Flowers Are Bait Novel - Chapter 154

There was something I absolutely had to say. Something I wanted to tell him.

Exhausted, she slept and woke, then slept and woke again, and before she knew it, the clock hands had passed midnight and were moving into the early morning. She searched for Kwon Chaewoo with blurry eyes countless times, but he simply wouldn’t appear.

But during her doze, there was definitely a warmth that carefully touched her stomach, smoothed her stray hairs, meticulously picked out her eyebrows, and gently kissed the back of her hand. Each time, Yiyeon thought as if she was wandering through a dream again.

Perhaps that dream was Yiyeon’s future. What if Kwon Chaewoo hadn’t arrived in time…?

As she was half-awake from such disturbing thoughts, a strangely familiar scent tickled her nose.

She quickly, reflexively turned her head and saw a large figure sitting on the guardian’s bed.

Kwon Chaewoo had buried his face in the back of Yiyeon’s hand, enveloped in a grief so profound it was suffocating just to witness. When she stirred, he, who hadn’t moved, immediately lifted his head.

“You’re awake?”

He instantly erased the heavy atmosphere and asked casually.

“How are you feeling? The doctor said you need a lot of rest. You’re anxious, so would you like to stay hospitalized for a few more days? I think that would be more reassuring.”

“Where did you go?”

In the dark hospital room, with no lights on, their eyes met precisely.

“I had some things left to take care of.”

“…Lie.”

Yiyeon murmured softly.

No matter how small the whisper, he couldn’t have not heard it. Kwon Chaewoo showed no particular reaction.

That seemed to be an admission of his lie, and Yiyeon’s brows furrowed.

“I, I had something I wanted to tell you, Chaewoo.”

At that moment, Kwon Chaewoo’s shoulders twitched. Despite that, his gaze, staring intently at Yiyeon, was so fierce that it was impossible to tell whether he was blaming himself or grinding his teeth.

“At Whydome…”

As she began, Kwon Chaewoo let out a hollow laugh and turned his head. Before starting the conversation, Yiyeon frowned at his crooked attitude.

Soon, a self-deprecating laugh began to fill the empty hospital room. Looking at his unreadable state, it strangely felt as if the room temperature was gradually dropping.

“Excuse me, Mr. Kwon Chaewoo.”

“I really tried to calm my temper and live.”

“…Yes?”

He ran his hand over his face and bowed his head deeply. The man, pressing his thighs with both hands and twitching his broad shoulders while laughing, was quite unfamiliar. At first glance, it was a polite bow, but his angular knees, wrists, and shoulders, none of them seemed easy to deal with.

It was a similar feeling to back then, when she constantly had to doubt and be wary of who was inside Kwon Chaewoo’s skin. She crumpled the thin blanket.

“You said it, Yiyeon. That you couldn’t live.”

He completely erased his smile and lifted his head.

“It was beyond a sinking feeling; it was terrifying. This woman has no intention of picking me up. Then I’ll just be a dog without a master. How do you think I felt when I realized that?”

Kwon Chaewoo gazed at her indifferently, like burnt ashes.

“It’s a huge relief the baby is safe, but if it wasn’t…”

He gritted his teeth, stood up, and nervously flung open the window. A cool breeze and the acrid smell mixed in the air rushed in simultaneously.

Even in the night sky, the black smoke was clearly visible, and the crimson flames swayed. Kwon Chaewoo pointed sharply at the scene and glared at Yiyeon.

“You would have set fire to that. If I had been even a little late, you would still be trapped in there. And I…!”

He contorted his face as if he was about to cry.

“If something had happened to the baby, would you even have looked at me? Perhaps to a place I couldn’t reach…”

Just the thought caused his jaw muscles to bulge with surging emotion.

“You would have left. Even though I asked you to pick me up last, even if you abandoned me countless times.”

A cold light gradually appeared in his gaze, fixed on Yiyeon.

“You had no intention of doing that at all.”

Yiyeon wanted to say something, but strangely, her mind went blank. Nevertheless, his clearly hurt eyes pierced her, and her throat stung. The blazing flames of the Whydome seeped into his profile.

“Is that a difference in affection?”

He tilted his head coldly. His hair, disheveled by the night wind, looked precarious.

“Is it because the baby is infinitely beautiful, but I am hateful?”

Kwon Chaewoo bit his lip as if ashamed of having uttered such words. A faint hint of shame appeared in his eyes, then quickly vanished.

Listening to the torrent of resentment, Yiyeon finally realized that Kwon Chaewoo’s state was unstable.

He tended to be more stubborn when he was anxious, and today had been a shocking and difficult day for both of them.

In the midst of it all, the words she blurted out in fear had pierced Kwon Chaewoo, and while she was unconscious, that fear must have grown like a monster.

