OTGM 5

Chapter 5

He looked even taller and bigger than Daehong. Probably over 190 centimeters. The sheer length of him was more intimidating than expected.

“What are you doing here…?”

In an instant, the man stepped closer. Close enough that they might collide. Startled, she had no choice but to back into the emergency stairwell again.

The emergency door closed behind the man, leaving the two of them in a rather dim space.

“Uh, well, um….”

Had he overheard her phone call in front of the emergency exit? Why was he looking at her with such an irritated expression?

“Did you happen to hear what I was sayin’?”

“What did you say? ‘Where do you kiss?’—I think that’s as far as our conversation went.”

The look on the man’s face was unsettling. His temples and ears were faintly flushed, whether from anger or excitement she couldn’t tell, his pupils darkened with shadow.

“Ah… um… well….”

She was rambling nonsense. She’d suggested rubbing lips together to make herself seem sexy, but deep down she never thought it would actually come to that. Probably not.

Judging by how flustered she was now that he was approaching her.

“I’m late with my answer. Here.”

“Pardon?”

“You asked where to kiss. Right here.”

“Ex—excuse me?”

“Why pretend you don’t understand all of a sudden? An emergency exit is perfect. Dim lights, no people, gloomy.”

She hadn’t expected him to take the suggestion this seriously. She’d just thrown it out there recklessly, trying to push him into agreeing to a contract marriage.

“I mean, still, suddenly doin’ it like this… I need time to prepare myself….”

“So you blurted it out without any resolve? I actually made a big decision earlier and accepted your proposal, Ms. Madosil. You’re even more immature than I thought.”

There it was again—that condescending look. He must have always stood above others, looking down on everyone from a superior position.

Looks, background, ability—he lacked nothing. He’d probably never known desperation.

Immature? She really wanted to live immaturely, she thought. Spurred by defiance, she shot back.

“Let’s do it, then. A kiss. No—do it real good and deep. I’m all prepared.”

She’d never even kissed a man in her life. Back in her rural village, there were hardly any guys her age besides Daehong, and she’d never had time to date.

No—really, the only decent guy around had been her buddy Daehong, so there’d been no opportunity.

But kissing a man she’d just met? She’d thought, What the heck, but now that it was right in front of her, her heart was pounding like it was being beaten.

Would she be… okay?

The man stepped closer. And then closer still. As she retreated, her back hit the wall.

Her heart pounded even harder, battering her body. It felt like her pulse was racing from the tips of her toes to the crown of her head.

The man’s face came vividly into focus, like switching from 2D to 3D.

Up close, his eyes were black and heavy like the night sea. As if they might swallow her whole.

Her pupils wavered uncontrollably.

Gojun, now just a single step away, let out a faint chuckle.

“Your expression’s way too solemn. I’m not asking to fight—just to kiss.”

Had her heart ever raced like this in her life?

When a typhoon knocked over the peach trees? When the fruit got sick with moth larvae? When she heard Grandma’s lung cancer diagnosis?

Just like those moments when her heart had dropped to the floor, her chest now lurched again. Her pulse felt like it had moved down to her soles, thudding wildly.

Just to kiss. She hadn’t known those words could feel so real.

And why did his voice, sharp like a honed blade, stab straight into her heart?

“Then what kind of face am I supposed to make?”

Her back pressed coldly against the wall. She barely managed to meet Gojun’s pitch-black gaze.

“This is perfect. Cheeks flushed, eyes trembling. A face full of excitement….”

It made her skin crawl. What was this? Why was he suddenly coming on so aggressively?

It was her first time feeling a man’s breath brush her face, and he was so devastatingly handsome her mind felt like it was drifting away.

Scoundrel. Now she understood why people called him that. Why he’d been linked in countless scandals with actresses.

With this kind of presence, no woman could keep her heart from racing.

That’s what scared her—and why she hated him.

“Enough talk already… just do it. Kiss.”

“Why are you telling me to? You’re the one who suggested it, Ms. Madosil. You should be the one pouncing on me.”

W-what? Pounce on him?

With every word he spoke, sweet breath brushed hotly against her lips. That was pouncing—too hot for words.

She was supposed to pounce on him?

Logically, he wasn’t wrong. She’d made the suggestion; if she pushed it onto him, she’d just look irresponsible and childish again.

But she’d never done this before. With zero experience, it took courage she didn’t quite have.

His beautiful face was the biggest obstacle. So she squeezed her eyes shut.

Like in dramas or movies, didn’t you just rub lips together and go slurp slurp (?) nom nom (?) smack smack (?) or something?

She puckered her lips and leaned forward. But his lips didn’t touch hers. Not even their breaths collided.

She cautiously opened her eyes. His face had pulled back, higher up, a mocking smile playing on his lips.

Whoosh—heat flooded her cheeks with embarrassment and shame.

“What are you doin’? Are you makin’ fun of me?”

Yes. He was.

“He’s good-lookin’, filthy rich, and loaded. I’m gonna live in luxury now. That’s why I’m sayin’ I’ll marry him.”

No one had ever treated him like that—a mere sucker. Her wording, reducing him to a tool for comfort, disgusted him.

And who was this grandmother she was pleading for? She must have her own circumstances. No one lived without a story.

But whatever that story was, dragging him into it so crudely irritated him.

Judging from her fixation on money and her behavior here, it didn’t seem like Chairman Lee had provided generously for his husband’s illegitimate child.

Exile to the countryside instead of abroad. “Bride training.”

That said it all.

Her family, like his, was probably squalid.

This brainwashed woman thought handsome and rich meant marriage was fine?

She was an immature girl who’d never tasted the bitterness of life. Or maybe an immature girl hiding tricks, recklessly trying to use him. Either way, he didn’t care.

You needed to know the bitter side of the world. Especially if you were going to use him.

A contract marriage. If she was dreaming of some pink romance drama, she needed to know reality was ash-gray.

Isn’t that right, Madosil?

“I asked if you’re makin’ fun of me.”

With eyes blazing, she glared at Gojun.

Finally, Gojun moved. He suddenly grabbed the back of her neck and her back, gripping hard.

It was a man’s strength she’d never known. More overwhelming than physical force was the psychological pressure—his blazing body heat pinning her in place.

Before she could even resist, his lips came down and pressed hard against hers.

“Hmph.”

W-what is this?

It was her first kiss with a man. His lips—neither thin nor thick, just full enough—stuck to hers.

Her heart went into overdrive, pounding wildly, and every nerve in her body converged on her lips.

So this was how soft a person’s lips could be. The unfamiliar sensation was dizzying.

When he bit her lower lip lightly, when his wet flesh slid out to lick her tender lips; when he sucked on her upper lip, slowly melting her away—

Mmngh. It was strange. The way her thighs twitched and clenched, the way her lower belly tingled like butterfly wings.

Unfamiliar, yet insanely good.

She wasn’t completely naïve. Back in her teenage years, when she’d been obsessed with R-rated stuff, she’d even lectured Daehong at length. About kissing.