Chapter 63
***
Hajin’s people, who had been operating quietly behind the scenes, gathered in a separate space arranged by Park Hyunwoo.
Everyone was busy moving around at their stations—running document shredders, organizing belongings, or looking at charts.
Hajin and Hyunwoo were strategizing in one corner of the space.
“Secretary Kim has expressed his intention to step back from practical work. It seems like a declaration of war, announcing that he’s going to scheme openly. For now, I’ve decided to take over Secretary Kim’s duties.”
“…”
“CEO.”
“…”
“Should I report again later?”
“No, I’m listening. Continue.”
Hajin spoke in a detached voice. His gaze remained fixed outside the window the entire time. On his first day working here, he seemed more preoccupied with something other than work. Park Hyunwoo sighed quietly as he observed the CEO.
“The board members are people who move according to money, and as soon as rumors spread that you were buying stocks, they seemed to distance themselves from Secretary Kim.”
Hajin spoke in a low voice.
“Hyunwoo, speak to me not as the CEO, but as a friend and colleague.”
Hyunwoo’s expression stiffened slightly before relaxing.
“What are you going to say now!”
“What if I pretend to back down… and then hit them from behind when they let their guard down later?”
Hyunwoo’s face twisted.
“If you can give me three or more reasons why you need to do that, I’ll follow. Until then, I can’t agree.”
“Well… possessiveness, the desire to conquer, the need to control?”
“Fuck, are you saying you want to screw Secretary Kim? Your taste has gone to shit.”
At Hyunwoo’s joke, Hajin threw his head back and laughed loudly, then looked at Hyunwoo with clear eyes.
“No way… You know how high my standards are.”
“Then? Why the hell are you suddenly acting crazy?”
“First, I don’t like my brother being at home while I’m at work.”
“…You crazy bastard.”
“Second, it’s no fun if you win too easily.”
“…You psycho.”
“Third, Yoon Juwon went out of his way and said he wanted to lighten my burden. Haha… If Yoon Juwon says he’ll do it, how can I refuse?”
Hyunwoo, who had been openly mocking Hajin, closed his mouth at the situation that was more serious than he thought. Knowing that Yoon Juwon had already betrayed him significantly, it was an absurd situation.
Hyunwoo advised seriously with a completely changed tone.
“CEO, it could be a trap.”
“I know.”
“What if you’re betrayed again?”
“I know that too.”
Hyunwoo didn’t say anything more. Until now, Hajin had always managed to accomplish whatever he considered his duty by any means necessary, so it would be the same this time as well.
“Then I’ll keep track of stock flows while monitoring the board members and looking for other weaknesses they might have.”
Hyunwoo said this and left the newly established CEO’s office.
Hajin thought of Juwon’s face from this morning.
Even if this was another betrayal, he was willing to endure it, so dance as you wish… With the memory of the expression he’d seen this morning in his heart, he would forgive anything…
That was Hajin’s resolution.
***
“This is difficult.”
I tried hard to analyze the financial statements of A Tech that I had spread out, but it wasn’t easy.
“If I had known it would be like this, I should have studied stocks…”
I muttered uselessly and smiled bitterly. I would need to have had money left over to study stocks. After using all the money I earned to pay off debts, what could I do…
I took my eyes off the screen that I couldn’t understand even after staring at it and flopped back onto the sofa. With neither Hajin nor Hahyun at home, the already large house felt even bigger.
Lying still and looking at the ceiling, Hajin’s face and his words about being willing to be fooled even though he knew he was a sucker came to mind.
Since Hajin agreed too readily, I started to lose confidence in my prediction. Given that events occur here at similar intervals as in my world, the land value would definitely increase in a few months…
“Ah, my head.”
Just then, my phone started vibrating. Assuming it would be Hajin or Hahyun, I checked the screen, but it showed “Restricted Number.”
Who could it be? Nobody knows this number…
Should I not answer? But thinking that the brothers might be using a different phone, I picked up.
“Hello?”
- Static noise.
Instead of a person’s voice, I only heard strange mechanical sounds.
“Excuse me. Who is this? Please speak.”
- Static noise.
Click, and the call ended.
I couldn’t do anything for a while, just holding the phone frozen. With an ominous feeling, I paced the living room biting my nails, then called Hajin.
