Audience with the Chairman
The first weekend of married life slipped by in a rush.
In the suite on the hotel’s top floor, the two of them spent a full twenty-four hours faithful to the contract. Roughly half of it in the bedroom; the rest attending to their own affairs until the appointed hour for shared meals.
Mo-jun was as upright and well-mannered as his looks suggested—except for the hours spent in bed.
“Eat. You must be exhausted.”
The night before, they had fulfilled three of the eight contracted couplings. Even that had ended only because Do-yeon had fallen dead asleep.
“Ah—stop, hnn, just stop for a—”
“You can’t push me away. That’s exactly why I laid you down.”
When it came to marital duty, Mo-jun drove her relentlessly. In every other respect he was surprisingly tender and generous.
For a new husband, this much counts as having a conscience.
Do-yeon’s assessment of him was positive. The world was full of men who infected you with the disease and then, far from offering medicine, insisted the whole thing was your own fault.
Even so, she could not find a proper name for the first night they had spent together. Too short to call a honeymoon, and still carrying the measured distance of a political marriage.
None of that mattered. They had held a wedding before countless guests and already shared the same family register.
“Chairman, Representative Kang Mo-jun and his wife have arrived.”
And now Do-yeon stood inside the vast Muyoung mansion.
“Very well.”
A deep, resonant voice carried through the closed doors. The true power of the household was waiting for the newlyweds.
The moment the waiting servant opened the door, Do-yeon consciously straightened her posture—then met Mo-jun’s eyes.
He moved only his lips. It’s all right.
Even in that fleeting glance she could read the intent to soothe her, just as he had done right before their wedding entrance, and again that afternoon when he had been astride her.
“It won’t tear, so breathe a little, hm?”
A sudden rush of heat climbed her nape; her fists clenched of their own accord. Why on earth did such an inappropriate memory surface in a place this difficult?
“We’ve come to pay our respects, Grandfather.”
Unlike her private fluster, Mo-jun’s back remained perfectly straight. He offered the greeting in his usual unhurried low voice, yet the bow he made to his superior carried a taut tension she could not miss.
Do-yeon followed suit, bowing silently beside him while rapidly taking the other man’s measure.
“Come in, both of you.”
The elderly gentleman seated with a massive bookcase at his back looked from one to the other with a genial face.
He was smiling, yet Do-yeon found herself lowering her gaze without meaning to. Those eyes—piercing was the only word—were the reason.
Last Saturday, Chairman Kang had appeared late in the bridal waiting room. Of everyone who had come to see her, he had been the last and the most unexpected guest.
“So this is why our Mo-jun was so stubborn.”
With a single wave of his hand he had dismissed every attendant, then simply stared at Do-yeon for a long while without a word of introduction.
It had been exactly the same look then: a gaze that made no attempt to hide the fact that he was weighing her, measuring her.
Tap, tap—
A wrinkled hand lightly struck the armrest of the chair, the same way Mo-jun had once snared her gaze at their first meeting.
“My new granddaughter, you are truly one of the Muyoung family now. How does it feel?”
The question directed at Do-yeon was nothing but kind. Even so, her mouth would not open easily.
A brief silence settled.
“…A little nervous.”
“Hahaha!”
At last she answered shortly, the hesitation still plain on her face. At that artless honesty, Chairman Kang threw his head back and laughed outright.
At least he hadn’t taken offense. Still unable to relax, Do-yeon stole a glance at Mo-jun’s profile.
“It’s only the first day; she’s being careful. I’ll stay close and help my wife adjust quickly.”
Perhaps he had felt her look. Mo-jun stepped in smoothly and tidied the moment.
“Yes, yes. Mo-jun, you take good care of her.”
Satisfaction flickered across the chairman’s face as well.
Before their eyes could meet again, Do-yeon quickly lowered her head once more. At the same time she ran the numbers in her mind.
From the look of it, hierarchy comes before blood in this house too.
Chairman Kang and Mo-jun did not resemble an ordinary grandfather and grandson. Whatever they felt inside, outwardly they looked closer to sovereign and subject.
If this could be called “family tradition,” then Chairman Kang was the one who had forged it. She had only just set foot in the household, yet Do-yeon already understood.
The reason was obvious. The more a family possessed, the more firmly they had to keep discipline, or else a noisy dogfight would erupt.
