helpless reaction for a moment before bringing his hand down between her legs. It sounded like he was ripping right through the center of her stockings. Then he unzipped the front of his own trousers.

The man’s knees, which had been kneeling at the edge of the chair, pulled closer to the inner thighs of the woman. Soon, after busily moving the hand gripping his core, he braced himself against the arms of the chair.

His lower body plunged deep between the woman’s legs. The woman trembled so violently in her hips that she could barely handle it, but the man didn’t stop.

“Haah, it feels so good. I can feel everything—it’s so slippery and hot.”

“Ngh…!”

“It’s been way too long since we last did it, so your hole got tight. When does your business trip end? Once you get back to the company, I’ll stretch it out for you again.”

“Ah-ah, n-ngh, it ends in a f-few days.”

The man pulled the woman’s pelvis into him with both hands. Then, moving his waist at a slow, deliberate pace, he panted softly.

“Still, why on earth did your ex-husband show up so suddenly, ngh? Does he miss you now that you’re actually divorced?”

“Ah-ah, ngh, ah….”

“He must be losing sleep at night because his dick gets hard whenever he thinks about this hole. Lately, I’ve been the same way.”

The man grasped the woman’s wrist and kissed the back of her hand. As he drove his lower body deep inside her with a sweeping motion, the woman gasped for breath as if her life were slipping away.

“Ugh, Mr. Graham, ah-ah…. It’s too deep, it’s way too deep.”

The moment she heard that name, Lee Soo’s breathing stopped dead in her tracks. Mr. Graham. Mr. Graham…

“Try aiming a gun and threatening me one more time, and see if I don’t give your ass a proper spanking.”

The voice from the previous night’s dream echoed faintly in her ears. Could it be him? Was it really that man? In an instant, her hands turned ice-cold.