What's Mine
"Ah..."
Looking at the rather impressive spread laid out on the table, Eun-jae couldn't find her words.
After putting everything together in a hurry, Mu-yeol stepped out onto the terrace with her. The glass-walled terrace was perfectly designed for taking in the night view, and a fire burned off to one side besides. Thanks to that, they weren't cold even without their coats.
Even before a single sip of alcohol, she felt intoxicated by the atmosphere.
"I'm not sure if it'll suit your taste. I just threw something together with what I had on hand."
The dishes he'd made just moments ago sat on the table — salmon poke, oil pasta, and even finger foods they could pick at casually. For something he'd supposedly thrown together, the quality was remarkable.
"You cook, too?"
Eun-jae's eyes went round with surprise as she asked him. Mu-yeol let out a faint smile and gave a slight nod.
"I used to cook for myself now and then when I was in the States, so I can handle the basics. Don't look so impressed — I can't guarantee it'll taste good."
"No, but still..."
Even the plating was perfect. And he'd put it all together in thirty minutes. When Eun-jae just gazed at him, unable to finish her sentence, Mu-yeol poured wine into her glass.
"Drink up. I'll be having this."
He lifted his own glass with a faint smile. Eun-jae looked back and forth between his glass and hers, then spoke with genuine curiosity.
"Why aren't you drinking the same thing? Why that?"
"Because it's strong? Mine's a bit higher proof."
"...Can't I have that too?"
Her unexpected response drew a laugh from him.
"Just drink that one. I thought it would suit you, Go Eun-jae. I put some thought into picking it out."
Eun-jae fidgeted with the glass in her left hand and nodded, as if to say she understood.
"But... what about it suits me?"
"Hmm."
Mu-yeol looked at her steadily. Eun-jae gazed back at him as if spellbound.
"That wine is considered one of the most feminine, elegant wines there is. But the taste, once you actually drink it, is a little different."
His pitch-black eyes traced over her face. The way his gaze drifted across her features was so intense it felt like heat spreading wherever it landed. She didn't know what resemblance he saw, but Mu-yeol was entirely serious.
"That wine is unusually firm. The flavor that lingers on the tongue is a little heavy. Dry, too."
"..."
"I don't know if my recommendation will land, but try it first."
Mu-yeol tipped his head slightly, gesturing for her to drink. Eun-jae lifted the glass and carefully took a sip. The wine's bitter fragrance brushed the tip of her nose, and then the cold liquid touched her dry, chapped lips.
"Ah."
She swallowed the mouthful of wine and furrowed her brow. Watching her, Mu-yeol let out a short laugh and knocked back his own glass in one go. The amber whiskey vanished in a single swallow, and the empty glass was set back on the table.
"You've had the wine, so try this too."
He twirled pasta onto a spoon with practiced ease using a fork, then set it in front of her left hand. It would have been awkward to refuse, so Eun-jae picked up the spoon he'd given her and carefully put it in her mouth.
After a few chews, her eyes went wide.
"It's good."
"Doesn't seem like it."
"No, it really is... it's delicious."
Eun-jae waved her left hand hurriedly in denial. Then she caught his expression and understood — he was teasing her on purpose. She pouted, rolled her eyes, and took another sip of wine.
"Alright then. Eat plenty."
A brief silence settled over them. They sat side by side, looking out at the night sea beyond the glass.
How much time had passed? Mu-yeol spoke first.
"Cha Jae-yeol."
At the sudden mention of her friend's name, Eun-jae turned toward him.
"He came into my room one day and said,"
"..."
"'Hyung, are you really going to marry Go Eun-jae?'"
Unlike his serious older brother, Jae-yeol had always been the mischievous type. Perhaps because of her prickly, somewhat closed-off nature, other girls never approached her — but Cha Jae-yeol couldn't have cared less. No — if anything, the less she reacted, the more relentlessly he teased her.
At first she'd hated it, found it infuriating. But Eun-jae later came to understand. Whenever she seemed to be in a bad mood, Cha Jae-yeol would come over and do it even more on purpose. It was his way of looking out for a friend.
"He's never once brought up anything like that, so I was suddenly curious. Why he'd ask me a question like that."
The smile that had been hanging at the corners of Mu-yeol's mouth slowly faded. His gaze darkened in an instant, and Eun-jae's eyes flickered, thrown into disarray.
"So I asked him. If maybe he was asking because he had feelings for Go Eun-jae."
