The look in Ganghyuk’s eyes as he gazed at Yeon Sangmin in the footage was astonishingly cold. Jaehyun swallowed dryly at the chilling feeling on the back of his neck.
“……Are you going to tell Ian-nim the truth?”
Jaehyun asked in a careful voice. It was because he knew why Ganghyuk had ordered him to catch Yeon Cheolho’s hit-and-run driver.
Ian also knew what kind of bastard Yeon Sangmin was. He was the person who, addicted to gambling, had sold him to a loan shark. Even so, he might fall into great shock if he learned that he had even killed his grandfather.
“I have to tell him. It’s what the kid wants.”
Ganghyuk answered briefly and reflexively started to take out a cigarette from his jacket, then hesitated. He had been quitting smoking for the past few days. Right after seeing Ian cough from the smell of cigarettes, he made a resolution to quit smoking, something he’d never done before in his life.
“Should I give you a cigarette?”
Jaehyun keenly grasped what Ganghyuk was trying to do. Ganghyuk lightly shook his head and instead massaged the back of his neck. Anger toward Yeon Sangmin was surging up, and he needed to suppress his emotions.
Otherwise, he felt like he would immediately order them to bring Yeon Sangmin and smash his face in.
“What’s Yeon Sangmin’s condition?”
“He’s hit rock bottom. He keeps trying to borrow more money, but since it’s not going his way, he’s even selling his body. He’s also taking drugs as soon as he gets them.”
Ganghyuk tapped the desk with his fingertips. He wondered how on earth a child like Ian could have been born under Yeon Sangmin.
It was probably thanks to Yeon Cheolho raising him well, but Ian’s very nature was pure and upright.
“Keep him in a condition where conversation is possible. Ian might want to meet him soon.”
“Yes. Understood.”
After Jaehyun finished his report and left, Ganghyuk searched for his phone. Even though he had held Ian in his arms until dawn, he already missed him.
Ian seemed to feel the same way, as there was a message. Today he had even attached an ugly cat emoticon. Was this character popular among kids these days?
A gray cat with hair standing on end like an improper fraction was shyly smiling—it was more ridiculous than cute.
「I want to hear your voice」
An arc formed at the corners of Ganghyuk’s mouth as he read the message. Ganghyuk pressed the call button. Before the connection tone had even rung a few times, a delighted voice was heard.
-Executive Director!
Just from the voice, he could picture the brightly smiling face before his eyes. Ganghyuk leaned back comfortably against the chair.
“How much did you miss it?”
-Umm……As much as the sky, as much as the earth.
“How does it feel to hear it?”
-It’s so good. Even better than eating delicious dessert. Just listening gives me strength.
Me too. Ganghyuk smiled as he firmly pushed down the words that were about to pop out.
Before meeting Ian, he didn’t know such pleasure existed in the world. He’d dated people before, but he’d never had embarrassingly sweet phone calls.
Like business partners, they would only briefly exchange what was necessary and hang up. If occasionally they started wanting affectionate words and actions different from the beginning, he would cut them off cleanly.
Back then, such emotional exchange seemed useless. But after dating Ian, there was a satisfaction different from physical pleasure.
“What did you eat?”
He’d never been interested in the food going into his own mouth, yet here he was becoming curious about one person’s daily life. Indeed, people live long and see many things.
-Soyeon noona bought me twisted donuts, so I had them with milk. They’re from the market and they’re really delicious. These days they’re famous on SNS so people are lining up to buy them, but noona is friends with the owner so she could buy them. The owner must have set some aside after receiving noona’s call. Can you believe they sold out before 3 PM? It’s amazing.
Twisted donuts. The image of fried bread covered in sugar came to Ganghyuk’s mind. He didn’t know which shop it was, but seeing how much Ian liked them, he thought he should buy some for him again.
-What about you, Executive Director? Did you eat something delicious?
“Umm……”
What did I eat? Things had been so busy with work that there hadn’t been time to have proper meals. He was already busy reducing work time to see Ian.
