Body Heat
Determined not to give her even a second to overthink, Taekyung closed the distance toward her lips—lips that held a faint purple cast.
…Purple?
His brow creased as he hesitated.
Something was off. Ordinarily they were a ripe, cherry-red, the kind that looked good enough to taste.
And now that he thought about it—the way she had been soaked through and trembling, the way she had staggered…
It couldn’t be.
It was a symptom he knew well from winters spent on the ice-hockey rink and snowboard slopes.
“Take your clothes off. Quickly.”
He pushed Dajeong back a fraction and spoke with urgent calm.
“What did you just say? Have you lost your mind?”
“Take them off. Everything’s soaked.”
While she bristled, he casually stripped off his own shirt and tossed it aside.
“It looks like hypothermia, Dr. Yu.”
Hypothermia. The word, spoken by a man who was not even a doctor, snapped her mind into sharp focus.
So the dizziness earlier hadn’t been for nothing. She had been unusually cold for a while now.
She mentally catalogued her own symptoms and finally accepted it.
In the middle of summer, though…? Because she had been drinking in the rain? She did run cold even on ordinary days, but—
This was no time to debate the cause. The real problem was where to put her eyes.
“…!”
Right in front of her, the man had stripped his upper body bare without a second thought.
The wet fabric hit the floor with a soft slap, revealing a torso so sculpted it could have been carved from stone.
“Director, why are you taking yours off…?”
Surely he wasn’t planning to warm her with his own body heat the way they did in dramas?
“I told you to take them off. Hurry.”
“How am I supposed to undress here—!”
“Pants can stay. At least get the T-shirt off. You’re not going without underwear, are you?”
“What? No?”
“Then why can’t you take it off?”
Even while she shivered, a disbelieving little laugh escaped her. This was absurd.
“So stubborn.”
He muttered the words, reached out, and spun her around in one smooth motion. A startled yelp tore from her throat.
“I’m not looking. Happy?”
Seated with her back to him, Dajeong trembled even harder.
What now? Her head was spinning. After a brief, frantic calculation she forced her numb fingers to the buttons of her soaked shirt.
This was only first aid.
If Director Jang were the one with hypothermia, I’d do the exact same thing.
So stop thinking weird thoughts…!
Hesitant, she peeled the shirt away. The damp chill of the air met her shoulders, then her back, and gooseflesh raced across her skin.
The wet T-shirt was yanked the rest of the way over her head and into Taekyung’s waiting hand.
“I’m going to hold you.”
The low voice sounded faintly unsteady—right before—
“…!”
Hot, solid heat settled carefully over her curled-up back as she hugged her knees.
His large body draped over her small, huddled frame with surprising gentleness.
She had expected hardness; instead he was warm, almost soft. A tingling heat bloomed wherever their bare skin met.
It was definitely working. Her heart was hammering so wildly that hot blood rushed all the way to her numb fingertips.
No—maybe it was working a little too well.
The soft rush of his breath against the nape of her neck and the shell of her ear, the rich scent that rode it—those were even stronger stimuli.
Now it wasn’t hypothermia making her vision swim; it was something else entirely.
“How are you feeling?”
She had no idea what to answer.
Neither “good” nor “bad” would come out. When she hesitated, a quiet huff of laughter sounded behind her.
“Looks like you’re doing better.”
The low murmur brushed the edge of her ear. Dajeong sucked in a sharp breath.
He hadn’t seen the tips of her ears, flaming scarlet from the rush of heat… had he?
Hoping the dim light had hidden them, she curled even smaller.
What on earth was happening?
Trapped against him, locked in a thorough back-hug she couldn’t escape.
Her body was growing warmer by the second—whether that meant her temperature was returning to normal or simply rising from the heat pressed against her, she could no longer tell.
Then Taekyung shifted. He adjusted his hold, settling even closer, denser against her.
“Ah…!”
She must have been losing her mind. That tiny movement dragged an involuntary, breathless sound from her throat.
“Um, Director…”
“What? Embarrassed because we’re not dating?”
He sounded amused. His palm gave a light push against the small of her back.
“Sit up straight. Spine straight.”
“Y-yes?”
“Lift your head. If you keep ducking like that, gaps open up. At this rate I’ll have to lay you down completely.”
