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Chapter 3: Not a Person, but a Cat
After getting out of the taxi, A-ryeon headed toward the magnificent mansion, which stood a considerable distance beyond the main gate.
It belonged to her maternal grandfather, Assemblyman Han Woo-jin, a man who had spent generations in politics, accumulating wealth beyond imagination.
Even A-ryeon had no idea of the exact extent of his fortune, and the underground storage rooms of his mansion were filled with countless pieces of artwork he had hidden away.
He had been elected to the National Assembly under the slogan, “I will work for the people,” yet in reality, he was a man who cared little about fulfilling his legal obligations and was solely concerned with lining his own pockets. Nevertheless, no one dared openly criticize him to his face.
He wielded enormous influence not only in political and business circles but also in the legal world. Furthermore, he was considered one of the leading candidates for the Seoul mayoral election the following year.
A-ryeon stopped in front of the main entrance and squeezed her eyes shut.
Keeping them tightly closed, she took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. She could already imagine the storm of abuse that awaited her inside.
Although it was still early, not even six in the morning, Madam Han would undoubtedly be waiting for her with fire in her eyes.
After taking another deep breath, A-ryeon opened the front door.
“You’re back, Miss. Um… Madam Han has asked you to come to her room for a moment.”
As soon as A-ryeon entered the house, Manager Nam, who lived there and oversaw the household affairs, approached her and spoke cautiously.
The look in his eyes already made it clear that Madam Han was in a foul mood. A-ryeon forced a smile to reassure him.
“Understood.”
Manager Nam said nothing more. He simply turned away, hoping that nothing too unpleasant would happen.
A-ryeon followed him down the long corridor toward Madam Han’s room. When they reached the door, Manager Nam knocked and announced,
“Madam, Miss A-ryeon is here.”
“Tell her to come in!”
Madam Han’s shrill voice rang loudly through the door.
‘What on earth does she eat to keep her voice so strong?’
Whether A-ryeon thought back to her childhood or considered Madam Han’s current age, the woman’s booming voice had never changed. Sometimes, it was almost impressive.
At Madam Han’s response, A-ryeon opened the door and entered.
It was the study used by Madam Han and A-ryeon’s father, Hyeong-geun.
A-ryeon stood before Madam Han, with a desk separating them.
“Mother, I’m home.”
Crash!
A mug suddenly came flying through the air and smashed against the door, shattering into pieces. One of the shards slipped between A-ryeon’s scarf and her neck, grazing her skin.
The cut stung, making her brows draw together, but that was the extent of her reaction. She didn’t so much as flinch, as though nothing significant had happened.
Instead, she felt relieved that the mug hadn’t struck her in the face.
“Have you lost your mind?! You stayed out all night after a blind date! That man is the secretary of the man Se-ra is supposed to marry! If he finds out how promiscuous you are, won’t he start looking at our Se-ra the same way?!”
“You were the one who forced me to meet him, Mother.”
A-ryeon replied calmly, despite Madam Han’s furious glare and ragged breathing.
The woman was impossible to understand through ordinary reasoning. If someone’s daughter stayed out all night, surely the natural reaction would be to ask whether something had happened to her.
But Madam Han was concerned only about the possibility that A-ryeon’s behavior might negatively affect Se-ra, her younger stepsister.
Well, A-ryeon wasn’t her biological daughter. After living together for so many years, this sort of reaction was hardly surprising anymore.
“Then you should have behaved yourself, eaten your meal, and come home! Why did you have to spend the night out? Tell me! Were you with that man?”
“Yes.”
At A-ryeon’s one-word answer, Madam Han pressed a hand to her forehead and squeezed her eyes shut.
“So please stop arranging blind dates for me when I don’t even want to go on them. I already have more than enough trouble cleaning up the messes you and Grandfather create.”
“What…?! How dare you stand there looking me straight in the eye and talk back to me like that!”
“And if things actually work out between that secretary and me, do you intend for me to spend the rest of my life cleaning up Se-ra’s messes?”
Madam Han had raised A-ryeon for twenty years. The time when A-ryeon trembled in fear of her had long since passed, and she was already working herself like a dog for this family.
She saw no reason why she should also have to surrender control over her own future.
“Of course! You should continue living for Se-ra! Who do you think paid for your education and made it possible for you to become a lawyer?! You were born to an unmarried mother and could have ended up an orphan, yet we fed you, clothed you, and gave you a home! You should be grateful and repay us for that!”
For the first time, a flicker of uncertainty crossed A-ryeon’s eyes, which had remained steady and unflinching.
She hadn’t expected Madam Han to drag her biological mother into the argument simply because she had spent one night away from home.
Noticing A-ryeon’s reaction, Madam Han sharpened her words, digging even deeper into the wounds she knew would hurt her most.
“No matter how hard you struggle or how successful you become, you will never be treated the same as our Se-ra. You come from a completely different background. Do you even know why your father brought you here in the first place?”
A-ryeon’s heart tightened.
“It was because you were the only stain on my husband’s life! He brought you here because he was ashamed to let anyone see you, so he could keep you hidden away. So remember this for the rest of your life: you are a stain on our family!”
Madam Han was an expert at finding A-ryeon’s most painful wounds and twisting the knife.
