126.
#Blackmail
A row of glamorous dresses on hangers was laid out in front of Choi Yu-na.
“Since you have fair skin, a slim figure, and a small face, I think anything would suit you well. Let me know which one you like, and I’ll help you with the fitting,” the dress shop employee explained kindly.
Choi Yu-na turned her head to look at Jeong Hayun sitting next to her. When their eyes met, he nodded towards the dresses, indicating she should choose something.
“Could you give us a moment alone, please?” she asked the employee, who politely stepped aside, telling them to take their time.
“Are you really going through with this engagement?” Yu-na asked with a sigh.
Instead of answering, Hayun simply raised one corner of his mouth. It looked more like a sneer than a smile.
“I contacted Writer Choi Seon-gyeom as you told me to. They said they don’t know anything, so what more do you want me to do…”
“I’m sure I explained sufficiently,” Hayun cut her off, responding in a cold voice.
Was that really an explanation? Wasn’t it more like a threat?
Anger welled up inside her, but she suppressed it by taking a deep breath. If yelling and getting angry could solve this, she would have done so already. Cunningly, this man had moved her grandfather and the media first. When the news of her engagement, which she knew nothing about, came out in articles, she was more than just surprised. If she had a knife in her hand, she would have gladly plunged it into Jeong Hayun’s heart.
“When did I ever say I was going to get engaged to you?” she had demanded, chasing him all the way to Haedo Group’s headquarters.
Hayun had replied without changing his expression, “Since you helped Jeong Dawoon escape, shouldn’t you take responsibility for it?”
He already knew that she had delivered Dawoon’s note to Choi Seon-gyeom.
“I’ve been thinking, you know. How on earth did that guy contact Choi Seon-gyeom? Lee Ui-hyeon, who visited the house, didn’t move, but when I looked into it a bit, I found out that you were quite close to Kim Na-eun, that guy’s girlfriend. And you were in charge of Writer Choi Seon-gyeom’s exhibition.”
There was nothing incorrect in what he said, so she couldn’t refute it.
“You probably know. That Choi Seon-gyeom is Jeong Dawoon’s biological father. That’s why you helped without hesitation, right?”
“…”
“Since you sent him to his biological father, you probably didn’t feel any guilt. Isn’t that right?”
That was true. She thought there was no reason to feel sorry for Jeong Hayun since Dawoon had chosen Choi Seon-gyeom.
“Well, it doesn’t matter. But since you took something precious from me, shouldn’t you lose something equally precious to be fair?”
A chill ran down her spine at his next words. As expected, Jeong Hayun showed her a photo of her boyfriend. It was a warning that if Choi Yu-na didn’t comply with his demands, she would lose him.
“If there’s something you want to protect, think carefully before you act. I’m not in a good mood these days. You’d better be careful with every word you say. You never know what might happen if you make a wrong move.”
Contrary to his words, Hayun was smiling brightly. That made it even more chilling. With that smiling face, he was someone who could do any harm not to her, but to her boyfriend.
“This won’t make things go the way you want…!”
Bzzzz. Her phone vibrated in her bag. Hayun’s gaze naturally turned towards her bag. Choi Yu-na also hesitated and looked at her bag.
Surely not…
“Answer it,” Hayun said, leaning back deeply into the sofa and looking at her. Even though he was just staring intently, it felt as uncomfortable as sitting on pins and needles. It was a truly terrible talent to be able to make someone uncomfortable with just a gaze.
Thinking it might be a call from work, she took out her phone. However, the moment she saw the number on the screen, her face froze.
The long string of numbers was an international calling code. She swallowed hard as a face came to mind. Even as this was happening, she could feel Jeong Hayun’s gaze fixed on her, making it impossible to raise her head.
“Aren’t you going to answer?” Hayun urged in a low voice.
Choi Yu-na slowly pressed the call button and brought the phone to her ear.
“Hello.”
She hoped it was the person she expected, but at the same time, she desperately wished it wasn’t.
[Senior, it’s me. Jeong Dawoon.]
The timing really couldn’t be worse. If only the call had come when she wasn’t with Jeong Hayun.
“You’ve got the wrong number,” she blurted out, surprising even herself. This wouldn’t help her situation at all. If anything, it would make her position even more difficult. She knew this, yet her thoughts and words were at odds. Perhaps it was a rebellious response to Jeong Hayun’s methods.
[Senior, are you perhaps with my brother right now…]
Before Dawoon could finish speaking, the phone was snatched from her hand. Surprised, she looked up to see Jeong Hayun, who had somehow come right in front of her, checking the caller ID on the screen. He put the phone to his ear without saying a word. Choi Yu-na frowned and turned her head away, thinking she was doomed.
