He rose late in the morning and smoothed back his disheveled hair. Pyo Mingyu, standing straight behind him, caught his eyes in the mirror and immediately spoke.
“Nothing out of the ordinary on your end, I take it.”
Gong Haejin’s gaze drifted back to his reflection. As if anything would be. Reading that in his look, Pyo Mingyu gave a small nod. Then he moved on to the next matter.
“That kid isn’t eating. Not a single meal. We’ve barely been getting water into him, and if this keeps up, he’ll starve or——”
“You’re reporting something like that to me?”
Do I really have to concern myself with whether some kid is putting food in his mouth. At the irritated look on his face, Pyo Mingyu paused briefly.
It was expected that Gong Haejin would be sharp after attending a meeting he had no desire to go to. It was the kind of gathering he endured purely out of necessity as a businessman. And no doubt this one had touched on the subject of the drugs President Nam had lost.
Of all the times for it to happen — right when the men under him had let their guards down. It wasn’t just alcohol and women at fault. President Nam, under the guise of entertainment, had slipped a small amount of something into the drinks.
Rumors traveled without sound, and very fast. It would never shake Gong Haejin’s standing over something like this — but it was a nuisance, and that much was certain.
“Mingyu.”
He knew the timing wasn’t ideal, but Pyo Mingyu drew a breath and kept his tone as respectful as he could manage.
“About the one we brought in.”
“Leave him for now.”
A second breath was drawn in, and this one was audibly louder.
“What if we clean him up, groom him properly, and send him to a club?”
“……”
“He’d sell for quite a bit. He’s young, and his looks are decent enough.”
Gong Haejin said nothing. He opened a drawer and pulled out a cravat. He tied it on without much deliberation and moved his long legs forward. Pyo Mingyu followed at a measured distance behind him.
Gong Haejin picked up the glass of water left on the table and drained it in one go, then turned his head just slightly. The cool look that said do I really have to spell out every little thing made Pyo Mingyu swallow dryly.
“I’m only saying it because if we dress him up a bit, the clients would come looking in significant numbers.”
“Ha…… Christ.”
“Wouldn’t it be better than just keeping him around like this.”
This was the kid who’d made a mess of things — the idea was to pass him around until there was nothing left, then dispose of him quietly.
Pyo Mingyu kept his back straight. The kid had been starving for three days now, and today he had forced food into him. He had spooned rice onto a proper utensil and offered it, but the kid wouldn’t open his mouth. In the end, he had picked up the rice with his bare hands and shoved it in. It seemed like some had gone down, so he had relaxed for a moment — only for the kid to immediately retch.
On top of that, the kid seemed to have caught on, because now the mere sight of a water bottle sent him into a panic. So today, not a single drop of water had made it in. The threat that he’d have piss forced down his throat if he kept refusing didn’t work either.
What a stubbornly stupid kid. Pyo Mingyu couldn’t understand what the Director saw in him — enough to keep him alive, enough to keep him here. Under normal circumstances he’d have had his limbs cut off and dumped in the ocean long ago. Or burned cleanly to nothing.
The Director had always been unpredictable and did as he pleased, but this time was particularly so.
“Mingyu. Drop it.”
Pyo Mingyu pressed his lips together. It was Gong Haejin’s warning — not another word on the subject. One more and it wouldn’t end with words. Sensing the edge of danger, Pyo Mingyu lowered his head and stepped back.
The shoes that had looked about to pass him by came to an abrupt stop.
“Ah — I just remembered something.”
“……Yes?”
Gong Haejin’s elegant mouth curved upward. His already cold impression ran even colder when he smiled.
“I stopped by last night for a bit. Drunk.”
Pyo Mingyu reached for the coat he had prepared in advance.
Whenever Gong Haejin drank, he always went looking for someone. That someone was sometimes a woman, sometimes a man. And the purpose of a drunk Gong Haejin going to find Dohui would have been, as always, one thing — to quiet the heat that had risen in him.
Gong Haejin didn’t touch drugs, but alcohol alone was enough to make his desire impossible to rein in. He hadn’t always been like this. It was after his adoptive father had died under suspicious circumstances in prison that he changed.
His adoptive father had worked tirelessly to raise him into a vicious dog. At his coming-of-age, he had been made to personally end the lives of several men who had tried to leave the organization. The adoptive father had bragged about it loudly, as though it were some grand ceremony.
Having grown up doing whatever his adoptive father commanded — and doing it quietly — Gong Haejin had hated that man more than anyone. The fact that someone was violent didn’t make getting blood on your hands a given. But the weaker he appeared, the worse the violence that came back to him. Everyone inside the organization knew. The Gong Haejin who had just turned twenty was hurt every single day, dragging bruise after bruise around with him, eyes completely hollow.
