Chapter 75
The message conveyed when requesting the first night with Se-jin clearly stated the instruction to “create a knot.” At the time, Tae-geon dismissed it as nonsense, but the more he thought about it, the stranger it seemed.
It was an instruction from someone who clearly knew how his extremely dominant alpha pheromones would affect an omega’s body.
It wasn’t his father. If he had known, he wouldn’t have made the mistake of keeping Hyeon-woo by his side for so long.
His father hadn’t foreseen even the possibility of Hyeon-woo’s omega manifestation, let alone the chance that Tae-geon would imprint on him. So there must have been someone else. A specific group that monopolized and enjoyed information unknown to the rest of the world.
Tae-geon stood up. He picked up the receiver on the cherry-colored mahogany side table and asked Mu-seok an unexpected question.
“Father, you’ve almost finished recovering the political funds you invested in Congressman Kim, right?”
A few months ago, during the tax investigation of the top 10 companies that shook the entire country, the Tae-ryeong Group was excluded from the search and seizure thanks to acting on prior information. They had backed an opposition party member, not the ruling party, because Congressman Kim’s older brother held the position of Prosecutor General.
“There won’t be any conflict between the two of them. Just trust me.”
The omega’s voice had been full of confidence when he said that. Tae-geon wanted to confirm what gave him such confidence.
The call connected.
“This is Choi Tae-geon.”
The person on the other end recognized Tae-geon’s voice and greeted him respectfully. It was the physical security engineer of the Tae-ryeong Group who managed the server containing highly confidential company data.
“A little mouse probably came in and out through the back door. Please check and let me know.”
Knowing that suspicious and impatient omega, he wouldn’t have just sat idly twiddling his thumbs during the three days Tae-geon was unconscious. Tae-geon intended to trace the omega’s tracks and find out what powerful and solid cards he held.
He never intended to roll around with that omega in the first place. His body wasn’t in a condition to do so anyway. The purpose of inviting the omega to the hotel room was to make him believe in Tae-geon’s imprinting.
Before heading to the hotel, Tae-geon had deliberately left bait to make the family’s attendants tail him. So that the act would be interrupted at an appropriate timing.
But the omega’s attitude was quite different from what he expected.
He was clearly in heat. Tae-geon thought he would pounce on him, crazy with lust and unable to control himself, but…
“We have a lot to discuss about our future, don’t we?”
Really, does he intend to remarry? Is he willing to go through a divorce with Congressman Kim’s family? What is he relying on?
Soon, the phone rang. As Tae-geon had expected, traces of someone poking around the server exactly three days ago remained.
“…But it’s strange,” the employee’s voice, full of puzzlement, came through the receiver.
“It wasn’t an intrusion using a back door.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well… it doesn’t seem to be an illegal intrusion. That’s why the firewall didn’t catch it. This permission is… from one of the government agencies…”
“Government agency?”
“Yes, and there were similar traces a month ago as well.”
A month ago…?
The tax investigation was much earlier than that. So it couldn’t be related to that.
At that moment, one government agency flashed through Tae-geon’s mind.
“Does that permission include the National Intelligence Service?”
“Yes, that’s right! This is the NIS’s permission.”
One corner of Tae-geon’s mouth curled up.
How stupid. To think he’d walk right into it.
Although it was a server containing the company’s financial flows, they had cleverly hidden the critical and sensitive parts while leaving permissions open for easy access by the investigation agency and the supervisory authority.
This was why Tae-ryeong could stand back and observe while other companies that refused to submit documents and avoided the recent tax investigation of the top 10 companies faced the hammer of the law.
As the saying goes, it’s darkest under the lamp. If they had investigated properly, Tae-ryeong’s history of tax avoidance by exploiting loopholes in tax law would have been revealed. But with the doors to the storehouse that should have been tightly locked wide open to them, the investigation ended with just a superficial look.
The record from three days ago could be attributed to poking around to confirm his identity, but the record from a month ago was unrelated to him.
“Haha!”
Tae-geon, leaning on the mahogany desk, laughed briefly. Mu-seok, who had been smoking, frowned and glanced at him.
The card the omega held was none other than Congressman Kim’s weakness. Because his own background was shady, he must have dug into Congressman Kim’s illegal activities to offset it, and in the process, got swept up to this point where political funds were involved.
