Chapter 1

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The woman at the mahogany desk looked absently out her 52nd floor story window to see the amazing night-time skyline of New York City when she was suddenly startled by the ring of a telephone.

Collecting herself, exhausted over her paperwork, she took off her golden-frame reading glasses and picked up the phone. She sighed, “Hwang and Hwang, Hwang the younger speaking.”

“Tiffany Hwang, if you don’t come back home later tonight, I will go to New York, knock you out, and carry you back to Massachusetts!”

“Good evening, mother,” Tiffany lazily sat back in her black leather chair. It engulfed her thin body, and she felt sleepy. She rubbed her temples, contemplating the New York skyline, drenched in darkness, smattered with glitter of lighted towers of gold. “I’ll be there tomorrow early afternoon. I just have to finish up some business here, go to Cambridge and pick up a few papers there to grade, and I’ll be there.”

“But tomorrow’s Christmas Eve! We wanted you to be here with us the whole day!”

“I will…later,” she said, picking up another paper and starting to read it.

“Tiffany…”

“Mother, please don’t start with me. We went through this last year. I went though it today. And Aunt Hara already threw a fit when I wanted to stay in New York this week, instead of going to the Castle with her.”

“Well that just shows I’m right. When your SENIOR partner in your law firm, who is also your aunt, calls it a day for both of you, it means that you both stop working.”

“Mother…”

“Don’t ‘mother’ me. I want you home tomorrow morning. The Kwon are spending Christmas with us, so you have to be here too.”

“ALL the Kwon?” Her heart started to pound. All the Kwon…which included…well…HIM!

“Yes, and if you came to visit more often, you’d know. But no, you’re too busy with your law firm in New York and teaching at Harvard to come!”

“I’m sorry…” Tiffany felt her mind in a flurry of wishes…to stay at home, to go there and finally confront him, to just forget he ever existed…

“I’m worried about you…”

When ISN’T she worried? she rolled her eyes, tugging a long gold curl that fell in front of her face back n. She focused her thoughts on talking to her mother. She shouldn’t think about HIM right now.

“Tiffany, you’re all alone in that city, and you haven’t met anyone…”

*Of all times…of course! It’s the holiday season…Nothing like packing a bunch of people in a house to know how much you want a bunch a people for yourself!*

“I’m still young…”

“YOU’RE TWENTY-SIX!”

“That’s not old…”

“Tiffany, a twenty-six-year-old does not just LIVE in New York. She hides in the office buildings and apartment buildings, and goodness knows where you’ll meet someone in all the millions of people who live there…”

“Mom, I’m fine the way I am…”

“HA! If you were fine the way you were, you’d be here. Mark my words Tiffany, if you had any sense in family tradition, you’d be right here, right now. And perhaps, if you had a HUSBAND, you’d understand that kind of duty…it’s called love of the family. Look it up some time!”

With that, Irene Hwang slammed down the phone, convincing her daughter to get out of her chair, and start to go back to her apartment. She shut her eyes a moment, gathered her thoughts, and then stood up.
Tiffany sighed as she packed her things up. Mother…

Irene Hwang was still a stickler for tradition and American family values. Even if it meant beating up her daughter to take her home. Her reign as the First Lady was over, but the White House was never the same again. Tiffany laughed to herself as she thought about it.

She brought her leather briefcase out the door of her nice office, and started to walk to the elevators. She was the only one left on the floor. Tiffany felt somewhat content with that fact, and walked a little lighter.
She got in the elevators and pressed the down button.

Tiffany was a stickler for work. It was amazing how her value of American family was so different from her mother’s. Tiffany had married her studies and job, and had began in her aunt’s law firm and had worked her way to the top. She then took on Harvard, as the new law professor. She rose to be head of the department. She had a busy schedule, but she liked the business. It was more professional. And she was the embodiment of professionalism.

Her very fit body was always in strict business wear, unless she was out in one of those social things her mother told her to attend, every once in a while. She jogged every morning in Cambridge when she was at Harvard, and sometimes ran in Central Park early in the morning when she was in New York. But no one could really tell that now. She looked feminine, and she looked professional. Right now, she was wearing a pink Laura Ashley business suit, and her black hair was bouncy and slightly straight. It flowed to just above her waist. But it was now elegantly coiled up in a professional French twist, but strands were falling out and gathering around her soft face.

