“How can you be so sure?” I ask.

“Don't you notice something strange about Dr. Lee?” Hyeon Jae says.

I pick the last slice of pizza in the first box. With the stress and confusion of Shi Won's last few days on earth, I didn't bother looking at that doctor. There's nothing strange about her. I don't see any reason why she can be involved with this.

“No.”

“The way he looks at Joon Hee. She has a thing for him. But as we all know, he's in love with somebody else.”

I look down. Guilt shakes up my heart at the thought of him, incarcerated for something he probably didn't do.

He continues. “She got mad when they kissed and Joon Hee didn't go all the way. Maybe that was her reason for killing Shi Won.”

I slam the table and stand up.

“That's absurd! How can that...”

“I talked to the nurses in their station this morning. Dr. Lee ordered one of them to give Shi Won an IV shot. And that nurse did as she was told. Now she just resigned.”

I instantly see that nurse as a ray of hope. I try to calm myself down and thankfully, I did.

“Where can we find her now?” I ask.

“The last time I heard, she's in Pocheon.”

It's past nine in the evening when Lee Hyun Mi finished her rounds. She comes inside her office, stretching her arms and yawning with her eyes closed. She sits on her swivel chair and puts both feet on the table. Taking a good lean on the backrest, she thinks of going on a vacation. Jeju, Tokyo or Malibu. Options are rolling in her mind but she's not in the mood to choose yet.

She's about to fall asleep when the blinds of her window move. Hyun Mi's eyes shot open and looks at the window. The blinds remain untouched. The pens on her table fall n the floor. The starnds of her hair stand in unison. She's alone in the room. But now she thinks she's not.

“Is somebody here?” she asks. The cool air brushing her skin is the only answer. Hyun Mi feels nothing but spooked.

Soon the papers on her table begin flying. She stares at them in astonishment. And when all the papers land softly on the floor, Hyun Mi sees the face of the woman she just murdered.

Then her strangled scream fills the cramped office.

Hyeon Jae pulls up in front of an ancestral house located south of Pocheon's city proper. The mid-morning air feels balmy and almost hopeful to me. The place is quiet and the house seems to be inhabited by a single person.

Neither of us gets out of the car. I lean my head on the backrest and speak up.

“You sure about this?” I ask him.

“Yes. There's no turning back now.”

“Then let's do this.”

I hop out of the car and take a deep breath.