Lights Don't Go Out in the Annex - Chapter 8
CHAPTER 8
As she exerted force against the hand holding her wrist, the man’s languid gaze shifted to her.
Kwon Tae-gyeom looked closely at her pale, tense cheek and her thin, bony wrists. He then glanced down at the damp spots on her t-shirt before releasing his grip on her wrist.
As he sat up, Tae-gyeom swept back his wet hair. Her gaze casually fell on his rippling abs. His body was so well-muscled that it looked like a needle couldn’t penetrate them.
Lazily stretching, Tae-gyeom resembled a satiated lion, yet he still seemed completely at ease. Hurriedly slipping herself out from under him, Leeseo turned her gaze away in silence. It was because Kwon Tae-gyeom’s lower body, previously concealed beneath the blanket, was now fully exposed.
He was only wearing a brief underneath. The awkwardness left Leeseo unsure of where to look, and she was the only one getting flustered by the situation. While she quickly averted her gaze, feeling embarrassed to be in front of a man she barely knew, with him dressed in nothing but his underwear, Kwon Tae-gyeom remained nonchalant and composed.
Fully out of bed, he ruffled his hair to shake off the remaining water. The sunlight reflected in his soft hair shimmered like gold.
Leeseo couldn’t help but wonder if he was so confident and at ease with revealing his body because he was the type of man who didn’t hesitate having intimate activities outdoors. He didn’t mind showing his naked body to others, that he could walk around in his underwear in front of a woman he didn’t know. She wondered what kind of experiences he had that allowed him to be so carefree.
At that moment, Kwon Tae-gyeom suddenly turned around and gave her a questioning look as if asking what she was still doing there. One of his eyebrows shot up. And then, it dawned on her. Kwon Tae-gyeom’s lack of shame in front of her wasn’t about his indecent taste or familiarity with such situations—it was something else entirely.
To him, she was a completely irrelevant being, not even worth feeling embarrassed in front of. She was like a mere speck of dust, completely insignificant in his eyes.
“Aren’t you leaving?”
Kwon Tae-gyeom said as he massaged the back of his neck.
“You shouldn’t be staring at me like that. It’s morning.”
He mumbled something incomprehensible while picking up a gray robe from the floor of the bed. He casually shook off the water from it, sighed, and put his arms through.
Leeseo noticed the glass that had rolled down to the bottom of the bed and picked it up.
“Mr. Hwang In-cheol is waiting for you downstairs.”
Thankfully, the glass didn’t break. Leeseo thought she should inform Mrs. Seo once she comes back about the wet blanket and sheets.
Tae-gyeom was already turning his back and heading towards the bathroom. The way he walked languidly, loosely tying the belt of his robe, it was clear that he wasn’t listening to anything she was saying.
Though In-cheol had told her to get him ready for work and bring him downstairs, there was no way she was going to wait for the cranky man to wash up and then force him to change. This was as much as she could do, at this point, she could only hope he had understood the situation well enough on his own.
She didn’t expect him to empathize with her awkward position, and he didn’t seem to have the kind of personality that would do so anyway.
She just wanted to get the hell out of his room. She walked quickly towards the door. She hadn’t even gotten out of the bedroom when Tae-gyeom’s voice called out from behind her.
“Bring me a glass of water.”
He sounded so commanding, like it was a perfectly natural thing for him to give orders. Leeseo turned around, clutching the empty glass. But Tae-gyeom didn’t even wait for her response and had already disappeared into the bathroom.
Leeseo stood still, staring at the empty bedroom, before finally coming out. As she headed towards the kitchenette on this floor, she pondered her feelings. Her stomach felt tight and a sharp pricking sensation seemed to stab at her chest. It was unpleasant.
She slowly looked around the entire area on this floor. The furniture and appliances, all brand new, stood serenely in their respective places. It was a completely different room from the one where they’d been partying and making noise last night.
The sunlight pouring into the room through the window cast a straight line onto the black TV screen. She could see her silhouette standing dumbfounded in the large screen. Tearing her gaze away from her reflection, she took a deep breath and headed for the kitchennette.
She calmed her restless heart. She reminded herself that she was just doing her job and there was no need to let the man’s arrogant attitude affect her mood. Besides, this would probably be the last time she had to deal with the owner of this annex anyway. With that thought in mind, it made her feel better.
