Seojin’s eyes darted around the room. On one side sat a six-seater sofa and a table for receiving guests; on the other, four desks pushed together.
Potted plants here and there, framed pictures on the walls. The office was a lot more respectable and tidy than he’d expected.
“Have a seat over here.”
The soft voice startled him. He turned to find Yoon Haegang nodding toward the sofa.
“Uh, I’m, well...”
“What did you come here for?”
I came here to start work, is the thing...
“No need to be so tense. What, is somebody going to eat you?”
Yoon Haegang had beaten him to it, so Seojin shut his mouth obediently and let his eyes do the darting instead. Just because the man spoke gently and looked beautiful didn’t mean you could take him lightly. The person in front of him was none other than the sub yandere top.
Meaning one wrong word could get him hauled up by the scruff of the neck and thrown out the window. In the novel, that hadn’t been a figure of speech.
Bang!
He was just about to explain why he’d come in the first place when the door flew open with violent force. Seojin jumped clean off his seat and lost his window to speak.
“Ugh, damn it. Why’d there have to be a crash today of all days, what the he— Noh Seojin! You’re here! You made it!”
The middle-aged man came barreling in on a stream of rough words, then spotted Seojin perched uncomfortably on the sofa and broke into a face-splitting grin.
A somewhat rumpled suit with no tie, sleeves rolled to the elbow, the look of an office worker ground down by his workload. But the long knife scar under his jaw gave him an impression that was anything but ordinary.
“Haha... And what do you know, the boss is actually in the office today! Is the sun rising in the north? Come on, come on, say hello, say hello!”
Manager Kim hurried over to the sofa, dropped his backside down next to Seojin with easy familiarity, and gestured to either side of him.
“This here is the man this company couldn’t run without, our boss! And this is Noh Seojin, who’ll be working with us starting today!”
He could’ve sworn there was a little extra weight on starting today. Or was he imagining it?
Either way, Seojin couldn’t argue the point and only let his gaze wander. Yoon Haegang was aiming a stare at him intense enough to bore a hole through his cheek.
“New hire?”
“Yes, yes.”
“Omega?”
Under that gaze sweeping him up and down, Seojin straightened his spine without meaning to.
“No. Beta!”
“Hmm... You look exactly like an omega, though.”
Where on earth do I measure up to the polished, delicate beauty of an omega? If anything, by that logic, wouldn’t it suit him better?
Purely on looks, the man’s face was exquisite and elegant. It was only that the towering height and the broad set of his shoulders made him feel less like a classical beauty and more like something provocative and dangerous, a wild animal.
“I’m not one.”
Even as the answer came out on reflex, he hesitated for a second.
But... my designation would be the same as before, right?
Seojin had, in fact, been classified an omega by designation, but the diagnosis was that he’d never presented, not even after reaching adulthood.
“I’m a beta.”
So strictly speaking, it wasn’t a lie. Seojin curled up the corners of his mouth and nailed it down one more time, good and clear.
Yoon Haegang narrowed his eyes. It was a bloodcurdling sort of look, like he was deciding what to do about this, and Seojin’s shoulders curled forward all on their own.
“Well, fine. Let’s say that’s true.”
He smiled brightly and rose from his seat. Crisis averted, Seojin thought. It didn’t take long at all for him to realize that was the wrong conclusion.
Yoon Haegang kept tracking him with his eyes, like a predator waiting for the moment to take its prey. Even while Seojin was organizing the supply inventory or reading through the handover files, he could feel in every inch of his body that the man’s attention never once let go of him.
It got bad enough that Manager Kim finally couldn’t take it and asked what in the world had gotten into the boss. Yoon Haegang shut his loyal subordinate up by telling him to mind his own work, and if he was that bored, to go do some fieldwork.
Even after that, the stare pinned to him refused to lift, and Seojin prayed with his whole heart for quitting time to hurry up and arrive.
A workplace with the sub yandere top in it was set to expert difficulty from day one.
The hour when the sun was sinking low. As Seojin waited for Euni to come home, the chatter of children drifted to his ears.
“What do you want to be when you grow up?”
“I’m gonna be an astronaut! What about you?”
“Um... I’m gonna be a singer!”
Listening to those adorable dreams for the future, he suddenly remembered a conversation he’d had with his noona a long time ago.
“Seojin, if you were born again, what would you want to do?”
“Never thought about it...”
Freshly released from an endless round of tests, Seojin sprawled out on the bed and answered without much interest.
“Oh, come on, don’t be like that. Hurry up and think about it.”
