TNS 04

Chapter 4

When Cha Jun-hyung sat askew on the sofa and casually waved his hand, Department Head Kim bowed respectfully toward the back of his head before stepping out of the General Manager’s office.

“What brings you here? Our busy Executive Director, who rarely even answers when contacted first, actually took the trouble to walk all the way to my humble office?”

Cha Jun-hyung threw out the words as he stretched, resting only half his rear on the sofa with his legs crossed. Not a single element of his tone, expression, or the light frivolity trailing at the end of his words failed to grate on Seon-jae’s nerves.

Seon-jae silently took a seat across from him, quietly observing Cha Jun-hyung’s subtly altered demeanor.

From this cousin who had always thrown around nothing but foolish, incompetent laughs, an inexplicably grounded confidence radiated today. Seon-jae instinctively tried to figure out the reason behind it.

“Oh, Miss Lee. Two sweet coffees for us, please.”

Pressing the secretary call button, Cha Jun-hyung nonchalantly tossed out a cliché line. The words sounded dated and tacky, as if dragged right out of a drama from a decade ago. Watching him use old-fashioned mannerisms picked up from goodness knows where as if they were a display of great wit made Seon-jae unable to even summon a chuckle.

“Why? Doesn’t Executive Director Cha drink sweet coffee? Hey, when you’re doing mental work, you’ve got to pour in some sugar. That’s how your brain stays sharp and rotates fast.”

The false pretense and shallow sense of superiority underlying the hearty laugh attached to the end of every sentence provoked the patience Seon-jae had managed to suppress.

“Forget that.”

Facing Cha Jun-hyung made Seon-jae so utterly fed up that even his original purpose began to blur. Staring intently at Cha Jun-hyung, who was flicking the toe of his shoe and laughing unpleasantly as if analyzing him, Seon-jae was gradually able to pinpoint why he felt the man had somehow changed.

Starting with the conversation he had just shared with Department Head Kim, something was off. In the past, Jun-hyung wouldn’t have even remembered the employees’ names or faces, yet here he was personally calling in operational staff to discuss sales strategies.

His tone might still sound cheap, but rather than a mere outburst meant to intimidate, he gave the impression that he surprisingly grasped the general details of the work.

While it remained doubtful whether this was an abuse of power through hierarchy, in any case, he did not appear to be working merely for show. Meanwhile, Cha Jun-hyung’s secretary set down two steaming cups of sweet coffee and left.

“Manager Ha Yun-seo says she plans to marry the General Manager.”

Cha Jun-hyung, who was about to take a sip of the steaming hot coffee, suddenly spewed it out with a burst. At the single stone thrown by Seon-jae, Jun-hyung’s face turned bright red and purple.

“Ah, shit!”

Onto Seon-jae’s trousers—where not a single speck of dust was normally tolerated—splattered the coffee droplets spewed from Cha Jun-hyung’s mouth. Seon-jae silently looked down at his stained pants with a cold gaze, barely hiding the disgust contained at his fingertips.

“Did Secretary Ha say that herself? That she’s marrying me?”

Cha Jun-hyung looked at Seon-jae with an utterly dumbfounded expression, seemingly at a loss for words. Knowing he wasn’t quick-witted enough to fake such a reaction in a split second, his state of utter astonishment seemed genuine. In that case, discussions of marriage between the two had likely taken place through his father, Cha Ik-hyun.

The moment the direction of the appalling story passed down through Ha Yun-seo’s mouth became clear, a cold sneer formed on Seon-jae’s lips.

“What Ha Yun-seo hates most is an ignorant man, so there’s no way you appealed to her. What did you threaten her with?”

“Threaten? Ha! Wow, Executive Director Cha. Are my father and I thugs? Why would we threaten a decent person?”

“Then why would Manager Ha suddenly bring up marriage—and with you, of all people?”

To the nuance implying how could someone like you ever be worthy of Ha Yun-seo, Cha Jun-hyung instead took it to mean why on earth would marriage be brought up with a lacking woman like Ha Yun-seo.

