His Match

Chapter 4 - Crossing the Line

After that little, let's call it "incident", at his house Han-Seok left me alone, unless it was for work. A little boring if you asked me. I had high expectations after that night, but, well.

As I was working he ordered the Inner Circle to his office and threw a tantrum like I've never seen before. Yes. I used the word tantrum. Like a five year old child. He was yelling at us how Vincenzo could beat us. Again.
Like, it wasn't our fault. He was just better this time. And I had to admit that his idea was brilliant. Throwing a party at the Plaza and even inviting the Italian Ambassador to stop the demolition? Genius!
But instead of acknowledging a competitor on eye level, he just overreacted. Like always. And since he has become really boring lately, I decided to add some fuel to spice things up again.
„Sir, if I may?", I slowly began. „I think it's important to stay calm and keep a cool head. We just need to think about another approach."
„Then think faster!", he lashed out at me. Oh wow.
„Of course, sir. We'll go to work right away to come up with an efficient solution", Mrs. Choi stepped in to get Han-Seok off my back. Not my intended goal here, but I still appreciated the gesture. Then her, Mr. Han and Han-Seo left. But I stayed back, not able to leave it alone. I felt a little ignored so it was time to bring his attention back to me. Wether it was good or bad.
„Mr. Jang, you really shouldn't be so sensitive when it comes to Vincenzo. You need to keep it together. It kind of makes you seem ... well, a little intimidated?"
I smiled on the inside because what I said had the desired effect.
He slowly turned his gaze on me, shooting daggers. Oh, hit a nerve? I anticipatingly awaited his reaction.
„Miss Kim, only because I want to get you in my bed, doesn't mean that you can cross the line. I'm your boss and you're gonna respect me as such", he said in a low voice. Then he started to steadily walk towards me while I was backing up, til I bumped into the wall behind me. That was so hot. But I had to play into his little intimidation game, so I pretended to be scared. Because that's what I always did. Pretending. Playing a role.
„Otherwise this could turn very ugly very fast, got it?" Is he threatening to k*ll me now? How dramatic. A little over the top in my opinion. As a result of me winding him up I had something else in mind, like him pushing me against the wall, or grabbing me by my throat, you know. But I was so not into this psycho k*ller thing. That's why I decided to end the fun here.
„Understood, sir. I will be more considerate from now on."
„Now go and help the others who are working on a solution instead of wasting my time!"
„Of course, sir."
It was fun while it lasted, but it still might be better if I left the topic Vincenzo alone from now on.

Oh and Mrs. Choi did find an "efficient solution" to our problem. She ordered her "chrystal balls" to run over Hong Yoo-Chan and Vincenzo with a truck. I mean, I was not a nice person either, but k*lling someone's last remaining parent was not cool. And it didn't even help us in any way. No, it all even backfired:
For starters, Han-Seo found a pillow drenched in red with syringes sticking out of it. He thought it was Cha-Young and got her arrested. But I knew exactly who was behind this, because I was aquainted with how he worked by now: Vincenzo.
And as if that wasn't enough, he set the Babel Pharmaceuticals Warehouse on fire and almost burned me alive in the process. Don't panic, it wasn't that bad. Let me tell you what happened:

How you all might know, there were certain rumors about filters and researchers getting sick, for quite some time now and as I didn't trust Han-Seok when it came to keeping me in the loop, because he didn't, I wanted to see for myself. That was the reason why I was at the warehouse that night.
Just when I entered one of the labs a guy in a hazmard suit came in and told us that they needed to do one of their routine cleaning sweeps. My suspicion arose at one of the researchers asking "Again?", so I looked at the hazmard guy more closely. But he didn't give away anything due to him being covered from head to toe. The only thing I was able to see were his eyes. Those eyes seemed familiar though ...
"You better leave too, ma'am. We'll let you know, once it's save to enter again", he said, directed at me, snapping me out of my thoughts. So I left without another word. The room, not the building of course. I hid out and watched the hazmard guy. He sprayed the walls with some liquid and I had no clue what it was at first, until I smelled it. Gasoline. My thoughts were running wild: Should I try and stop this or should I just let him burn the building to the ground? I chose the latter, because I thought it might p*ss Han-Seok off. And getting him p*ssed, was one of my favourite things to do these days. Plus, I didn't need to bother checking wether the accusations were true or not. Problem solved.
On my way out I already started to feel light-headed caused by the fumes, so I stumbled through the building, needing the walls for support.