Divorce in Bed Chapter 5

A silence fell.

‘The thing from yesterday.’

The clumsy first kiss that had collided. The very thing he had flatly dismissed as a child’s play at house.

Dowon continued to look at Yeohwi while still gripping his chin firmly. Soon, a cool thumb swept across Yeohwi’s lower lip in a slow, mocking rub. Yeohwi involuntarily held his breath.

He barely managed to press down and calm his frantically trembling heart, rising above his goal to somehow win. The two eyes facing Dowon, those eyes flashing intensely, resembled a young beast of prey trying to claim its territory upon reaching adulthood.

He would not run away.

Instead, he rested his face against Dowon’s hand that held his chin and blurted out an unexpected proposal.

“…Sleep with me tonight.”

“What?”

Dowon’s hand faltered. His brow furrowed fiercely, like a person witnessing an incomprehensible creature.

“I want us to sleep in the same bed together tonight.”

Yeohwi lifted his gaze, looking up. The sight of him looking up greedily while his chin was held appeared even more provocative.

“Nothing more than that.”

“…”

“You look tired.”

Dowon was momentarily speechless.

“You, right now…”

“Or.”

Yeohwi, cutting him off, glared at Dowon with a reddened face and whispered as if growling.

“W-we can… really… keep doing the thing from yesterday.”

Only then did Dowon adjust his gaze as he looked at Yeohwi, ever so slightly.

The wariness of facing something unfamiliar. An acknowledgement of an unexpected situation. This amateur was not a pushover or an easy-to-discard child as he had simply judged.

Dowon laughed hollowly and stepped back, letting go of Yeohwi’s chin.

“If I refuse, you’ll probably end up coming all the way to the company.”

“…Pardon?”

“Are you going to send me a photo of my office door tomorrow?”

As if he didn’t even have the energy left to exchange words with Yeohwi, Dowon roughly swept back his hair, disheveling it.

“I’m washing up.”

Leaving only those words, Dowon passed Yeohwi and headed toward the bathroom further down the hallway.

‧₊˚🍊༉‧₊˚.

That night, after coming out of the bathroom and drying his wet hair with a towel, Dowon headed for the study. Yeohwi tried to follow him in, but no matter how much he pushed, the door would not open. Dowon had locked it from the outside.

In the end, that day, the next day, and the day after that, Yeohwi monopolized the massive bedroom and could not see so much as Dowon’s shadow.

A lull continued for several days.

Dowon seemed determined to treat Yeohwi as a transparent human being. Even when Yeohwi sat at the breakfast table and shouted, “Good morning! Did you sleep well?” he would only look at the newspaper while holding his coffee cup.

Naturally, the texts Yeohwi sent remained unanswered, with the ‘1’ never disappearing.

‘…Was I really blocked?’

Yeohwi thought, burying himself in the massive sofa in the first-floor drawing room and tossing popcorn into his mouth.

‘Or is he just not replying… well, was I a bit too much? To a person busy with work.’

He glanced awkwardly toward Madam Park, who was looking at him with pity from the kitchen, and offered a sheepish smile.

“Young master, I’m sorry I haven’t been of much help.”

When Madam Park apologized while watching his reaction, Yeohwi waved his hand.

“No, please don’t be sorry. Dowon-ssi… the Director, had no interest in me from the start. I just did a bunch of useless things on my own.”

It was just as he took another handful of popcorn and put it in his mouth.

The sound of rough, overbearing footsteps rang from the entrance.

Upon identifying the person who entered, Madam Park’s face instantly turned white. She wiped her hands on her apron and rushed out to the entrance.

“P-President! What brings you here? Without even calling…”

“Where is Dowon?”

A neurotic, low voice cut off Madam Park’s words.

It was Do Jin-gyu, the current president of KD Group and Dowon’s eldest uncle.

Wrinkled eyes. A distorted jaw. It was a cold and greedy impression. He was wearing a well-pressed, top-tier suit, but he looked exactly like a snake wearing a necktie.