As she stepped out of the elevator, she said good night to the security guard, and put on her trench coat, and buttoned up. She wound her pink cashmere scarf around her neck, and put on her pink beret. She then stepped out into the cold bustling of Manhattan.

The scarf and beret gave more away about her than anything else in her appearance. The scarf showed that she was soft, and very beautiful on the inside, that she liked fun and pretty things, though she didn’t show it too often. She had learned to restrain herself from careless fancies over the years. 

But Tiffany Hwang, no matter how distant she was to the public, was still a little girl at heart, and only this way with her family and friends.

Now, the scarf was whipping against the late December winds. Snow was swirling about, in pretty tendrils from the sky. She walked briskly and lightly down 5th Avenue, passing the shoppers rushing out of Saks, happy with tons of shopping bags. 

She passed the crowds walking about the Rockefeller Center, sighed and turned away while passing the beautiful Christmas tree, and after a few blocks, went up the steps to a fancy tall building. As the doorman greeted her, she smiled and wished him a happy Christmas. 

She then walked to the brass doors of the elevator and pushed the up button. As she stepped in, she rested against the wall, closing her eyes lightly, pressing the button for the top floor, and inserting the key into the elevator that would allow her access to that floor.

As she stepped off the elevator, and got out her key to open her penthouse apartment. She entered, plopping her work bag and purse to the floor, already carpeted with various other things she had carelessly dropped after coming home other times.

So Tiffany Hwang wasn’t perfect. She didn’t have to manage a beautiful life AND clean her apartment.

That was just expecting way too much! She only cleaned on rare occasions, when she knew she’d have company, or when she had a rare Saturday to herself.

Since she spent most of her engagements in other places, and since she rarely had a free Saturday, her apartment, however nicely it was decorated, was still a mess.

Tiffany had two main alternatives when she first decorated her apartment, and that was the homey, or the elegant. 

She chose elegant, and cream velvet carpets, silky cream curtains, and cream-colored leather furniture.

The coffee table was glass with white marble ends, and her walls were cream, lit dimly by the simple light at the ceiling of the room. 

The walls were also decorated with soft Monets and other impressionists.

She sighed as that elegance had more of the homey appearance now, literally, for her coffee table was cluttered with coffee mugs she had been mindlessly leaving there for a month or so, and her couch was cluttered with briefs she was reading, and more papers she was grading covered her laptop computer, which had drowned somewhere in there.

She stepped around the obstacles on the floor to the kitchen, which was spotless, for lack of use. However, her sink was filled to the brim with more coffee mugs.

*And my colleagues actually WONDER why I buy so many mugs, and why I like them for Christmas!*

Tiffany went to the kitchen counter, by her cordless phone charger. She reached underneath the pile of papers next to it, pressed the button on the answering machine, and walked away from it, to the refrigerator, wondering if any of the leftovers of Chinese take out she had ordered three days ago was still edible.

“Tiffany!”

Tiffany jumped from the refrigerator and laughed when she realized that it was only her mother on the answering machine, and not in her apartment. If Mom saw this place NOW, she’d kill me! Her mother had undoubtedly called to find out why her daughter was not at the Castle, and still in New York.

*She first probably tried Cambridge and then my prof office, and then called here and then my work number right after this, and yelled at me then! I’ll have to remember that when I check my answering machines at Cambridge!*

“It is 9:30 on the night before Christmas Eve. It’s bad enough you aren’t here, with the rest of us, but it’s even worse you aren’t even at your APARTMENT! But then again, it must look like a pigsty now! You better be out shopping or doing something careless, because if I call and catch you at work I will ground you at the Castle until you have spent all of a year with us!”

Tiffany then tuned out as she rummaged the refrigerator once more, pulling out and smelling the Chinese carton. She wrinkled her nose and tossed it into her now slightly overflowing garbage can. *I’ve got to take out the trash!*

She opened the freezer and finally decided on an ice cream sandwich.

