Desires Chapter 8.4 - The Losing Game

Song Yeongin, who had suddenly appeared at the gallery, was a complete mess. The sight of him, with a worn and torn shirt barely held together by a dark navy blazer, was truly a spectacle.

Below his slender and elegant neckline and prominent collarbones, his white and indecent chest line was completely exposed. Song Yeongin had a dazed look on his face. From how much he had cried, the mucous membranes at the corners of his eyes, the tip of his nose, and his lips were all flushed a pitiful bright red.

As soon as he saw the disheveled Song Yeongin, James Han, with blood pooling below his waist, started rambling and spewed a string of filthy curses in English. James Han commanded Aiden.

“Get him out of here, now!”

That colorful and exceedingly precarious object had to be moved immediately to a place where people could not see it. James Han, along with Aiden, sent that messed-up, bewitching object back to his car.

Song Yeongin’s debut as a painter in New York was a success.

Whether or not the painter, Song Yeongin, showed his face before New York’s renowned critics and directors had no bearing on the evaluation. What was important was the painting, and without any need for explanation, that was all there was to it.

James Han had gathered New York’s most prominent art critics in one place at his contemporary art gallery, which prided itself on being one of the most prestigious galleries on Museum Mile.

The first impression that Song Yeongin’s three paintings gave them was one of mystery.

The critics lavished praise on the contrast of primary colors, reminiscent of Eastern shamanistic paintings, and the transcendent purity that was so desperately revealed. At the same time, they felt a very fresh and unconventional shock at the coexistence of a religious style within the paintings, reminiscent of Western Catholic sacred art and liturgical paintings.

The critics sympathized with the strange implication that emanated from this heterogeneous gap. A pure and strange eroticism. They tacitly agreed with the desperate and masochistic sexual implications revealed in the paintings, and they were greatly fascinated by Song Yeongin’s art.

The evaluation was that the sensual and romantic style, reminiscent of Chassériau or G. Moreau, seemed to have met the colors of the Orient and the exotic shamanism of the Far East. It was praised as a new combination that had never been seen before.

Among them, New York’s legendary critic Karen Saltzman did not spare her praise and favorable reviews for the fresh and attractive fusion of East and West and the transcendently pure composition that was almost sensual. She particularly wanted to own one of Song Yeongin’s paintings.

James Han, in front of her, proposed a deal with one painting on the line. It was an aggressive investment method. If it became known that she had acquired a painting by Song Yeongin, her followers, who reigned over the New York art world, would be scrambling to get their hands on his art.

James Han, a major player in the New York art world, and his director, Fredrick Wilson, whom he had scouted for a high price, were masters of the know-how to bring emerging artists to the surface and how to raise the price of paintings to astronomical heights.

The New York art scene, unlike Europe, was open and unconventional. New York was a place where even a street vagrant could become a genius artist overnight with a groundbreaking work. That was the most unique identity that only this city of immigrants could possess.

Collectors from all over the world were paying attention to New York. They were always busy looking for something new in this city of art that never sleeps. New York’s critics, who loved to search for new topics that stimulated the five senses, pour out harsh criticism or sing praises, would rush to contribute articles with fresh issues and artistically vain evaluations through the journals where they each exerted their influence.

With Karen Saltzman and James Han backing him in New York, the new home of contemporary art, Song Yeongin was set to be reborn as a rookie artist with unconventional genius.

Protected by large, burly Black guards following behind, the flashy supercar headed towards James Han’s residence located on the Upper East Side.

With a dazed face, his mouth shut tight, Song Yeongin was looking out the car window when James Han, sitting next to him, asked with an uncontrolled, turbid gaze.

“Well, how can I know when you’re keeping your mouth firmly shut like this.”

“…….”

“Just why are you in such a promiscuous state.”

Song Yeongin, who had been staring blankly out the window with an absentminded face, pressed his body tightly against the car door to get away from James Han, who was sitting next to him.

Pulling his collar tightly together, Song Yeongin scrunched up his face at that insidious gaze. The sharp expression of contempt on his delicate face was seen as a primness that heavily stimulated the lust of others. James Han felt his limbs tingle and his lower body grow stiff at the sight of that prim expression directed at him.