The kitchen on this floor seemed more geared towards serving drinks than preparing food. The large wine cellar was filled to the brim with so much wine that one might wonder who could possibly drink it all.
As she passed by the shelves lined with liquor bottles and opened the refrigerator, she found it filled with cans of beer. The sight of so many cans made her slightly nauseous.
She picked up a bottle of mineral water that stood next to the neatly arranged rows of beer cans. Placing the empty glass on the counter, she grabbed a fresh glass from the shelf and began pouring water into it. The sound of water filling the glass brought back the words that In-cheol had said earlier.
‘Go and bring a glass of water. After a night of heavy drinking, the first thing you need is water when you wake up.’
Hwang In-cheol knew about Kwon Tae-gyeom’s nightly parties and his late-night drinking escapades at the annex.
Even though In-cheol’s been in and out of the mansion much less often, he still seemed to have a clear grasp of the happenings here. With his trusted subordinate, Mr. Gong, in charge of the mansion’s management, it’s not surprising that In-cheol is in the know.
Mrs. Seo’s wish, hoping that the young master would discreetly enjoy himself without catching the Chairman’s attention, might come true for a while but it seemed unlikely to continue for long. However, that was a matter unrelated to her.
With the water-filled glass in hand, Leeseo headed back to the bedroom. The room was still empty. She could hear the sound of water running through the closed bathroom door. It seemed that after instructing her to fetch water, he was still leisurely taking a shower.
She set the glass of water down on the bedside table and left the room.
* * *
In-cheol, walking ahead, glanced back to see that Tae-gyeom was already far behind, trailing lazily behind him. He stopped and waited politely for Tae-gyeom to get closer.
Tae-gyeom’s lazy, unhurried pace was laced with a hint of annoyance. His freshly ironed white shirt had a couple of buttons undone, revealing his long, thick neckline and a prominent Adam’s apple.
His tie, instead of being worn around his neck, was roughly shoved into his suit pocket. He was far from neat and tidy, but his overly handsome face made up for all of his poor attire.
In-cheol recalled the image of Tae-gyeom as a young boy twenty years ago, holding his mother’s hand as they headed towards the departure gate at Incheon Airport.
The boy’s emotionless and silent gaze, the unusually calm and composed expression were deeply embedded in his mind, and he remembered the dreary atmosphere of that day as if it were yesterday.
The pretext of an early study abroad was just an excuse. After impregnating Shin Joo-ah, who was barely twenty years old, Chairman Kwon easily sent away his only son to the US, who was just ten years old at the time. It was the moment when Chairman Kwon’s eldest son fell from grace to become a troublemaker.
In-cheol vividly remembers the moment when Shin Joo-ah told Chairman Kwon that she wanted to get rid of the child in her belly and return to the entertainment industry rather than living as a hidden second wife. He couldn’t forget such event.
Due to the Chairman’s filthy desire for a young girl, who was nothing more than a child, Tae-gyeom was pushed to a corner. Unlike the deeply sad wife who seemed to have given up, there was no trace of any emotion on the boy’s face.
In-cheol saw the image of the young boy overlapped with Taegyeom’s appearance standing in the wind. Gone was the boy with the small and lean shoulders that held his mother’s hand as they walked through the departure hall, instead, he had become a large-framed young man, trapped in a life of indulgence, wearing a dull expression.
Tae-gyeom’s hair, carelessly brushed aside, danced in the wind. He yawned lazily, rubbing the back of his neck as if expressing tiredness. His droopy eyes seemed drowsy, giving off an impression of being either intoxicated by alcohol or sleepy.
“Are you tired?”
In-cheol took a slow step back, as if welcoming him. He asked with a modest smile. Tae-gyeom briefly glanced at In-cheol and nodded nonchalantly in response.
“Yeah, sort of.”
“It’s not easy to adjust to the time difference. Even a short business trip can leave you jet-lagged for over a week. Changing your circadian rhythm of almost twenty years will take time, so there’s no need to push yourself too hard.”
“Well then, please schedule my appointments at night.”
“The company executives are used to coming to work early, so we’ll try to adjust some schedule as much as we can. Besides, don’t they say that as you get older, you can’t sleep much? What else would you do at home when you wake up in the morning? It’s like being a machine, starting work right away. Haha.”
Tae-gyeom retorted in a sulky tone.
“Is that so? I wouldn’t know, haven’t grown old yet.”
In-cheol burst out laughing.