A furious click. Her mother had hung up. Tiffany tuned in for more messages.

“Fany. Taeng. Call.”

Tiffany laughed. Taeyeon Hwang DID hate answering machines.

And that was the end of the messages.

She went into the living room, paced around a bit, and finally decided that the phone was in the refrigerator.

She went to the refrigerator, and there it was, sitting next to the milk carton.

*I don’t know HOW it got there, and I don’t know HOW I know.* she calmly told herself. *I don’t want to know. If I have time, maybe I’ll clean up a little before I go to bed tonight. It’s only around ten or so now,* as she looked at the clock on the wall. *I’ve got a few hours. But I probably need two lifetimes.*

She then remembered the phone call, and picked up her phone and dialed Taeng’s cell phone number.

A woman picked up, her slightly deep and rich voice answering.

“Taeyeon Hwang’s phone, his wife speaking.”

“Hey Jessica!”

“Fany Hwang, if you don’t get your here now your mother will kill you!” Jessica scolded teasingly over the phone.

“I know, I know, it’s tough to get things done, though. I’ll try. I just got your husband’s message, so can I talk to my second cousin once removed?” Tiffany laughed.

“He’s tucking his little princess in.”

“And how is his queen?”

“Fine, my restaurant’s doing great. I’m thinking of opening in New York now as well.”

“So Boston, Denver, Detroit, Salt Lake City, Washington DC, Seattle, Orlando and goodness knows where still isn’t good enough?”

“Well, when your husband is the president-elect, the first lady’s got to do something!”

Tiffany laughed. “I suppose so. And are all the Hwangs and Kwon there at the Castle, listening to my mother rant and rave about her irresponsible daughter who doesn’t have her priorities set straight?”

“Pretty much all the guests have arrived. Hyoyeon got here this morning with Eunhyuk, and Yunho Hwang and his wife Yoona got here this afternoon. You remember her, right? The wedding in…what was it…August? 

Yeah, right after cousin Jiyeon!”

“Yes, Yoona is the somewhat temperamental business woman. But very kind and sweet once you get to know her. I remember her. Didn’t really get to talk with her or anything…hope to be better acquainted, though.”

“And first cousin Sunny came this evening, and brought her fiancee, Sooyoung”

“OHHHHHH!!! THAT’S SOOOOO CUTE!!!!!!!!!” Tiffany squealed. “It’s about time Sunny met someone special. I remember school years; she was more than a social recluse!”

“Yeah, I’m pleased too. Sooyoung is a very sweet and intelligent young man. He’s pretty cute. To top it all off, he also absolutely worships her. They love each other a lot.”

“I’m glad, but I wish Sunny had told me!”

“Well, considering no one can ever get a hold of you…why don’t you buy a new cell phone?”

“I fear having them robbed again.”

“Then move somewhere safe! You’re twenty-six, and alone in a huge dangerous city.”

“You sound like my mother.”

“Well, I'm worried.”

“Even more like my mother.”

“Tiffany, you know you’re always the one set apart from the Hwangs…you never come to these family things…”

Tiffany smiled over the phone. “Well, things get busy…”

“Busier than family?”

“Believe me, I don’t miss much except for my mom, dad, Suho, and you guys. And sometimes Gram, when she’s not setting me up…”

“Speaking of setups…”

“Oh…No…” Tiffany closed her eyes rubbing her eyes.

“There’s something funny going on here…”

“And I bet it has to do with me and a Kwon. The lengths my grandmother will go to see me ‘happily settled’. I can find my own husband…if I want one.”

“Tiffany…”

“What?”

“Anyways, rumor has it that the Kwon PRINCE is here for Christmas. I don’t believe YOU have ever met him, though almost every other Hwang girl has. They’re all madly in love.”

“Prince?” her heart beat faster.

HIM.

“Yes…from what I hear, he’s Gertrude’s favorite, she raised him since his parents had died. Every Hwang princess is crazy about him. He is hot, I’m told,” Jessica laughed, thinking of the distress that was in Tiffany right now.

