KMH – Chapter 1

Ha Jugyeong—twenty-nine, a patent attorney who had always been everyone’s first love.

She calmly sensed that today’s matchmaking, too, would end up a wash.

After finishing a private viewing at a personal gallery near Dosan Park with her blind date, they moved on to a café. The coffee she’d ordered there had already gone cold.

“These days, even dishwashing gets done by machines, don’t you think? Compared to the era our mothers lived in, women today really do have it easy.”

Kwon Hyuntae, an executive director and the eldest son of an aviation logistics conglomerate’s owner family, had a flushed face, as if he’d been drinking alone since midday.

“And yet I’ve seen far too many women change once they get married. I consider that a kind of dereliction of duty.”

Jugyeong, who had been stifling a yawn while rubbing beneath her fingernails, lifted her eyes.

‘Dereliction of duty….’

In any case, Kwon Hyuntae himself was unfit to be a business partner in the institution called marriage.

She’d thought so from the moment he suddenly snapped at the gallery valet for parking “like this,” only to snicker when the baby-faced employee panicked.

“In that sense, I was quite impressed earlier. Your upright posture as you seriously appreciated the Troika pieces, Ms. Jugyeong—your distinctive focus.”

Jugyeong arched her brow slightly.

‘Was I really viewing the exhibition with such cultivated poise?’

No.

Her feet had just hurt.

The pointed toes of the slingback heels she’d brought over from the main house, Cheongwoljae, had been pressing painfully against the tops of her feet the entire time.

“Perhaps that’s why… I don’t feel like playing childish push-and-pull games with you, Ms. Jugyeong.”

Kwon Hyuntae lowered his interlaced hands onto his thickly folded belly.

“I like you, Ha Jugyeong.”

Jugyeong, absently tracing the corner of her mouth with dull eyes, replied after a beat.

“I suppose you didn’t mind the time you spent with me.”

His gaze grew more overt.

“To be honest, it’s a bit of a shame that your job is practically a service role dealing with people….”

“……”

“But looks, figure, style, family background, education—you’re lacking in nothing.”

Kwon Hyuntae ran his eyes openly over her from head to toe, lips curling into a crooked smile. She’d thought it earlier in the parking lot, too, but he really was a man with a strange sense of humor.

Could she really share a bed for the rest of her life with a man who passed off words like that as compliments?

She pressed her lips together, but it didn’t help much. In the end, Jugyeong let out a small, incredulous laugh, lightly furrowing her brow as she brushed her hair back and spoke.

“Well….”

Suddenly—bzz, bzzz—her phone vibrated.

Jugyeong took it out as she continued.

“I don’t think there’ll be another opportunity like this.”

It was a message from Kim Sunwoo, a lawyer acquaintance, asking when she’d arrive at the office. She replied, then looked up.

“As I mentioned beforehand, I have a prior engagement. I’m sorry, but may I excuse myself first?”

Kwon Hyuntae, blinking blankly, flushed red, then blue. He must have always been the one doing the rejecting—never the one rejected. He puffed himself up at once and barked a warning.

“Ms. Ha Jugyeong. Let’s at least keep our manners.”

Thanks to that, his Glen-check jacket looked as if it were ready to burst at the seams. Jugyeong quietly stared at the gap stretched to its limit between the buttons, then nodded.

“I need to leave now if I’m not to be late. Thank you for your understanding. And as you said, I hope you meet a woman who knows how to raise her own value.”

“Don’t get so damn full of yourself.”

Jugyeong stood without reacting. Kwon Hyuntae sprang up as well and grabbed her, eyes bulging. Spun halfway around, Jugyeong knit her brows.

“Your wife must have a lot to worry about. Your hands are rather rough.”

“Sell yourself while you still fetch a good price. Don’t keep hopping from one bargain-bin blind date to another and end up past thirty.”

She still wasn’t sure what exactly he thought would set her off. And if his intention was to insult her, it only worked against him. Jugyeong’s mind was already occupied with nothing but her next appointment.

For instance, the fastest route to Kim Sunwoo’s law office, where she’d been asked for copyright-related advice. Or suitable topics of conversation for the dinner she’d have with her grandfather afterward.

So her response came a little late.

“Bargain-bin…. You’re taking on worries I’ve never once had, Mr. Hyuntae—on the very day we met. Should I be thanking you?”

People cast curious glances their way at the sudden commotion. When Jugyeong didn’t budge, Kwon Hyuntae—who looked ready to start spewing curses—made his upper lip tremble.

He was the one who’d ruined his own face; why was he glaring at her? Jugyeong let out a short, humorless laugh and asked in an even tone.

“Unless you plan to get even more rude, please let go of my hand.”

“Ha! What kind of crazy—!”

Jugyeong shook off the sticky hand that reeked of stale cigarettes. Then, wiping her wrist—red with fingerprints—with a handkerchief, she said,

“Please give my regards to your wife.”

“…….”

“I’ll also tell my grandfather that I had a pleasant time with you, Mr. Hyuntae.”

Kwon Hyuntae, fuming, froze for a moment, then swallowed hard.

Whether he’d finally come to his senses or simply hadn’t meant to take it this far, it no longer concerned Jugyeong.

Turning her back on him, she crossed the café with a straight, unhesitating stride.

The neatly folded handkerchief went straight into the trash.

***

“It seems the Chairman is very much looking forward to the day he can hold his great-grandchild.”

Chief Moon had let that slip earlier this year.