Song Yeongin once again pulled the torn collar of his shirt together and avoided James Han’s gaze. However, James Han did not miss the opening and persistently dug in. His droopy eyes were smiling slyly.

“Why?”

“…….”

The weight contained in that single word, uttered with slithery eyes like someone who knew everything, was not easily gauged.

“Did you, by any chance, meet Cha Woojin?”

Song Yeongin, whose eyes met James Han’s, flinched, his bright red mucous membranes, messy from crying, trembling artlessly. However, Song Yeongin had to put on a mask and deny it.

“No. Nothing like that happened.”

“It’s no use trying to deny it.”

“…….”

“The fact that Cha Woojin is currently in New York on a business trip is on his official schedule, so it is not a top secret.”

“…….”

“Cha Woojin, the executive director, is attending the annual Tech Forum in New York as the representative of the global group Woosung Electronics. And consecutively, Cha Woojin is scheduled to attend the CEO Summit and corporate charity events held in Manhattan.”

“…….”

“Cha Woojin must be in New York right now….”

“…….”

“Is that why you are in this state. Did Cha Woojin meet Mr. Song Yeongin, tear your clothes, and rape you or something?”

‘Do you know me?!’

An empty voice. The achingly ephemeral and cold voice of Cha Woojin echoed in his ears.

Song Yeongin remained silent. Soon, with a detached and pale face, he retorted coldly.

“You said that Cha Woojin wouldn’t look for me anymore, didn’t you?”

“…….”

“You were right.”

James Han once again smiled cunningly with an unreadable face.

“Well… I wonder if that is really the case?”

As soon as one entered James Han’s ultra-luxurious residence, a high-rise penthouse located on the Upper East Side, the East River and the lush Central Park could be seen at a glance.

James Han did not even give Song Yeongin time to change out of his torn clothes, and as soon as they entered, he forcefully pushed Song Yeongin’s body into a corner.

The man grabbed Song Yeongin’s straight, thin shoulders and pushed aside the torn collar.

“You… are you crazy?! Let go of me.”

Song Yeongin, with a frigidly cold face, struggled violently in the man’s grasp, and James Han, as if appreciating it, scanned the strange lines of Song Yeongin’s body that were revealed beneath the dark navy blazer.

The red nipples rising on the white, smooth skin were like a sumi-e painting of red plum blossoms. As if he could not bear the desire to suck on them, James Han gulped.

“So, are you saying that Cha Woojin did not lay a single finger on you?”

“Ah, ugh…! I said let go…!”

The eyes that had once looked upon Song Yeongin, overlapping him with Chloe, with a paternal and compassionate light were nowhere to be seen.

“You do not expect me to believe that, do you?”

Song Yeongin glared at the man with bewildered eyes filled with bewilderment.

James Han was acting like a father interrogating his unfaithful daughter to him, another man. At the same time, he was acting like a pathologically jealous husband who suspected his wife of having an affair. Song Yeongin was dumbfounded with absurdity.

His precarious red lips spat a cold, contemptuous sneer at the man.

“Do not look at me like that.”

“…….”

“It is disgusting.”

At that cold and chilling contempt, James Han’s eyes, which had been interrogating Song Yeongin, regained their reason and returned to normal. James Han was panting for breath, his lower body erect, unable to ejaculate.

Just the fact that Song Yeongin had met Cha Woojin made James Han’s blood boil.

“Haha, yes. Now I understand. Shin Hwa-yeon’s father, candidate Shin Hwa-cheol, has been embroiled in a sex scandal due to sexual favors at a villa, and he is now on the verge of resigning.”

The transparent eyes, wide open, began to shake violently with question and agitation. The things flowing from James Han’s mouth were stories that Song Yeongin did not know.

“Seeing as even his father-in-law, a media tycoon, cannot stop the video of Representative Shin Hwa-cheol’s sexual favors from spreading like wildfire on social media, it seems certain that a third party was involved.”

“…….”

“If this sensitive sex scandal is not resolved as it is, candidate Shin Hwa-cheol has no chance as president…. The wedding, which is only a few days away, will probably be called off by the Woosung side with a press release….”