He ignored Madam Park—who was responding in a flustered manner—as if she were invisible dust and strode into the drawing room.

Then, he looked down at Yeohwi, who was sprawled out on the drawing room sofa hugging a tub of popcorn.

“…This thing.”

Do Jin-gyu stopped in his tracks and scanned Yeohwi from head to toe, as if appraising a broken item at an auction.

“Is this it? The Seong orphan.”

It was contempt itself.

Passing the sofa, he approached the table where Yeohwi was eating popcorn.

“I knew his stomach was strong, but to think he’d actually take in a maggot of this level.”

Do Jin-gyu treated Seong Yeohwi as if he were looking at filth on an expensive carpet. Yeohwi stopped chewing his popcorn. Then, he narrowed his eyes and scanned the man.

‘Seong orphan? He knows me.’

“…Who are you, Mister?”

At those words, Do Jin-gyu’s eyebrows twitched upward.

However, instead of getting angry, he laughed as if the judgment he had made was proven correct.

“Mister? Ha, being the orphan of a collapsed family, you truly don’t know your place.”

He tapped Yeohwi’s cheek as if checking the quality of livestock.

When Yeohwi tried to swat the hand away, Do Jin-gyu’s eyes flashed coldly for a moment.

“Right, Seong child. I hear you inherited all of Chairman Seong’s legacy. Since you’ve married that Dowon fellow, you should fulfill your duty as a family member. Shouldn’t you?”

Do Jin-gyu picked up the popcorn bowl sitting on the table. Then, he slowly poured the contents onto the floor. The popcorn scattered miserably over the expensive rug.

“Do you know who gave permission for everything you are eating and where you are sleeping, for this very air you breathe? To dare crawl into the Do family reeking of trash. How shameless.”

He slammed the popcorn bowl back onto the table. Having set it down, he brought up the main point without even a hint of trying to hide it.

“Have you organized the asset list and handed it over to Dowon?”

“…”

“No, you should have brought it to me first. Since it must be merged into the family assets.”

In an instant, Yeohwi’s mind turned cold.

Money. Inheritance.

Of course, he knew. He knew this was his only use. But facing such blatant greed in person made a corner of his chest ache.

The words Dowon had used to drive home the fact that it was an arranged marriage on their first night came back to him vividly. He had tried to forget them, but it felt like a wound that had once closed had reopened and split.

‘It’s an arranged marriage. You must have come here knowing that.’

‘All we need is the legal binding, so don’t expect any unnecessary roles or emotions from each other.’

‘Nothing will happen between you and me. Especially not sleeping together.’

The futile struggles of sending texts, waiting at the entrance, and attempting a clumsy kiss were shattered into pieces. The wish for him to become his person. The hope of living like a real couple seemed to look like nothing more than a clueless child’s game in front of those with the surname Do.

‘I guess so…’

Yeohwi’s light brown eyes sank heavily.

‘Dowon-ssi knew it would turn out like this. That’s why he even warned me.’

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Yeohwi stood up slowly, brushing off the popcorn crumbs from his hands.

“Maggot, trash? Maybe it’s because I’m a truly uneducated orphan, but when I get angry, my fists fly first. Don’t just come into someone else’s house uninvited to flip things over and scream, Mister.”

“What? You…!”

“Why? Are you confident you can win in a fight against me?”

Instantly, Do Jin-gyu’s mask of refinement was stripped away. He grabbed Yeohwi roughly by the collar.

“You little brat… a piece of vermin like you, who do you think you’re being bold in front of…!”

“Let go of me.”

Right then.

Before Yeohwi could strike the arm away, a faster and greater force snatched Do Jin-gyu’s wrist in mid-air.

“…!”

It was Dowon.

As if he had hurried back after postponing an important meeting, his tie was slightly crooked unlike usual, and his jacket was off, draped over his arm.

Those characteristic jet-black eyes without light glared at his eldest uncle, Do Jin-gyu, with an icy coldness.

“Uncle.”

Dowon’s voice echoed low, as if he might kill the man right then and there.

“What do you think you’re doing right now?”