ANLAH 13🌈

Episode 13.

At his reply, Heejae felt both anxiety and, strangely, a sliver of relief.
At least it seemed he wasn’t actually involved with that woman he desired.

Kyobin, studying her reaction, crouched down so his eyes were level with hers.

“Why? Hearing that, do you not want to do it with me anymore?”

He tilted his lips into that infuriating crooked smirk, as if he found the whole thing amusing.

The sight made Heejae let out a hollow laugh.

“I don’t even like you anymore, so it doesn’t matter.”

The words burst out of her even though they weren’t true.
She hadn’t wanted to deny her own feelings just because she was hurt.
But her damn pride—what was it worth, if it drove her to deny her own heart?

At her answer, the laughter vanished from Kyobin’s mouth.
Instead, he raised one eyebrow, brimming with discontent.

“You said you liked me.”

He pressed her, almost accusingly.
Heejae frowned, as though baffled by the question.

When she tried to turn away instead of answering, Kyobin grabbed her wrist and yanked her back.

“I just wanted to sleep with you once.”

Heejae gave him a cold once-over, tossing out words she didn’t mean.

Her gaze traveled down his body, deliberate, and Kyobin let out a sharp laugh, half incredulous.

“Your body looked good, that’s all.”

Her pride—damn her pride.

She wanted to humiliate him.
To make him feel the same kind of shame she felt for having ever loved such a man.
She wanted him to taste it, even a little.

“Why else would I suddenly say I wanted to sleep with you?”

Kyobin pressed his lips into a straight line, staring at her wordlessly.

Why did he look so… pained?
More than anger, his expression looked wounded.

Seeing his eyes stirred a flicker of guilt in her, but she ignored it.
After all, he had hurt her too. This much was fair—just giving back what he’d dealt out.

“You’re awful. Really.”

Strangely, even his voice had lost its strength.
It sounded hollow, and that startled her—but there was no undoing it now.

“Why do you keep messing with my head?”

Shameless. Utterly shameless.

He had someone else he liked, yet still wanted to be loved by her?
It was brazen beyond belief—but with Shin Kyobin’s twisted emotions, entirely possible.

Heejae tore her wrist from his grasp with a violent shake.

“You’re the last person who should be saying that.”

She was wounded too.

And with that, she pushed past Kyobin and walked out of the room first.

After that, nothing changed.
Their relationship remained purely physical—sex partners, nothing more.

From that day onward, Heejae avoided unnecessary words with Kyobin.
Keeping conversation to a minimum was the only way to protect both their hearts.

And so it went on—an astonishing nine years.

There were breaks, of course: his military service, her language study abroad.
But still, the bitter bond never severed.

She had thought it would end once he found a girlfriend.
Yet strangely, Kyobin kept this connection alive, no matter what.

Had he failed to become lovers with that woman?
Or did he still consider her someone precious, someone to protect?

Heejae had countless questions—but in those nine years, she never asked him a single one.

Not a single thing.

“Haa…”

The work was piled high.

Having started her career as a prosecutor, Heejae still needed time to adapt to the work of an in-house lawyer.

But the flood of case files pouring in made her sigh and sigh again.
Was this company just bent on tormenting a newly transferred lawyer?

Or maybe… they trusted her this much?

“Attorney Choi, the director just asked if you could review these documents he sent over.”

“Ah, yes. Understood.”

The legal team’s office bustled with people going in and out.

Heejae was already buried under paperwork, so much that she didn’t even notice who had come to stand in front of her.

Opening Kyobin’s file first, she finally realized—too late—that someone had been standing there all along.

She spun her chair around sharply, and a man was staring down at her.

“I wasn’t sure, but… you are Choi Heejae, right?”

He asked carefully.

Heejae blinked wide, scrambling through her memory for his face.
And then—an image surfaced: a boy in the same school uniform as hers.

“It’s me, Chun Eungang. We went to high school together.”

Chun Eungang.

He had been one of the group always by Kyobin’s side.
Unlike Heejae, who had mostly been alone at school, Kyobin was always surrounded by people.
And Eungang, in particular, had been close to him all three years.

Of course she remembered him.

“Got a minute? How about a quick breather?”

Eungang glanced at the mountain of files on her desk, smiling a little awkwardly.

Heejae rose from her chair, and together they left the office, heading for the outdoor terrace at the end of the hall.

The crisp breeze cleared her head, hazy from overwork.
She hadn’t even noticed how bright and clear the day was.

“You work here too?”

“Yeah. In the Executive Secretary’s Office. Specifically… Shin Kyobin’s personal secretary.”

Leaning against the terrace railing, the two of them gazed out at the dense cityscape, stealing a moment’s peace.

So Eungang had become Kyobin’s secretary.

It was a very Kyobin-like choice—distrustful of strangers, preferring only familiar people at his side.

“I heard you became a prosecutor. Did you quit?”

“…That’s how it turned out.”

At his careful question, Heejae lowered her head, her expression darkening.

“So you ended up here, after all.”

Eungang gave a hollow laugh, lifting his gaze toward the sky as if he’d seen this coming all along.

And indeed, that’s how it was.
Everyone must have expected it—except her. She was the only fool still flailing against the inevitable.

“It was because of Shin Kyobin, wasn’t it?”

He turned back to her with the question.

She didn’t answer aloud, but her bitter smile was answer enough.

Eungang gave a short, deflated laugh.

“He’s relentless, isn’t he? Even back in high school, it was famous—how he wouldn’t let anyone near you, how possessive he was.”

“…What? That… everyone knew that?”

“Of course. He was practically a celebrity. Guys, girls—he had flocks of admirers. And yet he shut them all out and fixated only on you, invisible little Choi Heejae. You think that wasn’t gossip fodder?”

Unlike Heejae, who wanted to live quietly and unnoticed, Kyobin had been born to attract attention.

As the heir of Shinil Group, teachers and students alike had clung to him for the sake of their futures.
Even beyond that, his height, his looks—people were drawn in, background aside.

And yet he ignored them all, watching only her. Locking her down.

Of course it had become a story passed around.

“I thought it was eccentric back then… but to think it’s lasted until now.”

Eungang shook his head in disbelief at the depth of Kyobin’s obsession.

“Even after all these years, we’re still under that guy’s shadow, huh. You and me both.”

The two of them looked out over the tangled city with the same hollow eyes, sighing at their lot.

“Yeah. I wonder when I’ll ever be free of him…”

Heejae muttered to herself.

Eungang turned to her in surprise, eyes wide.

“So you’re sick of it too. I always thought it was mutual, you know. That you liked him back.”

“What?”

Startled, Heejae whipped her head around to stare at him.

“It was never mutual.”

“Really? I thought you liked him too.”

“Who said that?”

“No one. Just… it seemed that way.”

But her confession—her realization of her feelings for Kyobin—hadn’t come until adulthood.

In high school, especially, she had hated him. His suffocating obsession had made her furious.
She had begged for him to disappear from her life.

And yet, Eungang had mistaken even then—thinking she already liked Kyobin.

Why? From what?

“Because whenever I looked at you… your eyes were always on Shin Kyobin.”

It was something Heejae herself had never realized.

She remembered only how desperately she’d hidden, avoiding his gaze at all costs.
But to others, she had looked different.

Had she really… only ever been looking at him?