“Well, it’s not like I’m particularly thrilled about it either. But Secretary Ha is pretty good at her job, quick-witted, and, well… hot, isn’t she? Rather than marrying some foxy bitch, a naive one like Secretary Ha is better, no matter how you look at it.”

Cha Jun-hyung’s lips, which had been blabbering on while fanning his tongue burned by the hot coffee, instantly froze. This was because Seon-jae, who hadn’t even touched the sweet coffee, stood up, shoved his hands into his trouser pockets, and looked down at him.

Resting his shoe on the low table, Seon-jae stared down at Cha Jun-hyung with coldly hardened eyes and muttered,

“So I’m asking: why is Ha Yun-seo getting tangled up with trash like you?”

“A-Are you crazy?”

“Answer me.”

Seon-jae’s shoe stepped onto the table and extended, sinking deep into Cha Jun-hyung’s thigh. At the same time, Seon-jae’s hand grabbed the knot of Cha Jun-hyung’s necktie and yanked it fiercely. The sensation of being forcefully crushed until he couldn’t move an inch instantly turned Cha Jun-hyung’s face pale.

“M-My father… the Vice President arranged it. I didn’t push for it!”

“You son of a bitch. Who do you think you’re laying eyes on?”

Cha Jun-hyung tried desperately to shake off the hand choking his neck, but he couldn’t break free from the force crushing his thigh and neck simultaneously. Under the intense pressure that cut off his breath, Cha Jun-hyung’s face went from flush red to a sickly blue.

“I won’t let a slothy piece of shit like you have Ha Yun-seo.”

“Ugh, cough! Y-You bastard, what… are you saying…”

The necktie wrapped around him like a choking noose constricted his blood vessels, and the tip of Seon-jae’s foot trampling his thigh crushed even Cha Jun-hyung’s shallow self-esteem.

“Know your place.”

Having said his piece, Seon-jae removed his hand and foot and turned around. Jun-hyung, unable to utter even a single word as his entire body constricted, could only cough dryly again and again.

“Tell the Vice President: if he wants to make Ha Yun-seo his daughter-in-law, he needs to get my permission first.”

Cha Jun-hyung, still trapped in the horrific sensation of being strangled, clutched his neck with both hands. Panting wildly, he glared at Cha Seon-jae’s retreating back as it vanished into his blurred vision.

He had long heard that Seon-jae was unusually sensitive when working, but normally, Cha Seon-jae was someone who rarely revealed his emotions.

Though they had plenty of occasions to cross paths since birth due to being cousins, Jun-hyung had never seen Cha Seon-jae get agitated and ramble, let alone display such violent tendencies. Left alone, Cha Jun-hyung coughed violently and muttered to himself.

“That bastard… Does he think he’s her damn husband or something? Fuck.”

Ha Yun-seo had been clinging to Cha Seon-jae’s side for several years now. That Cha Seon-jae and Ha Yun-seo shared a relationship beyond boss and secretary was obvious enough that even a total fool could see it. Even so, given Cha Seon-jae’s razor-sharp personality, there was no way he would care for an insignificant woman like Ha Yun-seo.

Measuring the extent of Cha Seon-jae’s ambition was a waste of breath, so the one to squeeze and crush was naturally Ha Yun-seo. Yet when he tore through everything regarding Ha Yun-seo through his father, the only thing that came out was the fact that Secretary Ha cherished Cha Seon-jae immensely.

The most they had managed to extract by threatening Ha Yun-seo was her promise to hand over key information regarding an upcoming new drug release. Hearing such useless information had only annoyed him. Still, Cha Jun-hyung wasn’t the type to walk away empty-handed.

Even after months of threatening her using her family as leverage, she hadn’t budged, making him think there was nothing to gain. But to his surprise, when he threatened to block Cha Seon-jae’s path just to see what would happen, she suddenly uttered unbelievable words: that she would do whatever he commanded.