I didn't go straight back to the apartment after leaving the warehouse.
I parked my car on a street some distance from Seo-yeon's apartment and sat quietly behind the wheel, the message still open on my phone. *Stay away from Han Seo-yeon.* I read it over and over—not because I was afraid, but because I'd received too many threats throughout my life to let words frighten me. What bothered me was one simple yet fundamental thing.
They knew her name.
That meant this wasn't just about me. They were watching her. I picked up my phone and called Do-hyun.
"How is she?"
"Min-seok is still inside."
"Alone?"
"As far as we know, yes."
I closed my eyes. "Don't go in. Don't do anything."
"Hyung, what the hell is going on?"
I was silent for a moment before answering. "Min-seok met someone. Without permission. Without filing a report. That's what happened."
The call ended. I stared again at the old building across the street. Situations like this made me uncomfortable—too many variables I couldn't control, too little information to make the right decision. And what bothered me most was that there was one variable that shouldn't have been there at all.
Seo-yeon.
I didn't understand why I felt responsible for someone I barely knew. She wasn't a member of the organization. She wasn't my family. We'd only known each other for a few days. But when someone said her name in a threatening tone, something inside me changed completely—turning protective in a way I'd never felt before.
I didn't like that feeling. Because I knew exactly what it meant.
I was starting to care. And caring was a weakness.
At 1:13 a.m., Min-seok finally came out of the warehouse.
He looked around carefully before getting into his car. I started the engine a few seconds later, keeping enough distance between us. His car passed through several streets before stopping in front of an apartment building. I waited—five minutes, ten minutes—but no one came out. I called Do-hyun again.
"Follow from the other side. See who comes out of that apartment."
"Already on it."
I finally got home at two in the morning. I took a cold shower to wash away my exhaustion. I tried to sleep, knowing it was pointless. I stared at the bedroom ceiling while my thoughts kept circling back to Seo-yeon—the way she laughed, the way she called my name, the way she looked at me when I admitted I couldn't answer questions about myself.
My phone vibrated. It wasn't Seo-yeon. It was Do-hyun. The message made me sit straight up.
*«Min-seok didn't meet Red Viper.»*
The next message read:
*«He met someone from Black Hawk's old network. Identity unknown.»*
I threw the phone. Damn it. Damn it all to hell. A few seconds later, my phone vibrated again, and this time the name on the screen made me stop.
Seo-yeon.
*«You're not asleep yet?»*
I looked at the clock. 2:31 a.m. I typed a short reply. She answered almost immediately. The conversation continued simply—about who couldn't sleep, about why our thoughts wouldn't stop. When I offered to pick her up the next day, there was a brief pause before she answered. But she agreed. She actually agreed.
I smiled in the darkness.
I didn't know when I'd last looked forward to morning with that much anticipation.
At 7:42 a.m., I was already waiting in front of the hospital.
Seo-yeon came out in her work clothes, a cup of coffee in her hand. The moment she saw me, she smiled. It was so simple, yet somehow it made all the night's worries a little easier to bear.
"You really came," she said as she opened the door.
"I said I would."
"I thought you were just saying that."
She pointed to the driver's seat. "I'm driving. You look like you haven't slept."
I didn't argue. She got behind the wheel, and we started moving. For the first few minutes, we were silent—the busy morning sounds of Seoul serving as our soundtrack.
"You have a bad habit," she said at last without taking her eyes off the road.
"What?"
"Always keeping everything to yourself. Your face is easy to read, but you still don't tell me anything."
I turned to her. "You said I was cold."
"Cold doesn't mean hard to read."
Something in the way she said it left me silent. I looked out the window. I didn't know whether she realized how dangerous this closeness was for someone like me. For years, I'd built walls so no one could get too close. And this woman, without seeming to try, had already crossed those walls one by one.
"Have you ever had a girlfriend?" she asked suddenly.
"Why do you ask?"
"Just answer."
I thought about it. "No."
"Seriously?"
"Yes."
"But you're thirty."
"That's right."
She laughed. "Impossible. You're pretty handsome."
I looked at her, and I could see her realizing what she'd just said. Her ears turned slightly red.