Even after hearing the word stain for more than twenty years, A-ryeon had never grown accustomed to it.
By then, blood was trickling from the cut on her neck, staining her scarf red.
“If you’re finished, I’ll go upstairs. I have an important meeting today.”
“I’m not finished talking! Where do you think you’re going?!”
As A-ryeon turned toward the door, Madam Han called after her.
A-ryeon looked back, her expression completely indifferent, and cut the older woman off before she could continue.
“Would you like me to stay? I have to go negotiate a settlement with the former housekeeper you fired. She threatened to release video evidence of your abusive behavior toward your employees to the media.”
“You little…!”
When Madam Han could no longer find the words to continue, A-ryeon simply opened the door and left the room.
She closed the door behind her and went straight upstairs to her bedroom. Without even turning on the lights or changing out of her clothes, she collapsed onto the bed.
As she had told Madam Han, she had to leave in two hours to negotiate with the former housekeeper. She decided to get at least a little sleep before then.
When she tried to remove her scarf, the cut she had received earlier began to sting.
“Ah…”
Touching it gently, she realized that the bleeding had already stopped.
“Haah…”
She knew she should apply some medicine, but between the overwhelming workload that had piled up recently and the exhausting night she had spent with the man she had met yesterday, she was already at the end of her strength.
Just as A-ryeon closed her eyes and prepared to fall asleep, her bedroom door opened slightly, allowing a sliver of light to spill into the dark room.
“Miss, shall I prepare something for you to eat?”
It was Manager Nam’s voice.
When A-ryeon had been abused by Madam Han throughout her childhood, Manager Nam’s care had been what allowed her to endure until the end.
When A-ryeon had entered this house at the age of seven, knowing nothing about the world, Manager Nam had looked after her meticulously and treated her like her own daughter. Although she had never openly shown her affection out of consideration for Madam Han, A-ryeon had always been able to feel the warmth in her heart.
Keeping her eyes closed and resting the back of her hand against her forehead, A-ryeon answered,
“Manager Nam, I’m fine without food. I just want to sleep for a little while.”
“All right. But I heard something shatter earlier. You weren’t hurt, were you?”
“No, I’m fine.”
Manager Nam probably knew that her answer was a lie.
“Then let me know if you get hungry. I’ll prepare something for you right away.”
The light that had been filtering through the crack in the door disappeared. With the curtains drawn as well, A-ryeon’s bedroom returned to complete darkness.
She set an alarm and fell asleep almost the moment she closed her eyes.
The phone beside the bed in the suite began to ring.
The man, who had been sleeping naked, rubbed his face with both hands before picking up the phone and answering.
The moment the call connected, a man’s booming voice struck his ears.
“Sir! Where on earth are you?!”
“My hearing is perfectly fine, Chief Secretary Jeong.”
“Yesterday, you told me you were going straight home after finishing work! Then you suddenly called to say you were going to use my name, and now you’ve been unreachable until morning! Do you honestly expect me, your secretary, not to be worried?!”
“Chief Secretary Jeong, you’re such a workaholic. Once work is over, stop worrying about your boss. Don’t worry. Nothing happened.”
“Haah… Well, as long as you’re all right, I suppose that’s what matters. Yesterday, you were meeting Lee A-ryeon, the granddaughter of Assemblyman Han Woo-jin, for a blind date, weren’t you?”
Chief Secretary Jeong asked with a relieved sigh.
“Oh? You think what happened yesterday counts as nothing?”
“Forget it. This is all part of the act that will be exposed sooner or later anyway. So, where are you now?”
“L Hotel in Mapo. Send a suit to this suite. I’ll head straight to work from here.”
“What? A suite… No, sir!”
Chief Secretary Jeong shouted in disbelief at the unexpected location, but the man hung up before he could continue.
If he had listened to any more of the man’s nagging, he felt as though his ears might start bleeding.
The man who had spent such a passionate night with A-ryeon was not Jeong In-cheol, the chief secretary of DH Partners’ CEO, Cha Do-hyeon.
It was Cha Do-hyeon himself.
As Do-hyeon got out of bed and headed toward the bathroom, he noticed a bundle of cash on the bedside table.
Seeing the mixture of fifty-thousand-won bills and one-hundred-thousand-won checks, he blinked twice in surprise.
It didn’t take him long to guess who had left the money behind.
Do-hyeon rested a hand against his forehead and let out a laugh that sounded almost like a scoff. The corners of his mouth curved upward as he pictured A-ryeon leaving the money behind.
“After crying so much, why on earth did she even leave me money?”
Do-hyeon got to his feet, walked into the dining area, opened the refrigerator, and took out a bottle of mineral water. He drank it in one go.
Then he caught sight of his reflection in the mirror mounted on the wall.
Looking at his naked body, Do-hyeon gave a derisive smile.
“Did I sleep with a woman or a damn cat?”
Do-hyeon’s arms, particularly his back, were covered in scratches from A-ryeon’s fingernails.
The previous night, he had told A-ryeon that he wouldn’t be able to stop and that she should grab him if things became too much for her.
But he certainly didn’t remember telling her to scratch him.
Do-hyeon chuckled under his breath and shook his head.