“Jeong Dawoon.”
Even from the side, his voice uttering those three syllables was chillingly cold, as if freezing blood.
[Brother…]
At the sound of Dawoon’s voice, Hayun closed his eyes and took a long breath. His heart, which had seemed barely beating, suddenly started pounding madly at just that one word.
“Are you feeling alright? Not sick anywhere?”
His tone changed instantly. The previous coldness disappeared without a trace, and he was now imitating a caring older brother.
[No, I’m fine.]
“Good, then.”
Not only his tone but also his expression changed. The cynical face that seemed to be sneering even when smiling crumbled, revealing all sorts of emotions.
Watching this transformation, Choi Yu-na was speechless. She had thought it was just Jeong Hayun’s obsession. Believing that obsession and affection were different, and that his feelings would only harm Jeong Dawoon, she had judged that if Choi Seon-gyeom was Dawoon’s biological father, it was right to send him that way.
However, Jeong Hayun’s obsession, as it appeared to her eyes now, looked so much like affection. So much so that she wondered if she had misjudged.
“You’ll come to your brother’s engagement ceremony, won’t you?”
Hayun’s next words made any slight feelings of guilt she had felt meaningless.
“That’s going too far…!”
Choi Yu-na tried to stop him, but his glaring eyes made her swallow her words. Unlike his kind demeanor towards Dawoon, his gaze towards her was icy cold. The discrepancy between his tone and his eyes was so great that it made her hair stand on end.
[…The engagement, I heard it’s not what Senior Choi Yu-na wants.]
A faint smile appeared on Hayun’s lips at the response that came after a long pause.
“How many people do you think marry because they want to? Especially for people like us. It’s about compromising appropriately.”
[And that’s the result of your compromise?]
“As long as it’s not you, it doesn’t matter who it is.”
[…]
Once again, only a long silence followed from the other end of the phone. Hayun focused on Dawoon’s faint breathing sounds. The sound of breathing in his ear only intensified his thirst for Jeong Dawoon, driving him nearly mad.
After taking a long, quiet breath, Hayun returned the phone to Choi Yu-na. The call was still connected. Checking the screen, Choi Yu-na looked at Hayun with an expression that seemed to ask what he wanted her to do.
“Persuade him. Tell him to come back. Or else, who knows what might happen to your boyfriend.”
At Hayun’s warning, Choi Yu-na glared at him. Her boyfriend was truly an ordinary person. He was so ordinary that her father and grandfather might oppose if she said she wanted to marry him – just a regular office worker. She didn’t have plans to marry him yet, but it was unfair that he was being threatened by Jeong Hayun just for dating her.
“This has nothing to do with you anyway. You’re just caught up in it. So tell Dawoon to come and resolve this.”
“Why don’t you do it yourself?”
“It’ll maximize his sympathy if you do it rather than me.”
His words, accompanied by a faint smile, made her genuinely disgusted. She was certain that this man would do anything to get Jeong Dawoon back.
Taking a deep breath, she reluctantly brought the phone to her ear.
“Dawoon, it’s me.”
She called out, but the words wouldn’t come. Choosing her own survival meant asking Jeong Dawoon to return to this man and put on shackles.
[It’s okay. Go ahead and speak. I understand the situation roughly. I heard from Ui-hyeon. I also heard everything my brother just said.]
Dawoon spoke in a calm voice. Knowing that he understood what Hayun was forcing her to do made it even harder for her to speak.
[My brother needs to hear you say it for him to back down.]
It meant that ultimately, the words had to come from Choi Yu-na’s own mouth. She squeezed her eyes shut. In the end, she was the important factor. As Hayun had said, she was just caught up in the issue between the two of them.
“Help me, Dawoon. I need your help. Please come back to Korea.”
Even as she spoke, her feelings were complicated. She resented Jeong Hayun for forcing her to do this.
[I’m sorry. For getting you involved.]
Jeong Dawoon’s apology to her in this situation made her feel even worse. She had vowed never to cause him trouble again, but here she was in this situation once more.
[Tell my brother that I’ll be back before the engagement ceremony. So there’s no need to prepare for the engagement.]
The last part was already being heard by Hayun as well, as the phone had been put on speaker. After ending the call, Choi Yu-na covered her face with her hands, overwhelmed by a sudden wave of fatigue.
“Now, shall we choose a dress?”
Hayun pointed to the dresses laid out in front of them. Hah, she exhaled and glared at him. Dawoon had clearly given the answer he wanted, so why was he still asking her to choose a dress?
“We’ll have to wait and see if Jeong Dawoon really comes back or not.”
His words and expression, once again cold, made any remaining affection she might have had for him disappear completely.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
