“Tell me again what you said on the phone yesterday.”

Madam Jo, sitting elegantly in front of Alicia, said softly.

“I want to go to Germany for a bit.”

“......Again.”

“I said I want to go to Germany.”

“......Again.”

“I’m going to Germany.”

“......Again.”

Alicia’s eyes welled up with tears every time Madam Jo calmly repeated the same words.

“Go to Germany... Ack!”

Madam Jo suddenly stood up and struck Alicia’s head with her clutch.

“Can’t you get your act together, you wretch! What’s so great about being sick that you’re acting so pathetic? How did I raise you!”

Alicia finally burst into tears. Yet, she stubbornly sobbed and retorted.

“Hic, say it right! You didn’t raise me, hic! You bred me! To fit your taste, your preferences!”

“Don’t speak carelessly just because you have a mouth if you’re not confident you can handle the consequences.”

At Madam Jo’s chilling gaze, Alicia quickly got down and knelt. Trying to beat her mother in the first place had been a misjudgment. Maybe pleading with her would work.

“I’ve done everything you’ve told me to do, fiercely, until now.”

“......”

“I never missed being first in the entire school, and I perfectly managed my looks, figure, and even the last digit of my weight. I graduated from the prestigious university you wanted, just as you wished. I even went on a blind date with the Hanshin heir.”

“......”

“I’ve played your puppet well for 30 years. So, can’t you please let me go now?”

Please. But even at her daughter’s desperate plea, Madam Jo merely scoffed.

“So, you’re going to try for some pathetic love? You, who are rotten to the core with extravagance. What are you going to do with a guy who committed suicide and whose body can’t even be found?”

To Alicia, her mother had always been a scary and difficult existence. But it was even more so now. The reason she continued to meet other men even while seeing Heo Kyung-soo was to keep it a secret from Madam Jo. Leave no traces, don’t meet one man for too long. If she was ordered to return to Korea, she had to come immediately and do her best as Jo Young-hee’s daughter. That was the condition for enjoying freedom under the name Alicia Barton in Germany.

“How did you know about that? Could it be that you even know that man married me for revenge?”

“What if I do?”

“Mom!”

“You stupid thing! Seo Kangjoon doesn’t know you’re Alicia Barton. Even if he did, revenge my foot.”

That man is suspicious, that girl said so! But Alicia couldn’t say anything. If Madam Jo found out she had secretly met and discussed things with that girl, there would be hell to pay.

“I’ve cleanly erased your tracks. At most, it’s just suspicion, what can he do with mere suspicion?”

Looking at her daughter trembling in fear, Madam Jo clicked her tongue.

“Use your brain a little. Do you think it makes sense that the heir to Hanshin married you to avenge some bastard child?”

That impertinent girl had said there seemed to be something between her daughter and Seo Kangjoon. Being meticulous, she hadn’t taken it lightly and had immediately ordered a background check, finding out everything. But to Seo Kangjoon, Heo Kyung-soo was just a loyal and capable secretary. He had been calm in the face of death, living his life according to his usual pattern and not even trying to find the body. Judging by what he was doing now, it didn’t seem like he was seeking revenge either. Maybe that impertinent girl was doing better than expected, or maybe he preferred obedient and modest women. In any case, Seo Kangjoon was quite focused on his wife. That’s why he was protecting her so much. At first, that had made her uneasy, but she had decided to use it to her advantage.

“If you want to go to Germany, go. It wouldn’t be bad to clear your head for about a year.”

“Are you saying that sincerely?”

Alicia looked incredulous.

“I wasn’t planning on sending you back to your place right away anyway. You need to have a bit of a break so your husband doesn’t notice that his wife has changed. I’ve already laid the groundwork, so you just need to listen to me.”

Madam Jo planned to bring everything back to the way it was under the guise of work when their feelings deepened further. Seo Kangjoon was incredibly busy with the Hanshin heir succession process. With his cold personality, he wouldn’t cancel his schedule to go see his wife in another country. About a year would be appropriate. A suitable gap before his affectionate feelings cooled, a slight change that he wouldn’t suspect but accept as a refreshing difference. Thinking it was a perfect plan, Madam Jo gently took her daughter’s hand.

