“Ji-woo.”
Her last memory was of being curled into a tight ball, lying beside Seo Tae-joon in the hospital. She moaned as sunlight pressed against her closed eyelids. A shadow fell over her face, blocking the blinding brightness.
“Is that better?” Seo Tae-joon’s voice pulled her fully awake. Her eyes fluttered open. He was smiling faintly at her, his face battered and bruised. Morning sun streamed through the thin curtains of the hospital room.
“Why did you take so long to come back? I was waiting. Ji-woo, I’m hurt.” She could see the dried tracks of tears on his cheeks.
Ji-woo suddenly understood the urge she’d had to wake him. He might have been left alone, trapped in his nightmares. Without a word, she pulled her sleeve over her hand and gently wiped his face.
“You’re the end of this nightmare,” Seo Tae-joon whispered. She stared at him, stunned. “You’re always the end of my nightmares.”
Looking into the man’s hopeful eyes, she realized he saw her as the only one who could save him. But for Ji-woo, the words were horrifying. A warning flared in the back of her mind, a deep-seated anxiety she couldn’t place, telling her this was all wrong. It was something to do with her.
Her life with Seo Tae-joon flashed through her mind: their first meeting in the forest, being bound together in bed, the day he’d grabbed a live chicken. She saw them facing Hwang Jo-yoon, perched atop a thirty-meter tree, standing before a charging boar, at the stinking drug farm, on a violently shaking boat.
A strange power compelled her to do things she would never normally do. It was as if, by living in Seo Tae-joon’s world of terror, she was becoming surrounded by it, accustomed to it, absorbed by it. She sat up, a tremor running through her.
“Ji-woo, where are you going?” Seo Tae-joon asked.
Ji-woo turned, meeting his brown eyes. His gaze traveled over her, taking her in. They held a power over her, and the words she wanted to say caught in her throat. Her heart felt as if it were being torn apart. She was supposed to meet Mi-sook today, to be introduced to “normal” men. She had to know if her feelings for Seo Tae-joon were real or just a product of shared fear. If she couldn’t find the truth of her own emotions, she would be utterly lost.
“You’re not going to the mountain alone again, are you?” he asked.
“No,” she assured him.
Seo Tae-joon had always been sensitive about her going into the wilderness for work alone. Because of that, she’d been letting Mi-sook handle most of it, at least until he recovered.
“Then where are you going?” Seo Tae-joon pried.
“I’m going to meet a friend,” she said simply.
“You have friends?”
Ji-woo blushed, unsure how to take the question.
Seo Tae-joon seemed to realize his mistake and quickly tried to explain. “It’s just… no one else came to see me, and you’ve never brought a guest home. I assumed it was just the two of us, relying on each other.”
His gaze pierced her, and her heart began to pound. The anger in his eyes quickly faded as he lay back against the pillows. “They’re discharging me today. I’ll have dinner ready when you get home. Come back early.”
Ji-woo forced a smile and moved quickly to the door, feeling as if she were escaping a trap. Just as she was about to leave, his voice came from behind her.
“You look pretty today, Ji-woo.” He watched her with cold eyes, a twisted grin on his face.
“Three police officers were replaced, and eight others were fired.” Jang Beom-hee, an earphone in his ear, stared out the window at Ji-woo’s house.
The project, operated secretly from a remodeled fishing boat in the middle of the ocean, had been completely devastated by the youngest master of the Seo Family. A drug boat, photographs of a vinyl greenhouse, and the Korean-Chinese man who oversaw the fields—there was more than enough incriminating evidence.
Everyone on the boat was arrested and handed over to the prosecution. The only article ever published about the incident, however, served only to stoke public hatred toward the Korean-Chinese. They were the perfect scapegoats, sheltering the true masterminds.
The official case was simple: Korean-Chinese nationals secretly cultivating and smuggling harmful drugs.
“What should I do with Tae-joon?” Director Seo sighed. Jang Beom-hee’s face hardened.
The few unyielding police officers who had discovered the crime were punished. The others happily accepted the hush money to sweep the whole affair under the rug.
The person in real trouble, however, was Seo Tae-joon.
“My customers were offended. As his older brother, it’s my job to punish him for what he did, isn’t it?”
Seo Tae-joon stood by the window, watching Ji-woo’s figure slowly recede down the path. His expression was indifferent, but his eyes remained fixed on her until she disappeared from sight.
He sat on the sofa, perfectly upright, his hands resting on his knees. He didn’t move, frozen as if a switch had been flipped inside him. Only the slow blink of his eyes proved he was still alive. The moment Ji-woo left, it felt to Seo Tae-joon as though time itself had stopped.
Existing in a space without her felt fundamentally wrong. He felt the pull of gravity grow heavier as he pictured her face in his mind.
Where are you going without me? Who are you meeting? Is it a man? Who is he? How do you know him? He clenched his fist so hard his knuckles turned white. The questions felt childish, and he fought for calm, but he couldn’t restrain the anger boiling inside him.
The light-blue blouse and jeans she wore were perfect for summer. He had watched, captivated. He’d never seen that outfit before. When she had dressed in a hurry and rushed for the door, he had almost grabbed her arm to make her stay.
When are you coming back? He bit the question back. He ran a hand through his hair and leaned back against the sofa, feeling as if he might collapse. It was difficult for him to imagine a life without her. After all, he had no memories to fall back on.
Memories were such a huge part of a person. Without them, Seo Tae-joon felt unreal, as if he didn’t tangibly exist. He felt that the emptiness inside him was filled only by Ji-woo. He rushed to absorb her every move, her every word, to make himself whole.
Han Ji-woo’s husband. As far as he knew, that was his only identity, his only value.
Occasionally, doubt and distrust crept in, but he brushed them aside. As long as Ji-woo was by his side, nothing else mattered. And yet, she would still turn her back to him, as if determined to test his patience.
Seo Tae-joon pushed himself up from the sofa. He needed to clear his head.