He had roughly eaten the lunchbox Jaehyun bought him. Even that, he didn’t finish and left some.
-Don’t tell me you didn’t eat? You can’t do that. People work on the strength of food.
“No. I ate.”
-I’m a bit suspicious, but I’ll trust you. What time do you get off work? Are you going to be really late again today?
At the slightly subdued voice, Ganghyuk checked the schedule displayed on his computer screen. Today was also confirmed overtime.
After holding Yeon Cheolho’s 49th day memorial service, Ian and Ganghyuk returned to the soup restaurant building. What had changed was that the number of subordinates standing guard around the soup restaurant had been increased to ten.
And wherever Ian went, subordinates followed inconspicuously, and Ian always wore a wristwatch on his wrist that enabled location tracking.
In a way, it could be an invasion of privacy, but Ian obediently complied. Being kidnapped again would be terrible for Ian too.
Gal Hongdo’s matter was being wrapped up well. Things had ended amicably with Tae Minsu as well, and he’d made sure there would be no more gossip about Tae Minjae, but Tae Nayeon remained.
Knowing the tide had definitely turned against her, she was staying quiet, but Ganghyuk had no intention of ending it there. If he completely destroyed Tae Nayeon, Tae Minsu might rise up, so instead he was making plans to chase her out of Korea entirely.
In that process, Ganghyuk was planning to make her experience the same terror of kidnapping that Ian had gone through.
Everything was cause and effect. Ganghyuk had been steadily collecting information that could be the weaknesses of the Tae siblings for several years.
Tae Minjae generally caused incidents related to violence and drugs, but Tae Nayeon was a bit more complex. Officially reporting some of the income of affiliated entertainers lower in the official books or manipulating profit distribution unfavorably for company-affiliated actors and singers was routine for her.
She had siphoned off parts of production costs and advertising expenses to paper companies, reduced taxes by processing false expenses for tax evasion, and there was even evidence of abusing affiliated entertainers.
She had even administered narcotic drugs to entertainers suffering from severe depression and forced illegal medical procedures and surgeries.
Among the victims were many minors, so if this material was disclosed, Tae Nayeon could not avoid criminal punishment.
Being ousted from the company CEO position would naturally follow.
She was someone who cared more than anyone about others’ eyes. If he pressured her one by one and drove her into a corner, she would leave for overseas on her own. He just needed to add a bit of intimidation to that.
But he didn’t want to inform Ian of these detailed circumstances. It was enough for Ian to just not be unhappy anymore in his embrace and to find happiness in daily life.
“I’ll come home as early as possible. I won’t go past midnight.”
-Should I make a late-night snack then? I’ve been craving something spicy today. I want to eat chicken feet.
“I’ll buy it for you.”
-No. I want to try making it.
“Okay, then.”
I hope he doesn’t try anything weird like yesterday.
While running the soup restaurant, Ian had taken up an interest in cooking, and lately he’d been particularly displaying an experimental spirit when making food.
Strawberry curry. That was the food Ian had presented to Ganghyuk as a late-night snack yesterday. Dessert was ice cream topped with wasabi.
For a moment Ganghyuk worried if Ian had some complaint against him and was expressing it this way, but when he saw Ian eating so deliciously, he could only laugh.
He said he subscribed to a YouTuber these days who made a lot of unusual dishes and he wanted to try them all one by one.
“Please make it normal food.”
As they conversed, he felt a bit uneasy and added that. If fruit went into chicken feet, he didn’t have confidence he could eat it. The thought alone made him feel queasy.
A bright laugh came from the phone. Just hearing it made him feel refreshed inside his chest. Then his gaze landed on the tablet PC, its screen now dark.
I have to protect this laughter. It hasn’t even been long since he started laughing like this.
But he also didn’t feel like hiding the identity of the hit-and-run driver and lying. What Ian wanted was to know the identity of the real culprit who killed his grandfather.
