It was a barbecue restaurant they had reached after a long drive out from Songhak Village. Judging by the number of people inside, calling it a rural spot seemed like a stretch.

The middle-aged couples seated in pairs at the tables looked affectionate, as though they had planned it that way. Maybe it was because her police work had her seeing nothing but couples at each other’s throats every day, but the sight felt strangely foreign to her.

She walked back slowly to her seat, only to find that Yul was nowhere to be seen. Seo Hwido sat with his arms crossed, looking for all the world like someone who had been waiting a long time.

The gaze he fixed on her was sharp. Had she been in the bathroom too long?

Meeting his eyes made her breath catch, so she had dragged her feet as long as she could, but with Yul gone, the timing could not have been worse.

“Yul is… did he go to the bathroom?”

Seo Hwido said nothing and simply stared at her. Still, as though her words had not reached him at all.

Her face was already hot, and now it felt like it was on fire.

“Why, why are you staring like that? Is something on my face?”

“Yeah, there is.”

“That can’t be…”

She had been looking at herself in the mirror just moments ago before coming out. What could possibly be on her face.

Yeon-ah rubbed her cheek and sat down. Then she lowered her head to escape the prickling gaze that kept pouring over her.

What on earth is he staring at like that?

When she had been sitting in the back seat of the car talking with Yul, when she had been placing well-cooked pieces of meat onto Yul’s plate, those ash-grey eyes had been fixed on her without fail.

If she had not had that dream, she might have been able to manage well enough, but she could not bear this situation where just catching his eyes every so often was enough to make her breath seize up.

It was just as Yeon-ah was biting her lip and furrowing her brow, a hot finger intruded without warning and came to rest squarely in the center of her forehead. She startled and looked up, and the crease his touch had pressed into her brow smoothed out.

Thud. Thud-thud. Thud-thud.

It was only one finger making contact, yet a tingling sensation swept through her entire body. Her heart hammering away went without saying, and her lower abdomen clenched with a dull ache.

“Your face is already plain enough without making it worse. Relax your expression. Yeon-ah.”

Yeon-ah.

She wanted to snap at him and tell him not to call her that. Because in last night’s dream, Seo Hwido had called her exactly that. It made it feel less like a dream and more like reality.

Her heart, already thumping away without stopping, seemed to have broken down for good. Yeon-ah kept glancing toward the men’s restroom, wanting nothing more than to get away from him as quickly as possible.

“…Yul looks like he’s done eating, and so do you, Seo Hwido-ssi. How about we head back once Yul gets here? I think the alcohol is finally hitting me and I’m tired.”

No matter how she thought about it, that had to be the only explanation for why her body kept flushing with heat and her heart kept racing.

“You should finish that before we go.”

At his words she looked down at the table, and there on her plate was a pile of nicely grilled meat, practically begging to be eaten.

When did he even…

“No, I’m full now.”

“You ate a bird’s portion and you’re full? No wonder you can’t put on any weight. At least eat a little more, if only to honor the effort that went into grilling it.”

The first few times she had grilled meat and placed it on Yul’s plate, he had snatched the tongs away and kept piling meat in front of her.

She had not known what to make of his unsolicited generosity, so she had barely touched the food and only sipped at her drink, yet the meat that should have long gone cold was still warm, which meant he had grilled fresh pieces and placed them in front of her again. Absurdly enough.

Why? Why is he so intent on feeding me? She had no idea, and she did not want to find out.

Yul would be back from the bathroom soon enough. There was no point wasting energy on a squabble.

Left with no choice, Yeon-ah picked up her chopsticks and lifted a piece of meat. Then she tore at it little by little, chewing slowly and deliberately.

But something was off.

The pile of meat had dwindled to a reasonable amount and she could see the bottom of the plate, yet there was still no sign of Yul emerging from the bathroom.

At this rate I’m going to finish all the meat. Why isn’t he coming out? Could something have happened?

Yeon-ah finally could not hold back and opened her mouth.

“Yul seems to be taking a really long time… Wouldn’t it make sense for you, as his uncle, to at least go check on him once?”

He looked at her as though she had said something incomprehensible. Whether her words were even reaching him was unclear. He was a man who had spent the whole time intently watching her eat.

Yeon-ah could not hold back any longer and rose to her feet. It had been over ten minutes since his nephew went to the bathroom, and the man who called himself his uncle was being this indifferent.

As Yeon-ah turned toward the counter, he reached out abruptly and grabbed her hand.

“You’re looking for Kim Yul? He went home.”

“Pardon? Home? Yul went home by himself?”

She was so flustered she could barely speak. At this late hour, a child that young had taken the bus home alone?

“His mom came and got him. Need more of an explanation than that?”