And then the man who had been his greatest enemy had his life cut short in a single moment by someone else’s hand. The emptiness that followed twisted, strangely, into desire. Whenever he drank, he borrowed the alcohol as an excuse to go looking for someone. To him it was nothing more than release — an effort to bleed off stress, in the most literal sense.
“Funny thing.”
“……Yes?”
“Even after using him until the skin wore raw, it didn’t clear.”
In Gong Haejin’s own estimation, his cock was worse than an animal’s. It didn’t matter who — he’d grab anyone by the hair, pin them face down, and drive himself in. That was all it took. After a night like that, he’d feel better.
Last night with Im Dohui had been fewer rounds than usual. And then he had separated cleanly. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t have been satisfied until Dohui’s hole was torn apart — and yet.
Is this compatibility.
The image of Dohui’s slender body surfaced in his mind. Thin legs spread apart, body saturated with the traces of the others, glazed eyes looking up at him — he let out a long breath.
The flaw was that the lines of the kid’s face wouldn’t come back to him clearly. Not surprising, given he had been drunk, and had taken him without turning the lights on. On top of that, Dohui was so small that Gong Haejin only had to stand in front of him and the shadow swallowed him whole.
He had parted those lips and let out breathless, lewd sounds. When he pushed in, that flat chest rose and fell with it. The skin around the nipples had gone completely red from however much they’d been mouthed at.
Crazy bastards.
Gong Haejin pushed his thick arms into the coat. Then, scarf draped in a deep shade around his neck, he walked toward the door with unhurried steps.
Without any instruction yet given, Pyo Mingyu scrambled to follow after him. Closing the distance with quick steps, he asked:
“Director — what if we just dealt with that kid roughly. He doesn’t look like he’ll last much longer anyway. Not the way he’s refusing to eat.”
It would honestly be easier. Far better than the trouble of bringing him meals and water to keep the frail thing alive, and going as far as putting good drugs into him. Pyo Mingyu had reasoned his way to that conclusion thinking about what was ahead of him. He kept his eyes on those sealed lips, hoping a positive answer would come.
The line of Gong Haejin’s mouth, held perfectly straight, loosened slightly at the corners. He smiled.
“Tried him out and he’s worth keeping around — so leave him alive for now. Call Professor Kwon if it comes to that.”
“……Understood.”
The elevator doors opened and Gong Haejin stepped in. Pyo Mingyu bowed from the crown of his head to his feet toward a man without a single thing to fault from any angle.
Once the elevator doors had closed completely, he turned and made his way toward keeping the young fool alive, as instructed.
***
Ugh……
Dohui could barely force out a single word. His throat was clogged and thick, as if something had lodged itself there. Every cough dragged a sharp, scraping pain across his throat.
Both cheeks were seized in a rough grip, and water came pouring into his forced-open mouth in a torrent. It felt as though someone had aimed a faucet directly at him and turned it on full. What he couldn’t swallow overflowed from his mouth and threatened to come out his nose. His chest was soaked through — and so was his back.
“Ugh, hk…… cough……”
Dohui coughed in misery. Perhaps from swallowing so suddenly, his chest ached as if something had seized up inside it.
He thumped his chest with his fist and twisted his body. After coughing for a long while, his eyes grew hot. Bloodshot eyes rolled, searching for the one responsible for just having poured water all over him.
They had always been difficult men. Whether they were using his body, or in the act of giving him food, there was not a shred of patience in any of it. They handled him like an animal, and when he went against their wishes, they threatened to cut the heating or piss inside him.
It was almost funny. Why were they so fixated on making him eat.
But then.
“You trying to die?”
It wasn’t the men — it was Gong Haejin. When had he come in. Dohui trembled his thin, bony arms and pushed his upper body upright. Water had soaked all the way into the sofa, and when he pressed his hand down, his palm came away wet as though he’d squeezed juice from something.
“……They said you’re not eating.”
“……The drugs. I don’t want to take them.”
“And other than that.”
“……Other than that…… there’s nothing…… else.”
Gong Haejin tilted his head slightly. The men below him had apparently been making quite the fuss. Saying the kid was going to die. That they were doing what they were told — fucking him — but it felt like screwing a corpse.
Looking at him now, that was understandable. The pale skin had not a trace of life in it. Even the fingertips and toes, which had at least held some pink, had whitened until he looked like a patient. He carried himself with the hollow listlessness of someone in the grip of a serious illness.
“If that was calculated — it worked.”
“……”
Dohui’s eyelids fluttered as if even that was heavy. Gong Haejin placed a hand on Dohui’s knee. A light, unthreatening touch — and Dohui drew in a sharp, undignified breath.
“Come to think of it — we never drew up a contract.”