At the time, Jugyeong had been refilling the humidifier in her grandfather’s hospital room.

She’d thought this, quite clearly:

‘Marriage?’

‘It’s not like it’s a big deal.’

‘What’s so hard about it?’

Chairman Cha’s only blood relative he truly doted on was Jugyeong. She was his most tender concern—the granddaughter who took after Cha Hwajeong, CEO Director of Hyogwang Hotel, down to the bone.

Jugyeong had been summoned to Cheongwoljae one autumn when she was ten, a season when her academic zeal faltered, and her grades plummeted beyond control.

On the first day she unpacked at her grandfather’s house, Jugyeong watched a documentary in a darkened study with Chairman Cha—one in which beasts devoured other beasts.

Fangs slick with blood, the sound of flesh being torn and chewed, swarms of corpse flies boiling in the dusk….

The hand that firmly supported his granddaughter’s back so she wouldn’t curl in on herself that evening was the same hand that later flung a soup bowl, splitting the forehead of her second uncle. It had been barely a day since news broke of the ethical issues surrounding a clinical trial he’d overseen as an executive director at Hyogwang Pharmaceuticals.

That uncle, leaving the room with a face streaked in gray hair and tears, didn’t cross Cheongwoljae’s threshold for quite some time.

From that day on, Jugyeong became a good granddaughter—one who never went against her grandfather’s wishes.

Or perhaps it began even earlier: when her mother, who had defied fierce family opposition to marry her father—a then-unknown painter—was eventually pushed by her grandfather’s relentless pressure into divorce.

“Haa….”

Walking toward the public parking lot, Jugyeong let out a long sigh. She hadn’t walked that far from the café, yet she was already short of breath. Even reaching her parked car felt daunting—troubling, in itself.

Bzzz—.

Her phone vibrated again. She thought it might be Kim Sunwoo, but the screen showed a mobile wedding invitation from a college classmate.

Jugyeong skimmed past the opening line—I’ve met the person I want to spend my life with—and checked the bank account number listed at the bottom.

She transferred the congratulatory money mechanically, then turned her head toward the breeze. It was a weekend afternoon when greenery stretched and yawned awake.

‘…Do people really all just live like this?’

Passing through the warmly pouring spring sunlight, Jugyeong rubbed at her wrist, where the discomfort was still painfully vivid.

She’d never needed love in the first place. Dealing with her grandfather’s attention alone had been overwhelming enough. Then marriage should be easy, shouldn’t it?

Once her grandfather filtered the blind-date candidates, Chief Moon from the main house would select from them and arrange meetings to fit Jugyeong’s schedule.

The final decision, however, was left entirely to Jugyeong. Maybe if she’d simply followed her grandfather’s will in everything, life would be less exhausting than it was now.

Probably….

Yes.

“…This is kind of pathetic.”

She dismissed it as the worries of someone who had it too good and set off again—but her slender shoulders gradually drooped, and her steps slowed noticeably.

Her parents’ divorce. Her father’s death. Life at Cheongwoljae. Top of the class. Admission to Korea University. The patent attorney exam. Employment.

All of it had been a series of quests. From her very first breath, Jugyeong had lived as a diligent marathon runner—backed by Hyogwang’s halo, running faster than others, on better tracks than others.

But these days…

Jugyeong adjusted the strap of her handbag again and again.

It didn’t feel like she’d lost her way—yet she had no idea where she was standing now.

“…….”

Waiting at the crosswalk, her tired face creased slightly. Her heels throbbed. On any other day, she would’ve slapped on a bandage and rushed through the day without sparing even a moment to complain.

Today, she didn’t want to.

The irritation welling up from deep inside felt unfamiliar. During counseling she’d begun attending due to mood swings, she’d been advised to “find your own stress ball, Ms. Jugyeong.” It hadn’t helped much.

…And it wasn’t as though she could just switch centers again so soon.

Usually, looking at a calendar packed tight with appointments made her focus on how to use her time more efficiently. Lately, she just wanted to throw it all away.

Blink. The traffic light turned green.

Jugyeong, who had been staring blankly at the crowd surging onto the crosswalk, joined the tail end and stepped along the white lines.

Reaching the parking lot, her eyes narrowed. A bright red Panamera, scratched all over, was blocking her small, neat Morning.

‘That needs repairs.’

Whether the owner drove recklessly or was simply so easygoing as not to care about this level of damage was none of Jugyeong’s concern.

Slipping her handbag onto her shoulder, Jugyeong went around to the back of the Panamera and shoved the trunk. Her foot dug into the ground, the bones of her hand standing out against the metal, her nails whitening.

“Are you kidding me…”

Panting, Jugyeong lifted her head. In the past, she might have assumed the owner had their reasons and hurried off so as not to be late for her appointment.

But not now.

She wanted to sue.

Double-parking like this and disappearing after leaving the gear in park.

Flicking her hair back, Jugyeong circled the Panamera and spotted a note tucked under the windshield. It looked like someone had torn off a piece of art paper. It took her a while just to decipher the number scrawled messily across it.

She finally managed to call the owner, but only the dial tone repeated. She laughed helplessly for a moment, then took a deep breath and forced herself to type on her phone.

[Hello. I’m contacting you regarding a parking issue. I’m in a situation where I need to move my car urgently—would you be able to come over this way?]

She checked the spelling and spacing twice before sending it. What was strange was that although he hadn’t answered the call, a reply came almost immediately.

[If you were that urgent, you should’ve left yesterday]

[Just ram it and go]