Not just Tae-ryeong, but numerous companies related to Congressman Kim must have been investigated in this way. Impersonating a government agency under the pretext of his father’s authority, and with everyone having been investigated once during the tax probe, they all had to keep their mouths shut and let it happen.
In this way, he must have obtained all sorts of illegal activities Congressman Kim had committed, including nomination corruption and political fund receipts.
He must have been terribly afraid of being kicked out someday for his vulgar behavior that he couldn’t correct even after marriage. Well, since the omega’s father dominated the political world with a clean image, he probably wouldn’t easily accept a child driven out of the in-laws’ house for shameful reasons.
Now he seemed determined to boldly demand a divorce with that card he had been clutching tightly like a lifeline. And for marriage with Tae-geon, no less.
The corner of Tae-geon’s mouth curled up ominously as he approached the sofa and sat opposite Mu-seok.
“How about doing Congressman Kim a favor he can never repay?”
Tae-geon leaned in and whispered, tapping the table.
“Not some political fund nonsense, but a real, proper favor.”
*
Hyeon-woo woke up thirsty and only then realized he was in Tae-geon’s arms. The warmth he occasionally felt in his sleep had indeed been Tae-geon.
Hyeon-woo roughly removed Tae-geon’s arm wrapped around his waist. Despite the rough movement, Tae-geon’s face, deeply asleep as if unconscious, was full of fatigue.
He was in a suit, complete with a tie. Since Hyeon-woo had been alone when he fell asleep close to midnight last night, it seemed Tae-geon had returned even later in the early morning and collapsed without changing clothes.
He seemed so busy with something recently that he didn’t even have enough time to sleep, yet he still drove here to stop by. If Hyeon-woo hadn’t woken up in the middle, he might not have seen Tae-geon today either. He would have disappeared without a trace as usual when dawn broke.
However, even on days when he couldn’t see Tae-geon’s face, Hyeon-woo could feel traces of his visit. Because a freshly prepared breakfast was laid out on the table every day. Tae-geon’s cooking, which accurately gauged Hyeon-woo’s extremely sensitive taste due to morning sickness, stimulated his appetite. The snacks he brought as special treats were also perfectly to his taste.
While he used to trample Hyeon-woo with vulgar words, recently he hadn’t forced any perverse acts at all. He seemed focused solely on feeding and fattening Hyeon-woo up.
It felt strange somehow.
“…What are you trying to do?”
Hyeon-woo, who had been staring at the sleeping Tae-geon, got up and poured himself a glass of water from the table. His eyelids, still heavy with sleep, began to close again.
He made his way to the bed with unsteady steps, but didn’t feel like lying down again. He didn’t want to lie next to Tae-geon and sleep peacefully side by side.
However, no matter how much he looked around, there was nowhere else to sleep in the cramped room without even a sofa, except for this bed. He didn’t want to sleep on the hard bare floor without a blanket.
Reluctantly, Hyeon-woo lay down on the bed, and Tae-geon’s arm ghostly caught him and pulled him tightly into his embrace.
“I told you not to touch me!”
But the more he struggled, the stronger the firm arms held him, until Hyeon-woo, trapped and exhausted, finally surrendered. Unable to resist the overwhelming drowsiness, Hyeon-woo’s eyelids slowly closed.
That night, Hyeon-woo had a strange dream.
He was walking on white clouds when a large tree appeared. Black roses hung in clusters like grapes on every branch, lusciously ripe. The fragrant smell made him feel good.
He wondered if he could eat them. He reached out, but they were too high to reach. Just then, a single black rose that had been hanging like fruit fell onto Hyeon-woo’s outstretched palm. As Hyeon-woo tried to grasp it tightly, it instantly turned to smoke and disappeared without a trace.
When he woke up in the morning, as expected, no one was beside him. He saw a freshly prepared breakfast on the table. He first headed to the bathroom to wash up. Throughout washing his hair and body, the black rose he had held in his hand in the dream lingered in his mind. It was distinctly different from ordinary dreams.
Could it be a conception dream?
Or a premonitory dream?
What could it mean?
He wanted to search for the flower’s meaning, but it was impossible without even a cell phone.
A single black rose that disappeared like smoke when he tried to grasp it.
Hyeon-woo’s face hardened with an inexplicable sense of foreboding as he mulled over the scene from his dream.
