Hello guys! thanks for taking the time to comment! I really hope you enjoy the story!

Thanks to Sandy as well, for being super awesome and helping me with the edits!

And, just to avoid confusion with the guys' job titles: Mu is CEO (chief executive officer) a.k.a in charge of the company, Yo is CFO (Chief Financial Officer) a.k.a. in charge of the money and So is COO (Chief Operating Officer) a.k.a. in charge of the daily running of the company.

To Melimelo: Hello! Glad to hear from you! Well... you'll get too see how they got together and how they broke up little by little! :) And there will be lots of Seol! :D thanks.

Anyway, on to the chapter!

Chapter TWO

Present day

Soo was nervous and kept looking around. She kept telling herself she wasn't even sure he still worked here...but even if he did, he was likely holed up in his office, ever the workaholic. She set out to speed things along by helping the lone makeup artist get the dancers ready, which also allowed her to plop Seol down in one of the chairs and keep an eye on her while the little girl colored.

So far so good. Woo Hee introduced her to some of the dancers, and they had a nice chat going. Soo got distracted for half a second when the makeup artist asked her if she knew how to make a wing-tip. Soo demonstrated on the girl sitting at her makeshift station.

One second Seol was there, meticulously coloring a pony Soo had drawn for her and the next she was gone...

…

Wang So was not in a good mood. He had been in a pointless meeting all day, watching as his two eldest brothers undermined each other in front of their father to the point that, just to end the fucking meeting, he had stepped in and wound up in charge of a project he had no interest in.

He had hoped to go out for a quick lunch to clear his head. Instead, he found the atrium of the Taejo Group's headquarters invaded by a posse of ballerinas.

"Baek Ah!" He yelled when he saw his favorite cousin and best friend.

"Hyung!" Baek Ah said with a genial smile. "Came to see me work?"

"Came to see why you aren't gone already."

"Hyung, that hurts my feelings."

"You know what I mean," So said, trying to calm himself down.

Baek Ah had the grace to look sheepish. "I'm sorry, I know we were supposed to be done an hour ago; but we had some troubles setting up. We'll be done soon, though, I promise!"

"I still can't believe Father allowed this."

"He's a secret patron of the arts?"

"He's a not-so-secret patron of ballerinas, apparently," So said humorlessly, knowing his father still liked to surround himself with beautiful young women, even though it annoyed his wife.

Baek Ah laughed. "We're just finishing with the Traditional Korean Dance Company and then we are done. It would have taken longer but our Director's P.A. happens to have a good hand at makeup and helped us get the girls ready faster."

So nodded, looking over the controlled chaos Baek Ah was sheepherding: the dozen or so dancers in traditional garb, the odd ballerina still standing around, and a photographer barking orders and positioning the girls in various compositions around the fountains and garden that took up almost half the atrium of the company's building.

"We have a group of Chinese investors coming in at three. I want this place impeccable by then," So said. As Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the company, this whole building was his responsibility.

"We'll be gone long before that."

They weren't, but that didn't matter. Before So could take his leave, his phone vibrated, and he took the call. To the untrained eye it might seem like So was impassive as ever but Baek Ah knew better: an explosion of So's legendary temper was about to happen.

"We agreed on a date," So said icily into the phone. "Tell Mr. Hwang Bo that unless he delivers by end of business hours today, I will sue him for breach of contract and bury him in so many legal documents that his grandchildren will need a lawyer." So was quiet for a moment, listening. "Yeah, I don't care who said it was okay. I'm the one you're dealing with now," So snapped and then hung up.

"Hyung?" Baek Ah asked carefully.

"I'm going to murder Won," So said, turning on his heel and stalking toward the elevators.

Baek Ah looked at the shoot he was supposed to supervise and then at his cousin who was about to murder their other cousin. Whatever Won had done this time, So would have his head if he wasn't stopped.

Making a choice, Baek Ah began to follow So. "Hyung, wait up!"

