Burning The House Of Cards: taking revenge on my billionaire family -
Chapter 77 - 76. Tracing The Past
Chapter 77: Chapter 76. Tracing The Past
"That night when you were drugged..." Hajin started. "How much do you remember, Princess?"
Ugh--Sarah pressed her lips. It was also a horrific and humiliating memory, so she would rather not remember it at all, but...
"I remembered pulling you for a kiss on the bed, and...that’s it?" Sarah narrowed her eyes. "Did we...do more?"
"Hmm..." Hajin smiled wryly. "Not by much...I guess?" he added quickly when Sarah squinted her eyes even more. "Well...you were kind of rubbing yourself on me, Princess."
Sarah widened her eyes. "No..."
"If I say there were no clothes shed except for my jacket, would that suffice?"
Sarah nodded quickly. Yeah, that was enough. It was enough knowing she acted slutty. Embarrassing enough without any detail. But...
"What’s that got to do with anything?" Sarah tilted her head.
"That deja vu and voices--I had them too that night," Hajin shrugged. "I assumed it was something like the ghost of the previous timeline?"
Sarah widened her eyes. It was easy thinking about her deja vu as something she had experienced herself, but...Hajin too? He clearly had no recollection of the past--or so he said, anyway--so...what was this?
"Maybe because I know about your--what do you call it? Regression?" Hajin offered an explanation. "At any rate, I felt like we did something like that before."
"Something...like what?" Sarah asked nervously.
Hajin chuckled in her ear. "Getting tangled on a bed?"
Sarah suddenly felt conscious that they had been conversing while entangling themselves--she was basically on his lap already, since he was busy soothing her earlier.
Strangely enough, she didn’t feel like moving away.
"I don’t remember it, though..." she muttered.
"Not yet," Hajin whispered. "You only remembered we might have kissed after we’ve done it, right?"
Oh, that was true. Sarah nodded in agreement, and only after a few seconds did the implication of that statement dawn on her.
"Oh..." she let out a bashful exclaim.
Hajin chuckled lightly in her ear, and Sarah gasped in reflex. Still, she did not shift away. With a soothing voice that almost sounded hypnotizing, the man whispered against her skin.
"Tell me what you remembered from that night, Princess."
Sarah clutched the man’s shirt tighter as she closed her eyes. Immersing herself deeply in the past that was way better than the one jumping out uninvited earlier.
He remembered that day, when she was suddenly told to settle a matter between Jasper and a gangster group in B-city. She was essentially used as a sacrifice, pretending to be Ruby--didn’t matter as long as it was a member of the family. Hajin was a last-minute addition to the guard, perhaps because no one wanted to stay near her--whether it was in fear of Mason or because they didn’t want to be responsible if she got kidnapped.
In a sense, both of them were a pair of sacrifices.
"You sat with me in the car," Sarah recalled. "We did not talk at all until we reached the port, but you did...look at me with a strange gaze before we got down."
Hajin chuckled--he could guess where that strange gaze came from--while slowly putting his hands on the girl’s waist, familiarizing her with his touch so her unconsciousness wouldn’t associate it with others.
"I was probably wondering what kind of conglomerate girl you were," he said. What kind of rich girl would be so quiet and meek while going against an organization lording over a port?
"Yeah...I think you were asking me why I was the one there instead of the one responsible for the whole fiasco," Sarah muttered. "And then it was chaos and a lot of fight--I knew how strong you were because of that."
"Mm," Hajin leaned down and put his head on the girl’s shoulder, observing her face from the side.
Sarah frowned a bit deeper. The memory she could easily recall was only to that point; they arrived, the bodyguard fought, the gangsters were willing to concede after Hajin pummeled them, and they spent the night at the hotel before negotiating stuff the next day.
Ah...spending the night. How did they spend the night again?
"We go to a hotel," she muttered. "You...were tasked to guard me since...well, nobody else wanted to, I guess?"
"Their loss," Hajin murmured against her neck, making Sarah feel ticklish and shiver. He paused a bit, and when she wasn’t rejecting it, continued. "I guess something happened there? We were alone in a hotel room, after all."
Sarah coughed in embarrassment, but...well, that should be the explanation since she didn’t think they had any more meetings afterward. Thinking that she could kiss and even have sex with someone she had just met made her feel ashamed, however.
How was that even possible?
Sarah looked at the man lying his head on her shoulder, looking all handsome and dreamy with those beautiful grey eyes framed by long lashes.
Ugh...maybe he was already his type from the start.
Hajin stroked the girl’s waist with his thumb, just lightly. "What do you think happened? Do you remember?"
