The next morning, Lukas woke before sunrise. Not that he’d really slept—he’d spent the entire night staring at the bedroom ceiling, going over every detail of the plan like he was putting together a military operation. Except this time, it wasn’t about territory, money, or power. It was about a doorbell.
He chose his clothes with more care than he’d ever shown in his life. A suit that was too dark would draw attention. Too casual wouldn’t fit the story of a lawyer. He settled on a navy dress shirt, no tie, the sleeves rolled to the middle of his forearms. Gray tailored pants. Clean shoes, but without too much shine. He wanted to look approachable. He wanted to look normal.
Takeshi was waiting beside the car, arms crossed, wearing that half smile that meant he knew exactly what was going on.
“You changed your shirt three times,” Takeshi said.
“I did not.”
“I counted.”
Lukas ignored him and got into the car. In the back seat, Suh’s ex-husband was sitting with the divorce papers in his lap. He had deep dark circles under his eyes, his lip was still swollen, and his hands were shaking so badly that the papers made a faint rustling sound. He didn’t look at Lukas. He didn’t dare.
The car crossed Tokyo in silence. Lukas stared out the window without seeing anything. His heart was beating fast—and that irritated him. He commanded Japan’s largest criminal organization. He’d faced armed men without blinking. He’d made decisions that changed entire lives with a single sentence. But now, on his way to the door of a woman who sold vegetables in Adachi, he could feel his palms sweating.
He showed nothing. He never did.
When the car stopped on the narrow street, Lukas recognized the place. The same street he drove down every day. The same sidewalk where, two nights ago, his world had been turned upside down.
Her ex-sister-in-law’s house was simple. Peeling walls, a small iron gate with flaking paint, potted plants by the entrance—the only sign that someone there cared about anything beautiful.
“Go,” Lukas said to the ex-husband without looking at him.
The man got out of the car on trembling legs. He walked to the gate like he was walking toward his own judgment. He pressed the doorbell.
Lukas got out of the car slowly. He stood one step behind him, hands in his pockets, face composed. Inside, every second of waiting weighed like an hour.
Footsteps inside. Light. Hurrying.
The door opened.
And there she was.
Suh was wearing a simple, faded blouse, and her hair was twisted into a loose bun with a few strands falling around her face. She wasn’t wearing makeup, nothing at all—and even so, when Lukas saw her in daylight for the first time, something inside him stopped working for a second. It wasn’t beauty in the sense the world used that word. It was something else. It was the way her eyes still shone even when she was tired. It was the quiet strength that radiated from her without her realizing it.
But Suh wasn’t looking at him. She was looking at her ex-husband. And her face hardened at once—her shoulders stiffened, her chin lifted, and her eyes took on the kind of hardness that belonged to someone who’d been hurt too many times to ever be caught off guard again.
“What do you want?” Her voice came out firm, but Lukas noticed the tremor hidden beneath it.
Her ex-husband swallowed hard. He held out the papers with a trembling hand.
“Here’s what you wanted. They’re signed. Everything’s signed.”
Suh looked at the papers without taking them. Then she looked at her ex-husband. Then back at the papers. Her distrust was so visible it was almost tangible.
“And this is…” the ex-husband continued, his voice faltering as his eyes shifted aside, as if he couldn’t stand looking at anyone. “This is Mr. Lukas. He’s a lawyer. He’ll take care of everything you need to sort out. Talk to him.”
Every word came out forced and careful, as if he were reading from a script with a gun pointed at his head. In a way, he was.
Lukas stepped forward.
“Nice to meet you,” he said calmly, extending his hand. “My name is Lukas.”
Suh looked up at him.
And the world stopped.
She looked into his eyes—those dark, deep eyes that made underworld men look away—and she didn’t. She stayed there, frozen, her hand halfway to taking his, and something happened between them that neither of them knew how to name.
Lukas’s heart went into overdrive. It didn’t speed up little by little or gradually increase—it slammed into motion all at once, as if someone had started an engine that had been turned off for twenty-eight years. He felt the blood rush to his face and needed every bit of discipline he possessed not to let it show.
He smiled.
Not the calculated smile he used in meetings. Not the cold smile he gave before destroying someone. A real smile—light, almost shy, softening his entire face and revealing, for an instant, the boy he’d been before the world took everything from him.
Suh felt the ground disappear beneath her.
The man standing in front of her was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen in her life. Not beautiful like the actors on television her ex-sister-in-law watched. Beautiful in a way that hurt, that stole her breath, that made her heart beat so hard she was sure he could hear it. Perfect features, a commanding build, a powerful presence—but above all, that smile. That smile that seemed to say she was the only person in the world.
Her hand found his. The handshake was gentle and brief, and when their fingers touched, Suh felt warmth travel all the way up her arm.
“N-nice to meet you,” she stammered, and immediately wanted to disappear. “Suh. My name is Suh.”
“I know,” Lukas said, his voice coming out lower than he intended.
At that moment, a high-pitched little voice cut through the air.
“Mommy!”
Lee came running up behind Suh and wrapped both arms around her leg. He looked up with those huge, curious eyes, saw the tall man at the door, and hid behind his mother, peeking out with half his face.
Suh instinctively placed a hand on her son’s head. She looked at her ex-husband, who was already backing away, and then at Lukas.
“Do you… do you want to come in?” she asked, not quite sure why she was offering.
Her ex-husband took another step back.
“No need. I’m leaving.” His voice belonged to someone who just wanted to vanish as quickly as possible. He glanced at Lukas—a look of pure terror—and hurried down the sidewalk without looking back.
Lukas didn’t follow him with his eyes. He was looking at Suh.
“I don’t want to bother you,” he said. “But if you’d like, I can leave you my number. We can set up a time to handle the paperwork at our leisure. Tomorrow, maybe?”
Suh looked at him. At that face. At the smile that still lingered discreetly at the corner of his mouth. And she felt something she hadn’t felt in so long she almost didn’t recognize it.
Hope.
“Yes,” she said, and a small, involuntary smile appeared on her face. “Yes, tomorrow works.”
Lukas took his phone from his pocket. She dictated the number in a voice that was still slightly shaky, and he saved it carefully, as if every digit were too important to get wrong.
“Then I’ll see you tomorrow, Suh.”
The way he said her name. As if it carried weight. As if it were beautiful.
“See you tomorrow,” she replied, almost in a whisper.
Lukas turned and walked back to the car. Every step controlled, measured, perfect. He got into the back seat and closed the door. Takeshi was already behind the wheel.
The car pulled away.
Lukas rested his head against the seat and closed his eyes. His heart was still pounding. His right hand—the same one that had punched a man in the face the night before—could still feel the warmth of her fingers.
“So?” Takeshi asked, looking at him in the rearview mirror.
Lukas opened his eyes. He looked out the window. The streets of Adachi passed in a blur, but he saw none of it. He saw her face. Her small smile. The way she’d stammered her own name.
“Tomorrow,” Lukas said, more to himself than to Takeshi. “I’ll see her again tomorrow.”
Takeshi said nothing. He just smiled and kept driving.
And at the door of that simple house in Adachi, Suh was still standing there with the divorce papers in her hand and her heart beating so hard that Lee tugged on the hem of her blouse and asked:
“Mommy, why are you so red?”
Suh laughed. A real laugh—the first in months.
“I don’t know, my love,” she said, picking up her son. “I don’t know.”
But she did. Deep down, she knew.