“Hello? Hajin-ssi?”
- What’s the matter?
There was a hint of surprise in his voice.
“Are you going to be late today? I’d like it if you could come a bit earlier… No, I’ll tell you over the phone. I just feel uneasy no matter how I think about it.”
- What is it?
“I just got a call from a restricted number.”
- …
“No one knows this number, so I’m really anxious…”
- It’s probably nothing. Nothing’s going to happen right away, so lock up well and wait until I get there.
“…Will you be late?”
- There’s been a bit of a problem, but I’ll try my best to get home early.
The call ended like that. Hajin’s assurance that it was nothing wasn’t comforting at all.
Who could it be? The police? Or Secretary Kim, who was desperately looking for the brothers’ weakness?
The crisis that had seemed distant because I hadn’t experienced it directly finally became real. Suddenly, my head hurt and I felt dizzy.
***
I opened my eyes on the sofa. I remembered lying on the sofa, but I couldn’t precisely recall when I had fallen asleep.
I grabbed my phone, which I had pushed away, and checked the time. It was past 6 PM.
But there was no sign of the brothers. I started to feel scared.
“When are they coming, really…”
I got up and walked around looking for them, but neither was to be found.
“Should I call to see when they’re coming?”
I put my phone down. I looked just like a dog who had lost its owner. Even though it was natural to depend on the brothers given the situation, I didn’t feel good about it.
Am I overreacting to one phone call?
I went back downstairs and checked my phone. There were no messages.
“What’s going on? Usually they’re constantly asking if I worked out, if I ate, messaging me all the time…”
I stared blankly at the empty messaging app and wrote and deleted messages to Hajin repeatedly. In the end, I couldn’t send anything.
“Nothing even happened… But I feel disappointed.”
If I had no feelings for Hajin like before, I wouldn’t have felt this disappointed.
Since I’m not gay, it didn’t make sense to feel this kind of disappointment toward a man. But the current emotion was definitely romantic.
That’s it. Without realizing it, I had gotten soaked by the drizzle. It’s not that I liked men because I’m gay, but that I, who had become Yoon Juwon, had grown to like the brothers who had special meaning to me.
“Haah…”
Thinking these were just idle thoughts because I was alone in a quiet, spacious house, I turned on the TV. And then I had to face another shock.
[Top model Seo Hajin in a pink romance with beautiful actress Jeon Hyesu. Today’s entertainment exclusive.]
“There’s no way…”
I couldn’t believe it, even as I saw the photo of a smiling Hajin and a beautiful woman clinging to his arm on the screen. But it was hard to dismiss it as just another scandal—the two looked so affectionate.
“That’s a photo that anyone would have to acknowledge as confirming their relationship, isn’t it?”
Cold sweat ran down my body, and my face burned hot.
No, it can’t be. I, who live with Hajin, would have known. If he had been dating someone, it would have shown somehow…
‘Come to think of it, he never said he loved me.’
Hajin’s words from before came to mind.
What if Hajin didn’t actually love Yoon Juwon, but was just playing along because I pretended to like him, and then moved on to someone else?
“No way. If that were the case, he wouldn’t have slept with me…”
I clenched my fists tightly and said loudly,
“I’ll just believe what I’ve seen. It could be a false report. They said it was an exclusive, not an interview, so it probably isn’t true.”
I immediately picked up my phone to search for other articles. I entered Seo Hajin’s name on a portal site. Despite being called an exclusive, the portal was flooded with the scandal between model Seo Hajin and actress Jeon Hyesu. I selected one, read the article, and scanned the comments.
Comments:
Damn, of all the celebrities, why her…
Lucky Jeon Hyesu. If you have any conscience, pay double taxes.
Is this real? I heard it’s a false rumor released by Jeon Hyesu’s agency to clean up her image?
→Even those kinds of rumors are spread by agencies.
→Jeon Hyesu had an article about dating a married man recently, so I guess the rumor was false.
Scandal or whatever, when are you going to film the movie?
→No rumors, no one said anything about filming a movie. Some director just said Seo Hajin’s image matches the movie’s protagonist.
→Ah, I got excited for nothing.
How handsome even in the midst of all this…
My hands trembled as I struggled to read the shaking text. Even after carefully examining the article and all the comments, I still couldn’t tell for sure.
