DH ✦ Ch 23

✦ Chapter 23 ✦

It was late at night, and Ga-young was alone in the detached house.

She had perched on the edge of her bed, intending to turn in early, when her eyes fell on the bag she had tossed onto her desk.

It was proof that she had gone out briefly that afternoon. She had originally meant to visit a bookstore, but instead of buying a book, she had ended up purchasing something rather unexpected somewhere else.

A pharmacy.

And birth control pills.

She had asked herself countless times why she had bought them.

No matter how much she thought about it, though, it wasn’t entirely irrational.

She was married, but she absolutely could not get pregnant.

She and Hyun-jae didn’t even share a bedroom, let alone have a physical relationship, so perhaps she was getting ahead of herself.

But what if, someday, their impulses happened to align?

Wouldn’t it be better to prepare for that possibility and prevent the worst possible outcome before it happened?

That was simply the kind of person Ga-young was.

She prepared thoroughly, anticipated the worst-case scenario, and accounted for every possible error until she had arrived at the perfect answer.

That was how she had always managed to stay at the top academically.

Ga-young pulled her bag closer and carefully took out the birth control pills she had hidden deep inside one of its compartments.

According to the pharmacist, she had to take one pill every day for at least a week before the contraceptive effect would begin.

“Should I take it?”

Holding the small rectangular box in her hand, she hesitated for quite some time.

Eventually, her thoughts leaned toward the conclusion that there was no harm in taking it.

She was already drinking herbal medicine meant to help with ovulation. Taking birth control pills on top of that wasn’t exactly a big deal.

“I’ll just take it.”

Ga-young cut off her train of thought and stood up.

It was still too early for Hyun-jae to come home. There was no need to be cautious, so she headed straight for the kitchen and placed a glass beneath the water purifier.

As water trickled into the glass, her thoughts wandered again.

Since getting married, had Hyun-jae ever crossed the line?

Not once.

Well, aside from that kiss goodbye this morning, which had only been for Mrs. Eom’s benefit.

And yet here she was, doing something ridiculous.

Ga-young stared blankly at the glass as it filled with clear water.

She honestly had no idea why she was so determined to take the pill.

It was irrational, and yet that was the problem—she couldn’t bring herself to turn back now.

It was like sprinting at full speed in a short-distance race, suddenly realizing halfway through that the race itself was meaningless, yet being unable to stop when there was only one step left before the finish line.

Ga-young picked up the glass and turned around.

She set it on the table and peeled open the square plastic blister pack.

Just as she was about to put a pill into her mouth—

“Are you sick?”

Ga-young jumped so violently that the pill slipped from her fingers.

She hurried to hide the box of birth control pills on the table, but her hands were shaking so badly that she dropped it onto the floor.

Frozen in despair, Ga-young watched as Hyun-jae approached and picked up the small box.

The brand printed on it was a well-known oral contraceptive frequently advertised on television.

After reading it, Hyun-jae lifted his eyes to Ga-young.

“I doubt someone else bought this for you. So you bought it yourself.”

“……”

“Why are you taking this?”

“……”

Was this what it felt like to be caught red-handed at a crime scene?

More than anything, she wanted to turn back time by exactly five minutes.

Of course, that was an impossible and utterly pointless wish.

Ga-young clenched her teeth and forced back the tears threatening to spill from sheer embarrassment.

Not wanting to look pathetic in front of this man was the last shred of pride she had left.

She gathered what remained of her tattered dignity and focused her gaze.

Hyun-jae’s eyes, as flawless and composed as ever, looked down at her from what felt like far above her head.

His expression remained calm, as though he had simply stumbled across an ordinary part of everyday life.

Meeting Ga-young’s thoroughly flustered gaze, he repeated himself.

“I asked why you’re taking birth control pills.”

There was no way out anymore.

Trying to make up an excuse would only make her look more ridiculous.

Ga-young slowly inhaled and decided to tell the truth.

“I thought… someday, we might.”

“Might what?”

“Have… se-sex.”

“Sex?”

At the shamelessly direct word, Ga-young squeezed her eyes shut.

Hyun-jae let out the faintest breath of laughter.

Fine.

She had done something ridiculous enough to deserve being laughed at.

It’s okay. Just endure it, Ga-young silently told herself as she opened her eyes.

But by then, Hyun-jae had stopped laughing.

“Looks like we were thinking the same thing.”

That was absolutely not the reaction she had expected.

“Have you thought about when that ‘someday’ might be?”

That question was unexpected too.

It was an ordinary combination of words, yet the meaning behind it was anything but innocent.

A different kind of tension, one that completely overshadowed her embarrassment, slowly crept up from Ga-young’s toes.

Looking down at her trembling figure, Hyun-jae spoke without changing his expression.

“I’m fine with tonight.”

“……”

“You don’t need to take birth control pills. I already have condoms.”

“……!”

“Want to have sex?”

Ga-young was genuinely terrified by how casually Hyun-jae could ask something like that.

And he had already prepared condoms?

