The police had barely given her any time before they started pounding on the bedroom door again.
Hyungnam was stepping into her still-warm flower-print panties when she lost her balance and staggered. Then she shouted loudly enough to be heard through the door, awkwardly throwing a few curses into the mix.
She wanted to drag things out as long as possible, but picking up the clothes she had stripped off and putting them back on did not take very long.
Once dressed, she looked into the palm-sized mirror hanging on the wall.
She deliberately left her hair disheveled from pulling on her top. Her eyes were still swollen, and that swelling would make her false indignation look perfectly genuine.
Before leaving the room, she remembered something Eunhyung had said.
Obstruction of something or other—whatever the charge had been that ended with official duties.
Hiding Choi Eunhyung was deceiving the police too. Maybe they would punish her even harder simply because they were pissed off.
Am I going to prison? If I do, for how long?
But what did it matter whether the sentence was months or years?
Surely she would get out sooner than Choi Eunhyung. And even if she became an ex-convict, Park Shineok would gladly take her back into the house if she asked him for work.
After all, Hyungnam was exactly the kind of native girl who looked mixed that he liked.
Even if the same exploitation continued afterward, if she intended to have someone killed, it was only natural to keep him close and watch what he did.
Besides, nothing would really be any different from now.
She could endure that much.
And maybe Choi Eunhyung truly would not be caught at all.
Maybe the police would fail to notice the attic and withdraw.
Maybe Choi Eunhyung would somehow pry up the floorboards and disappear so completely they would never find him.
“…”
For that to happen, I have to buy him enough time.
I can do this. I can fool them.
The old man said he was coming. He’ll find some way to make the police surrounding the house back off.
Then Choi Eunhyung can run far away.
After several deep breaths, the visible trembling in her hands gradually subsided.
She could not stall any longer.
She had to go out.
The moment Hyungnam placed her hand on the cold metal doorknob, the door flew open.
“Fuck, so the girl was naked, big—”
Hyungnam had not let go in time and lurched forward as though dragged along by the door, colliding with something as solid as a wall.
Startled, she quickly regained her balance.
Everything in front of her was dark charcoal gray.
She blinked blankly, then slowly raised her head.
First came the unbuttoned suit jacket.
Then the wrinkled dress shirt.
Then the tie stuffed carelessly into his pocket.
Then his eyes.
“Oh.”
The smooth corner of the man’s mouth slowly curled upward.
Hyungnam froze instantly.
Like a small animal trapped before a predator, she could not take a single step. Her breath merely fluttered inside her mouth.
This fear was different from the fear she felt with Choi Eunhyung right in front of her.
Behind the thin frames of his glasses, long, deep-set eyes curved pleasantly.
That curve looked like the talons of an eagle out hunting.
The man removed his glasses and greeted her as though they were acquaintances.
“Fancy meeting you here.”
Did he smile like that when I gave him the strawberry yogurt too?
A horizontal dimple appeared high on his cheek, softening his cold expression in an instant.
And yet the easy smile felt like camouflage, making the sense of wrongness only stronger.
His gaze pecked at her like a beak, moving from her forehead to the bridge of her nose, from her faintly trembling lips down the delicate line of her jaw, until it reached her slender neck.
“In a gangster bastard’s house.”
The man’s smile vanished at once.
Hyungnam glared up at him.
She tried to look composed, but moisture gathered in her stinging eyes the way a terrified animal might piss itself.
See?
He wasn’t smiling because he was happy to see me.
“I’d like an explanation.”
“…”
“Or maybe an excuse?”
The man sat in the place of honor on the sofa—Park Shineok’s regular seat, which Choi Eunhyung had occupied for some time—and lit a cigarette.
Hyungnam perched with only half her backside on the seat at the far end where Chilgu usually sat and secretly rolled her eyes around the room.
There were about six officers inside the house.
They were shouting, rummaging through things, pulling objects out and searching everywhere, making the entire place chaotic.
“What am I supposed to explain?”
Even as she answered cautiously, her eyes followed an officer peering into the liquor display cabinet.
There was so much commotion that she could barely concentrate on the conversation.
The man seemed utterly unconcerned and leisurely exhaled cigarette smoke.
“The lie?”
Hyungnam’s gaze settled on the cigarette pack on the table.
Cheongja.
The cigarettes Choi Eunhyung had wanted so badly.
She fixed her eyes on the oddly elongated left stroke of the first letter on the pack and answered as though it were nothing.
“I’ve never lied to you.”
