Heiran chewed on her lip nervously as she scrolled through her emails. 

She was in her office at the company that day and she immediately felt something different in the air but she didn’t know what it was. People weren’t filtering in and out of her office nonstop or fighting to set up appointments like they normally did. Her phone was ringing but it wasn't from prospective clients or the accounting department but just the managers asking about little tasks that they normally wouldn't come to her with.

It was pretty obvious that all the time she spent working at home was programming her employees to become more self-sufficient.  She couldn’t complain. 

But her inbox was still a mess. 

The emails from Samsung were getting increasingly more agitated and enraged because of Yeonhee was stonewalling them. If it didn’t make her so anxious, she’d find it a little hilarious who a single person could make major executives so exasperated. 

But the reality was that the clock was ticking on her career. She could feel Samsung’s patience running thin and it was only a matter of days until they snapped and called everything off. With how distracted she had been the last few weeks, she hasn’t been monitoring the situation or coming up with a plan. 

What on earth was going to say when people turned to her when everything fell apart? Ooops?

“Eun is basically falling asleep out there. Is it that slow today?” Mark asked as he walked in. 

Heiran’s cheeks immediately burned up when he sat down on the couch. That was the other thing distracting her. 

She couldn’t stop thinking about last night at the bar. It wasn’t the first time she got drunk but it was the first time she’d ever let alcohol make her loose-lipped. She couldn’t believe that she sat next to him and boldly asked him to have with her after she had gone on about how attractive he was.

And he turned her down. 

It was humiliating. 

“U-Uh…yeah, slow.” She mumbled, keeping her eyes fixed on her screen. 

Mark tilted his head back and watched her. He had thought about her a lot when he got home earlier this morning. He thought about her when he was in the shower and when he was getting dressed and when he was driving over. 

He couldn’t not think about how pretty she looked, flushed and tipsy, telling him how much she wanted him. It was going to be something that played in his mind over and over again like one of his worst nightmares, he was sure. But he was also a man of his word. 

She wanted to act as if nothing happened, so he’d give her that.

“Did you eat yet?” He asked. 

She hummed non-committedly and he was sure she was doing it to avoid addressing him directly. 

He tried again, “Did you hear anything from the Samsung people, yet?”

“Yeah. This and that.” She breezed. 

He scoffed, “You’re the one that wanted to pretend last night didn’t happen. You’re doing a really ty job at pretending.”

She winced and closed her eyes before dropping her head against her table, “God, I know.”

He wished she would just own up to it. To tell him that yeah, she wanted him. She could apologize for being forward if she wanted but he just wanted to hear her say it. He didn’t know what he’d do or say but he needed to hear once more. 

But he wasn’t going to get it.

He’d just take great pleasure in knowing that in the depths of her mind, she was attracted to him. It made him feel less alone in his feelings for her. 

“Look, let’s just put it on the table and talk about it. Then we can promise never to bring it up again.” He said. 

She peeked at him over her computer screen, unsure, “Okay…”

“So, you were stood up.” He was giving her an easy out, he knew it. 

Heiran sat up straighter, “Right, some man-child with a tiny stood me up. I got drunk, I was hurt and vulnerable because I was rejected. I was embarrassed and then you bummed me out by asking me about my ex. I went on that date with the intentions of having some y times—“

“Please never call it that again.” Mark interrupted. 

She glared, “y times. So I was wound up and made some rather forward comments that I now regret.”

“Hmmm.” He said thoughtfully. 

She scowled, “What?”

“I vivdly remember you calling me hot. I’d like to discuss that please.” He mused. 

She ran her tongue along her teeth, “I was clearly drunk beyond reason.”

He bit down on his lip to avoid laughing, “But you clearly meant it anyways.”

“Okay fine, I find you mildly attractive in a very objective, you-have-a-symmetrical-face kind of way but we are technically work-colleagues with very different lives so it doesn’t really matter. Are we done?” She snapped. 

Mark tilted his head, “Do you remember what I said to you?”

Her face twisted in annoyance, “No, but I have a hazy memory of you not sleeping with me despite how I practically climbed into your lap. So, I’d rather not relive being rejected twice and just go on my day.”

That intrigued him. She had no memory of him saying that he’d want her, how he like Lucy, and would have no problem having her in his life too. And all the compliments, touches, and how he was a second away from kissing her; from signing his soul away to her.

If only she hadn’t implied wanting the same arrangement he had with Yeonhee, he probably would’ve kissed her too. 

No.

He didn’t need these thoughts. 

Not now.

At the end of the day, she was his boss’s daughter and his assignment. He had to chant that in his head, hell, he’d need to get it tattooed on his face at this rate. 

He couldn’t forget. 

Hopefully one day he'd get the chance to properly open up that part of his brain and unpack everything that Heiran made him feel.

“Are we good now? Can we agree never to bring this up and just go back to how things were?” She asked impatiently. 

Probably not. 

“You bet, duchess.” He purred. 

“Great, so do you have lunch plans?” She asked, straightening her back with a renewed confidence. It made him smile. She was back. 

He smirked, “My plans are typically your plans."

-----

“I thought we were going to eat.” He deadpanned as he took the plastic bag from her while she helped Lucy out of his car. 

He didn’t bother commenting on how Heiran basically lied to Lucy’s teachers to pull her out of school. 

She hummed and led them down the rows of headstones in the cemetery, “I never made promises. You played yourself there.” 