Yiyeon chastised herself for being momentarily enchanted by the fire. For a man who was beginning to be affected by her gaze, her gestures, and even her slightest breath, the words ‘I can’t live’ must have been a bolt from the blue.

The voice she heard in her dream was right. We can choose differently. She strained her eyes, which were blurring with tears.

“So, sign it.”

At that moment, Kwon Chaewoo approached with a cold face and pushed a document toward her. Sign? What sign? She blinked, caught off guard, but then saw the paper in a fleeting glance and was speechless.

“…A marriage registration form?”

The tears that were about to fall instantly disappeared.

“Fill in the blanks and sign it while I’m being nice.”

“…Are you perhaps threatening me?”

She had once been forced to sign something like this by Kwon Giseok and ended up with a patient in a vegetative state. Of course, the situation was completely different now, but her body involuntarily flinched.

Just as a subtle discomfort was about to show on her face, Kwon Chaewoo sat on the edge of the bed and gently smoothed her stray hairs. But his lowered gaze was somehow chilling.

“Yiyeon, I will live as your servant.”

“…!”

“Instead, you’ll have to become my master first, clearly.”

“Why, why would I—”

“Because if something goes wrong, I might end up like a dog chasing a chicken, only to stare at the roof.”

Kwon Chaewoo pulled her soft hand and demonstratively placed it on his neck.

“Yiyeon, don’t refuse, just grip it.”

“…!”

His thumping pulse brushed against her fingertips.

“It’s true that I wanted to live a good life. But as you can see, it didn’t work out well.”

Kwon Chaewoo didn’t want to be reminded of Kwon Giseok in this way, but in the brief moment when the light left Yiyeon’s eyes, he was tormented by the urge to forcibly seize her soul and confine her, preventing her from doing anything. If even sunlight stimulated her, he would have blocked everything around her.

But to avoid following in Kwon Giseok’s footsteps, he struggled through the mud as if fighting for his life. The document he brought was his attempt to find his own answer.

To confine her, but the fence had to be invisible.

To possess this woman, kneeling was not enough. Waiting for her from a distance, watching over her, letting himself be swayed, and humbly bowing as if to say ‘come when your heart is at ease’ was not enough.

The lighter mark that remained like a scar on her palm. That one mark made all his thoughts of being good vanish.

He would rather become more wicked. So that Yiyeon wouldn’t even experience despair. So that no threat would dare approach. He would turn Whydo into a safe zone just for her. Instead of humbly abandoning everything, the man instinctively learned how to hide his true intentions more maliciously in a single day.

To prevent Yiyeon from falling into despair again, Kwon Chaewoo intended to become a guardian, protecting her world with all his might.

“If I could, I would have sewn us together with thread and lived as one body.”

“…Don’t tell me this is a proposal.”

“Still, I’m offering my neck for your convenience, aren’t I? I don’t want to be blindsided like today, and if I can’t sew us with thread, I’ll bind us with a signature.”

He glared as if growling, and Yiyeon shrugged, retorting.

“That’s not what you really want to say.”

“…!”

“Chaewoo, you have something else you want to say. Is this the first or second time I’ve experienced something like this?”

At her words, Kwon Chaewoo slowly blinked, then furrowed his brow. Outside, sirens wailed, and red lights occasionally swept through the hospital room.

Kwon Chaewoo glared at her with a thorny gaze, but instead of gripping her neck, his hand gently caressed her terribly chapped lips, and one of his eyes helplessly softened. She had truly easily pushed her way into the stubborn man’s heart.

Then, not resentment or sarcasm, but the words he had been biting back all day, as if his mouth was rotting, burst out.

“…Damn it, Yiyeon, I love you to death. That’s why I’m so lonely and anxious.”

The night sky was strangely red. The world seemed to be entirely like his eyes.

“But just you wait, I’ll become your lingering attachment.”

At that one word, spoken through gritted teeth, the black ashes that had been buried in her dream seemed to flutter away.

“Even if I die a hundred times, I’ll die living as your husband.”

He declared with bloodshot eyes.

Even as his tightly clasped hands choked her, she felt her whole body sinking deeply into a comfort she had never experienced before. Yiyeon wanted to finally stop her long-floating legs right here, in this place. Her eyelashes slowly became wet.

“What I wanted to tell you, Chaewoo, was…”

He swallowed roughly as if nervous.

“Thank you for saving me.”

“…!”

Until the very end, for not leaving her alone even in the flames. Those words were a mix of dream and reality.

“Thanks to you, Chaewoo, I lived.”

Even if Yiyeon were mercilessly exiled somewhere in the world, Kwon Chaewoo was the kind of man who would willingly embrace her, even if she was unsightly and dirty.

The moment she felt certain of that heart, Yiyeon wanted to build a new home where everyone could live together.