“But Kwon are genetically inclined to look fabulous anyhow,” Tiffany giggled, trying to sound calm. Her heart…it was up in .

HIM!

“But none are as hot as the prince. I haven’t met him, but I’ve heard. Taeyeon tutored him English when he first came to America.”

“From where?” Tiffany asked, dumbly. Of course, she knew. She knew everything.

“Korea,” Jessica said, smiling over the line.

“Korea?” she asked again conversationally…trying to sound calm…she knew the story…she just wanted to hear it again, she supposed.

Besides, Jessica didn’t know about…that…did she?

“But he’s not Korean. He was born in America, had the same story as you did, basically, but this time, it’s not a happy ending. His parents got killed in a car accident, and he was taken here by Gertrude,” Jessica continued, thinking she could hear the shallow nervous breathing on the other side of the line.

“Ah…no wonder the Hwang cats are all sharpening their claws. The matriarch’s prodigy. I think I’ve heard of him. Hot, but cruel! Isn’t he some kind of DOCTOR or something?” she asked, again conversationally.
Of course he was a doctor…she’d known that for years…

“Yeah. From what I hear, he’s a GREAT doctor, top of his field, teaching at Johns Hopskins. I hear he also teaches a little med and bio up at Harvard as well. You might know him,” Jessica said.
HA! Know Him, or know OF Him?*

“I don’t think so. I haven’t really gotten to know the staff outside of the law department. I don’t think I even SET FOOT outside the law department buildings and my apartment there. But anyways, about the prince…what was his name?” she laughed.

Keep up the charade…besides, she never really MET him…

“Yul.”

“Ah…with a name like that a girl ought to melt upon just hearing it!” Tiffany faked a sigh.

The name, however, was more than familiar. Ah, the boy Gram always mentioned to Tiffany, the name that had been stealthily slipped into her mind and memory.

*Yul did this…Yul did that…*

She was FIERCELY competitive with the image of all Yul represented. However, she wouldn’t compete in medicine with him…she wasn’t really into the medical stuff. She loved politics and American Government and History…and she had an astounding speaking ability…a captain of the Debate team for three years in a row in high school, then another three in college. No, Yul Kwon couldn’t compete with her there, but he did projects with profs and ended up going to places like Poland and Italy to present his ideas…it was ridiculous the way they competed, and she knew it now, but when she was younger, there was an importance.

“Oh, I’m already feeling my cheeks flush at his name, and my heart is thudding.”

Actually, it was, for she was going to finally meet, face to face, with the one man she had competed with all her life. She wondered what it would be like. And she knew, it would be strange.

“Fany, I wouldn’t talk so fast. If everything said about him is true, then you will absolutely swoon once you meet him.” *SWOON? She’ll be in love…she’s already halfway there…though she’s never met him!* Jessica smirked.

“I’m sure I will…with laughter…”

She knew of his good looks. She never saw him…she had many opportunities when she was younger, at many of the parties, but she never cared much to meet him. She was always afraid…to go and find that the boy she was competing with, this young intelligent man, would be a nice guy. It was TOO hard to compete with a nice guy. Now, she had read some medical journals about him (only to remain up to date in medicine, of course). His name was everywhere. She’d never seen him before, but had a vague image in her mind of him. She imagined the arrogant tanned young man she’d always pictured, with slicked jet black hair, and proud dark brown eyes. He’d be tall and domineering, with an ego the size of Mount Everest.

To see an actual picture would spoil her image, and spoil her whole fancy.

“Tiffany…I know you’ve been wanting to meet him. When I first met you, one of the first things Taeng said to me was that you had been fiercely competitive with guy you’ve never met, and that he was Yul Kwon. I don’t know…we all thought that it would be romantic…” Jessica started, thinking that she HAD to tell Tiffany she knew…it was fair this way, she supposed. Then she could all the more for pretending Tiffany DIDN’T know of him.

