Don't Make It So Obvious

"Mu-yeol..."

Seon-ju had been restless since well before the arranged meeting was even supposed to begin, and in the end she didn't last two hours before calling her son again. As expected, Mu-yeol picked up and said nothing at all.

He had never been the warmest of sons, but he wasn't usually this curt, either. Silence like this could only mean he was furious.

"Come on, you know how it is. You're about to take over as heir. If you're going to marry, it might as well be someone with better bloodlines, so we can get more support—"

His low voice cut her off mid-sentence. Madam Oh? The atmosphere was anything but ordinary. Seon-ju's eyes flicked uneasily, and she bit down on her lip.

"You—calling your own mother 'Madam Oh'? That's really too much."

Even her sulky protest earned no reply. Seon-ju pressed on at once, as if making excuses.

"It's not just me. Everyone thinks this way. There's a reason they say blood is thicker than water. And you want to marry a girl whose background nobody even knows?"

He murmured the word, turning it over with a sneer.

"W-was I wrong? Was I? Then why do you keep circling around that girl? It's not like you two were even dating."

She was watching her son's reactions carefully, and something about all of this struck her as odd. Did he really need to go this far?

"And a younger girl is better, isn't she? Hye-ri from that family—she may not look it, but she's got a good heart."

"You—!"

She was only doing this for his own good. A solid family of in-laws would give his business wings. No matter how well Chayeong was doing, KH Group was not a family anyone could afford to ignore.

Seon-ju swallowed the rest of what she had been about to say. Her son's temper was anything but ordinary right now.

Then his voice filled her ear once more.

"Oh my. Really? All right, then. You made the right choice."

"What? Mu—Mu-yeol! Oh, honestly."

The call cut off without warning. Seon-ju huffed through her teeth and glared at the dark screen.

"Unnie—you. What's your relationship with CEO Cha Mu-yeol?"

Whether she was "you" or "unnie"—even the way Hye-ri addressed her had never been quite settled. It wasn't an unfamiliar sight. Hye-ri was years younger than Eun-jae, but this was how she had always treated her. The contempt underneath was thick enough to feel.

"You're not going to answer? Can you not hear me?"

Hye-ri's voice was shaking, and she wasn't even trying to hide it.

She was supposed to have had her arranged meeting today. A glance at the time confirmed she had already been and come back. And yet Hye-ri had barged straight into her room looking like a wreck. She had been crying. The eyeliner under her eyes had smeared completely, and mascara had run down her cheeks in black tracks.

"Go Eun-jae! Are you going to answer me or not?!"

When Eun-jae still didn't respond, Hye-ri finally lost her patience. She raised her voice and yanked the blanket off her.

"Haa."

Eun-jae barely managed to sit up, letting out a sigh. She had no idea why Hye-ri was doing this. She didn't want to know, either.

"What are you talking about?"

"Playing dumb, are we?"

"Hye-ri, I'm sorry, but..."

"If you're sorry, then just tell me. What's going on between you and Cha Mu-yeol?"

Veins stood out on Hye-ri's neck as she screamed, her voice nearly a shriek. Eun-jae looked at her with a dry, empty gaze and opened her mouth.

"There's nothing between us."

"What?"

"What kind of relationship would I even have with him? He's Cha Jae-yeol's older brother. Nothing more, nothing less."

It was the truth. Her only friend—her high school classmate, Cha Jae-yeol. His older brother was Cha Mu-yeol. In reality, she had crossed paths with Cha Mu-yeol only a handful of times. She could count them on one hand.

And of those few encounters, there had been that day—the day she had taken Mu-yeol into her heart.

That was all.

Cha Mu-yeol had no way of knowing how she felt. To him, she would be nothing more than a candidate for a political marriage. And then they had run into each other at the hospital after years apart. That was it.

There was no reason to tell Go Hye-ri any of that, so Eun-jae swallowed the words.

"So that's why Cha Mu-yeol reacted like that. Ahh. I see."

A bitter, twisted smile tugged at Hye-ri's lips.

