Right, I was going to have to go back there eventually anyway. Pack up my things and make a clean break. I’m not being forced — I’m choosing to go on my own terms. And I needed to keep this man, who had absolutely no business being anywhere near a hospital, as far away from there as possible. If I left him out there even a second longer, there was no telling what other bombshell he’d drop to catch me off guard.
I slid into the inner seat and patted the spot beside me, and the man climbed into the car with effortless grace. It was such a stark contrast to the way I’d been shoved in like a clown that my lips jutted out in a pout. Why does he get to look cool all by himself? The rear door closed, and only after Chief Kim settled into the driver’s seat did the car finally pull away.
I crossed my arms and kept my gaze fixed on the window outside — but the man couldn’t hold himself back even for that long before dropping another bombshell.
“Daddy likes Gang, but does Gang not like Daddy anymore? Hm?”
If his goal was to get my attention, he succeeded.
I slapped both hands over his mouth and cried out,
“Wh— why would you say that. Di-rec-tor Lee!”
It was a title I used very deliberately, fully conscious of Chief Kim sitting up front. Daddy — and in the car again, no less! Maybe the problem was that we’d never properly settled the question of what to call each other. I found myself seriously considering whether I needed to buy this man a muzzle, and I carefully peeled my hands away from his mouth — ready to clamp them back down at the first sign of trouble.
“Ahem. Di-rec-tor Lee. From here on out, I will be addressing you exclusively as Director Lee.”
I spoke with stiff formality, but even so, his hand kept creeping up onto my thigh, and I had to swat it away like I was shooing a fly — multiple times.
“Do you really want to call me Director?”
“Of course I do.”
Even if things were over between us, I had no intention of leaving the Gangho faction. I had no education, no other skills to speak of, and there were people I’d brought in myself that I was responsible for. I wasn’t about to cut and run just because I couldn’t separate my personal feelings from work. Although — the fact that I’m an omega is something I’ll have to keep hidden for the time being. Looks like I won’t be able to uphold the company motto I wrote with my own hands. Not for a while.
Hah…… How am I supposed to pull the wool over those eerily perceptive guys’ eyes.
“Alright. Do whatever you want, Gang.”
His easy compliance made me suspicious, and I studied him carefully — but I couldn’t read what was going on beneath the surface. Why does this man still look at me like he’s in love with me? And that’s setting aside meeting other omegas — he already knows what I really am. Now that I’d lost my trust in him, there was no way to tell what was genuine and what wasn’t.
After that, the rest of the ride home passed in silence. The car descended into the underground parking of the upscale building and came to a smooth stop without a single jolt. As I climbed out, the man draped his suit jacket over my shoulders. I was about to refuse on instinct, but then I remembered I was still in a hospital gown and quietly accepted it.
Fortunately, we didn’t run into anyone on the way up, and I arrived at the apartment — only to be hit with yet another surprise.
“To think he’d been living somewhere like this all this time……”
I flared my nostrils eagerly, drawing in the pheromones that filled every corner of the place. The concentration was incomparably richer than the hospital room — it wasn’t a perfect, overwhelming flood, but it seeped in steadily, bit by bit. My body, too, felt noticeably more at ease.
As if in a trance, I drifted through the apartment toward the bedroom, where the pheromones were thickest.
“Ahh — so soft.”
Money really is something, isn’t it. It was leagues more comfortable than the office — no comparison at all.
I tossed the man’s suit jacket carelessly off the side of the bed and flopped down face-first, burying my nose deep into the bedding to breathe in the pheromones soaked into the sheets. It felt almost maddening to think I’d gone my whole life without being able to feel this.
I knew it was disgusting — shoving my face into someone else’s pillow like some kind of pervert — and it irritated me, but I couldn’t stop. I lifted my face up, then buried it back into the pillow again — and then, as if someone had flipped a switch, the scent I’d been drinking in just moments ago vanished completely. It must have been the unstable way my secondary sex was manifesting, just like the doctor had said.
“Tired? Want to sleep for a bit?”
I hadn’t even noticed him come in. His voice from the doorway startled me so badly I shot upright. I was sitting cross-legged on the bed, and I was cradling the pillow to my chest like a stuffed animal.
