Chapter 37
Bora grabbed a taxi as soon as she landed at Dubai Airport and headed straight to the hospital.
After she gave the driver the address Kang Yoon’s secretary had sent her, the taxi driver praised it as the biggest hospital in Dubai.
But Bora could barely hear him.
Please… please be safe, Kang Yoon….
During the ten-hour flight, Bora had not rested for a single moment. She kept praying for Kang Yoon the entire time.
The first day she met him—he had seemed a little arrogant and cold. She had been flustered when he suddenly proposed a contract marriage.
But his large, dark eyes, watching her with interest when she boldly told him to “invest in me,” had been captivating.
He had introduced himself as a “rude and shameless man,” but in truth, he was deeper and kinder than anyone.
While preparing for their wedding, and during their short married life, he had been the best man—only for Bora.
Unable to stop her tears, Bora endured the long flight with swollen, puffy eyes.
I… I think I like Kang Yoon. No, I do like him. I did from the beginning. From the day we first met for the blind date… I….
Because it was a contract marriage, Bora had never properly examined her own feelings.
“This is a contract. It’s written in the agreement.” Using that excuse, she had forced herself to interpret her feelings for Kang Yoon as business.
If Kang Yoon was safe, if he smiled at her again the way he used to, she had decided she would tell him—no more contract marriage. Let’s have a real marriage. Let’s start dating properly.
“Team Leader Choi! It’s me! How is Kang Yoon? It’s nothing serious, right? Right?”
The employee who had been waiting for her in the hospital lobby stared at Bora in shock as she shouted at him.
“…Madam.”
“Yes. Tell me. How is he? Is he badly hurt? He’s not, right? Right?”
Her red, swollen eyes showed how much she had cried.
Team Leader Choi let out a sigh and led Bora toward the elevator.
“He fell from a high-rise building. Fortunately, he didn’t land on asphalt but on a truck carrying construction sand, so he survived….”
“Oh my God…!”
“He’s in surgery right now. This is the best hospital in Dubai, so he’ll be fine. Please don’t worry too much.”
“…How can I not worry? How… how can I!”
Her eyes blazed as she glared at Team Leader Choi, who was speaking calmly.
“How did he fall? Kang Yoon isn’t a rookie. He’s a veteran who’s worked on construction sites for years. Why did he fall when no one else did?”
“I… I’m not sure. He suddenly lost his balance and staggered….”
“Someone must have done something to make him collapse. A healthy, professional man just suddenly loses balance and falls?”
“Madam, I understand you’re distressed. Please calm down—”
“Team Leader Choi.”
As soon as she landed in Dubai, Bora had received a message from Jin Hyun-sook. It said that the Team Leader Choi whom Kang Yoon trusted had been bribed by Kang Moon to stage the accident.
She knew ten billion won was a huge amount of money—but was it enough to kill a person? To kill his own employer?
Clenching her trembling hands into fists, Bora stared at his flustered face.
“The money you received from Han Kang Moon—it wasn’t into your own account, was it?”
“…Excuse me? Madam, what are you talking about—”
Seeing his hands trembling, Bora gritted her teeth.
“That money in the borrowed-name account—you won’t be able to keep it. You can be charged as a co-conspirator in attempted murder, and the moment you enter Korea, you’ll be investigated.”
“M-Madam, I think there’s some misunderstanding—”
“A misunderstanding? A misunderstanding? My husband might die in this foreign country, and you’re talking about a misunderstanding?”
The sharpness in Bora’s voice shocked Team Leader Choi, who had thought she was just an innocent rich girl. He collapsed to his knees.
“M-Madam. I committed a terrible sin. But I couldn’t disobey CEO Kang Moon’s orders. If I did, not only would I lose my job, but I don’t know what kind of retaliation my family and I would face. Please, just once—please spare me!”
“I understand very well that three billion won was the price of your conscience.”
Bora looked down coldly at his trembling eyes.
“If Kang Yoon dies… you will be charged as a principal in murder. Death penalty, life imprisonment, or at least five years in prison. Of course, five years won’t be enough. You must have been prepared to rot in prison for life. Your family facing retaliation is pitiful—but isn’t my husband, who might die, pitiful?”
“Madam….”
Foreigners passing through the hospital glanced at them.
“So you must save Kang Yoon. That is the only way you survive.”
“Y-Yes. I will… I’ll do everything I can… yes….”
Sweat poured down Team Leader Choi’s face as if he had just taken a shower. He looked pale.
Bora stepped out of the elevator and collapsed into a chair in front of the operating room.
The red words In Surgery flashed brightly, and tears burst out again.
“Live… please live, Kang Yoon… I still… still have something I haven’t told you….”
I love you.
Will you truly become my husband?
Bora forced herself to calm down and kept repeating to herself that when Kang Yoon woke up, she would definitely say those words. No matter what, she would hear him answer “yes” in his beautiful voice.
“Mom, what’s wrong? Please calm down and tell me what’s going on—”
“You tried to kill Kang Yoon, didn’t you?”
“What? No— I—”
“You! You tried to kill my child! You and your mother! It wasn’t enough that you killed my husband—you’re trying to kill my child too!”
Jin Hyun-sook screamed as she threw everything she could grab.
Kang Moon stared blankly at her outburst, then met Chairman Han’s eyes.
“Grandfather, what is she talking about? Why is Kang Yoon her son? Huh?”
“…It was bound to come out like this. It’s all my fault. My sin.”
“Grandfather! Please explain!”
Kang Moon stomped his feet as Chairman Han sighed deeply and called him into the living room.
“Kang Moon. Is what your mother said true? Did you really order Kang Yoon’s death?”
Kang Moon silently ran his hand through his hair.
Who told them?
When he didn’t answer, Chairman Han pressed again.
“Stop thinking foolish thoughts. Tell the truth.”
“No.”
“No?”
“Yes. I don’t know what my mother heard, but why would I kill Kang Yoon? Who is he to me? I’ve said many times—someone with such low blood shouldn’t even be placed on the same level as me.”
His expression was arrogant.
Chairman Han felt suffocated as Kang Moon’s face overlapped with Ahn Ji-hye’s in his mind.
“Kang Moon. You know better than anyone how your mother raised you.”
“Yes. She raised me very well. I know I may not meet her expectations, but how can she call Kang Yoon ‘my child’? Don’t you think that hurts me too, Grandfather?”
Chairman Han looked at him with pity and finally spoke.
“Kang Moon. I hope you won’t be too shocked.”
“…About what? Why are you both acting like this?”
A sense of dread crept over him.
If he could, Kang Moon wanted to leave right now.
“The truth is… Kang Yoon is your mother’s biological son. You are the son your father had outside.”
“…Grandfather, that joke is too much. I may have done wrong, but you can’t say something like that.”
“You are the son of your father’s mistress, the shaman Ahn Ji-hye. Your mother’s curse killed your father. I believed her words—that only by switching you and Kang Yoon would disaster be avoided. So I switched you two. It’s all my fault. All my sin.”
Kang Moon’s eyes shook as he listened, went blank—then flashed with murderous intent.
“So what? Let’s say that’s true. Does anything change now?”
Chairman Han felt an unpleasantly familiar chill in Kang Moon’s voice.
“Han Woo-jin! You coward who ignored your own child! You will suffer divine punishment!”
A voice like Ahn Ji-hye’s flowed from Kang Moon’s mouth.
