Heart of Ice

Hand

Seeing Soonyoung after deciding that she was going to seduce him into marrying her made her shudder, not from him, but from herself and what she was going to do. She took the seat beside him, and he gave her a kind smile and a respectful bow.

Soonyoung had always been very courteous with her. She knew about his sexual escapades and his obsession with women, but he had never shown her any signs of disrespect that one would expect from someone like him. He treated her like who she was: his brother's wife.

Honestly, she would have preferred it had he been just a little more ill-mannered towards her. She wished he had flirted, or looked at her body, or treated her like he treated every other woman he saw. That would have made it so much easier to transgress the boundaries of good conduct with him herself.

"So... you'll be going back soon?" Soonyoung asked.

"You know?" Yewon asked him.

"He told me."

"How do you feel about it?" she asked him.

"I don't know about the politics side of it," Soonyoung shrugged. "But I know I'll be sad to see you go. It was nice having a new face around the palace."

Now was the time.

The king, queen and Yulhee were sitting at the table, and Yulhee was talking with them about one of her friends, and so none of them were paying attention to notice. Yewon hesitantly placed her hand over his. It seemed innocent at first, and he seemed to take it as a gesture of amity.

"I don't want to go back," she turned her body so that she was facing him, and held eye contact with him. "I need to stay," she told him, and she held his hand tighter.

Soonyoung raised an eyebrow towards her, noting that something was wrong with the way she was suddenly treating him.

"Marry me," she lightly whispered to him.

His eyes widened, "are you crazy?" he replied, also in a whisper.

"I need to stay here, so I'm asking you to marry me instead of Seungcheol," she repeated. He didn't seem very accepting of the suggestion.

It was then that Yulhee turned her attention to Soonyoung, blabbering on about something he did to her. Soonyoung turned away from Yewon and diverted his attention to Yulhee.

Haein was right, Yewon thought. Soonyoung wouldn't just agree to marriage without some kind of promise of physical indulgence.

From beneath the table she reached out and placed her hand on his thigh. He seemed startled, but he kept having the conversation with Yulhee. He didn't move his thigh or give any indication that he wanted her to stop though.

It was almost physically painful for her to break of rule of conduct she had ever known, but she did it anyways. She rubbed his thigh with her left hand, and ate with her right.

Eventually he put his hand over hers to stop her, gently removing her hand from over his thighs.

"We'll talk later," he told her softly when Yulhee turned to talk to her parents again. "I got the message."

-

Soonyoung did indeed go to her room an hour or so after the meal. When he did, he just crossed his arms and stared at her with curiosity.

"Marry me," she requested again.

"I feel like you've been completely desensitized to what marriage actually is," Soonyoung told her with a scoff.