She had bought birth control pills herself, yet somehow, learning that Hyun-jae had prepared for the same possibility filled her with a suffocating sense of panic.

Her lips trembled so badly that her teeth nearly knocked together before she finally managed to answer.

“N-No.”

Hyun-jae lowered his head slightly toward her pale, stiff face.

His gaze settled on her eyes, which were shaking from shock, yet his expression remained as calm as ever.

How could he say things like condoms and sex without batting an eye?

Ga-young felt like she was the only idiot here.

Hyun-jae tilted his head as if he genuinely didn’t understand.

“Didn’t you buy those because you wanted to sleep with me?”

“……”

“Then tomorrow?”

“Or the day after?”

“……”

He wasn’t forcing her, yet Ga-young’s face gradually crumpled as though he were relentlessly cornering her.

Hyun-jae watched her for a moment before letting out a quiet laugh.

“Tonight’s probably too much for you.”

For a brief moment, it felt as though she could finally breathe again.

Ga-young let out a deep breath.

But her relief lasted only an instant.

“Then should we just kiss?”

Having changed his proposal, Hyun-jae stepped forward.

Ga-young was pushed back by the sheer force of his presence until her hips hit the edge of the table.

Alarmed by the suddenly narrow distance between them, she leaned backward.

Hyun-jae braced one hand against the table beside her and wrapped the other around her slender neck.

As Ga-young tilted precariously backward, his hand supported her neck and drew her slightly forward.

Calling it consideration would have been difficult when his palm was this hot.

The heat generated by their skin brushing together made Ga-young’s neck and ears flush red.

Hyun-jae brushed his thumb gently over her burning ear before flicking it playfully.

The man reflected in Ga-young’s frightened eyes showed no change in expression.

Only the slight curve of his lips suggested that he was enjoying teasing her.

“Kissing is okay, isn’t it?”

“……I don’t want to.”

Ga-young herself didn’t know whether she truly didn’t want it or secretly did.

There was only one thing she knew for certain.

A strange stubbornness had taken hold of her.

She didn’t want to be swept along by this experienced man, to crumble exactly as he teased and tempted her, or to become that easy.

It was a fairly firm answer, but Hyun-jae seemed to take it as nothing more than an adorable act of resistance.

He held her small head in his large hand as though it were a toy and slowly lowered his face.

“You look like you want to.”

“……”

“You really don’t want to?”

“……”

“Really?”

If he had set out to seduce her, then this man was an expert.

His overwhelming build, the warmth of his hand around her neck, the eyes lazily fixed on hers from only inches away, and his low, husky voice—

Everything about him was a lethal temptation.

Ga-young felt as though her face were melting.

An unfamiliar warmth bloomed deep in her abdomen, draining the strength from her entire body.

With every trembling breath, something seemed to slip away from her mind.

As her reason gradually faded, instinct moved of its own accord.

Her eyelids, which had already lost all strength, slowly drifted shut.

For a moment, neither of them moved.

Only Ga-young’s lips grew damp beneath the warmth of his breath.

When the kiss he had threatened never came, Ga-young found herself feeling a strange sense of longing instead.

She should have just let him do it.

She should have let him cover her lips already.

The thought had barely crossed her mind when his breath suddenly moved away.

Then the hand around her neck disappeared.

When Ga-young opened her eyes, Hyun-jae had already taken a step back.

He looked at her slightly bewildered expression and spoke.

The softness from moments ago had disappeared, replaced by something closer to a cynical smirk.

“You said you didn’t want to. So why did you close your eyes?”

Ga-young had nothing to say.

“Next time, I’ll look forward to hearing you say yes.”

Hyun-jae let out a short, somewhat hollow breath and picked up the bag he had set on the floor.

“Good night.”

Leaving behind only that dry farewell, he turned and walked away without hesitation.

Ga-young felt as though she had been bewitched.

Embarrassment had turned into tension, then fear, then relief, then suffocating excitement.

And after riding that emotional roller coaster, she arrived at a complete vacuum.

Nothing.

A little while later, back in her room, Ga-young decided she would take the birth control pills outside the estate and throw them away tomorrow.

Then she went to bed.

But sleep never came.

Her thoughts were filled with something strange and suggestive, yet she had no idea why.

She didn’t understand why her mouth felt dry or why her chest felt so tight either.

She found neither an answer to her long chain of thoughts nor any rest for her exhausted mind.

There was only one conclusion she could reach.

Shin Hyun-jae had completely toyed with her.

How ridiculous must she have looked, getting excited and preparing for something when he had never intended to give her anything in the first place?

Every time she ran into him, Yoon Ga-young felt like she became a complete idiot.

From now on, she decided she would wake up late and go to bed early.

Avoiding any time alone with Hyun-jae was clearly the best strategy.

Unfortunately, the resolution she had made with such difficulty didn’t even last a day.

She saw Hyun-jae again at dawn.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

The knocking was so violent it sounded as though the door might break.

When Ga-young opened it, Hyun-jae stood outside with an irritated expression and gave her a curt command.

“Close your eyes.”