HPK 79

“You weren’t the first either, President. So why, why are you only doing this to me?”

“Hey, are you and I the same?”

“What’s different?”

A hot breath, “Heo,” escaped between Taejung’s lips.

“You weren’t the first either……. I don’t understand why you’re so angry about this, President.”

“……”

“If you didn’t like it, you should have, should have said so from the beginning.”

Wooseung placed a hand on the table and slowly pushed himself up. Taejung’s eyes followed his movements.

“I, I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Hah……”

Leaving Taejung, who was letting out a hollow laugh, behind him, Wooseung slowly turned his body. He had no intention of staying involved in this fight any longer. He had already said everything he needed to. He planned to leave the room just like this and end his entire relationship with him. But no sooner had he turned his shoulders than a dark shadow suddenly loomed over him from behind.

“Hey, we are different.”

At the same time his shoulder was seized with a forceful grip, his body was shoved backward with a thud.

“……Ah!”

With his lower jaw grabbed and lifted upwards, the tips of his toes barely touched the floor. After struggling for a bit, he was only able to find his balance after desperately grabbing onto Taejung’s wrist as if hanging from it.

“Why would you and I be the same. We’re so fucking different, Wooseung-ah.”

Taejung’s thumb rubbed threateningly under his ear.

“What, what’s different, heut……”

“You sold your body to me for money.”

Taejung said, “Huh?” and shook the hand that was gripping his jaw. His head was shaken back and forth, and his vision spun.

“And you even fucking scammed me while you were at it.”

At the word “scam,” Wooseung, who had been gasping from dizziness, glared up fiercely. At the sight of him flaring up without even knowing his own fault, the corners of Taejung’s mouth twisted.

“It’s true. Who would pay a hundred to eat you.”

Even at the jeer that trampled his ego, Wooseung did not shrink back.

“Don’t eat me, then.”

“……What?”

“You can just not buy me with your money……!”

No sooner had the words finished than he raised his hand. The palm that brutally cut through the air was sure to fall on his face. Wooseung reflexively squeezed his eyes shut. But no matter how long he waited, the pain of a slap on his cheek never came.

When he cautiously opened his eyes, the large, calloused hand was stopped awkwardly in midair. A moment later, he felt a heavy weight tapping his right cheek, tap, tap.

“If you don’t want to get your ass beat, stop right there.”

His head turned slightly, but the force was gone, so it didn’t hurt.

“……”

Wooseung blinked blankly, then slowly lifted his head. For some reason, Taejung was staring at him intently, as if trying to read something. The movement of his pupils was somewhat frantic. It was unlike the him who was always full of conviction and confidence.

Slowly, the strange behaviors Taejung had shown began to surface in his mind. Even the actions that had made Wooseung misunderstand.

“Do you like me, President?”

The voice that tore through the silence was rather emotionless. For someone who had been agonizing over it all week, the hesitation was also short.

Taejung’s eyes, which had been chasing the other’s every little action, came to a dead stop. Their gazes clashed in midair. Slowly, a spark began to ignite.

“No?”

Taejung snorted as if he had heard the most ridiculous thing.

“Really fucking not.”

However, he couldn’t hide the eyes that had caught fire. More force than before was put into the hand gripping his jaw, but he didn’t seem to notice that either.

Wooseung glanced his eyes down to look at Taejung’s arm, where veins bulged like tree roots. The man who had shown no hesitation or wavering in swinging his fist had raised his hand as if to strike, only to lower it futilely. He had slapped his cheek, but there was no force behind it at all. And yet, and yet…….

What did he mean, “really fucking not.”

“……Then I would like to stop here.”

“What?”

“I have to keep going to work.”

“Go ahead. Who the fuck is stopping you?”

Wooseung let out a sigh as if to make sure he heard. He turned his head to the right and briefly stared into space. Unable to wait even for that moment, Taejung shook his jaw roughly and growled, asking where he was looking.

“You came here suddenly and interrupted me just now.”

“……”

“The other time too, you called me out when I was working and took me home, and you keep interfering whenever I say I’m going to work!”

“……”

“If this isn’t me being unable to work, then what is it?”