“HA! I thought I was beyond the age of romance!” Tiffany laughed nervously, having been seen through. Her cheeks colored and she looked up the ceiling, closing her eyes. Yul’d never hear about this anyhow, but all the same…

“Taeng married me when he was twenty-nine. Yul’s only twenty- eight. I was twenty-seven. You’re only going to be twenty-six. Taeng and I’ve been married for ten years now, and have a beautiful nine-year-old, and a wonderful six-year-old. That wasn’t too late. Who knows, Tiffany, Yul could sweep you off your feet, and you could fall in love, as fast as I did.”

“Yeah, but you’re sweet, agreeable. You WANTED matrimony. You loved each other. I’m not that kind of girl anymore. I was when I was a teenager, and that was what being a teenager was all about. Being foolish enough to fall in love with love. Now I know romance does exist, but only for certain ones. Not me. Especially not with some “prince” all my mindless cousins are swooning over; he’s probably got the body of a tennis pro, a bank account the size of Fort Knox in Switzerland, and let’s not forget the brain of tapioca pudding…”

“He’s the HEAD OF THE MED DEPARTMENT OF JOHN’S HOPSKINS!” Jessica sighed.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. My cousins don’t care for intelligent guys; they tend to be boring, seeing that INTELLIGENT guys tend to talk about things other than other women’s dresses. I hope my taste in men is better than THAT, or else, he’ll have to keep me up with fashion trends!” Tiffany knew that was entirely untrue. If he was a blockhead, then she’d never forgive herself for competing with an illusion.

“We’ll see, when you duel with the prince yourself tomorrow.”

“And is my charming opponent already there?” she asked, her eyes bright and wide. Her heart quivering.
“As a matter of fact, he came in an hour ago. He then proceeded to be locked up in the den with my husband for an hour, and they discussed macho guy things. Speaking of which, I think my husband is ready for you now.” Tiffany wanted to protest.

She wanted to hear more about Yul…so she’d be prepared tomorrow.

She heard the phone being passed, and she heard a clearing of a throat. “Fany Hwang. Why aren’t you here yet? You’re mother’s worried sick about you!”

Tiffany laughed. “And how is my cousin, the president-elect of the United States of America?”

“Good, if his dear cousin Fany will agree to be his wonderful attorney general.”

“WHAT?”

“I meant it, Fany. I want you to be my attorney general when I take office. I KNOW you’ll just do a great job!”
Tiffany laughed. “I’m, well, very flattered that you have asked me! In fact, I am going to something I don’t normally do. I’m going to accept this position impulsively, and not even bother thinking about that law firm I have in New York.”

“I know, it’s complicated to get out of a law partnership, but Fany, I know it’s been your dream to sweep all of Washington, ever since you’ve lived here to be mortified at the press.”

Tiffany pressed her lips, remembering the past. She had changed over the years. No, the eight year old Hwang Miyoung in that walked carefully onto American soil for the first time would never had guessed she’d end up being Tiffany Hwang, the former first daughter, successful lawyer.

Sure, she had certainly regretted leaving Korea. Though she was born in America, she had barely even begun to live when her father was transferred for diplomatic reasons to Korea to discuss politics with the Koreaen president. It wasn’t fair that when she was eight, the American government had decided that Michael Hwang was needed back in Washington, where he could preside over American politics.

And certainly wasn’t fair when Hwang Miyoung had to give up her bunny name, her Korean name, which was a mere adoption to make the Hwangs welcome in Korea, to be Miss Tiffany Hwang, always “Miss Tiffany” to everyone, or “the Hwang princess”.

And it was even more unfair when she had to learn English from scratch, since the only thing she had known in her life was Korean. And being a Hwang didn’t help. She didn’t understand everything, but she knew that people looked down on her, as the dull-witted princess, the Late Hwang, as she was nicknamed, who’d only get what she want because she had the money to do it.

Well, she showed them. Tiffany was very sensitive to what people said, and after going through stages of arrogance, anger and self-pity, she decided not to throw in the towel, and just take the press on a little ride.
She had risen quickly, taking in her information the speed of light, and skipping two grades…the one grade behind she had started before at, and then another grade for good measure. She was accomplished, and she was ready. She had shown them all. Tiffany Hwang was not a dumb princess. She was clever, beautiful, and very distant.