“Seo Kangjoon is the sole heir to Hanshin without any competition. If you calmly endure, it’s only a matter of time before you become the madam of Inno.”

A firm position completely different from Inno’s competitive structure, where there were three sons and even distant relatives were vying for power.

“Since it’s a family that values heirs, if you just give birth to one great-grandchild, the chairman will give you anything you ask for.”

It was a famous anecdote in the business world. The moment his grandson was born, Chairman Seo of Hanshin had declared him the heir and immediately resolved the competitive structure. He had also given all the shares of a successful Hanshin affiliate to the daughter-in-law who gave birth to his grandson. And the immense wealth he had poured into his daughter-in-law’s family.

“How far are you going with your greed, Mom? No, how long are you planning to use me? You said it would be enough if I just had a child! No, you said I just needed to endure for a few years! Why are your words different?”

Alicia’s gaunt body trembled as she shook off her hand.

“You’ve benefited from your parents so far, so now you have to be filial until you die, my daughter?”

“No! I won’t! I absolutely refuse!”

But Madam Jo calmly stood up and smiled elegantly.

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to. Instead, leave everything behind right now and get out of the hospital.”

It meant she would cut off all support immediately. Even hospital bills.

“I’ll gladly remove you from the family register.”

Madam Jo was a woman who only knew herself.

________________________________________

Taeryeong checked her reflection in the mirror with trembling eyes. A silk slip with a daring design that exposed her body. Milk-white skin that stood out even more because of the black slip. Her hair, which she always tied up high, was naturally let down. Hoping it would cover even a little bit of her exposed skin.

“Haa, I didn’t want to go this far.”

Taeryeong had tried her best to send signals all week. But whether she had no talent in this area, or this man was obtuse, or perhaps abstinent. The man who was always calm and brazen would avoid her gaze if their eyes met, and would recoil if even their fingertips touched. So how was she supposed to seduce him and ask him to sleep with her?

“I have to succeed today.”

Taeryeong, who had muttered as if sighing, headed to the first-floor bedroom. Her heart pounded with every soft step she took. Even the air touching her skin felt acutely sensitive. How long had she been standing stiffly in the bedroom? She heard the sound of the bathroom door opening. As she headed towards the hallway next to the bedroom, Kangjoon was in front of the powder room. Water-soaked hair that glistened on his forehead. Deep, dangerous eyes that pierced through his black hair. A breathtaking upper body sculpted with lean muscles. A towel precariously wrapped around his hips. In a way that made her utterly confused about who was seducing whom. Her husband’s eyes, looking at Taeryeong with a slightly unfamiliar gaze, narrowed at the corners.

“......”

“......”

A hot sensation spread through her body at his gaze that slowly scanned her from head to toe. She knew how she must look to her husband right now. But Taeryeong herself felt more unfamiliar than her husband. This appearance, this clumsy seduction. Lowering her trembling eyes, Taeryeong slowly approached her husband.

“Do you want to sit here? I’ll dry your hair.”

“Suddenly?”

Her husband’s well-groomed eyebrows arched as if intrigued.

“Because you never dry it, so.”

Fortunately, her husband obediently sat on the vanity chair. But he sat facing away from the mirror, staring intently at Taeryeong. With a gaze that seemed to urge her to dry his hair already, his legs slightly apart. Biting her lip, Taeryeong stood between her husband’s legs and picked up the hairdryer. But because they were facing each other, her husband’s eye level happened to be near Taeryeong’s chest. His indifferent yet subtly heated gaze felt like a spear piercing her heart. Thump-thump, she hoped her husband couldn’t hear her heart pounding in her ears.

“Do you know, Taeryeong-ssi, you seem a bit unfamiliar today?”

His soft breath tickled her exposed skin as if caressing it. Their distance was that close. Taeryeong, biting her lip tightly, silently dried her husband’s hair. In fact, Taeryeong didn’t want to go this far either. But the husband she thought wouldn’t return had returned, they had reunited and were living together. Even though she had defended herself, been wary, and stubbornly endured, this was the result. In this pathetic situation, in this circumstance where love was a luxury, she had embraced her husband in her heart. It was a love she shouldn’t have, a man she shouldn’t covet. So, Taeryeong wasn’t going to love him, wasn’t going to covet him. But she also couldn’t stand seeing this marriage work out well. So, she had belatedly planned another revenge. Because she knew how desperately Madam Jo wanted this marriage, what her final goal was. After returning to her original place, hoping her husband would break off this marriage.

