"You said you would divorce your wife for me," she hissed. "It's been two years. Are you going to do it or not?"

To her horror and disgust, he laughed. "You really thought I would? I'm not a man who would throw my things away for a girl."

She's so angry, she slaps him.

"Careful," he warned, grabbing her hand when she moved to strike again. "You may be carrying my child, but I can still hurt you." She gasped when his free hand began to roam her body, lingering tantalizingly over her fragile stomach.

"Get away from me!" she pushed him as hard as she could and glared at him.

"Don't be like that. I know very well you've only been using me these past two years," he said quietly. "It's my brother you've always wanted, even though he broke your heart."

"That's right," she spat in anger, "but now that my career has soared, I've no more use for you. So why should I even bother to keep this baby? Since you obviously don't care, I'll just get rid of it right now." She ripped open her bag and took out a bottle of pills, but she had just barely opened the cap when it was swiped out of her hands. She looked at the discarded pills on the ground and then at him. "What is it? Feeling sentimental?" 

"What if I told you I could get you what you want the most?" he whispered, slowly closing the distance between them.

She shuddered in disgust, but couldn't help being intrigued. "What do you mean?"

 His eyes glinted maliciously, and his smile made Yeonhwa's hairs stand on end. "You will have to do exactly as I say. A single mistake could cost us everything... but done perfectly..." his face split into a broad smile. "Will you do it?"

The anger and disapproval sparked by the scandal of HB entertainment's newest, hottest sensation could not be quelled. Hate comments flooded every article, every SNS connected to her, day and night.

"At first glance, you can actually tell she's a homewrecker."

"It's a shame. I thought she had so much potential."

"There are so many rich men in the country, why did she have to go after married men with families? Oh, because they're handsome. The epitome of a shallow, greedy ."

"Those poor children will be fatherless from now on. Isn't she ashamed?"

"She really is a good actress. Everything about her is a lie. Never watching anything with her in it, what a joke."

"Happy to ruin not one family, but two. She really is something."

"What are you saying?" her low voice shook from both anger and humiliation.

This was not supposed to happen. He was not supposed to remember. They promised her he wouldn't. It was all going so well... those two had avoided each other for so long... she thought it would only be a matter of time before they split for good.

Her manager scratched his head, looking exhausted. "The public wants nothing to do with you right now. More than half of the audience of your fanmeeting have refunded their tickets, and even though we tried to sell them at half the price, well over a thousand still remain. There are rumors of disappointed fans going to your concert just to spite you. It's better this way."

"So I just cancel my entire tour?" she shrieked in anger. "And what of my latest project? Filming for the next scene started 3 hours ago!"

"Not for you. They're starting over from scratch. The director has cast a different actress to fill your shoes," he informed her, not without pity. "Rising star Kim Woohee. Lead actor Baek Ah threatened to abandon the project if they continued to deny his requests. Your commercial deals and modeling shoots have also been cancelled. I'm sorry, Yeonhwa-yah... until everything dies down, you should just focus on resting and eating. Do it for your baby if not for yourself."

The public was supposed to sympathize with her, not hate her. She had her whole story planned for the press: After losing her love to a villain, it was only a matter of time before her former lover would rekindle their past flame together after one drunk, passionate love affair. But it was a mistake she was going to apologize for and she was going to reject him and raise their baby by herself. Be a strong example to all single mothers out there.

Revenge was supposed to be hers, not theirs.

She grabbed whatever was nearest her - a Best Actress Award for her last drama - and flung it across the room, where it shattered into a thousand pieces.

Yo grabbed his younger cousin by the collar and pushed him up against the wall. "You... it was you, wasn't it? You betrayed me."

Won winced in pain and pushed him away, annoyed. "Don't blame me. Your brother called and told me he was going to tell the President about my gambling, so I had no choice but to release the CCTV footage."

"And me?" Yo sneered awfully, eyes gone wild. "You aren't worried about me telling my father? You've become very brave, Won-ah. You forget that I know you've been gambling away, not your money, but the company's. I have the documents to prove it."

