The Woman Who Stole My Flower
Chapter 2
Chapter 2
#2.
“Cough, cough!”
Fortunately, by clapping a tissue over her mouth in the nick of time, she avoided a full-blown disaster of spitting it everywhere. But because she happened to be drinking lemonade, her sinuses stung sharply. Seeing Yeon-seo’s eyes instantly well with tears, Min-ah quickly handed her more tissues from the café table.
“Are you okay?”
“S-Sorry.”
Before Yeon-seo could even catch her breath, Min-ah picked up right where she had left off.
“Anyway, about Kang Joo-heon’s girlfriend. Doesn’t she seem crazy possessive?”
“Why?”
“She must have known he had an official event, so leaving a hickey right where everyone could see it was practically telling the world to look. Like, ‘Look here, he’s my man, don’t even think about touching him’—that’s totally it!”
Because Min-ah was spinning a whole story as if she had witnessed it herself, Yeon-seo bristled in spite of herself.
“Wait, what did the woman do wrong?”
“Huh?”
“No, I mean, whether it’s a kiss mark or whatever, it takes two to tango. Why make the poor woman out to be some obsessed stalker?”
“Well, put that way, I guess you have a point.”
Thankfully, the simple-minded Min-ah didn’t suspect a thing about Yeon-seo ardently defending a total stranger, readily agreeing instead.
“Anyway, I’m so jealous of whoever she is. I wonder what it feels like to sleep with a guy like Kang Joo-heon?”
Then, lowering her voice, she whispered conspiratorially.
“……It’s gotta be huge, right?”
Yeon-seo nearly jumped out of her skin.
“Are you crazy? How could you even ask something like that?”
Min-ah looked back at her with genuine bewilderment.
“Who asked you? Why are you overreacting like crazy all of a sudden?”
“S-Sorry.”
Min-ah crossed her arms, narrowed her eyes, and stared intensely at Yeon-seo as if seeing her anew.
“You’re acting really weird today. Why on earth do you have a scarf wrapped tightly around your neck in this sweltering heat?”
It was already late October. It was well past time for temperatures to drop, but an unseasonal late-heat wave lingered due to anomalous weather. With daytime temperatures climbing well above twenty-five degrees Celsius, wrapping a bulky scarf all the way around her neck—rather than a light neckerchief—was certainly bound to draw suspicion.
“Well, um, I have a bit of a cold…… and my dad insisted I wear it before heading out.”
Tucking the scarf even tighter lest any bare skin show, Yeon-seo answered.
“You know how overprotective my dad can be.”
Fortunately, Min-ah didn’t pry any further this time either. As if all her attention remained riveted on Kang Joo-heon, the conversation promptly shifted back to him, and she leaned in with sparkling eyes.
“Anyway, how does it feel having none other than Kang Joo-heon as your company Director?”
Yeon-seo was an employee at the South Korean branch of the global sportswear brand, Bellator. It was the very brand that had hosted the event that sparked this whole uproar.
“He’s called an honorary Director, but he’s basically just a brand model. It’s not like I’ll ever see his face.”
“Still, you’re in the Public Relations Office. If you wanted to see him, couldn’t you manage it somehow?”
If she had to pick the one person in the world she least wanted to see right now, it would be him. Shuddering inwardly, Yeon-seo replied.
“I’m only affiliated with the PR Office on paper; the work I do is totally different. Why would I ever cross paths with him?”
Only then did Min-ah smack her lips in disappointment.
“I guess so. Ah, what a bummer. I thought maybe I could ride your coattails and get a close look at Kang Joo-heon.”
Feeling burdened by the ongoing topic, Yeon-seo subtly changed the subject.
“Min-ah, shouldn’t you be heading back soon?”
Checking her watch, Min-ah gasped.
“Ah, is it that late already?”
Though Yeon-seo and Min-ah worked for different companies, by chance their offices were in the same building. Yeon-seo’s company occupied the 20th through 24th floors, while Min-ah’s was on the 10th through 12th. Because Min-ah’s lunch break ended thirty minutes earlier than Yeon-seo’s, Min-ah often had to rush off like this whenever they ate together.
“I’m off!”
Only after Min-ah hurriedly dashed away did Yeon-seo let out a sigh of relief.
Before heading up to the office, Yeon-seo stopped by the restroom. After checking carefully around her to ensure no one was watching, she stood before the mirror and cautiously lifted her scarf, letting out a sigh.
“What do I do? It won’t go away…….”