Taejung only moved his lips, unable to offer any rebuttal. As if that was a severe blow to his pride, his huffing breaths took on an even more menacing aura. But Wooseung did not back down. He put strength in his eyes and glared.

This was the moment to settle things. He kept recalling the countless burdens hanging on his shoulders. Sometimes it was a sudden call from his father, and other times it became a yellow sticker threatening to cut off the electricity due to unpaid bills. None of it was ever light.

“I want to stop. I want to stop.”

Taejung’s house was occasionally peaceful, and the money he gave allowed him to experience a tranquility he had forgotten for a long time. But those moments were painfully short, and in contrast, Taejung’s capriciousness was long.

Wooseung carefully took Taejung’s hand. Was he surprised by the warmth of another person touching the back of his hand? Taejung’s hand trembled.

Between his tightly clenched teeth, an unpleasant sound, scrape, rang out.

“Who says you can stop.”

As expected, a sharp response came back. As if to ask where he thought he was going, trying to pull out on his own terms. But he had not the slightest intention of continuing this dragging fight any longer.

“It’s true that I wasn’t a first, and I have slept with clients when I was at the main building.”

“Hey.”

“As for how many I’ve slept with…… honestly, I don’t know.”

“This, you fucking bastard……”

He thought he might really get hit this time. But Taejung, while breathing raggedly, did not raise his hand. Even as he was dying of frustration, even as he was incredibly pissed off that he couldn’t mold the situation to his will, he only glared and cursed, but he did not resort to violence. Even though he knew better than anyone that he could easily control Wooseung with violence alone.

A single assumption he had dismissed as a misunderstanding was gradually taking on a solid form.

“You do like me, President.”

He delivered the final blow and watched the other’s reaction.

Unresolved excitement, anger, and other agitated emotions filled the space between them in the form of hot breath. Finally, a hollow laugh squeezed out from between Taejung’s twisted lips.

“Where did you go and what did you see?”

“……”

“Why. Should I like you? Ah, what, should I do that?”

Taejung said this while tilting his head, deliberately taunting him. To regain the lost upper hand, he unhesitatingly trampled on the other’s words. He chose to treat it as something ridiculous and trivial.

“I don’t need it.”

But at the words that came back, he froze like a fool once again.

“I’m not going to do anything with you anymore, President.”

The upper hand isn’t something that can be regained with willpower alone. Taejung, through countless actions he himself hadn’t realized, had already handed his fatal weakness over to Wooseung. And even then, he didn’t know it was his weakness.

“So let go of me.”

“……”

“I said let go of this……!”

Wooseung struggled to shake off Taejung’s hand. He grabbed it with both hands and tried to pull it off, putting his strength into it, and even shoved his shoulder with a thud. But the other man didn’t budge, like a solid rock embedded in the ground. He just stared silently at Wooseung with hot, flickering eyes.

“I, I’m going to go see another room. Let go.”

In that instant, Taejung’s eyes blazed black, as if consumed by a raging fire.

“I’m going to another room, mmph!”

Just like that, his lips were devoured. A thick tongue pushed through the seam of their joined lips and instantly conquered the inside of his mouth.

“Don’t, uht!”

Even when he thrashed his head and pushed at his shoulders with a thump, thump, it wasn’t nearly enough to push Taejung away. The more he did, the deeper the kiss became. The heat he held was transferred entirely into him. It was so hot that his insides burned feverishly.

“Mmph……!”

Taejung held Wooseung’s lower jaw firmly with both hands and bent his head back. When they separated for a moment due to the fierce resistance, he greedily stuck out his tongue and licked his lips. His entire lower face became drenched in saliva, and he kissed him until his thoroughly sucked tongue went numb.

“Euheut, don’t, mmph……”

Despite that, Wooseung did not give up trying to push him away, but when Taejung’s hand slid under the hem of his thin knit sweater, he ended up flinching in shock. The hands that had been pushing away curled up like a mimosa plant.

“Don’t, uht……!”

Taejung’s hands showed no mercy, as if he intended to strip Wooseung’s clothes off completely. In the meantime, their lips parted, and a small space was created between them.

Wooseung raised his hand high and swung it forcefully.