.  What the heck was going on?

  Ruda asserted that Lucas wasn’t trustful; the guys, who just rushed into this place, shared a weird conversation. However, Lucas was smiling leisurely while he was in a quandary. How could he behave that way? What else was the message that those guys were talking about?

  In the chaotic situation, Lucas opened his mouth with a grin.

  “Yeah, I sent the message.”


  A guy then took out a paper from his inner pocket, which made me unable to repress my astonishment.

  [Miss me? It’s Lucas.

  Tell Jenny. I brought a present for her.]

  It was a picture of that message filling the whole TV screen.

  ‘Hold on,’ I touched my forehead in silence, thinking, ‘Then his remark about incapacitating the security system was actually––’


  The guy flung a question with his eyes on me.

  “Is she the present?”


  “Yeah, she’s the only kid Ruda has befriended at school. Would you also add these words to Jenny?” Smiling bitterly, Lucas continued, “Look how awful your son is in that successor position.”


  A guy in a suit asked Lucas as if he felt exhausted, “Geez, Lucas. Are you still vindictive?”


  Lucas looked back in the front at his words. I repeated what the guy just said in my head, ‘Still vindictive?’


  Lucas’ response wasn’t contrary to my expectations.

  “I have a right to be enraged. Don’t you think so? I checked what the distinguished Mr. Successor was doing and found out that he became a fugitive despite his position; besides, his friends, whom he had traded for his freedom, was just these…”


  He then turned around to look at me and drove a wedge in his cold remark.

  “Morons.”


  Considering his affectionate character, which lasted until just now, Lucas was talking very abusively.

  While I was petrified, the men in black, who glanced at the look on my face, began to blurt out, “Lucas, aren’t you speaking too harsh to a girl who’s way younger than you?”


  It was my time to get more dumbstruck. During the operational meeting at my house, Lucas introduced himself that he and Ruda were the same age; therefore, we didn’t need to speak politely to him as same-age friends. However, now the other guys were talking about the huge age difference between me and him. Thus, was Lucas also lying about his age?

  Another guy threw in a helping word, “Yeah, Lucas. You weren’t that type of guy, were you? You shouldn’t vent your anger on someone else.”


  Above all, I couldn’t understand their expression about ‘venting his anger on someone else.’ It sounded like Lucas had to take his anger out on someone or something.

  Having those thoughts in my head, I soon turned around at the footsteps coming from a different direction. The men in black around us, who looked in that direction one after another, began to lower their heads at the same time. Lucas, however, kept his neck straight obstinately and stared at the front.

  The last person, who showed up, was Yi Jenny in her black suits, the same outfit she wore when we met before.

  Her neatly parted hair was tied in a tight bun; her face looked pale and dry like a plaster cast. Unlike Ruda, she didn’t show any feelings of life or vigor in her black eyes. Throwing a cold glance at me, Yi Jenny soon switched her gaze to Lucas.

  Her lightly colored lips opened, “What’s all this fuss about?”


  Opening his arms wide as if to make an exaggerating gesture of welcoming her, Lucas replied, “As you can see, I have a gift for you.”


  Yi Jenny squirmed her narrow eyebrows, asking him, “Shouldn’t delivery guys, at least, knock the door?”


  “That’s why I sent you a message?”


  “If I was able to reply, I would have returned it right away.”


  Yi Jenny then bent her steps to approach me. The look in her eyes, which were dropped on me, who was still kneeling on the floor to talk with Yi Ruda, seemed arid.

  After a moment of silence, she stretched out her hand to me. Surprisingly, she even showed a smile at me.

  “Hi, dear. Glad to see you again.”


  Rolling my eyes for a second, I nodded and said, “Oh, um… hello.”


  “Why are you here?”


  Lucas then simply interfered Yi Jenny’s question, “She told me that she wanted to rescue your son from you. As much as I was disappointed at Ruda’s friend, I was disappointed at Ruda too. How low would your son fall?”