It was a feeling Eun-jae herself had sensed more than once. She wasn't the most perceptive person, but even she hadn't been oblivious to the interest Cha Jae-yeol had in her. Of course, she'd only ever had eyes for Mu-yeol, so she'd treated him as nothing more than a friend.
"He jumped up and insisted that wasn't it."
Mu-yeol leaned back lazily in his chair and picked up the whiskey bottle. He filled his glass to the brim. Watching the liquor slosh and threaten to spill over, Eun-jae thought it was about to overflow — and then he set the bottle down, lifted the glass, and drained it.
It must have been terribly bitter. Mu-yeol didn't so much as grimace.
"Something about how my personality is so terrible that his friend would suffer, or whatever."
He let out a short, incredulous laugh as he turned his brother's words over. Watching him, Eun-jae found her lips going dry for some reason. She drank about half of her wine. Whether she was getting used to it, it went down more easily than the first.
"...Hah."
After a brief pause to catch her breath, she drained the rest. Mu-yeol, who had been watching her quietly, refilled her glass.
Then he reached out and carefully took hold of her swollen left wrist.
"Ngh."
Pain flared through her, and Eun-jae nearly dropped her glass. But he caught the falling wine glass with ease and gently kneaded her swollen wrist. A sharp ache drew a moan from between her lips. The pain was considerable — that bastard from earlier had grabbed it over and over.
"Go Eun-jae. Are you getting married?"
Mu-yeol asked without any preamble, applying a pain-relief patch to her slender wrist. Eun-jae looked down at the patch, then shifted her gaze to him. Her heart started racing again at the sight of his lowered eyes. Her left wrist was still held in his grasp.
He was asking because of what had happened today, no doubt.
"That's..."
"Did you turn me down just so you could meet some piece of trash like that?"
"No, that's not it..."
As if she were that insane. As if she would ever do that, when just sitting across from this man made her heart race. Words she couldn't bring herself to say to him circled inside her mouth.
"Jae-yeol's right that my personality isn't the greatest."
Mu-yeol's brow slanted as he continued, looking somewhat angry.
"Even so, I can't possibly compare to that bastard. I find that a little unfair."
A look of fluster spread across Eun-jae's face. She'd refused him, laying out her circumstances at length, saying she wouldn't marry — and then not long after, she'd gone on a matchmaking meeting with another man. From Cha Mu-yeol's perspective, it was a situation ripe for misunderstanding.
Eun-jae's lips parted and closed for a moment, then she lowered her head.
"I-it's not like that."
"Then explain yourself."
Explain... Where was she even supposed to start?
Eun-jae tried to sort through the tangle in her head. Even so, there wasn't a single thing she could say lightly. That her stepmother, Hong Mi-jung, had forced her into it. That she'd been promised her independence if she just went and turned the man down. A small sigh escaped her lips from the frustration of it.
"What would have happened today if I hadn't shown up."
Just thinking about it made his anger surge. The image of her sitting on the floor, struggling with her wrist caught in that man's grip, rose unbidden. After coming back from the airport, Mu-yeol had had a meeting right away. But it had kept getting delayed, and in the end he'd walked out midway without even wrapping things up and come straight to the hotel.
Go Eun-jae would never know that.
"You're not going to explain?"
Mu-yeol's thumb brushed over the back of her hand. Every time his finger traced her skin, something she couldn't quite place started to tingle. Embarrassed, she tried to pull her hand away, but his grip was too firm.
"Go Eun-jae. Listen to me carefully."
At those words, Eun-jae slowly lifted her gaze. From the moment she'd arrived here — no, even in the car, even when they'd first met — Mu-yeol had always looked at her just like this, unwavering.
"..."
"Whether it's a person or a thing. Whatever it is."
Mu-yeol said it with finality. Looking at him, Eun-jae smiled bitterly.
"That's hardly surprising."
His eyes narrowed as he tried to parse her meaning. With a somewhat sad look, Eun-jae hesitated a moment before continuing.
"I hear these kinds of arrangements fall through all the time. It was all just a business connection between families anyway. And..."
She let the sentence trail off, catching her breath, and forced down the emotions welling up inside her.
"Anyway, now I..."
The moment she tried to speak, the corners of her eyes burned. Would it have been a little better if she hadn't injured her arm? If she hadn't, she would have married Cha Mu-yeol and escaped that house.
The one thing that had let her endure that hellish life was that single hope. And now even that hope was gone.
"I told you then — I can't even play the piano anymore. There's nothing left worth looking at."
The piano had been her way out of that life, but she also knew it was that very background that had brought the marriage talks with the Chayeong Group in the first place.
Not that any of it meant anything now.