"I mean..." she began.
"Thank you," I said, holding back a smile as I watched her try to fix a statement that had already been too clear.
"Don't get the wrong idea."
"I didn't say anything."
She turned her attention back to the road, and I laughed—a real laugh, loud enough to be heard, something that rarely happened. When she glanced over with an expression that was slightly annoyed, I knew it was a moment I wouldn't forget.
I didn't know when our relationship had changed. A few days ago, she had been nothing more than the doctor treating my wounds. Now she could make me laugh with a single sentence, make me look forward to morning, make me forget about the threatening message and the betrayal within the organization.
And that frightened me.
When I dropped her off in front of the hospital, she paused before getting out.
"Want to have dinner tonight? Eight o'clock?"
I nodded. "Okay."
She smiled and left. I watched until she disappeared behind the hospital doors. Only then did I realize I was smiling—and then my phone rang.
Boss.
All that happiness vanished in an instant.
"Yeah."
"Were you with Seo-yeon?"
I was silent. "Yes."
"Why?"
"Because I wanted to."
Silence. Then he said in an unchanged tone that nevertheless carried heavy pressure, "Don't make a mistake, Tae-jun."
"What mistake?"
"Don't make something that should stay simple complicated."
I frowned. "If you have something to say, say it directly."
"It's not time yet," he said, and the call ended.
I stared at the phone in the darkness. There was something he was hiding. And for the first time, I began to suspect that perhaps I hadn't been the one digging too deep all this time.
Maybe I was the one being kept from the truth.
Night came quickly.
I arrived at the restaurant we'd agreed on. Seo-yeon was already waiting. The evening passed simply and beautifully—we ate, talked, and laughed. I lost track of the time until she asked something that made my heart tremble.
"If one day you could leave everything behind, where would you go?"
I was silent for a long time.
"I don't know."
"Russia?"
"No."
"Korea?"
"Not that either."
She looked at me curiously. "Then where?"
"Maybe somewhere that doesn't know me," I said softly. "Somewhere I wouldn't have to be anyone."
She smiled as she imagined it. "I want somewhere peaceful. A small house far from Seoul, near the sea. No work. Just living."
I looked at her in silence.
"You could come with me," she said with a light smile. "I could be a doctor, and you could be whatever you wanted."
I imagined something I'd never allowed myself to imagine—a small house, the sea, no Black Hawk, no guns, no orders. Just the two of us.
I banished the image at once. A life like that wasn't mine.
At least not yet.
When we left the restaurant, it started to rain.
Seo-yeon stood beneath the awning, looking up at the sky as she said she hadn't brought an umbrella. I opened mine. We walked side by side, close enough that her shoulder brushed my arm from time to time. Neither of us said anything. Only the rain hummed softly around us.
Until she stopped.
"Why do you always look around? Like someone's chasing you."
I couldn't lie. "Reflex."
"From what?"
I fell silent.
"Sometimes I wonder who you really are," she said more quietly. "Who is Kang Tae-jun, really?"
I looked into her eyes. "What if I'm not a good person?"
"I never said you were a good person," she replied with a faint smile. "But I know you never meant to hurt me."
I almost laughed at the innocence of her statement. If she knew everything about who I was, what I'd done, what I was capable of—she would never say that.
"Seo-yeon," I said softly.
"Hmm?"
"If one day you learn something about me that you don't like, if you learn things that make you ashamed you ever knew me..."
I couldn't finish.
She waited.
"Don't hate me right away," I finally said.
She looked at me in confusion. "I don't know what will happen in the future," she said, moving a little closer. "But if one day you want to tell me something, don't lie."
I was silent. The words felt far heavier than she realized. "Okay," I answered.
But by then, I already knew I was lying. There were too many things I still couldn't say, too many truths I hadn't even learned myself.
Like the fact that the woman standing beneath the umbrella with me wasn't just a doctor loved by someone. She was the daughter of the man at the center of my life. And when that truth finally tore itself open, I would realize that from the beginning, we had never truly met as two strangers.
We were only two people walking toward the same secret, unaware that it would destroy us both.