Chapter Forty-Seven: The Confrontation
It started with her staring. My best friend stood in the middle of the bustling corridor, not blinking, not breathing, just drilling holes into my skull with her eyes as if she were piecing together a crime scene where I was the prime suspect.
"Okay!" she finally announced, marching over and seizing my forearm. "Spill. Now."
I blinked, feigning ignorance. "Spill what?"
"Don't you dare play dumb with me." She leaned in, her voice a theatrical whisper. "You've been weird. He's been weirder. You, who never so much as glanced at a professor, suddenly have the campus kingpin brushing your hair back during presentations like some dark, possessive Romeo in a three-piece suit."
I stiffened, my blood running cold. "That was… it was nothing. He was just—"
"You flinched," she cut me off, her eyes sharp. "You blinked twice and scratched your right ear. That's your lying tic. Don't even try."
I exhaled, the sound shaky. The walls felt too close.
She crossed her arms, a fortress of suspicion. "You're hiding something monumental. What is it? Are you secretly dating him? Is he blackmailing you? Oh my God, is he your secret, long-lost, terrifying dad?!"
"What? No!" I whisper-yelled, grabbing her sleeve and yanking her down the hall. "Could you not announce theories like that to the entire student body?!"
"Then tell me!" she hissed, matching my frantic pace.
I glanced around. The coast was clear, but the walls had ears. I pulled her into the first empty study room, slamming the door shut and locking it with a decisive click.
She stood there, arms still crossed, bracing for impact.
I took a deep, shuddering breath that did nothing to steady me. "Okay. Just… don't freak out."
She leaned forward, eyes wide. "You starting with 'don't freak out' means I'm absolutely about to freak out. What. Is. It?"
The words felt like shards of glass in my throat. "I'm… married."
Dead silence. The hum of the ventilation system was suddenly deafening.
She stared. Blinked. "...What?"
"To Professor Kim Taehyun."
Another beat of profound, earth-shattering silence.
She processed it. The color drained from her face. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice eerily calm. "Did you just say you are married to Professor Kim Taehyun?"
"Shhh!"
"HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO SHHH RIGHT NOW?!" Her composure shattered, voice scaling octaves. She fanned herself frantically with a nearby folder. "You. Married. A professor. The professor. The one who looks like he was carved from sin and owns half the city's shadows! The one whose jawline is a lethal weapon!"
I grabbed her shoulders, forcing her to look at me, to see the raw panic in my eyes. "Breathe. Just sit. Please."
She collapsed into a chair, sitting ramrod straight, staring at me as if I'd just confessed to being an extraterrestrial.
"W-When? How? What?!"
I swallowed around the knot of shame and fear. "It's… complicated."
"Complicated? This isn't 'complicated,' this is a psychological thriller plot twist!" She fanned herself harder. "Okay. Okay. Start from the beginning. A real one."
The truth, the awful, bloody truth, felt like a poison I had to expel. "It was forced," I whispered, the words ash in my mouth. "I didn't agree. I didn't even know it was happening until I was standing at the altar in a wedding dress that felt like a shroud."
Her jaw went slack.
"He's not just a professor," I continued, my voice dropping to a trembling thread. "He's… more. He had my parents killed. He shot the man my family tried to force me to marry right in front of me. And then he… he married me. Right there in the cathedral, with their bodies…" I couldn't finish. The memory was a physical nausea.
Her hand flew to her mouth. "Oh, my God. You're married to… to the devil in a tailored suit."
"I didn't want it. I hate him." The words were automatic, my mantra.
She nodded slowly, her initial shock morphing into a dazed understanding. "Okay. Yeah. That's… that's beyond valid. That's trauma-textbook valid. But…" She hesitated, her gaze searching mine. "Why are you still here? With him?"
I looked away, my fingers gripping the edge of the table until my knuckles turned white. "Because I tried to run. He always finds me. And he…" The contradiction choked me. "He doesn't hurt me. Not like that. He… protects me. He makes sure I eat. He watches over me when I'm sick. He looks at me sometimes like I'm the only source of oxygen in a room he's been drowning in for years."
The confession hung in the quiet room, horrifying and true.
She was silent, just watching me unravel.
"And the worst part?" My voice cracked, the dam breaking. "Sometimes, in the quiet, when he's just… there… I don't feel afraid. For a second, it just feels… still. And I hate that stillness almost as much as I hate the fear, because it feels like a betrayal. Of them. Of me."
A heavy silence descended.
Then her eyes widened with a new, dawning horror. "Oh. My. God." She breathed the words like a prayer to a terrible god. "You're in love with your kidnapper."
"I AM NOT!" The denial tore from me, too loud, too sharp.
"You are! I can see it! Oh, God, is this Stockholm Syndrome? Do you need a therapist or a full-on exorcism?!"
