Chapter 45
The sleepless night was cruelly long, yet also fleetingly short.
She watched the surroundings brighten into a pale gray before closing her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again, golden sunlight piercing through the narrow gap between the curtains stabbed sharply at her eyes. As she frowned and sat up, someone knocked on the door.
“Miss, I’m coming in.”
The door opened as soon as the words were finished. Seo-ah bolted upright in surprise, and she saw Barbara freeze in the doorway.
“Would you like to sleep a little longer?”
If she said yes, it seemed likely that Barbara would take the food back, just as she had last night. It probably wouldn’t matter even if she said she wanted to sleep all day, not just the morning.
“No, ma’am.”
Seo-ah hurriedly pulled on a coat over her clothes. She was conscious of the door across the hall visible behind Barbara’s back.
As she pulled back the curtains while clutching her coat closed with one hand, the dark room brightened instantly. Sleep had eluded her when she wanted it so badly, but the moment she had closed her eyes seemed to have lasted longer than she thought.
“You must have been very tired.”
Barbara said as she entered the room, pushing a trolley toward the table.
Embarrassed by the untouched food from the night before, Seo-ah approached the table, but there was no hiding it. Barbara stared quietly at the remains of last night’s meal and asked, “Is your stomach upset?”
“No.”
“It looks as though you didn’t sleep.”
“No, I slept well.”
Barbara didn’t look convinced. Her sharp, navy-blue gaze felt burdensome, so Seo-ah looked away. Then Barbara spoke.
“How about taking the day off to rest?”
The eyes of the stranger and the veteran wolf met in the air for a moment.
In truth, Barbara hoped that Seo-ah would stay at the mansion today if possible.
Fortunately—or perhaps not—the backup agents agreed that while Abel had it rough, the target’s day yesterday must have been hell as well. Sure enough, the Seo-ah she faced this morning had the characteristic face of someone who hadn’t slept a wink.
No matter how fun sightseeing in a foreign country might be, would anyone go out exploring in that state?
“Surely you aren’t planning to go to the market again today?”
Seo-ah felt the doubt floating in Barbara’s question. The thought crossed her mind that she shouldn’t say she wanted to see the market today.
As Seo-ah looked away to avoid Barbara’s gaze, the older woman began loading the uneaten food from the night before onto the trolley and setting the table with a few items from the fresh, warm meal that seemed easy to digest.
As Barbara suggested, it might be better to rest for a day. If this were home, or if she were really on a trip, she might have done just that. But she couldn’t afford to waste a single day.
It was a stroke of luck that she remembered Abel’s ruined clothes.
“Um, Mrs. Barbara.”
“…?”
“Where… can I buy clothes for Mr. Abel Sting?”
Barbara, who had been silently pouring water into a glass, set the pitcher down and turned toward her.
“Abel’s clothes?”
For the first time, a hint of a question colored her usually flat, dry tone.
The naive stranger and the veteran wolf looked at each other, both hiding their true intentions, while the morning sunlight seeped deep into the room.
When he first started working as an intelligence operative…
Abel Sting used to hope that his targets would be his type. Preferably someone his age, with a bit of a chest or a nice backside.
However, his seniors in the same field had laughed at him and told him flatly:
A rich target is the best target.
Type? You don’t care about that when your life is on the line. They insisted that, regardless, a rich target was the best.
At first, he didn’t understand. If your life is on the line, shouldn’t money be the last thing on your mind too? Even if you’re going to die tomorrow, isn’t it better to spend your last night with a target who’s worth kissing?
But as the missions repeated, Abel found himself agreeing with his seniors.
Types could change at any time. He couldn’t remember what kind of sex he’d had a year ago or how satisfying it had been, but a target’s money always left a mark in one way or another.
Because…
“The spoils remain.”
His voice was thick and heavy with fatigue.
The expensive suit and shoes he had acquired from a certain Countess had reached the end of their lifespan yesterday. No matter what he did, the smell wouldn’t come out, and they were so caked in stubborn mud that they could only be used as combat fatigues now.
