Chapter 27

Talk of business, talk of someone from one family or another, talk of investment prospects.

Along with the drinks, the conversation deepened.

By the time everyone was growing pleasantly drunk, Ijun quietly rose from his seat and opened the folding door leading to the small backyard.

The air conditioner had been running, but when he stepped out of the tightly enclosed room, the summer night air felt fresher instead.

Standing there, Ijun looked at the thick-grown leaves and the neatly trimmed grass.

A vivid green.

Ijun thought of his wife Seoyun, whom his friends had been so curious about.

He had acted hypocritically in front of them, but even to himself, it felt rather unexpected.

That he was quite satisfied with his married life with Seoyun.

If he had married in the normal way, then even if it had not been Seo Harin, he would have chosen someone who could create the best possible synergy with him.

And in order to maximize the effect of marriage, he probably would have lived a publicly busy life.

His marriage to Seoyun had been a conclusion reached after extremely meticulous review for the sake of risk management.

Rather than something chosen to gain profit, it had been a final measure to block loss.

The day he returned from Switzerland, made his decision, and went to inform his father Myeonguk.

Myeonguk had asked with a gloomy expression.

‘Do you really have to go that far.’

‘We need a definite method, rather than some half-baked stopgap.’

‘That child aside, are you really all right with using your marriage like this.’

‘Marriage is originally about making the choice with the greatest merit, isn’t it. Right now, I don’t think there is a more important choice than this.’

‘All right. If that is how you feel…. Do as you see fit.’

In short, Myeonguk, too, was a witness to this transaction and one who had assisted it.

And Seoyun was the one and only counterpart in this deal.

In carrying out the contract called marriage, Ijun intended to be a sincere partner.

If only to keep the project from going wrong.

And the way to do that was simple.

To perform the role of husband perfectly.

“How very strange……”

Ijun murmured under his breath.

He was a man who had made countless deals and contracts.

He had decided to be a sincere contracting party himself as well, but he had never had a partner as satisfying as Seoyun.

His daily life was the same as before, yet somehow he had gained room to breathe in everything.

Management was a relentless succession of days in which one had to stay sharply honed, thinking, predicting, and judging from morning to night.

It was the work of cutting, stabbing, and advancing at the front lines, as if his very existence had become a finely sharpened blade.

But these days, it felt as though he had found a sheath to return to and rest in.

In the mornings, she laid out his clothes for him before work, shared gentle, easily digestible meals with him, and exchanged small conversations that required little thought.

At night, when he came home weary from work, she welcomed him and looked at him with concern.

Above all, she became someone with whom he could release the tension and desires in his body.

In the past, he had thought of s*x as an exchange of pleasure for energy, but now it had become catharsis.

A process in which desire ignited, flared up of its own accord, and finally reached a peak, cleansing both body and mind.

The moment he recalled that clear, gentle face flushing red beneath him and twisting with pleasure, a heavy tension had already begun to gather low in his body once more.

Perhaps someday there would come a day when he would weigh profit and loss again and decide to end this relationship.

But until then, he intended to continue this transaction that felt like a form of rest.

Wasn’t it ironic.

That a choice made to block extreme danger had, for him, come to serve as something like very comfortable therapy.

“Oh, so you were out here.”

The folding door opened behind him, and a stream of cold air from the air conditioner spilled out.

It was Suho, the second son of Samjeong Financial Group and the owner of this bar.

Suho, his face flushed, had a thick cigar clenched in his mouth.

“Hey, Cha Ijun. I’m seriously shocked.”

“Is that still not over?”

“No, I mean, come on. Not just anyone, but Cha Ijun of Daejeong falling in love. And then getting married for love. Who would believe that. Even I can’t believe myself saying it.”

Suho cackled as if he found it absurd.

Ijun looked at him with a faint smile still on his face.

“Love?”

“Yeah, man. Your wife. The daughter of that ruined company, that tiny little company even before it went under. What else could there have been for you to see in her and marry her? If that’s not love, then what is?”

Whether drink had emboldened him or not, Suho raised his voice confidently.

“Is she some breathtaking beauty? Seo Harin wasn’t exactly lacking in looks either. If she’s enough to beat out Harin…. No, no, no, I don’t know anymore. Anyway, it’s love.”

“……”

“You bastard. You be good to your wife. You know, buy her flowers once in a while, huh? Say some embarrassingly sweet things every now and then. Because you got married for love.”

“… Yeah. Got it.”

He was indifferent to company matters and only chased excitement from bars to clubs, and now he was going on and on about love.

If he let him keep talking, it felt as though it would never end, so Ijun gave him a vague answer.

Suho had envied everything about Ijun since they were young, and now Ijun wondered if he was even envying this kind of marriage.

The thought itself was so absurd that Ijun let out a hollow laugh.

***

Ijun wrapped things up at an appropriate point and left.

The designated driver, who had been waiting after receiving his call, opened the back seat door for him and quickly got into the driver’s seat.

On nights when drinking gatherings ran late, this was a driver he called from time to time, so he started driving with easy familiarity.

What would Seoyun be doing.

With slightly drunken eyes, Ijun watched the lights rushing by outside the window.

He had told her it would be late and that she should go to sleep first, but she always waited until he came home.

As if greeting him for his hard work and taking his jacket from him were some great duty of hers.

Perhaps she did not irritate him because she never asked useless questions or said unnecessary things.

Suho’s words suddenly came back to him.

“Would there be anywhere to buy flowers at this hour?”

“At this hour?”

The driver, startled by the impulsive question, asked back.

Well, of course.

There was no way any flower shop would still be open at this time.

Just as he was thinking it had been a foolish question himself.

“The flower shops will all be closed, but these days there are things called flower vending machines.”

“What is that?”

“They put ready-made bouquets inside a large cabinet you can see into, and if you put in money, you can take one out.”

“……”

When Ijun said nothing, the driver asked again.

“If I see one while we’re passing by, shall I buy one for you?”

“… Go ahead, then.”

The car, which had been driving through the night, came to a stop along a quiet roadside.

The driver got out from the front seat, and before long he really did return carrying a bouquet and opened the back seat door.

Ijun accepted the bouquet feeling slightly dazed.

For something that had come out of a vending machine, it was fairly well made.

Like a proper summer bouquet, it was full of apricot roses, lisianthus, tuberose, and eucalyptus, gathered into a bouquet in warm tones.

“Madam will be pleased.”

“I suppose she will.”

The driver was usually not one to say much.

But tonight, he added that one comment.

He did not know what meaning the man had attached to a bouquet bought by a husband coming home late at night after drinking.

Ijun felt a little awkward, but he thought this was not bad either.

After all, he was doing his best in his role.

***

“Oh my……”

That exclamation came from Seoyun, who had been waiting in her pajamas.

At the sight of the bouquet.

Seoyun, who was always calm and composed, saying “Oh my.”

Ijun smiled faintly.

“You bought this for me?”

“Then who else would I have bought it for.”

“Wow…. Thank you. It’s so beautiful.”

“That’s a relief.”

Seoyun held the stems tightly with both hands and buried her nose in the cluster of flowers, as though trying to breathe in their fragrance.

He felt rather pleased.

Ijun took off his jacket and was about to head into the dressing room when a small voice continued behind him.

“Um… I….”

“Hmm?”

“I…. This is my first time receiving a bouquet. I mean, other than at graduations or things like that.”

Ijun, who had been slipping his arms out of his jacket, slowly turned around.

And without meaning to, he answered.

So this was the kind of thing Suho had meant by those “embarrassingly sweet things.”

“From now on, you’ll get them often, so what of it.”

Seoyun smiled shyly.

The perfect partner looked very happy.