It wasn’t her fault if she was born into one of the richest families in America, and it was even less her fault that her father had happened to be likable enough to become Massachusetts state senator, and eventually president of the United States. So there was absolutely no reason why the press should have had a field day with her anyway.

He became president when Tiffany was studying in the most prestigious schools in the nation, when she was fourteen. She heard about it on the radio, and had called her father, who hadn’t wanted to disturb her studies; after all, she had two huge tests the next day.

She spent only two years at the White House, when she was not at her private boarding school, and the remaining six years of her father’s presidential term was spent at college. She had only been sixteen when she had graduated high school.

Tiffany Hwang was different, but not quite as different as everyone thought. She kept the distant image because it suited her study environment. If she remained distant, the press would be distant with her as well, calling her shots as acts of arrogance, or some nonsense foolishness. But she wasn’t really as distant and cold as the press said. In fact, she loved her family, and she loved her friends. It wasn’t her fault if the press had set out to throw mud at her in the very beginning, and it wasn’t her fault if the press decided to nickname her the Ice Queen.

Of course, in the midst of all this, there was also another icon she always fought…and that was the ever-lasting image of this boy her grandmother had put on a pedestal…Yul Kwon, the Kwon prodigy…her “intended”, sort of. She knew her grandmother had hopes for both of them, and it annoyed her. So she strived to be better than Yul, trying to show her grandmother that she was good enough for anyone she chose…it was her choice, and not Yul’s, not Gram’s.

“Fany? You there? Are you reminiscing?”

“Of course! What else?”

“Fany. Don’t worry about the press. You are untouchable now. Perfect. Besides, you never really cared much about what they said.”

A bump formed in Tiffany’s throat and she laughed superficially and said, “No, of course not!”
“Well, then just show them you don’t care. Be my attorney general, and be the best attorney general in history. Make the Hwangs proud.”

“All right.”

“Now pack those bags. We want to see you here tomorrow, safe and sound, relaxed and cheerful. It’s the holidays, and we’re going to be one loving family again.”

“Yeah, the bunch of brats, sweeties, gossips, charity saviors, snobs and other things that we are. I can’t wait. For a whole week, and maybe beyond, if there is a snow blizzard. And this time, we do it times two, with a new family there as well,” she sighed, laughing. No, the Hwangs weren’t ALL floozies, only a few. Over all, the Hwangs were a great family.

“Well, see you tomorrow.”

“Bye, Taeng, and thank you.”

As she pressed the off button, she placed the phone back in the refrigerator as she mindlessly took out the milk carton and poured herself some milk. As she gulped down the glass, calm and composed, a smile crept into her like a tide. She set the glass in the pile of mugs in her sink and shined.
ATTORNEY GENERAL!!!!!

“WAHOO!!!!!!!” she shouted into the air.

She spun around the things on the floor, and slipped on a stray sheet and fell the couch, laughing hysterically that no matter how late she had to stay up, she was going to clean this apartment, pack up, and leave for Boston first thing tomorrow.

She started to organize her things and pick them up. She took the shopping bags she had carelessly brought home over the last month and hung the clothes inside the bags up in her closet. All those nice business suits which she never had the time to get out of the shopping bags. And all those nice casual clothes she was going to bring with her. Tiffany rarely went shopping, but when she did, she went all out. She spent a whole day. She knew she had some things in her Cambridge apartment as well, but she decided she didn’t need to stop by there anymore. She had some papers already here, and she’d take those to grade. As she piled stack over stack of briefs on the shelves, into the folders of the filing cabinet, she chose a few she was going to bring with her to Massachusetts.

At four in the morning, Tiffany had cleaned her living room, her desk room, her kitchen, her bedroom and closet. Her mugs were all washed, and her phone was charging in the phone set. Two or three of her briefs were sitting on her desk to be packed into her work bag for her trip, a yellow highlighter placed on top, and a stack of papers was at the side, with a red marker placed on top of that. By that, her packed up laptop computer sat in her nice desk chair, and a sappy romance novel was placed with it.

In her bedroom all the clothes she had planned to bring were folded and laid on the bed.

Tiffany was laid out on the couch, asleep.