  Yi Jenny directed her eyes on Lucas and thundered against him in annoyance.

  “I never asked you to argue about my son’s condition, but….” Looking at the small flap on the door that was still open, Yi Jenny concluded, “… We do need to reconsider.”


  At that moment, a loud thud pierced through my ears.

  While I flinched in fright, a few men in black began to whisper to each other with knitted eyebrows.

  “Gosh, again… today…”


  “I wondered why that wasn’t happening today.”


  As soon as they grumbled in a low voice, Ruda’s sharp shriek came from the small opening on the door.

  “I’ll kill you if you touch my friend, Lucas! And you too!”


  Yi Jenny replied with a sneer, “We are a legitimate enterprise. Why would we do something to a high school kid?”


  Ruda then shifted his blame to somewhere else.

  “Shit, Lucas! Why would you have to bring her in? You’re gonna pay for this!!”


  Despite Ruda’s desperate words, Lucas also displayed a sneer on his face like Yi Jenny.

  Watching Lucas acting that way from beside him, I felt a part of my heart sting. So, that was his true color!

  Lucas soon responded as if he was mocking Ruda, “You should first get out of there and talk to us, kid!”


  “Shoot! Lucas, if you long for this successor position, just take it! You, in the first place…”


  Ignoring Ruda’s following words, Lucas swiped the cardkey through the reader next to the door. A red light appeared with a beep, then the small opening on the door closed.

  I still couldn’t understand this situation. Above all, I wasn’t able to find out yet the reason why the term ‘successor’ went back and forth between Lucas and Ruda.

  No, there was something I could assume, which was the relationship between Ruda and Lucas…


  As if I was an invisible person who didn’t need any further explanation, Lucas’ gaze simply past me and was now on Yi Jenny. He then opened his mouth still with a confident attitude.

  “I came here to prove the qualification of your successor. I guess he’s disqualified for the position.”


  “I never asked you to do so.”


  Regardless of Yi Jenny’s cold response, Lucas wasn’t discouraged at all. With a shrug, he continued, “Don’t I have this much right as an abandoned candidate?”


  Yes, so that was the reason. I bit my lips.

  The reason why Lucas knew thoroughly about the selection process of Reed Enterprises’ successor, and why he betrayed us in the end…


  Lucas was Ruda’s rival who sought the successor position.

  * * *

  Staring at us for quite a while, Yi Jenny heaved a sigh, at last, and suggested us moving to a different spot.

  While she ushered us to move to somewhere else, I tried hard to not even brush against Lucas’ fingertips by mistake. As if he noticed my demeanor, Lucas asked me in a mocking tone, “You don’t have to freak out like that. Now that I met Yi Jenny, I have no interest in you.”


  Without exchanging any eye contact, I replied, “Please don’t talk to me, sir.”


  “Ha…!”


  “Do you feel happy about deceiving other people?”


  Despite that he indicated me as a moron, Lucas returned to his friendly character, which I thought it as his true color at first. Curving his eyes into a slight grin, he flung a question shamelessly.

  “Come on, do you think I feel happy to do that? I needed to act that way. That’s all.”


  “Wish you can’t speak, sir.”


  He suddenly asked me, who was feeling dumbfounded, “Sir? Why are you talking politely?”


  Reading his countenance for a second, I replied, “… You aren’t the same age as me.”


  The person who reacted to my response was Yi Jenny. Walking ahead of us, she turned around and threw a question as if she felt ridiculous. It was such a big change I noticed for the first time in her expressionless face.

  ‘Does Lucas have that much age gap between us?’ Wondering about that question, I soon got surprised at Yi Jenny’s following words.

  “He’s twenty-four.”


  “Excuse me?”


  “I look quite younger than my age.”


  Neglecting Lucas’ shameless response, I counted our age difference with my fingers then shrieked, ‘No way! If Lucas is twenty-four years old, he is seven years older than us!’