“What on earth are you talking about right now…!”

“Do not tell me you did not know?! I know everything, that you search for information about Cha Woojin whenever you have a chance….”

These were matters that had blown up into issues in just a day or two, and Song Yeongin was completely oblivious to this mega-scandal that was shaking up Korea.

He grabbed the small face that was trembling from the shock.

“Why…? Now that you hear he is about to break off his engagement, are you dying to go back to Cha Woojin again.”

“…….”

“A year has passed, yet you still have so much lingering attachment….”

“…….”

“My my…. At this rate, if Cha Woojin pokes you just a little, you will follow him and spread your legs happily like a dog in heat for mating, will you not?”

Song Yeongin violently shook off James Han’s hand that was gripping his face. A sharp venom flashed across Song Yeongin’s face.

“You have crossed the line now…! Whatever I did, you have no right to interrogate me like you are something to me…!”

“…….”

“What I entrusted to you under contract was only my career and work as a painter. What kind of delusion are you under right now?!”

However, the slyly drooping, mature eyes lightly ignored Song Yeongin’s words.

“Even if the engagement is broken off, another line of the best possible marriage partners will be waiting for that high-nosed, handsome stallion.”

“…….”

“A chaebol heir is the same as a top-grade breeding stallion.”

“…….”

“That is the unavoidable fate of an inheritor. Just like how I could never let the world know that I have a daughter with an intellectual disability. If it becomes known that there is a disqualifying reason, you are bound to be eliminated from the marriage market and the mergers and acquisitions that can be enjoyed through a strategic marriage.”

Song Yeongin, who got goosebumps from the words he uttered so nonchalantly, quietly trembled with a chill.

“Your eyes are all swollen from crying so much.”

The middle-aged man caressed Song Yeongin’s face as if handling something precious.

“Do not touch me…!”

James Han strongly grabbed the arm of Song Yeongin, who was resisting violently with his whole body.

“Ah, ugh…! Crazy…! You son of a bitch! I said let go.”

Song Yeongin spat ‘Ptoo..!’ at James Han as if he were disgusting.

Wiping the spit from his face, James Han swiftly grabbed Song Yeongin’s small face and showered him with kisses.

A thick and rough tongue dug into Song Yeongin’s soft and tender lips. Song Yeongin writhed in disgust and strongly pushed James Han away.

“Ha, ugh…! You crazy bastard…! Are you out of your mind?! If you lay a single finger on my body, the contract with you is void! Sob…! I said let go…! Give me back my paintings…!!!”

James Han’s stiffly erect penis poked at his lower abdomen. Song Yeongin had to spew any words he could to escape this critical situation, filled with nauseating contempt and disgust.

“You said I look like your daughter Chloe…! You’re doing this filthy thing while thinking of your dead daughter when you look at me?!”

“Haha…! I have never had a child like you who makes a man lustful.”

At that cunningness of his wagging tongue, Song Yeongin lamented, trembling with fear and terror.

“There is only one reason why I have not touched you physically.”

“…….”

“Because I thought that you, delicate and pure, would get hurt and break like Chloe… It was because I absolutely did not want to destroy you.”

“…….”

“But, if you are thinking of going back to Cha Woojin, the story changes.”

James Han grabbed the convulsing Song Yeongin with a rough grip. He began to urgently strip off his clothes as if tearing them.

The middle-aged man’s desperate kisses continued. The dense kisses, poured out as if begging for love from a lustful lover, were even more nauseating because he was pretending to be affectionate as if treating a lover. Song Yeongin could not bear the disgust and revulsion that surged within him.

The hard, fully erect member touched Song Yeongin’s body. He grabbed the waist that was struggling and resisting with difficulty and kneaded the luscious and firm buttocks as if kneading rice cake. James Han subdued the frantically resisting Song Yeongin at once with brute force and laid him on the bed. A rough grip forcibly grabbed his two thighs and spread them apart. The man, who had slyly entered between his thighs, began a deep caress.