“N— no. I’m going to pack up my things.”
I flung the pillow behind me and mumbled with as much dignity as I could muster — and then Chief Kim came in behind the man, shopping bags dangling from his hands.
“Director Lee. I’ll organize your belongings in the walk-in closet— urk!”
He suddenly clutched his throat like something had seized his airway and dropped to his knees. I scrambled off the bed awkwardly. The shopping bags slipped from his grip and spilled open, sending a cascade of new clothes tumbling out — clothes that had apparently already done their job of delivering pheromones.
“Mind your form of address. Chief Kim.”
“Hh— what form of address do you— mean……”
I couldn’t pick up pheromones the way I wanted to, so I couldn’t be entirely sure, but this rotten alpha seemed to be torturing Chief Kim with his pheromones again. With no way to help, I could only gnaw at my thumbnail — and then the man caught my eye and grinned.
“I’m the only one Gang gets to call Director. No one else.”
Suddenly, something he had said on this very bed surfaced in my memory, and a chill ran down my spine.
‘I don’t feel like letting other people call me by the same thing.’
‘Should I make it so only our Gang can use it?’
So that’s what he meant……!
I watched Chief Kim’s face growing paler by the second, then stepped forward toward the man. I had to sort out this godforsaken naming business once and for all.
“When did I ever say I’d call you Director!”
“Hm? What then?”
“I’m not going to say Director, I just — uh……”
“Just?”
The first thing that came to mind was Daddy, which I’d heard in the car — absolutely out of the question. What kind of son sleeps with his own dad! But I couldn’t go back to calling him babe either. That’s what you call someone you’re dating — and we’ve broken up! The most neutral option was Director, but using that title was guaranteed to make everyone around me miserable. The gang members might even band together to come after me.
So then — mister? No — absolutely not. I shook my head as the memory of that word making him hard surfaced unbidden. So given all of that, the only thing left I could actually choose was……
“I’ll just call you Jaeho!”
Right, that’s the safest bet! It was a little disrespectful for a subordinate to call their boss by their first name, but right now, nothing else would do. Surely just a name wouldn’t make him hard the way daddy or mister did.
“Jaeho, I’m hungry! Feed me. Food!”
I grabbed the man’s arm and shook it, then shot Chief Kim a look that said figure it out and make yourself scarce. Just for a moment, I caught it clearly — the flash of camaraderie in Chief Kim’s eyes.
Right, broadly speaking, we’re colleagues at the same company, aren’t we. We look out for each other. So that means you keep your mouth shut about what you just saw. And that’s how the deal was struck, in silence.
“Shall we? Then go get cleaned up — I’ll get something ready.”
“Yes, yes. Let’s go.”
I shoved the man out of the room and successfully managed to separate him from Chief Kim, then slipped into the bathroom. My original plan of grabbing my things and leaving immediately had gone off the rails. It looks like I’ll need to at least eat before I can get out of here.
“Haah……”
The person staring back at me in the large bathroom mirror was a sight. The hospital gown that made me look like I’d escaped from a psychiatric ward. Hair sticking out every which way from all the commotion. Eyes hollow and sunken, probably from being sick for so long — even though I wasn’t in pain right now. And my collarbones, more pronounced than ever from the weight I’d lost. In short — a mess.
“And he still looked at me like that and brought me home……”
I stripped off the hospital gown, let the warm water hit me, and brushed my teeth with the full force of my fury. I was thinking about the shopping bags Chief Kim had been carrying earlier.
“Hah — so you gave it and took it back?! Ptoo! Cheapskate!”
I spat out the toothpaste, gargled noisily with water, and was done with my shower in five minutes flat. Powered entirely by rage.
***
“Unbelievable.”
The stream of exclamations refused to stop. Though my mouth was also busily working through the braised short ribs at the same time.
“It’s melting, it’s literally melting……”
This is paradise on earth. I closed my eyes and savored the bite of braised ribs I’d been dreaming of. Reality was more dream-like than any dream.
“Is it good?”
The man was watching me with a warm, satisfied smile, and I set down a cleanly gnawed bone and looked away.