“I feel like I’m going to misunderstand again.”

His slow voice lazily brushed against her ear. A large hand slowly pulled her slender waist, drawing her close and pressing their bodies together.

“It seems like Taeryeong-ssi is seducing me.”

His endlessly deep, dark eyes stared up at her, as if trying to read her thoughts. His eyes, full of composure and confidence as if he knew everything and was just asking, were infuriating. Yet, the arm wrapped around her waist and the heat of his firm body pressed against hers were intense. Had her seduction finally worked?

Swallowing her trembling breath, Taeryeong looked at her husband with eyes mixed with nervousness and desperation. If you know it’s seduction, please do something about it. Perhaps due to the strange tension, her slender body began to tremble uncontrollably.

“I think I warned you not to touch if you couldn’t handle it.”

Her husband, speaking slowly, released his arm from her waist and slowly stood up.

“Go to sleep first, I need to get some air.”

With those last words, he left the bedroom. Studying was easier, working was easier, dealing with Madam Jo was better. The most difficult thing for Taeryeong right now was seducing her husband. With a dazed expression, Taeryeong came to the bed and plopped down, muttering gloomily,

“I did seduce you.”

________________________________________

As soon as Kangjoon stepped onto the terrace, he frowned deeply. He needed to cool his overheated body, but not a single breeze blew today. He couldn’t very well go back inside to shower again either. Ever since his wife had whispered that she wanted a divorce, the wife who had always been wary and built walls had changed. She sent clumsy seductive glances and cautiously initiated skinship. Today, instead of her usual neat pajamas, she was wearing a breathtaking slip and had even let her hair down. As if she was openly trying to seduce Kangjoon. It was driving him crazy. At the sight of her fair skin before his eyes, at the sweet scent of her flesh, he had almost lost his grip on his sanity. If his wife hadn’t trembled in his arms.

“Haa.”

A long sigh escaped him in frustration. After acting so well all along, why was she suddenly acting like a stubborn child? Was she revealing the true colors of Alicia Barton? But even in her seduction, Kangjoon could tell his wife was enduring, as if forcing herself. She shouldn’t have kissed him saying she liked him to death. His mouth felt bitter, and he kept letting out hollow laughs.

“She should just say it outright.”

That she wanted a divorce. Now that she was revealing her true colors, doing things she never used to do, she should stop making him feel miserable.

“She should stop driving me even crazier.”

Kangjoon also knew. There was no point in dragging out this marriage. When he looked at his wife, Kyung-soo came to mind, putting a brake on his emotions. The pangs of conscience fiercely raised their heads and whispered. What are you trying to do with your brother’s woman? He was even going to take revenge on the woman who had now become his first love. If that was the case, he should just divorce her and never see her again. That was the only thing Kangjoon could do for his wife right now.

“Amazing, Yoo Taeryeong.”

Seeing that she had not only shaken him up so much but was even pushing for a divorce. But there was something he needed to confirm before the divorce. Every time he wavered for his wife, an absurd suspicion arose. That his wife wasn’t Yoo Taeryeong, nor Alicia Barton. That was something he could confirm by checking for the twin red birthmarks below her chest.

“How do I check?”

If he suddenly opened the door while she was showering or changing, he would look like a pervert. If he asked her to take off her clothes, he would feel like trash. A natural night together was the only answer. When the wife who wanted a divorce made such clumsy advances like today. If she was Alicia, she would somehow stop him. He wasn’t such trash that he would sleep with his brother’s woman, let alone love her. And then, of course.

“......It would be a divorce.”

But what if, by some slim chance, there were no red marks? If his wife was someone else, neither Alicia nor Yoo Taeryeong? A strong light flashed from the dark pupils beneath his slowly opening and closing eyelids.

“I absolutely won’t let it go.”

Neither this burning desire, nor these trampled and crumpled feelings. That night, he would let them explode to his heart’s content.