"So has the exact same documents, only he isn't threatening me with them. On the contrary, he's offered to help me," Won drawled lazily, triumph in his dark eyes.

"What's he going to do, pay off your debts? Soo is pregnant. He'll never spend that much on you." Yo's attitude changed suddenly, from looking crazed with anger, to looking crazed with nerves. "Help me, Won-ah. You can help me fix this."

"I'm sorry, hyung. I did everything I could to help you. I even drugged your brother and put an aphrodisiac into his drink like you asked me to. But that plan failed miserably. All your plans have failed. That's why I've changed my mind. I'll be backing So from now on. He has always been a favorite of the President, and his life isn't falling apart. It's only natural I side with him. Then, if that's all, I need to get back to work..." Though Won felt guilty about leaving his cousin in this way, he had no choice. He nodded once and began to walk off, stopping only when his cousin shouted again.

"You can't do this to me! That was my last chance! When the divorce becomes final, father will kick me out, mother will disown me, I'll have nothing, I'll-"

"I'm sorry, hyung..." Won said softly, eyeing his cousin with pity, "but you should have thought of that before you went and got another woman pregnant."

So closed the door behind him and cricked his neck with a groan. Because of the storm, the traffic had been terrible and he was dead tired from driving. He shed off his coat, shook his wet hair, and walked around in search of his wife.

He found her in the kitchen, preparing something on the marble counter. She had her back to him and classical music filled the room, which meant she probably didn't know he was home. He walked quietly up to her and slipped his arms around her, resting his hands on her swollen belly.

She flinched in alarm and growled in annoyance when she realized it was him, but he planted a large kiss on her cheek, and she decided to accept it as a peace offering. "A little heads up next time, if you don't mind, or I might accidentally drop your baby on the floor from fright."

He gasped and hugged her tighter, protectively. "You wouldn't dare."

"I wouldn't, but I can't say the same for my body. It betrays me at the worst possible moments," she grumbled.

He chuckled and eyed what she was doing. "Porridge again?" There was a plethora of ways to describe his tiny spouse's cooking. It could be delicious, fulfilling, rich, bland, even the occasional hit-and-miss...

Or it could be porridge.

Unfortunately for his bowels, she'd been craving the stuff lately. 

"I asked my mother for help this time," she said defensively, "I'll get it right, you'll see."

"The last time I tried your porridge, I ended up having diarrhea."

She sniffed, hurt that he should keep rubbing that little incident in her face. "You don't have to eat it if you don't want to. I'm perfectly willing to taste it mys-"

He stopped her before she could finish with a kiss to her ear. "You will do no such thing."

"Hmph! But we wouldn't want you to get diarrhea now, would we, darling?" she addressed their unborn baby.

"Better me than you two," he muttered, letting her go. "Okay, tell me what I need to do."

"I want to know what happened to Won. And Chaeryung."

He had known she would ask and came prepared with a quick summary. "Chaeryung has been fired. But I already told you it was bound to happen. When Wook found out about her relationship with Won and her role in his gambling activities, he was furious."

"Oh." Though Soo felt sorry for Chaeryung, who had an entire family to support, she also felt the woman should have known better than to give him everything he asked for out of "love", especially when those things were never hers to give away. "And your cousin?"

"Same as my brother," So shrugged. "Disowned and stripped of all his shares. They're banned from ever meeting again. He'll be working as a minimum-wage laborer at a separate warehouse starting tomorrow. I've helped him enough so that he'll only need to work 25 years to pay off his entire debt to the company. After that, he's on his own.

"They should count themselves lucky we aren't in Goryeo, or they'd have been flogged and executed."

She smiled impishly at him. "Someone's been watching too many dramas."

"Someone has someone else to blame for that," he glared pointedly at her.

"What? Don't lie, you enjoy watching them with me!" she laughed heartily at him.

He grinned and pulled her into a hug so he could whisper into her ear, "I enjoy cuddling with you on the sofa. That's not the same thing."