It fell on deaf ears as So continued his deadly march towards the elevator bank. Though it was rather impressive, Baek Ah had to admit, how everyone quickly got out of his way. As COO, So held these people's livelihoods in a far firmer grip than Yo as CFO or Mu as CEO; and they knew it. Though Yo was generally regarded as a bastard, it was So's temper everyone feared.

Baek Ah caught up with So as he waited for the elevator to arrive, which, of course, only irritated his cousin more.

"Fuck it, I'm taking the stairs," So declared, remembering Won's office was only on the fourth floor.

So took a step in the direction of the stairs, but that was as far as he got before something hit him in the stomach.

The whole atrium froze as So looked down. Way down.

In front of him was a small girl, staring at him with wide eyes. Noticing his frown, the girl quickly put both hands to her forehead and began to make dramatic noises. "Aww, aw, ouch."

The image of Hae Soo doing the same thing the day they had met flashed through his mind. "You bumped into me," He said automatically.

The little girl stopped and just stared up to him. Surprising everyone, most of all himself, So crouched down to the girl's level. "Who are you?"

"Seol, but I'm not supposed to talk to strangers. My Umma says so."

"Your Umma is right." So said with a nod, which seemed to please the little girl.

Seol reached out with a tiny finger and poked him right between his brows. "You'll get wrinkles if you frown."

So laughed. "So I've been told." There was just something so familiar about this girl, and he couldn't quite place what.

Before he could figure it out, there was a bit of a commotion behind them, and Seol turned her head to see what happened. That's when he saw it: the hairpin on the girl's head. He knew that hairpin. It was one of a kind.

"Hae Seol!" an achingly familiar voice called out. "There you are! We've talked about you wandering off!"

"Umma!" Seol said happily, running toward the woman who had called her name.

"Wait!" So said but Seol was already gone.

The woman had brown hair, dewy looking skin, and the same brown eyes as her daughter. "Don't scare me like that again," She was saying as she wrapped Seol in her arms and lifted her against her chest.

"Hae Soo." The name left his lips for the first time in years. There she was, in front of him as if she had never left, stealing his heart and shattering his life.

Soo turned at the sound of her name. Her eyes widened and he could hear her gasp.

Then someone screamed and there was a loud splash as someone fell into one of the fountains. So looked away for a split second, and when he looked back to where Hae Soo had stood, he only caught a glimpse of that hairpin as Soo practically ran out of the building with her daughter in her arms.

Without thinking So ran after her, but this time it seemed everyone was determined to get in his way as a bunch of people rushed toward the fountains to help whomever had fallen there.

By the time he got to the street it was only to see them get in a cab and speed away.

"Hyung!" Baek Ah panted as he caught up with him. "What is going on?"

"That woman-"

"Director Oh's P.A.?" Baek Ah asked, confused.

"You know her?"

-00-

6 years ago.

It took a couple of days before Soo saw W. So again. She was once again tasked with waiting for a delivery in the parking lot and bored out of her mind. By the time the delivery finally arrived, she was annoyed, tired and hungry.

The box was heavy, and the delivery person refused to help her take it inside. Muttering, she began to drag it toward the elevator.

"Oh, come on!" Soo muttered, pulling at the box, which was stuck for some reason. "Come on!" She said again, pulling harder until the box gave and lurched forward, sending her toppling backward in her heels.

She braced herself to fall on her ass, but before that could happen an arm wrapped around her middle and she was pulled back as the box fell on its side and spilled its contents.

"Are you all right?" A suspiciously familiar voice asked, and Soo turned to face the man who had saved her from a bad fall. She found herself face to face with W. So.

The first thing she noticed was that his hair was rather long in the front. In fact, it covered most of the left side of his face; she hadn't noticed the first time she had bumped into him, but it covered from his forehead to his cheekbone. And the makeup artist inside of her noticed that he had really nice cheekbones.

"Hey! Are you all right?" He asked again, shaking her a little.

