The Toy She Threw Away

Insane. To feel lust surge at the sight of a woman lying unconscious — even by his own reckoning, he was well and truly out of his mind.

"Seo Jae-i. Snap out of it."

Yu-gam reached his arm into the bathtub. Her water-soaked body came to him easily. A rough breath hissed between his teeth; cursing the beast-like instinct clawing up in him, he gritted his jaw and lifted Jae-kyung out of the water.

His wife. Seo Jae-i.

He wrapped that lovely body — moaning softly, like someone murmuring in her sleep — in the towel lying within reach. Jae-kyung fit perfectly into his arms, and he didn't want to put her down. He wanted to hold her like this and sleep the whole night through, but the moment she opened her eyes, she would run; of that he was certain. Yu-gam laid her carefully on the bed and dressed her in a shower gown.

They had spent countless nights together long ago, yet seeing Jae-kyung's body beneath the light for the first time, he found her so beautiful he couldn't look away.

"Mmnh."

Her closed eyes had barely fluttered open when a sharp scream rang out.

"Wh-what... what are you doing right now?"

Still groggy with sleep, she swayed as she tried to sit up, and Yu-gam pulled her staggering body into his arms and held her there.

"Trying to kill yourself, were you?"

"L-let go of me. What do you mean, kill myself?"

"What if you'd passed out cold, falling asleep in the bathtub like that?"

She'd been coming down with a cold, and the warm water and the scent of aromatic oils must have lulled her under. Gathering herself, Jae-kyung spoke in a husky but resolute voice.

"Please leave."

"I'm not leaving. Who knows what you'll pull next."

"I have to get dressed. Or would you rather I stayed naked?"

"I'll be back. Hurry and change."

The moment the door clicked shut, Jae-kyung stripped off the shower gown.

"Th-this is insane."

At the sight of her own body without a stitch on, her head throbbed as though it had caught fire. Why on earth had she fallen asleep in the bathtub? She wanted nothing more than to collapse and sleep right there, but she couldn't stay in this house a minute longer. She pulled on her blouse and trousers, threw a sweater over them in a frantic rush, and — bag in hand, thick jacket clutched in the other — eased the bedroom door open a crack. The man was nowhere in sight.

She had just opened the front door, ready to bolt, when—

"Seo Jae-kyung."

A low voice called out to her from the hallway.

Early that morning, Yu-gam washed up feeling refreshed and put on the suit laid out in his dressing room. As he fastened his shirt buttons before the full-length mirror, the memory surfaced — Jae-kyung fleeing right before his eyes the night before.

Finding Jae-kyung had been a coincidence that felt like fate.

Was this how it felt to recover a toy Managing Director Jin had smashed to pieces?

'Mommy lost everything precious to her. So you should lose something too. Then you'll understand a little of how Mommy feels.'

After his father's funeral, those sharp stiletto heels had shattered eight-year-old Yu-gam's toys into splinters. Seo Jae-kyung, whom he had held in his arms and kissed every night, was no different from a toy Managing Director Jin had tossed away.

Even without his medication, he had slept properly for the first time in the five years since Jae-kyung left. Perhaps it was the satisfaction of reclaiming the wife who had abandoned him while he was sick — the woman he had once mistaken for love.

Because of the will left by the collapsed Chairman Do Eui-tae, Managing Director Jin had brought him a woman he had never seen before. It was a rushed marriage, arranged on the logic that he could not afford to be pushed down the line of succession by Do Yu-jin, his illegitimate half-brother, born the same year.

His heart should never have been swayed so easily. Had those ten months spent under the same blanket meant something after all? His insomnia had worsened from the very day Jae-kyung disappeared.

'Tell me about anything from your past that made you most anxious.'

'My wife, who ran away. ...I slept just fine when she was with me. I wonder why that was.'

Even with treatment and psychological counseling every single day, nothing improved.

'That woman said she hated you for taking your medication, so she left. Said she couldn't live under the same blanket as a mental patient.'

According to Managing Director Jin, one of the reasons Seo Jae-kyung had left was that Yu-gam was taking psychiatric medication. When his doctor pressed the pills on him again, he flatly refused to take back what he had fought so hard to quit. In the end, when the treatment proved to be nothing but wasted time with no progress, his physician referred him to a renowned psychiatrist in the United States.

It was an escape disguised as studying abroad for treatment. During his time overseas, he never once thought of Jae-kyung — rage had surged at the betrayal of the wife who had once burrowed into his chilly embrace.

But the moment he returned to Korea, the runaway wife began circling his mind, and his insomnia deepened. When the image surfaced of Jae-kyung glowing with happiness at a proposal from another man, displeasure came crashing in. Frowning, Yu-gam finished knotting his tie.

She wanted money out of me, so no doubt she wants money out of that man too.

