Aware or not, unlike him, Ha-jin refocused on the meeting. That was pretty too.
He might have seemed distracted throughout the meeting, but he had already grasped its content. The meeting smoothly concluded, ending with the usual pleasantries.
Fending off the client’s staff who wanted to follow to the parking lot, the two walked to the car alone. Ha-jin felt particularly awkward walking half a step behind Tae-hong.
If only it had been a relay meeting, how nice that would have been, she thought.
Sitting in the driver’s seat, Ha-jin quickly opened her notebook.
Rushing to the next location, finishing the meeting, moving again, finishing again. Soon, she hoped, it would be time to return to her suite.
Tae-hong, for some reason, didn’t mention the kiss again until the schedule was over.
Right, just like this, as if nothing happened, she thought. Of course, she knew this wasn’t the answer. But with her energy drained, she couldn’t think straight.
And this thought shattered instantly in the elevator heading up to the suite.
“Tired today too?”
“Yes?”
I understood the intent of his question but had to pretend not to know, needing to hold out as long as possible. Especially when I hadn’t slept since waking up at 6 AM.
“Fewer meetings than yesterday, are you tired?”
“Ah, tired.”
Pretending to just understand, I played a clumsy act. Although the meetings were fewer, all the energy spent during the day had been focused on him.
“Of course, I’m tired.”
The early morning wake-up had fanned the flames of fatigue. With the culprit in front of me, my feigned act gained momentum.
“Do you know what time I woke up?”
I mimed looking at a watch, even though I wasn’t wearing one.
“At exactly 5:30 AM.”
Ha-jin looked up at Tae-hong with force in her eyes, but his expression remained unchanged. She needed to be more dramatic.
“Oh, I’m so tired.”
Ha-jin yawned with her hand and slipped into the elevator that just opened. Tae-hong, with one hand nonchalantly in his pocket, stood askew.
He followed her into the elevator and pressed the button for their floor. Ha-jin continued to act tired, rubbing her shoulders.
“You must be very tired.”
“Yesterday and today. I’m completely drained.”
She moved from massaging her shoulders to lightly thumping them with her fist.
“Manager, you must be more tired than me. You should rest early.”
She put the final touch on her act with another yawn. Ha-jin exited the elevator first, and Tae-hong, without saying much, followed.
Now, just entering the room in the middle of the hallway would make Ha-jin the victor of the day.
As she neared her goal, Ha-jin quickened her pace. Trotting along, the distance between her and Tae-hong didn’t widen.
Tae-hong, with his long strides, maintained a steady distance behind her.
Finally, she stood in front of her room. How much she had waited for this moment. Ha-jin placed her card key on the door. Beep! With the sound, the door opened, and she was about to enter.
“Manager, you worked hard today too. Then, I’ll knock on your door again tomorrow at 6 AM.”
She was about to turn and enter, and that would have been it.
“Deputy Ha-jin.”
Tae-hong’s voice floated down from above Ha-jin’s head.
I haven’t even turned the handle yet, she thought, considering ignoring him and turning the handle anyway, but her hand wouldn’t listen anymore.
“Do you remember what you said earlier?”
“What, what was it?”
Why is my voice trembling? That makes you the loser, Ha-jin.
“Think carefully. You said something earlier.”
What did I say? There must have been hundreds of words today; what answer does he want?
She quickly rewound the day’s events in her mind. And then, one particular scene stuck out.
It was definitely in the car before the meeting. Tae-hong’s hands were caressing and pressing on her lips, and he said he’d look at them instead of a mirror when an employee from the client approached. What I said then, that is, my words were…
Ha-jin’s face muscles, which had been subtly moving, froze completely. Tae-hong didn’t miss it and twinkled his eyes. She remembered.
“You remembered, it seems.”
Any feeble attempt at evasion only comes back to haunt you. With a lesson learned the hard way, Ha-jin’s body stiffened with the words that had clearly returned to her memory.
“Mana, ger. Next, time. What, ever, next, time.”
Tae-hong, with his good memory, recited Ha-jin’s words like a robot, articulating each syllable. It was supposed to be a quick escape from a crisis.
“But what exactly did you mean by ‘next time’? What should we do next time?”
But, that was only her own thought.
My Step-brother Is Obsessed With Me (Female-dominant)
A gentle female protagonist vs pitiful in the early stage, and a sick male protagonist in the later stage
Cheng Songer transmigrated into the body of a vicious cannon fodder female supporting character with the same name as her in a female-dominant novel.
In the original story, the cannon fodder female supporting character was inhumane, committing domestic violence, gambling excessively, being lustful, and even wanting to sell her stepbrother to a brothel for money.
As luck would have it, she just happened to transmigrate at this time.
Seeing Cheng Qingzhi biting his lip, enduring the tears in his eyes, looking pitiful, her heart softened.
She stuffed the money back into the Madam’s hand and reached out to him.
“Brother, come home with me.”