He said nothing and just held his hand out when Lucy started grasping at the air with her other hand. The little girl seemed a bit more distressed than she normally was. “Is it your mom’s birthday?”

Heiran raised a brow at him and he shrugged, “I saw your calendar.”

“Hmm, perceptive. Yeah, it is.” She paused and turned to him, “Are you okay being here?”

His lips hitched, “I’m fine, duchess. Where is she?”

She stopped at a headstone covered by the shade of a nearby tree. “Say hello.”

He waited until Heiran set up a blanket and the proper offerings before sitting down next to her and Lucy. He stayed silent and just watched her faff around before settling in. She took off her blazer off and pulled her knees up to her chest. He looked over at Lucy who was laying on her stomach. 

He thought she’d launch into a long speech or thoughtful recount of her day but they all just sat in silence. It was then that he realized that Heiran probably spoke to her mother a lot in her head or at her photo when she as home. 

Heiran didn’t seem like the type to act differently on special occasions. She was who she was. Knowing her, she probably thought that it didn’t mean anything to only talk to her mother on her birthday. She probably believed that she should be talking to her all the time. 

“What’s your mom like?” She asked. 

His instinct was to snort, “Why?”

She shrugged, “I’m curious. You never talk about her.”

“She isn’t you.” He said plainly. 

She tilted her head, “What does that mean?”

“She’s not a good mother. Never was.” He deadpanned. 

There was a thoughtful pause before she hugged herself tighter, “I’m sorry. That .”

“Yeah, I guess it does.” He murmured. His fingers itched to touch her, to skim his fingers down her spine or her arm. 

She gulped and he knew she was going to go for the big questions, “What did she do to you?”

He didn’t know where to begin. 

He wasn’t sure Heiran would take it well if she found you. It would probably scar her the way it scarred him. “She only cared about money, about getting more. Her and my dad. They cared about me a lot less.”

She knew that he didn’t answer her question but his words were enough to stab at her heart. Leaning against him, she sighed, “That really .”

He welcomed her weight like it helped outweigh the dark memories in his head. His fingers moved on their own, trailing up and down the inside of her arm. He couldn’t remember when touching her became so second-nature, “My mother wasn’t like you. She didn’t take me to extra-curricular or know what kind of after school snack I liked. She wouldn’t value my life over hers and she definitely wouldn’t have seemed so pained if something happened to me.”

She pulled his hand off of her and laced their fingers together. He stiffened for a second before letting her hold him, “You don’t know that.”

“I do. But it’s not just my mom. My dad was like that too.” He said. 

She sighed, “My father treated me like that.”

“Never treated me like that.” He teased.

She rolled her eyes and nudged him with her shoulder, “Don’t brag. They're still alive?”

"Yeah, but I like to pretend they're not. That way I don't have to think about them being out there somewhere walking around like they didn't ruin my life. It also prevents me from trying to track them down." He muttered. 

He wondered if she'd push him to find them. It was hard to explain why he didn't want to do that but instead, she sighed, "Yeah, that's a feeling I know."

“You asked me if I’m so loyal because I see your dad as kind of a father figure. I guess I do. He cared for me, he basically raised me and helped undo a ton of trauma. He gave me an out. I know you might not consider what I do as an escape but compared to where I was, it’s a much better life.” He explained. 

She pursed her lips and stared at her mother’s headstone, “Yeah but you don’t have to stop there.”

“What do you mean?”

“You can keep searching for an even better life. One without the things that are giving you new traumas. You don’t need to settle just because the life you’re living now is better than the one you had before.” She said. 

Lucy stood and walked up to the headstone and just touched it, tracing the carvings with her fingers. Mark said nothing. He had considered leaving in search of something better before, that’s why he had the bar. It just never felt necessary to actually leave before. 

If he left, where would he go?

He’d be alone. 

“My father wasn’t loyal to me or my mother. I think it’s unfair that he gets to have someone like you be so infallibly loyal to him.” She murmured. 

His lips twitched at her comment. Maybe one day he’d tell her how he grew up, what his parents did, what he had to do, and the places he wanted to go. He hoped he could tell her and that she’d be as warm and understanding as she was now. He could only pray that she wouldn’t pity him too much or look at him like tainted, damaged goods. 

Somehow all of that sharing felt more intimate than the idea of having with her.

“Our parents don’t define us, you know.” She mumbled, “My mother, no matter how much I love her, doesn’t define me. God bless, neither does my father. Whatever your parents did to you you didn’t deserve and must hurt a lot but it doesn’t define you. Even if it put you in the position you’re in now.” 

When she spoke, she made his feelings about his past make sense, even if they usually didn’t. “It’s not so much about them defining who I am as it is them defining my future.”

“It’s the same thing, Mark.” She explained, “I had to learn that the hard way. I had to rewire my brain to understand that I am not someone who everyone leaves and abandons. I’ve built a bond with Lucy and my friends that proves that. They’re my future. If you think your parents define you, then of course, that will dictate your future because you’re going to make decisions based on that.”

He furrowed his brows, “You’re losing me.”

“Okay, what is it about your parents that hangs over your head?” She asked.

It was a question he never liked to answer and never let himself think about but when she asked it, the answer was simple, “That I’m worthless. That if my parents, who are supposed to love me unconditionally could throw me away, then everyone else will too.”

She tensed and he figured that she hadn’t expected that answer from him. He was pretty sure he was constantly throwing her off. “Well, if y