She smiled and hugged him back, feeling safe at last. He hadn't lied when he told her he would fix everything.

The last time she had seen Yeonhwa on the news was about a month ago, when it was reported she had been rushed to the hospital and had given birth prematurely. There had been complications, and both mother and child were still fighting for their lives. 

The news blamed stress. Soo blamed karma, though she did feel sorry for the child, who was, after all, innocent.

With such a low monthly income, Soo wondered if Yo would still be able to pay for child support, to give the child the kind of care he needed while his mother was indisposed.

"Thank you for giving me another chance."

Soo blinked and brought her mind back to the present. "Hm?"

"To fix things. For believing me that night."

Ah. "After everything you've done for me, after my accident..." she began in a quiet voice, "You're someone I'll never be able to forget. You gave me a second chance at life. How could I not give you the same?"

"Still... when you asked me how I would have felt if our roles had been reversed, that's when it hit me... how lucky I was that you were even still there to listen. I probably would have left and murdered the man."

Soo snorted. "Don't underestimate me. I would have murdered that woman if she hadn't told me about her baby."

He recognized her morbid attempt to lighten the conversation, but he could only manage a bitter smile. "I said some things that night that I still regret. I really am very sorry."

She shook her head. "We were both wronged. You were tricked, I was lied to. If anyone's at fault, it's them." She could see he was not convinced and knew he still blamed himself. "I've already come to terms with what happened, and so should you. Think of it as a test... we passed, didn't we?"

She forced him to look at her; gently smoothed out his frown with her fingers. "You made a mistake, but it was not your fault. Do you not believe you deserve my forgiveness? Do you not believe you have my whole heart?"

He closed his eyes with an inward sigh. It would be a while before he could truly forgive himself for that momentary weakness, but he shouldn't punish her for it as well, not when he knew how much she wanted him to put everything behind him and move forward. With her. With the precious little gift he held carefully in his hands. 

He looked at her and smiled. "I don't know about that. It's hard to know how you really feel whenever I come home and find you cooking porridge. Then I have no trouble believing just how deadly you can be."

Just like that, her indignation flared. "I'll be eating it anyway, so you-"

"Yah, I didn't say I wouldn't eat it."

She lifted her chin in defiance. "Since you don't like it so much, you needn't force yourself." She released him and walked away, but he was quick to pull her back. 

Not bothering to hide his amusement, he chuckled as he tried to coax her back into his embrace. "Don't leave me," he pleaded, "my love, my baby, my sweetheart, my darling."

She narrowed her eyes. "Go on. I didn't say you could stop."

He grinned and continued in between kisses, "My joy in the morning, my comfort at night, my thought every second of every day. You are my kiss of sunshine, my soft drizzle of rain; my heart, my soul, my everything." He traced light kisses from her jaw, up her cheek, to her temple, to the sensitive apex between her closed lids. "I will never let you go. Eternity was made for us. I will endure every hardship, every test of time just to find you and be with you again. My Soo."

She blushed at the talk of eternity and lifetimes, but she knew he meant every word. She couldn't explain it... the sensation running through her body, enveloping her, reaching into her soul... It was him, but it wasn't. The feeling felt older somehow, strange yet familiar, like an old friend come to greet her after a long absence.

My Soo.

He was looking at her strangely. She wondered if he felt it too. But a blink and a breath later and it was gone.

Giggling with satisfaction, she hugged him back. You're mine without a doubt. "Okay. You may eat my porridge."

He sighed dramatically. "Dealing with you is harder than dealing with the board."

She took it as a compliment and laughed, but she had to let go when a nice, strong kick from their little person forced her to. She winced. "Yeah, baby's hungry and so am I. Husband, go do the dishes while I make the perfect porridge."

He smiled grimly and secretly ordered takeout.

He watched them from dusk until dawn. He watched them as the first light fell in through the white curtains, breaking into the coolness, the darkness of the previous night.

His two greatest loves.

Like a timer, the light woke his first. She opened her eyes and smiled when she saw him.

He felt he could watch her forever.

He knew he would.