"I don't love him!" I shouted, but my cheeks were on fire, a traitorous blush betraying the chaos in my soul.
I collapsed into the chair beside her, burying my face in my hands, the sobs I'd been holding back finally breaking free. "I don't know what's wrong with me," I wept, the words muffled and broken. "My mind is a war. I should despise him. And I do! I do! But there's something… broken in my heart. It beats too fast when he's near and aches when he's gone, and I don't know which feeling is the lie anymore."
She reached out, her hand tentative on my shaking back. "It's not your fault," she said softly, all traces of judgment gone. "None of this is your fault."
I looked up, tears streaking through my makeup. "He ruined everything."
"But maybe," she said, choosing her words with a care I'd never heard from her before, "in his own twisted, monstrous way… he also saved you from something worse. Something you can't even remember yet."
I shook my head violently. "He's a monster. That doesn't change."
"Maybe not," she murmured, her gaze far away for a moment. "But what if… he's decided to be your monster?"
---
♡ The Invitation
The mansion was steeped in the golden, honeyed light of late afternoon, a rare and fragile peace settling over the marble and silk. I was adrift in it, trailing my fingers along a polished banister, listening to the distant call of birds, feeling almost… normal.
The butler's voice, crisp and calm, shattered the illusion.
"Sir Jihan has arrived, Mr. Kim."
I froze. Jihan. Park Jihan. Taehyun's oldest friend, the only one who seemed to bridge the gap between the ruthless kingpin and something resembling humanity. The soft-spoken CEO with a smile that could disarm and eyes that saw too much. I'd met him only once since the wedding, a brief, carefully orchestrated encounter that had left me feeling curiously seen, not as a possession, but as a person.
Curiosity, a dangerous old friend, propelled me forward on silent feet toward the study. The heavy oak doors were slightly ajar. I paused, a shadow in the hall, as their low voices filtered out.
"I'm not certain it's wise, Jihan." Taehyun's voice was a restrained rumble, laced with a tension I recognized—the tension of protecting something vulnerable.
"I understand your caution," Jihan replied, his tone quieter, warmer, but no less firm. "But it's my wedding. My fiancée… she wants to meet her. To know the woman who holds your heart. She'll be safe. She'll be with us."
"If her memory is triggered too abruptly, the fallout…" Taehyun didn't finish the thought. He didn't need to. I'd lived the fallout.
Enough.
I pushed the door open without knocking, stepping into the masculine sanctuary of dark wood and old leather. Both men turned, identical flashes of surprise on their faces—Taehyun's quickly hardening into a mask, Jihan's softening into a gentle, genuine warmth.
I planted my hands on my hips, channeling every ounce of faux indignation I could muster. "Declining your best friend's wedding invitation? Really, Mr. Kim? That is shamefully rude behavior." I directed a bright, uncomplicated smile at Jihan. "Don't listen to him. He has the social graces of a hibernating bear."
Before Taehyun could form a retort, I glided past him and plucked the thick, ivory invitation straight from his fingers. I flipped it open with a flourish, admiring the elegant script. "Ooh, this is beautiful! When is the blessed day? Who's the lucky woman? I adore weddings!"
Taehyun's jaw tightened, a muscle leaping. He looked like a man watching a priceless vase wobble on the edge of a table. I hugged the card to my chest, a deliberate act of defiance and possession.
"I'm attending," I announced, my voice leaving no room for debate. "And you," I pointed the corner of the invitation at Taehyun, "are my plus-one. I require a new dress. And cake. Lots of cake."
Jihan's smile deepened, something profoundly grateful and a little sad shining in his eyes. He thought I didn't notice. He was wrong. "Thank you," he said, the words heartfelt. "It would mean a great deal to us."
Taehyun exhaled, a long-suffering sound, and dragged a hand through his hair. "If anything happens to her—"
"I would destroy myself before I let any harm come to her," Jihan cut in, his voice suddenly devoid of all its softness, replaced by a steel that mirrored Taehyun's own. "You have my word."
I looked between them, this bond of fierce, lethal loyalty that was both terrifying and somehow comforting. My brows knitted. "Why is everyone acting like I'm made of spun glass? I'll be fine. I'll probably cry during the vows, eat my weight in petit fours, and force my grumpy husband to dance with me until his feet hurt."
"Delicate," Taehyun muttered under his breath, but his gaze on me was anything but dismissive. It was a banked fire.
I grinned, a real one this time, sharp at the edges. "Oh, you have no idea. Just wait."
The heavy tension in the room didn't vanish, but it transformed, woven through with a new, tentative thread—a shared purpose, a fragile trust. The invitation remained clutched in my hand, no longer just a piece of stationery, but a key. A promise of a world outside the gilded cage, a step into the light, with my monster walking silently beside me, ready to swallow the shadows whole.