“Ah.”
“Who are these people? I doubt you got the chairman’s permission to do this.”
Irritation crept into Hyungnam’s voice.
For a moment, genuine annoyance had slipped out at the thought of people who were not even guests trampling across the spotless floors she had cleaned with their shoes on.
It was not her house, so perhaps she had no right to get territorial, but she was the one who cleaned and maintained it.
Surely she had the right to complain that much.
The man held the cigarette between his teeth, and his brow furrowed faintly.
Resting his arms on his knees, he narrowed his eyes, then suddenly straightened and slipped one hand into the inside pocket of his jacket.
He drew out a glossy black leather wallet, polished from heavy use.
He opened the folded wallet and removed something.
“I’m Prosecutor Lee Seonjin, Violent Crimes Division.”
Hyungnam’s breath stopped at the sight of the stiff white business card held out in front of her.
She had assumed that if anyone questioned her, it would be a detective at worst. Or maybe just a police officer.
And now, out of nowhere, she was facing a prosecutor.
With Choi Eunhyung hidden above the ceiling.
Her empty stomach twisted painfully.
When Hyungnam showed no sign of taking the card, he exhaled smoke almost like a laugh and laid it on the table.
“You remember I told you before that I catch gangsters for a living, right?”
Hyungnam worried the inside of her lip between her teeth and slowly nodded.
He flicked ash into Park Shineok’s crystal ashtray.
Unlike someone else who used to tap ash away slowly and elegantly, his movements were blunt.
“Why do you think I came here?”
Seonjin smiled teasingly and put the cigarette back between his lips.
Judging by the filter he kept chewing between his teeth, this man seemed to be quite the heavy smoker too.
Hyungnam took in every one of his movements and stiffened her neck before answering.
“Our chairman isn’t a gangster.”
She knew perfectly well they had come for Choi Eunhyung, but she brought up Park Shineok like a shield, trying to scatter the conversation elsewhere.
As though she did not know anyone named Choi Eunhyung at all.
As though she could not understand why they would be looking for such a person in this house.
Hyungnam met Seonjin’s eyes without looking away.
Her lips were stubbornly pressed together in wounded indignation, and the slightly raised corners of her eyes lent determination to her youthful face.
He lifted one eyebrow as though inviting her to continue.
“I don’t know all the details, but he runs a perfectly legitimate company. Sure, maybe he knows a gangster or two through business. I wouldn’t know.”
“…”
“But there’s no way our chairman is a gangster.”
“Yeah. That’s right.”
Seonjin picked up a thick notebook from the table.
It was a black hardbound notebook, likewise polished from constant handling.
Colored notes, photographs, and other papers had been tucked between nearly every page, swelling it to almost twice its original thickness.
Seonjin flipped rapidly through it, found a photograph, and removed the clip holding it in place.
“He’s a gangster.”
He pinched the photograph between two fingers and tossed it onto the table.
It spun several times over the smooth glass before neatly coming to a stop directly in front of Hyungnam.
Hyungnam had expected, without any particular surprise, to see a photograph of Park Shineok alone.
Instead, her brow creased slightly.
“What is this…?”
“A ceremonial oath-drinking ritual. The kind of shit those Jap yakuza do.”
“…”
“Over there on the left. See him? Chairman Park.”
He nodded toward the photograph and murmured almost gently.
Sure enough, Park Shineok sat in the place of honor before a row of men kneeling in black suits.
With a solemn expression, he watched the men receive cups of liquor and drink.
Hyungnam’s mouth fell slightly open.
She knew Park Shineok was a gangster.
She also knew his organization operated on the scale of a fairly substantial business.
But she had never imagined he had connections with the Japanese yakuza.
Apparently his “business” was more than some mediocre neighborhood-gangster operation.
At the same time, Hyungnam became certain that the prosecutor sitting in front of her knew far more about Park Shineok than she did.
If I keep pretending I know nothing, they might decide I’m one of them too.
Her mind raced.
Hyungnam made her voice tremble deliberately.
“I—I didn’t know. I really didn’t.”
“You didn’t know.”
“Th-then… did you come to arrest our chairman because he’s yakuza?”
She deliberately said something absurd to throw Seonjin off.
His cigarette had burned down close to the filter. He gave a short, incredulous laugh and ground the butt out in the ashtray.
The face that could smile with boyish shyness also knew how to sneer hard enough to make a person feel stupid.
“We’re not here to arrest the chairman today.”
“Then why…”
“You know Choi Eunhyung.”