Therefore the role Do-yeon had to play inside Muyoung was clear: the quiet, well-behaved youngest daughter-in-law—even if she fell a little short.
“….”
The sorting was finished in an instant. The moment she reached her conclusion, Do-yeon demurely turned her face aside as if shy.
It was not particularly difficult. Treating a VIP client was not so different.
Of course, Chairman Kang was no easy opponent.
“However you met is of no importance. All that matters is that the two of you live well.”
Still wearing that generous smile, he delivered a pointed remark. His gaze leisurely swept over Mo-jun, and the atmosphere that had been soft until a moment ago stiffened at once.
On the surface it sounded like a blessing to live happily. His true intent, however, was unmistakable.
You made such a fuss to seat the woman you wanted beside you; now do not create any further noise over this marriage.
A warning.
“Yes, Grandfather. I will keep it firmly in mind.”
Mo-jun’s profile as he answered at once was flawlessly composed. Do-yeon did not need to confirm it; she knew he was thinking the same thing she was.
“I’ll see you at dinner.”
The conversation was brief. As if to say that was all the time he would spare them, Chairman Kang dismissed the couple with a single short sentence.
At this second meeting—more exacting than the first—Do-yeon quietly swallowed a sigh.
While they left the main house, not a word passed between them.
A leisurely ten-minute walk. Only when they reached the two-story house—far smaller than the main residence yet by no means modest—did Mo-jun ask casually,
“Are you all right?”
The sentence had no subject, yet interpretation was easy. The preceding interview had been intense, and the look he gave her was overly careful.
Somehow she felt like laughing. Even a man who habitually looked down on everyone else apparently had moments when he read the room.
“Yes. He was more generous than I had braced myself for.”
She answered with deliberate nonchalance; Mo-jun’s brow shifted by a fraction. Pretending not to notice how his gaze lingered longer than usual, Do-yeon stepped through the open doorway.
“The dinner table will be more uncomfortable.”
While he acknowledged the greetings of the annex staff, a large hand guided her toward the stairs.
The warmth that settled on her shoulder was hot; Do-yeon glanced at his fingertips without thinking.
“….”
Only two days into the marriage, and Mo-jun already touched her with complete naturalness.
They had already joined their bodies several times in the interim, so it was hardly strange. The problem was simply that she alone kept noticing.
Along the spiral staircase leading to the upper floor, glass blocks were set here and there into the wall. As they climbed, Mo-jun added a low explanation.
“Kang Sang-jun manufactured an unavoidable overseas schedule, but the rest of the family must attend the welcome dinner the chairman ordered.”
Sunlight filtering from outside clung to the marble-like plane of his face. As if the light annoyed him, Mo-jun kept narrowing his eyes.
“It’s fine.”
Watching how his face changed with the light, Do-yeon spoke words she did not mean.
Honestly, she was not pleased. The scale was overwhelmingly larger, yet tonight’s dinner would be no different in quality from everything she had endured in her father’s house.
“Promise you’ll give up Hanbit.”
“Unlike our Jin-woo, you’ll be marrying out, after all.”
The greater the wealth at stake, and the more people who wanted it, the fiercer the competition—that was simple logic. Even over Hanbit, which was nothing but a drop in the ocean compared with Muyoung, Juran had fretted and schemed endlessly.
“It isn’t as though I married without knowing.”
Irritation aside, that very knowledge kept her calm.
Power struggles, ranking fights—she had built up no small immunity to this kind of mess.
Besides, right now Do-yeon had a problem that grated more than tonight’s dinner.
“But still.”
She eyed the thick arm that had all but wrapped around her shoulders.
“Is it really necessary to stay this close even inside the house?”
They were a couple who had entered a political marriage for mutual benefit. In other words, the emphasis lay on the transaction, not the relationship.
Even if the contract contained a clause about marital relations, why did he keep trying to stick to her the moment there was an opening?
Do-yeon could not understand his intention. Why make things awkward for both of them?
She twisted her body slightly and lifted her eyes to stare straight into Mo-jun’s face, packing the question Doesn’t this bother you? tightly into both pupils.
“Between two people who’ve already done everything there is to do, is that not allowed?”
Whether he was denser than she had thought, or simply felt no need for tact—the answer that came back at once was shameless to the point of absurdity.