She grabbed the hem of his hospital gown and shook it, pushing him, so Seojin gave it a moment’s thought. Honestly, he had no idea. It was hard to picture a life after discharge.
When I don’t even know how much longer I’ve got.
But a cynical answer like that would only put tears in her eyes, so he had to give her something she’d be satisfied with.
What would be good...
“I guess an office worker with a stable job would be nice.”
Because he’d never once gotten to work at a company.
“A house?”
“That’d be nice to have too.”
Just imagining a place of his own where he could rest in peace lifted the corners of his mouth.
“What else?”
“Mmm... maybe two billion won in the bank would set my mind at ease?”
“What kind of answer is that...”
She cackled at him, then kept going without ever seeming to tire.
“Family?”
Seojin let the pause stretch, then turned his head. Out the window, he could see little kids running around the hospital playground.
“...I’d like to have a daughter.”
“Just a daughter?”
His noona let out a laugh like air escaping.
“Yeah. It’s just, you know how it is. The warm feeling that runs through a house, a kid’s bright laughter, that kind of thing. I want to feel that.”
“And a spouse?”
“Well...”
It was something he’d never once let himself hope for, so no answer came easily, and Seojin quietly changed the subject.
“What about you, noona? Didn’t you want to get married?”
“Obviously I did. My dream was living all cozy and sweet with an alpha husband and a kid!”
“See? Kids are a good thing, all of them.”
He said it with a grin, and his noona dealt out her retribution, which didn’t hurt in the slightest.
“Ow, ow, ow...”
Hamming it up, rubbing his arm, Seojin looked back at the little kids tearing around and playing again. Kids that age really were the best.
Because they could play so brightly, without a single worry in the world.
And he thought he’d probably held a small wish back then too, that if it ever happened, the child he raised would get to live bright and happy like that.
“I didn’t mean for it to come true like this, though.”
Seojin muttered it blankly. The wish had been granted. With the small caveat that he’d been dropped into noona’s novel to get it, but aside from that, everything was fine...
“Daddy!”
The second the door opened, Euni came down out of the car with that clear, ringing voice. The little body came running straight at him and threw itself into his arms, and a smile climbed onto Seojin’s mouth all on its own.
“Thank you, Teacher.”
“Not at all. Euni, see you tomorrow.”
“Yesss... See you tomorrow.”
Euni waved her hand, still clinging tight to Seojin. Her body smelled like milk and was so unbelievably snug that Seojin rubbed his cheek against her squishy one.
“Did Euni have fun today?”
“Yes! Today we played outside! Euni’s not even scared of the swings!”
“Is that right.”
“What about Daddy? Did work go okay?”
“Yeah. Daddy also...”
The words did great simply refused to come out, so Seojin let the sentence trail off, badly.
“Whyyy, was it not good, Daddy?”
“Hm? No, no. Daddy was fine too.”
Fine, that is, if you didn’t count Yoon Haegang and that unbearable stare of his.
Starting tomorrow, go chase the main bottom around instead. Please.
Seojin prayed for it with everything he had. Maybe the prayer got through, because when he clocked in the next day, Manager Kim was the only one in the office.
“Ah! Seojin, you’re here? Sit, sit. Want a coffee?”
“No... I’ll make my own.”
“No, no. I was about to have one myself, so just hang on a sec. Instant mix? Black?”
“Black, please.”
Manager Kim gave him a comical wink and had the coffee over in no time.
“There you go. Black.”
“Thank you. I’ll enjoy it.”
Taking the cup, Seojin stole a sideways glance at the empty desk where the boss sat. Manager Kim caught the look and filled him in.
“He won’t be coming in today, so you can relax.”
“Out on business, then? But isn’t a secretary supposed to stay at the boss’s side and assist him?”
“Ah, that. The boss finds it a real nuisance, having someone trailing after him.”
Seojin nodded, remembering the setup: the man hated having anyone around him, so he’d hired a secretary purely to handle the paperwork.
“I see... So what am I doing today, then?”
“There’s someone I need you to get a read on.”
“A person?”
“Mm. It’s nothing difficult, just something I’d like you to know in advance. You know, for, ah, client management purposes.”
Unlike yesterday, there was something distinctly shifty about his face.
“...”
And sure enough, when Seojin opened the file he’d been handed, there was a reason for it.
“He’s a client the boss manages personally, see? So the personal details are a little on the thorough side. And there’s a lot you need to know ahead of time. Just get that done today.”
Crammed as densely as a résumé, it was all information about a single person.
Shin Seyoung.
The main bottom that the sub yandere top, Yoon Haegang, had his eye on.