The neck hidden beneath the scarf was mottled all over with marks from being bitten and sucked. Even after rubbing it frantically with a hard-boiled egg last night and again this morning, there was no sign of them fading anytime soon.
“I took way more damage.”
Yeon-seo muttered with a tearful pout.
That was right. The culprit who had left the kiss mark on Kang Joo-heon—the one currently setting the internet ablaze—was none other than her. But she had received far worse in return!
She had left only a single mark, but he had turned her neck into a complete honeycomb. It couldn’t even be covered by a turtleneck, forcing her to walk around swaddled in a scarf in this stifling weather.
And yet people were calling her a clingy stalker!
Yeon-seo felt utterly wronged. Even if she wanted to be clingy, she couldn’t; she didn’t even know his phone number. In fact, he probably didn’t even know her name.
To briefly explain how things had unfolded:
Three days ago, due to a certain incident, Yeon-seo had ended up binge drinking alone at a bar. Never being one to drink normally, she hadn’t known her own tolerance and had simply chugged alcohol recklessly—which proved to be the problem. Beyond a certain point, she had zero memory.
And when she opened her eyes the following morning, an unfamiliar ceiling greeted her, with an equally unfamiliar man lying beside her. The problem was that the man was soccer superstar Kang Joo-heon!
Too shocked to believe it, she rubbed her eyes and looked again, but the sleeping man was undoubtedly Kang Joo-heon. South Korea’s most famous athlete, the sexiest man alive, and its most famous virgin! To make matters worse, he was completely naked, save for the blanket draped over his lower half.
Though she had no idea how things had come to this, what had transpired was glaringly obvious. Terrified out of her wits, Yeon-seo had grabbed her clothes and fled the scene in a panic. So shaken was she that she tripped several times along the way, leaving bruises scattered across her legs. Even after escaping outside, she had had no clue where she was, barely managing to hail a taxi to flee back home.
Min-ah’s words echoed in her mind.
[I wonder what it feels like to sleep with a guy like Kang Joo-heon?]
Because she had been so utterly wasted, she couldn’t remember what it felt like at all. Then again, had she not been drunk, she never in her wildest dreams would have considered a one-night stand. Seeing how both his neck and hers had ended up in this state, it was undoubtedly a mutual affair, yet she couldn’t recall a single detail of how it had even happened.
[It’s gotta be huge, right?]
Regrettably, Yeon-seo didn’t know the answer to that question either. Ah, except for one thing: she vaguely recalled gripping something intensely hot and hard. Even in her drunken state, it must have startled her, because that tactile sensation remained vivid to this day.
Still, it had been so thick that her hand couldn’t even wrap fully around it, so she hardly believed that had actually been that. Perhaps her senses had just gone haywire from the alcohol, or she was misremembering, or it had been something else entirely.
“Just what on earth happened……?”
As she sighed while gazing into the mirror, two women entered, chattering loudly. Startled, Yeon-seo hurriedly wrapped her scarf tight again.
“About the woman who gave Kang Joo-heon that kiss mark. Rumor has it it’s actress Ryu Chae-young.”
“Ryu Chae-young? The one they call the top visual in the entertainment industry right now?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, if it’s someone on that level, at least you can’t feel bitter about Kang Joo-heon being taken.”
Her heart pounded so violently that Yeon-seo practically bolted out of the restroom. She felt as if she could hear years being shaved off her lifespan in real time.
Yeon-seo was the type of person who couldn’t sleep at night if she received even a couple of hate comments on an online post. Experiencing firsthand how everyone was gossiping about her everywhere she went was downright unbearable. She found herself freshly in awe of celebrities who endured such fame.
‘What if people find out that woman is actually me……?’
The mere thought made her heart shrink to the size of a pea. For a man said to only match a figure-skating queen or a top actress, to be linked with an ordinary office worker?
‘How could Kang Joo-heon end up with a woman like that?’
‘Did that woman dare steal Kang Joo-heon’s purity?’
Strictly speaking, she had lost hers just as well, but no one would ever take that into account.
‘It’s fine. Nobody knows it’s me.’
Yeon-seo desperately tried to soothe herself. When not even her partner, Kang Joo-heon, knew who she was, how could anyone else in the world possibly find out?
‘It’s not like we’ll ever cross paths again anyway. As long as I keep my mouth shut, no one will ever know.’
That was right. Just like anyone else might, she had simply indulged in a rare night of reckless rebellion. Besides, given that her partner was the Kang Joo-heon, she could just cherish this as a private trophy in her heart. It was almost a pity she couldn’t brag about it anywhere.