“This suddenly? He told me he was leaving tomorrow…”

“His mom’s intense like that. What can you do? She wanted to take her own kid home. Anyway, that aside. Shall we get going? I think you’ve had a decent enough meal.”

It was absurd, but what was the point of fighting with him? More than that, the real problem was having to ride back home alone in that man’s car.

Yeon-ah glanced at her watch for a moment and smiled to herself. Fortunately, the buses had not stopped running yet.

“Then I’ll…”

She had turned to face him, ready to make it clear she would take the bus and go home separately, when it happened.

“Come to the parking lot.”

Seo Hwido cut off her words, pushed open the restaurant door in an instant, and vanished from sight. She had no idea when he had settled the bill either. Yeon-ah suppressed her bewilderment and ran out after him.

***

Clack, click.

Hwido, leaning against the car, lit the cigarette he had pulled out. Sss, huu… He pushed the smoke deep into his lungs and let it sit for a moment, and a smile spread naturally across his lips.

Not an unreasonable thing to feel.

Was this not the moment Kim Yul, whom he had been waiting on so desperately all this time, had transformed from a companion into an obstacle?

Every time the little brat played the role of an eight-year-old and drew Baek Yeon-ah’s attention, Hwido had been dying inside from holding back the urge to wring his neck, so this was also a moment of private celebration of sorts.

In that case, all that remained now was Baek Yeon-ah.

Hwido watched Baek Yeon-ah push open the restaurant door and step out.

Her face was flushed red, which meant she had drunk just about everything the restaurant had to offer. She was not even a decent drinker, so what kind of bravado was it to drink without any food to go with it.

The saving grace was that her words were still clear and steady. Well, it was only a few glasses of beer. How drunk could she be already? Just from the way she was marching toward him, it was plain she had quite a lot to say to him.

“Seo Hwido-ssi, I’m going to take the bus from here…!”

Hwido, cigarette hanging crookedly from his lips, clicked open the passenger door. The acrid smoke cut between the two of them, but through it he could soon make out her soft face, visibly flustered.

Hwido snatched up Yeon-ah’s hand as she tried to step back. Then he looked down at her steadily, his expression somewhat softened.

“Stop going on about the bus and get in.”

“I have somewhere I need to be.”

“Should I drag you in and sit you down?”

Only then did those gentle, puppy-like eyes curve into something more like a cat’s.

“Wow… there’s really nothing you won’t say to a police officer, is there, Seo Hwido-ssi.”

“A police officer? Where’s a police officer?”

The sharp, piercing gaze went round as a rabbit’s in an instant.

“I know of a constable on leave, though.”

“Ha…?”

“So get in. You said you had somewhere to be. I’ll be your driver, as a special favor.”

“……”

Yeon-ah hesitated at his words and furrowed her brow. She seemed at a loss for words from sheer disbelief. In that instant, reading the flicker of indecision on her face, Hwido wrapped a hand around her slender shoulder and gently steered her into the car.

Thwack. The passenger door closed, and Seo Hwido crossed around the front of the car and settled into the driver’s seat.

The enclosed interior was already filled with Seo Hwido’s scent, and the moment he climbed in, it was swallowed whole by a deep, vivid musk.

It was at that moment.

Seo Hwido turned to look at the passenger seat and leaned forward in a swift motion. As though he were about to kiss her.

Yeon-ah suddenly recalled the dream in which a tongue had forced its way between her lips and wound around her in something lewd and sticky, and she squeezed her eyes shut.

“…Why, should I give you a kiss?”

Yeon-ah’s eyes flew open. She had not closed her eyes hoping for a kiss. She had closed them because the you from the dream, who had done shameless and obscene things without hesitation, had come to mind. Her face, already burning, felt ready to burst.

“N-no! It’s not like that! Something I was curious about just came to me right now! I was just thinking for a second about how to ask it!”

She tried her best not to let it sound like an excuse, but the corner of his mouth, already tilted at a slant, seemed to have already made up its mind.

Yeon-ah watched Seo Hwido yank his tightly knotted tie down roughly. He had been grabbing and releasing his tie over and over throughout the meal. The memory of how he had looked ready to tear it off at any moment made her want to laugh.

Had Yul not told him they were going to a barbecue restaurant.

Thinking back on how Seo Hwido had treated Yul carelessly all this time, the thought followed that he deserved at least this much of a comeuppance.

“So. What is it you wanted to ask?”

He had startled her with the word kiss and she had blurted out whatever came to mind, but had she said something pointless. Yeon-ah fidgeted for a moment, then recalled the one thing she had been most curious about.

“When I first came to my grandmother’s house… you called my name so casually right away… I let it go at the time because I was flustered, but it stayed with me. How did you know my name back then?”

Seo Hwido, who had been about to pull out, went still and turned to look at Yeon-ah. A moment later, the lips that had been firmly pressed shut parted slowly.