That was absolutely not happening. Dajeong snapped her back upright at once.
Taekyung gently tipped her so she could lean against him. Her body settled at a comfortable angle, as if she were reclining in a beanbag chair.
She fidgeted restlessly—and then a large hand settled over the top of her head.
Was she imagining it, or was that hand stroking her hair with a soft, dangerous tenderness?
Please let this end soon. She bit down hard on her lip, fighting the wild thrash of her heart.
“…You’re good at that. Covering the head.”
“I know a few basic facts.”
More than half of body heat is lost through the head; a hypothermia patient needed the scalp kept warm too. Apparently he knew that as well.
“Yes. That was a compliment on how thoroughly you know it.”
“She’s alive again. Enough energy to crack jokes.”
Yet the man saying those words was in no condition for banter himself.
This was only emergency care—yet with her slender body in his arms, a man’s instinct rose hard and insistent, impossible to ignore.
That was why he had to hold her with a careful space between them.
When was this rain going to stop? He tried to check the weather, but his gaze kept slipping of its own accord to the pale gleam of her skin.
If he had known it would come to this, he should have just kissed her earlier. The useless thought surfaced unbidden.
Maybe then this boiling thirst would have been eased, even a little.
Unaware of the storm inside him, Dajeong squirmed and shifted slightly.
“….”
Beneath the small crown of her head, a flash of her body caught his eye—unnecessarily white, soft-looking. And the color of her undergarments—
Taekyung’s eyes, usually so still, went wide.
Ah. Damn it. He swallowed a string of curses and forced his gaze upward—only for the lettering tattoo etched into the valley of her chest to fill his vision.
What phrase could be important enough to carve into her own skin? A lover’s name, maybe?
The fact that he even wanted to find out told him everything. If he stayed like this any longer, something was going to happen right here.
“You seem much better.”
No more.
“That’s enough.”
He gave her a light push and stood in one abrupt motion.
He felt a pang of guilt when she instinctively curled in on herself at the sudden emptiness against her back, but there was no other choice.
“The rain looks lighter than before.”
Mercifully, the downpour had eased. Taekyung stepped outside to check the state of the stream.
The violent rush of water had lost its force; the surfaces of the stepping-stones were visible again. They were still submerged, but the current no longer looked strong enough to sweep anyone away. Crossing should be possible.
He couldn’t leave a woman still shivering out here forever.
“How is it? Do you think we can cross again?”
Dajeong had already pulled her clothes back on to cover her front and come up beside him. Instead of answering, Taekyung simply lifted her clean off the ground.
“…W-what are you—!”
She was as light as a sheet of paper; he settled her folded over his left shoulder.
No matter how she flailed, he strode toward the stream without a word, her body still slung over him.
“Put me down!”
She pounded on the broad back that filled her upside-down view, but it had no effect whatsoever.
“I can walk! I can walk myself!”
“And if you stagger again and fall all the way in this time?”
He was already planting each careful step on the stones. She could no longer protest. Dajeong swallowed hard, staring at the powerful legs bracing against the current.
And just like that—almost anticlimactically—they reached the other side safely.
The mortifying ordeal was finally over.
“…Thank you, Director.”
The moment her feet touched solid ground she bowed deeply, then spun away, arms wrapped around herself. She couldn’t look straight at his still-bare torso.
“This is… a little surreal… We’ve been through all kinds of things. But I mean it—thank you, truly.”
Tell me about it. He shook his head with a low laugh.
He himself had lost count of how many times he had quietly helped Yu Dajeong without her even realizing it.
It wasn’t as if she were some carefully cultivated prey he was nurturing.
He could just bite those lips once and for all, or spend a single night with her, and be certain one way or the other.
If it were only a fleeting lust, one night would settle it.
If it was because Yu Dajeong was special…
…Yet even that felt different from the women who usually brushed past him.
A short vibration cut through his thoughts. A message from his secretary: the laptop had arrived.
Even the most clichéd melodrama had to end somewhere. Time to return to reality and pay his brothers back double for the mess they had dumped on him.
“Let’s go to my place.”
He watched her shoulders jump and gave a soft, dark laugh.
“No—I’ll just go to my own room.”
“You need dry clothes before you walk around. My lodge is closer.”
He started walking. After a moment’s hesitation, careful footsteps followed behind him.