Eun-jae hadn't been able to sleep properly as it was, thanks to a headache that had lasted all day—and now Hye-ri was throwing a fit right in front of her, making her skull throb. She sighed and waved a hand through the air.

"Just go. My head hurts."

"If you marry him instead of me, I won't let it go. Remember that."

The door slammed open.

Hong Mi-jung appeared in the doorway, looking thoroughly displeased, her expression ice-cold.

"Go Hye-ri. Come out."

"Mom!"

"Don't just sit there. Come out. Your father's home."

"Waaah—"

In the end, Hye-ri sank to the floor and started to cry. Without the faintest idea what any of this was about, Eun-jae simply stared at her.

It was the same as always. Bursting into her room, throwing a tantrum, insisting, screaming. Nothing out of the ordinary—and yet even this was becoming hard to endure.

"Nngh..."

A sharp pain lanced through Eun-jae's right arm. The extreme stress, it seemed, had finally reached her body. As her face crumpled, Mi-jung strode in and seized the wrist of Hye-ri, who was still sitting on the floor in tears.

"Come out. Now."

"Mom—!"

"Go Hye-ri!"

At the barked shout, Hye-ri, still crying, glanced around nervously and pouted. In the end she was dragged out of Eun-jae's room, reluctantly trailing after Mi-jung's grip.

Eun-jae stared blankly into space, then lay back down.

A cautious knock sounded at the office door.

"Come in."

At his permission, the door opened and the secretary stepped aside. Seon-ju glanced at Mu-yeol as she slowly entered and sat down on the sofa. He didn't even lift his eyes, his gaze still fixed on the documents in front of him.

"I'll have a glass of kombucha."

"Yes, ma'am. I'll have it ready right away."

The secretary bowed politely to Seon-ju, then walked backward out of the office.

Silence settled over the room. Faced with a son who offered neither a greeting nor a single word, Seon-ju's eyes flickered with unease. She fidgeted with her bag strap, then finally spoke first.

"CEO Cha. Your mother is sitting right here. Are you going to ignore me like this?"

"I have a meeting in ten minutes. There's a great deal I need to review before then."

Even his mother's snide remark didn't rattle him. He answered without a flicker of emotion.

"So you're telling me to say what I came to say in ten minutes?"

"You've understood perfectly. That's why you should have made an appointment. Especially since you know perfectly well how busy I am."

Ordinarily, he was a son who joked around, who could even be somewhat affectionate. But when something had gotten under his skin, he became this—cold, bloodless, without a shred of mercy. She wasn't unaware that she had a share of the blame for how sharp he'd become. So Seon-ju could only watch her step.

"You won't even take your mother's calls. How am I supposed to make an appointment?"

"Is my secretary just for show? That's exactly why I keep one."

"Cha Mu-yeol!"

Mu-yeol finally lost patience and dropped the file folder onto the desk with a thud. One eyebrow cocked at a slant, his brow furrowed in faint displeasure—and then the way he tugged slightly at his tie. He let out a short sigh, glanced down at his wrist, and spoke again.

"Seven minutes left."

The secretary slipped through the frigid atmosphere of the office and set a glass of kombucha in front of Seon-ju. Sensing the tension between the two of them, she hurried back out.

"Fine. Since you're so busy, I'll get to the point and leave."

As if daring her to try, Mu-yeol stared at Seon-ju with a dry, expressionless gaze.

"I don't care how much you disliked it. If you turn an arranged meeting into a complete disaster, what does that do to your mother's face?"

After the arranged meeting, a call had come in from Mi-jung.

At Mi-jung's displeased tone, Seon-ju had begun with a genuinely apologetic face.

It was a headache of a situation. Marriage talks had been in the works for some time, but the truth was that Go Eun-jae, KH's eldest daughter, was a girl other families had been after as well. Her background, of course—but also her looks, and her profession on top of that. As a wife for their eldest son, Mu-yeol, she had seemed lacking in nothing. That was why the two families had given their verbal promise of a match so long ago.

Hong Mi-jung had brought up her second daughter, Go Hye-ri, from time to time. She was too young, for one thing—and compared to Go Eun-jae, the gap was so steep that Seon-ju hadn't even bothered to respond.