At the gestures of this middle-aged man who laid him down and begged for love as if handling a lover, Song Yeongin shuddered with surging disgust and nausea. The man’s hand slipped inside his clothes and was opening Song Yeongin’s penis and hole. Song Yeongin spat out curses and pushed him away.

“Haeu, ugh…! You son of a bitch! Fuck, I said let go…!!!”

The man with drooping eyes buried his face in the soft, white chest as if he could not stand it anymore. With a debauched tongue, he greedily sucked the bright red nipples, making wet noises as if teasing him.

Taking advantage of the moment when the man caressing his chest was panting and had his face buried, Song Yeongin quickly reached to the side and struck the long-necked glass vase on the marble nightstand.

With a loud shattering sound, the long glass vase that held a Phalaenopsis orchid was broken.

Song Yeongin tightly gripped the shard of the vase, its mouth broken as sharp as a weapon, in his hand. He placed the long piece of glass, which was seeping with blood, against his own left wrist.

“…D-don’t move…! I would rather die than be raped by someone again!!!”

“…….”

“Yes, like your daughter… I, too, like her, will slit my wrist in front of you….”

James Han gasped for breath and shouted fiercely.

“Shhh…! G-give that here! Stop playing around…!”

“In the end, you are the one killing two people.”

Ironically, Song Yeongin was smiling prettily, the corners of his eyes crinkling. That white smile, breaking apart in the air, left a macabre and beautiful afterimage, enough to make one remember this tragic day for a lifetime.

It was instantaneous.

Without a moment’s delay or hesitation, bright red blood began to seep from the wrist that was slit in a single motion with the glass shard.

He saw the ghost of his daughter.

Frozen with terror, James Han was seeing a vision of his daughter, who had committed suicide by slitting her wrist at the Montauk villa, through Song Yeongin. James Han could not breathe and convulsed like a madman.

“…Ca…calm down…! Mr. Song Yeongin…! I will not touch you… so calm down…!”

James Han lunged to snatch the glass shard from Song Yeongin’s hand.

Song Yeongin smiled pathetically as if it were ridiculous. His achingly beautiful and detached face pushed the sharp glass fragment even deeper inside, as if for show.

Blood spurted from the gaunt wrist like a fountain.

He felt no pain.

The broken senses of the past year must have also applied to his own dull body. Profuse blood was soaking the pure white bedsheets in streams.

“I was wrong…! I will not touch you…. Stop…!!! I said stop…!!!!!!”

James Han grabbed his body and snatched the blood-soaked glass shard from Song Yeongin’s hand. Blood was still gushing from his wrist like a fountain.

Song Yeongin, who had lost his mind and reason, babbled incomprehensible words.

“It was a mistake for you people to touch me… I have no will to live….”

Song Yeongin, bleeding as if he would spurt it all out, with a pathetic face and covered in blood, kept convulsing and talking nonsense.

Song Yeongin was dragged back to the front of another middle-aged man who had violated him in his childhood.

‘…Sob. Huhu…! Sir, sir…! Please help me…!’

Sir… the kids hit me and raped me. The sunbae hyung and the kids took turns tormenting me. Sir…! Sir…! Sir, I don’t want to…! Don’t do this…! Please don’t…! You cannot rape me just like those bastards did…!

Sir, no.

Sir, please never call my parents.

My mom cannot hear.

She cannot speak.

It is really not my fault….

I was not being promiscuous….

I never looked at them like that….

I never seduced them….

So, please, you come quickly and tell me it is not my fault.

‘Yeongin-ah, I like you.’

‘I want to keep you in my arms. I want to protect you. So, stay by my side.’

‘Cha Woojin will not leave it alone. If you touch me, that person will kill you.’

He said he would get gruesome revenge on those who insulted and humiliated me and tear them to shreds. Like last time, even if I hide so tightly like this, even if I do not say anything, that person will eventually find me.

To save me.

Here….

“Aiden…! Aiden!!!!!!!!!!!!”

At James Han’s ear-splitting roar, Aiden, who had been waiting outside the door, entered the bedroom.

“Call an ambulance right now…! Transfer him to the hospital.”

No. The one who abandoned him was me. Cha Woojin does not love me anymore.

He will not come for me now.