“Hmph. It’s alright, I guess……”
But the mountain of bones that had piled up without me noticing was doing plenty of talking on my behalf — it was absolutely delicious. When I added the last bone to the pile, it all came crashing down with a loud clatter, and my embarrassment doubled.
“Is that so. Next time I’ll make it even better.”
Next time? What next time — this is the last time! Farewell, braised ribs. It’s been delicious.
Pushing aside the bittersweet feeling, I roughly wiped the sauce from the corners of my mouth and fingers with a napkin. Then I delivered a solemn announcement to the man.
“I’m going to head to the office now.”
“I told you to rest for a while.”
“It’s not that…… The office is my home now, so I’m going there.”
I was clean, I was full. It was time to pack up for real and go.
I stood up from the table, found my suitcase, and walked straight into the walk-in closet without hesitation. The memory of that dizzying incident that had happened here last time surfaced as I stepped through the entrance, but I tried hard not to let it resurface.
But the moment I spotted the perfume bottles arranged on the dresser, my head tilted involuntarily.
“Didn’t these break last time……?”
I was fairly certain a few of the bottles had shattered — maybe not all of them, but some — yet here everything was, arranged right back on the table exactly as before. Not just mine. His bottles too.
I registered the oddness of it, but the sound of footsteps approaching the walk-in closet made me stop thinking and start moving. I pulled out my gray suitcase and unfolded it in the middle of the room, quickly tossing in underwear, socks, and clothes. I did not touch a single couple’s item.
“Gang, aren’t you tired? Come take a nap with me.”
The man stood behind me, watching, and kept trying to lure me away with various tricks.
“Oh, and we should have dessert before sleeping, right? I have vanilla ice cream too — your favorite.”
He bore no resemblance to the man who had shoved me roughly against a wall at the hospital, demanding to know if I was going to let another alpha have me. This version of him was entirely soft — coaxing, coaxing, coaxing. I swallowed hard and tried my best to ignore him. I can’t let myself waver anymore.
Steeling myself, I opened the drawer that held his watch collection. Which one should I take — I reached for the one that looked most expensive among all the gleaming watches, then stopped. For some reason, taking it felt too much like stealing.
After some deliberation, I fastened the watch I’d been about to pocket onto both my wrists instead. This thing’s heavy enough to sell for a decent price. I pulled my sleeves down to cover them, and then suddenly remembered there was something else I needed, and breezed right past the man where he stood.
I jogged to the master bedroom, grabbed the pillow off the bed, and headed back to the walk-in closet. The man was still standing in the same spot, arms crossed, watching to see what I’d do next.
“This pillow is mine, so I’m taking it.”
Not having my familiar pillow all this time — how had I managed. Now I’d finally be able to sleep properly on the office sofa.
I crammed the pillow on top of the already-straining contents of the twenty-four-inch suitcase and threw my whole body weight onto it to barely get the zipper closed. I wiped the sweat that had gathered at my temples with the back of my hand, then dragged the suitcase over to stand in front of him.
“I’ve got everything I need. Do whatever you want with the rest — throw it out, keep it, up to you, Jaeho.”
“You’re really leaving? You’ll need my pheromones…… Will you be okay, Gang?”
I tensed, bracing for him to bring up other alphas and say something crude again — but for some reason, his mood didn’t seem particularly bad.
“I’ll be fine. I’m twenty-three already.”
I gripped the handle of the suitcase and rattled it all the way to the front door, then jammed my feet into the most familiar pair of sneakers I could find. The man came forward with a jacket in hand.
“Evenings are cooler than you’d think.”
I was only in a long-sleeved shirt and jeans, and a cardigan was lowered onto my shoulders. I slipped my arms in without thinking and gave a small bow.
“Thank you. The ending was a bit rough, but I got to experience a lot of good things in this world thanks to you, Jaeho. I’ll see you at work.”
Damn. That line was perfect. So mature.
The man only dipped his head slightly in response to my impressive parting words.
All that was left was to turn around, walk out the front door, and leave without a single glance back. That would have been perfect.
“Huh?”
But for some reason, the door was firmly locked and wouldn’t open.
Clunk — clunk —
Why is it doing this?