“Do you know how much that cost…”
In the pale morning, Abel woke up as he always did, starting his day with a lament like an idiot who couldn’t let go of an ex-lover.
The miserable part was that he was getting out of bed out of sheer habit. The momentum built over the past week or so didn’t just govern his body. Even as he muttered curses, he was already worried about which market they would end up at today.
Standing before the bathroom door in his birthday suit, dodging the liquor bottles rolling on the floor, a thought suddenly occurred to him.
Wouldn’t she say she’s resting at the mansion for a day?
Yeah. She’s human too; shouldn’t she be bedridden by today?
“Senior.”
He meant, shouldn’t she be?
“The target is waiting for you in front of the Annex.”
The junior agent who had come to wake Abel clicked his tongue slightly at the sight of his senior burying his face in his palms while naked. Then he quietly turned his gaze out the window to look down.
There stood the woman who was currently the talk of the mansion’s agents.
Since they were a lot without a grain of sentimentality, most of the words used to describe her were clichéd. Among them, the one that garnered the most nods was ‘cosmos.’
The standard of beauty in East Norfolk was a woman with honey-blonde hair and a voluptuous figure. Abel’s target was the polar opposite. She was plain and modest. Yet, perhaps because she was exotic, that very quality drew the eye.
The agents were divided into two camps.
Better to follow that woman around all day than to see blood!
Damn it, you try doing it.
The latter was, of course, Abel, and the former was everyone else. And the junior agent, who belonged to the former group, relocated to the first floor to avoid the spite-filled Abel Sting. He went with a small sense of anticipation, wondering what kind of fun and drama the curiously eye-catching stranger would provide today.
Meanwhile, Seo-ah, who was hovering near the entrance of the Annex, huddled into herself against the increasingly cold weather. It had been the same when they arrived at the cemetery yesterday, but the drop in morning temperature was definitely noticeable. The leaves on the trees along the path, as well as those at the mansion, had clearly begun to fade in color.
As she pressed her cold hands together, she felt gazes filled with amusement from all around. Everyone seemed to find this entertaining.
Except for one person.
Seo-ah took a deep breath.
The approaching presence was much more fierce and frightening than usual.
She clutched her bag and forced herself not to step back, and then a pair of long, lean legs entered her field of vision.
“Sigh.”
A sigh filled with resignation and annoyance felt like a heavy frost.
Seeing her already pale face turn even whiter, Abel rubbed his face roughly.
Judging by Oscar’s reaction last night, he wouldn’t be killed for failing to secure the target, but it seemed he wouldn’t be able to avoid a penalty like a demotion. On top of that, he had to follow her around regardless of success.
In the end, he was left with two choices.
Either follow her around like a lost puppy and get demoted, or somehow charm her and get the position he wanted.
No matter how much he thought about it, the latter was the better deal.
However, the resolve he had desperately clung to while coming down the stairs shattered like falling snow the moment he saw Seo-ah. It was truly a mystery how he couldn’t get a grip on his heart. Where had the Abel Sting gone—the man who was confident even if the target were a man?
Looking at her face, there was no doubt she had been crying her eyes out all night without a wink of sleep. Why on earth was she asking to go to the market from early morning in that state? It wasn’t like he could split open that pretty-but-empty head to take a look and then put it back together perfectly.
Abel recalled Oscar’s face and exerted his professional spirit to the maximum.
I can seduce this woman. This woman will fall for me. I love this woman.
The morning greetings he had offered targets in the past were numerous enough to fill a dictionary.
To a target who loved gentlemanly things, he gave a gentlemanly greeting; to one who preferred something a bit more vulgar, he gave a greeting that fit that taste perfectly. It wasn’t even a conscious choice; a question tailored to the other person’s preference would instinctively pop out of his mouth.
“Are you curious about the market today, too?”
Damn it, seriously…
Abel felt like he wanted to die right then and there because of the greeting that had escaped his lips. As the professional spirit he had barely managed to maintain receded like the tide, his disillusionment was revealed like a mudflat that had been submerged underwater.
He felt as though he could hear the young wolves behind him snickering, and something inside Abel came crashing down.