'If the terms are that I treat you strictly as the Chairman of the Board, I'll accept. The moment you come near me as a husband, I can't work as your secretary.'

The way she performed it — pretending to have forgotten both the marriage and her husband's existence — was adorable. But he had no intention of playing the fool.

By the time he noticed, the man in the mirror was impeccably dressed. He was about to step out of the room when the phone rang.

Jin Hee-yeon, who poked into every trivial detail of her son's life, hadn't been able to rest easy even in Europe.

"What brings you calling this early? It's the middle of the night over there — can't you sleep?"

— I lay down, but I couldn't stop thinking about my son. Is the insomnia any better? You need to take your medication the way the doctor prescribed. What are you doing, quitting it on your own?

Indifferent to the anxieties of the sleepless Managing Director Jin on the opposite side of the globe, Yu-gam's expression didn't change. He ambled unhurriedly into the living room and took a sip of the warm tea waiting for him.

"How old do you think your son is, that you worry about his pills on top of everything else? I must have been tired from thinking about work — I slept soundly for the first time in ages."

— You slept? Without medication? How strange.

"Yes, without medication. A snail bride took care of me."

— Did you dream that? What's this out-of-nowhere fairy-tale nonsense? Who looks after my son if not me? I only say it because I'm afraid you'll collapse. Is the work manageable? If it weren't for this business trip, I'd go there myself and introduce you personally to the principal and vice principal — tell them to take good care of our Chairman Do.

Perhaps because he had found the wife who had vanished without a trace, vitality surged through Yu-gam's body more than ever before. He swung the front door wide with a firm stride.

"I'll handle it myself. If the Managing Director comes chasing after me, all I'll hear is talk that a chairman so young has no ability of his own."

— All the same, everyone needs to know who's senior here, or they won't shut their mouths.

"I'll be judged on my work alone, so let them chatter — I couldn't care less. Don't worry."

— Anyway, I'll come back as soon as I possibly can, so just hold the fort until then.

Even with his reassurances, Hee-yeon was impatient.

That Managing Director Jin's business trip had been extended was a stroke of luck for Yu-gam. He intended to keep Hee-yeon from meddling in the Eui-tae Foundation's affairs.

"Yes, I will. You ought to give your son the chance to show what he can do, too."

— Oh, right. You know Minister Han's daughter, the one I mentioned last time? I've arranged a dinner. She's your age, and she's a beauty. She's an Eui-tae Foundation alumna — did you ever run into her back in first year?

"I attended for barely a month. How would I remember anyone?"

— One look at her face and it might come back to you. Good matches keep pouring in from everywhere — I couldn't be more pleased.

Every single time, Managing Director Jin shoved her airtight, meticulous itinerary into his marriage and his life. Yu-gam's expression turned glacial.

He opened the door and started down the steps; beneath the bright morning sky, his car stood waiting.

"I take it the rumors going around that I was a pill-popper have quieted down."

— Well, you've quit the medication now, haven't you? And you took it because you were ill — since when is that a flaw? I live on stomach medicine myself.

"Is psychiatric medication the same as stomach medicine?"

— Once I've married you off, I'll have no regrets left in this world. This time she's truly a daughter from a good family. With your father-in-law as Minister of Justice, imagine how secure that would make you.

The ones made secure would be KE Group and Managing Director Jin — not Yu-gam.

"What's so wonderful about it that I should marry again? You could simply bring back the last woman."

— Don't you dare mention that woman. That's ancient history — why dredge up the girl who ran away? It wasn't much money, but she took it and walked out, so she'll manage on her own.

Did Hee-yeon simply not know that her son was still married on paper?

"That woman suited me perfectly too. I believe those were more or less your words?"

— That was only because things were so urgent with the Chairman's will at the time. But poor families on the hunt for money are not the kind one associates with. Don't tell me — you haven't been running around looking for her, have you?

There was no telling how Hee-yeon would react if she learned he had already summoned the woman to his office. Yu-gam made no mention of Jae-kyung.

"I have no intention of remarrying, so don't even dream of it."

— My son! How long will you keep this up? You wound me.

"I have to get to work. Hanging up."

Yu-gam pressed the end button and slid into the back seat Director Kwon held open for him.

"Director Kwon, you have all the foundation's administrative documents ready?"

"Yes, sir. Everything has been gathered except the records disposed of after their retention period ran out. The volume was staggering."

In the nearly five years since Chairman Do Eui-tae had collapsed, the Eui-tae Foundation's corruption had piled up layer upon layer.

He needed to learn as much as he could about what had been happening inside the foundation before Managing Director Jin returned from her trip.

Last night, his manhood had stirred at the sight of his wife lying collapsed in the bathtub in such a shamelessly sensual pose. He wanted to carry her home and put her there today — this very minute.

Now, no matter how far she ran, she was in the palm of Yu-gam's hand.

"Check whether Seo Jae-kyung has come in to work."