She had only been curious anyway. She had not been trying to question the reason.

Passing along information she had obtained directly from Hari, Nanhee had never once felt a pang of unease. Whatever conscience she might have had was long gone.

Her manager’s car arrived shortly, and Nanhee got in with a blank expression and set about enthusiastically editing the photos she had taken earlier.

She lined them up on her social media, photos taken as though the room and everything in it were hers, and made sure to add a carefully chosen caption.

「All New♥」

And that day, for the first time in a while, the view count and follower numbers on Nanhee’s social media account exploded.

A few hours later, articles appeared too. The new sponsor she was seeing must have pulled some strings.

「Yoo Nari finally out of her rooftop room? Glamorous new home revealed.」

「Yoo Nari buys luxury bag! Mirror selfie flexes land her first trending search.」

Even if the attention had been earned with things that were not hers, Nanhee thought she could be content if every day were like this. She was simply, purely happy.

* * *

At the top floor of a high-rise overlooking Gangnam-daero, with the dense, captivating sprawl of Seoul visible through a wall of floor-to-ceiling glass, was Jisang’s space.

Cha Jisang, the youngest son of Chayoung Group Chairman Cha Gon and the owner of this entire building. Three days ago, the succession process had finally been completed, and he had at last become the official head of Chacha Entertainment, the largest comprehensive entertainment company in the country.

“Welcome back, CEO.”

“Prepare some tea.”

He gave the instruction lightly to his female secretary and strode into his office.

Maeng Hyunseo followed him in.

A large custom desk with clean, refined lines, its surface without a single sheet of paper out of place.

The chair, finished in charcoal leather and gold steel, projected a restrained authority that seemed to reflect its owner’s taste exactly.

With each step, a sharp echo spread across the matte marble floor.

In that space filled with an expensive kind of quiet, Jisang and Hyunseo sat facing each other.

They had already met alone once before.

“Don’t tell me you had this intention from the moment you sent the merger proposal to my company.”

At her demand to know whether he had approached Hari with a plan from the start, Jisang answered honestly that he had.

“Why now, after all this time? From what I hear, you ignored every letter Hari sent you. I genuinely don’t understand.”

He could not tell her everything, but he laid out enough for her to understand.

How he had helped her because she seemed to be in danger, and how what had started as simple goodwill had grown over time.

He also revealed that, knowing the injustices that existed in the entertainment industry, he had wanted to help her pursue her dreams freely under his protection.

That he had only wanted to keep her close, watch over her, and catch her if she ever looked like she might fall.

“……All right. I’m somewhat convinced by the argument that no one could protect Hari as sincerely as you.”

Even so, Hyunseo shook her head.

“Still, I can’t help but oppose you becoming deeply involved with Hari before you tell her who you really are.”

After sitting in deep thought for a while, Hyunseo made one request of Jisang.

“If Hari comes to you first, that’s one thing. But please don’t be the one to turn her head with sweet talk.”

“Yoo Hari is a strong woman. She wouldn’t be so weak as to lose her judgment over something like that.”

“Hari is more…… than you think she is. Anyway. Do that.”

“All right. I promise.”

Jisang had kept that promise clearly.

He had not let his feelings slip. He had not asked for what he wanted. He was confident he had done a sincere job of keeping his darker desires in check.

“So you and Hari…… ended up that way after all.”

That was why he could speak about it without flinching.

Jisang gave a slight nod and added an explanation.

“I did not break my promise.”

“I know. You only accepted her feelings.”

Hyunseo let out a sigh deep enough to sink the floor.

“I’m just so worried. I keep thinking about how hurt Hari will be when she finds out the truth……”

Jisang understood her anxiety. He had felt something like a guilty conscience himself, looking into those clear eyes of hers.

“There’s no way to undo feelings that have already grown this large…… Since it’s come to this, I have just one request.”

“Go ahead.”

“You said you would reveal the truth once a bodyguard was no longer needed, but given how things stand now, I’d like you to tell Hari the truth as soon as possible.”

“……”

“I’ll be watching. If it comes to it, I’ll tell her myself.”

There was nothing else Jisang could offer her. Only that he would do his utmost to make sure she was not hurt.

He had no certainty either. The only thing he had to hold onto was Hari’s words, that it did not matter what kind of person he was.

After finishing his conversation with Hyunseo and handling a few miscellaneous matters, Jisang summoned his chief secretary, Kim Minsu.

“Bring him in.”

A short while later, Minsu dragged a man in by the collar and threw him onto the office floor.

“C, CEO!”

The man, on his knees, was shaking violently, as though he already knew what was coming.

Jisang pushed himself up from his desk, walked toward him with measured steps, and without warning, brought his shoe down on the man’s head.

“Urk!”

Driven down by the force, the man’s head met the matte marble floor.

Without a shred of mercy, Jisang ground the back of his skull against it, the way one stubs out a cigarette. All the while, his face remained composed as he looked at Minsu.

“What’s his name?”

“Kim Youngmuk. Five years with the company. His role is scheduler.”

“Scheduler……”

Jisang turned the word over and let out a short, contemptuous laugh.

“That makes it even more unforgivable.”

He tapped the man’s head with the toe of his shoe and asked, “Kim Youngmuk. You know why I’m doing this. Don’t you?”

He had concluded that someone inside the company was aiding the blackmailer, and had narrowed down the list of suspicious employees.

Since not all staff had access to an artist’s schedule, the process of elimination had not been difficult.

Among them, the number of internal personnel who had been given even the minor detail of Hari’s dress fitting appointment was four, including Jungwook.

Thinking over how to flush the person out, Jisang had circulated a fabricated schedule, saying that after Hari had fainted at the failed fitting, she was set to return the very next day to fill the gap in her itinerary. He had, however, told each of the three suspects a different time for the visit.

When the power went out again, Jisang had smiled. He had wondered what would happen if nothing occurred, but the culprit had revealed themselves as if on cue. The person who had been told Hari would arrive during the exact window of the blackout was unmistakably the blackmailer’s accomplice.

He had brought Hari here to keep her close and protect her, and the fact that a threat had been lurking right within this company was deeply unpleasant.

“Breach of duty, violation of personal information protection law, disclosure of business secrets, and aiding and abetting in a threat…… D*mn, how many charges is that.”

His shoe, loaded with fury, came down on the man’s head again.

“What you handed over wasn’t just a schedule. It was a person’s life.”

“Ugh, uaaah……!”

“If my artist had been left with even a single scratch on her face, you wouldn’t be sitting here like this right now. Be grateful.”

“Heuak. I’m sorry. I was wrong!”

With each kick, agonized sounds tore out of the man pinned beneath him.

“Part of me wanted to haul you in right then and beat you half to death. But our chief secretary kept insisting we needed to gather evidence first, that a person has to use their head. Thanks to him, Kim Youngmuk got to eat a few more meals before today.”

Jisang smiled thinly and lifted his foot once, then drove it back down hard.

“Uugh.”

The man let out a faint groan, unable to hold his head up properly, and raised both hands above it in desperate supplication.

“P, please spare me. CEO. Please…… I was blinded by money.”

“We pulled your messenger logs and secretly obtained your bank deposit records to build the evidence…… but we still need a direct testimony.”

Jisang crouched down and looked at the man beneath him.

“Who is it? The person who put you up to this.”