"Uhh...I think we started to talk, then?" Sarah averted his eyes out of embarrassment. "And..." she smiled wryly, "...you were starting to look at me pitifully."
That gaze made her keep looking at the grey eyes and realize how pretty they were. And he knew it--he asked her if she liked his eyes that much.
Hajin lifted his head and stroked the girl’s cheek. "Did I offend you?"
"No," Sarah chuckled lightly. "I thought...it was intriguing. Confusing too, honestly, since I thought nothing was pitiable about me back then--I must have been so stupid in your eyes."
"That’s impossible," Hajin said, as if he were there in that past. Well, it was still him, so perhaps he did know what he might think. "I wouldn’t have flirted with you if that were the case."
And he wouldn’t look at her with pity. Hajin had no pity for stupid people. Foolish, perhaps, or naive. But not stupid.
"Huh..."
"I did, didn’t I?" Hajin tilted his head. "Flirted with you, I mean."
Sarah pressed her lips, tracing back the memories by igniting the phantom voice he heard when they ’first’ kissed. "I don’t know about flirting, but...you asked about what kind of thing I usually did outside of the family business, and..."
"And you did nothing," Hajin smirked. If the changed Sarah hadn’t even experienced arcade and stuff, there was no way the old Seul-ah would. "A sheltered princess..."
Sarah gasped. "Oh, right--I think you started to call me that from there," she widened her eyes. "How do you know?"
"I didn’t," Hajin shrugged. "But I’m still me, I guess."
"That..."
Strangely enough, it gave Sarah some relief. Hajin was Hajin, the person who talked to her like she was a boss, but also like she was a friend.
A friend with a casual fling.
"...’So, you never go on a date?’ you asked," Sarah closed her eyes, memories started to fill in the gap. "Then...’You never had a kiss?’--oh..."
"And I must have offered you that," Hajin whispered, lips ghosting over her earlobe. "An experience."
Sarah inhaled deeply, both the scent and the voice. She remembered being filled with adrenaline from the harbor fight, and the conversation with Hajin called forth a desire she had never entertained before: for an adventure, for an excitement.
"And you agreed,"
The whisper was right on her lips this time, and Sarah received it with half-lidded eyes and butterflies on her stomach--exactly like how she felt after that real first kiss.
It was light and lasted only for a few seconds, but the fluttering lashes and the clear black eyes told Hajin she was no longer drowning in that nightmare.
"And I must have offered something even further," Hajin held her waist tighter.
He did. "A deeper kiss," Sarah whispered. "Like we meant it."
"Like we mean it," Hajin smiled, resuming the kiss halted by that nightmare, slipping his tongue between the inviting, parting lips.
Sarah sighed into the kiss, taking a deep breath whenever she could make sure it was the fragrance she picked, so she could make sure it was the man she trusted.
The kiss was slower than before, as if Hajin wanted her to savor every flavor, giving her time to digest it so no disturbing memories could slip in between. Slowly, their body lowered to the mattress, slow enough to give Sarah a chance of pulling away if she couldn’t continue.
But she continued, hands kept moving to trace Hajin’s shape, making sure it wasn’t someone else. When she gasped after, it wasn’t because she was afraid. She just felt something deep, deep inside her stomach that made her heart leap.
She breathed heavily, staring at the dreamy face above her. "What did I ask after that?" he asked softly, stroking her hair gently.
"Would you like..."
Sarah took a deep breath, recalling what Hajin said in her forgotten memories. And now, she was asking it back to the same man.
"Would you like to...make love to me?"
Back then, it was probably an offer out of pity, more than out of desire. Hajin was asking it like he was offering help, and it seemed like he would be fine with either answer.
This time, however, there were many more emotions in those grey eyes; much more desire. He wanted her as a woman, as a lover. And Sarah...
Sarah wanted to answer it properly. At least for one night.
Hajin stroked the girl’s reddened cheeks. Ah...this must be where his memories came from. A girl, inexperienced and filled with newfound excitement. She had a chance to do what she couldn’t, a rare chance where she was away from anyone’s eyes but a handsome bodyguard’s.
And yet, she was also scared of the consequences. Scared of what her ’brother’ would do if he knew. Even if no one knew, Sarah could never lie to the person she thought of as her savior.
And so, she made a concession: to do it in a way she wouldn’t remember it the next day; to do it while she wasn’t sober.
But this time, her eyes were clear. She was sober. She asked him first.
Hajin smiled and leaned down, whispering his reply before her lips sealed his.
"Yes, I would like to."
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