"Yeah. Sorry." She mumbled. W. So let go of her quite abruptly and she almost fell again.

"You should be more careful."

"I usually am; I'm just having one of those days." Soo said, looking around for the envelopes and packages that had spilled all over the floor. "And now I'm going to get in trouble," She added, throwing the stuff back into the box he had righted.

"Probably," He agreed, earning a glare from Hae Soo. But then he picked up the box and began to carry it toward the elevator which had just opened. "And I'm not going to miss it."

Still glaring, Soo followed after him. She grew sulky as he refused to hand over the box which he carried as if it weighed nothing. Bastard.

"There you are!" Her supervisor said crossly as soon as Soo entered the copy room again. So was at her heels, placing the box on a nearby table. "I've been waiting for hours!"

"There was a bit of an incident," Soo began to explain, knowing she wouldn't get very far.

"Always with your excuses! I will report you to HR if you are this late again!"

"It's not my fault the delivery guy was late! You told me to not come back until he arrived!"

"The tales of your incompetence do not interest me."

"I, for one, find them fascinating." Wang So said, his voice glacier and almost robotic.

Soo's supervisor paled and turned to him, bowing deeply. "Director Wang, I didn't see you. I apologize if Hae Soo caused you any trouble. She is new, but we'll see that she is disciplined."

"Director Wang?" Soo asked in confused whisper. She looked at So up and down critically. He didn't notice.

"I'm sure she always causes trouble, but that's not the issue," W. So went on. He seemed like a completely different person. "Why are you sending personnel down to pick up a delivery that the messengers know they are supposed to bring up here directly? Does that seem like good management to you?"

"No, of course not," The manager said, her gaze never lifting from the ground.

"If she's so incompetent, then fire her," So said.

"Hey!" Soo cried out.

So went on as if she hadn't spoken. "Otherwise, have her do something actually worthwhile. We are not paying her so you can have someone to bully."

"I apologize, Sir."

So let the supervisor squirm for a few moments—which the small, petty side of Soo enjoyed—before asking for some documents and finally taking his leave.

Of course, that whole scene would end up costing Soo. She knew this, but she had to admit it had been kind of great.

-00-

Present Day.

Wang Yo did not need this. "What do you mean he's gone? We have a meeting in twenty minutes."

"I'm sorry, Sir," So's secretary Han Jae Min said in a quavering voice. How So put up with the man, Yo would never know. "He stepped out to eat, but when I went down to see if he had returned, your cousin said he was gone."

"Which cousin?"

"Um. Uh. Mr. Baek Ah."

"Is he still downstairs?"

"I think so, Sir."

Yo made his way to the ground floor of the building and sure enough, there was Baek Ah, standing next to a monitor and pointing stuff out to some other man holding a camera. They had never been particularly close. Yo was six years older than his cousin, and Baek Ah had always been a bit too artsy for them to ever form a close bond. And then there was the "So" of it all.

"You!" Yo said, pulling Baek Ah aside. "Where the fuck is So?"

"He said he had some important business to take care of and left," Baek Ah answered, not quite meeting his eyes.

"What is it? Speak up."

"It's his personal affair, okay, Yo-hyung? He just ran into someone from the past, and he had a rather strong reaction to her—"

"Her?" Yo jumped at the word.

"I know nothing more. And I'm very busy," Baek Ah hastily added.

Yo sighed. He wouldn't get very far with Baek Ah; he and So were ridiculously loyal to each other. But as far as he knew, there had only ever been one "her" in So's life. Yo reached for his phone as Baek Ah walked away. "Won," Yo said curtly, "I need you to look into something."

Author's Note: Thanks again! and From the next chapter:

They both froze for a moment before he pulled back. "I don't like being stared at."

"Because of the scar?" Soo asked. She had noticed the thin, discolored line crossing the bridge of his nose, under his eye and going into his cheekbone before, and figured that was why he kept his hair long in the front – he had spectacular bangs, to be honest, which were quite at odds with the rest of his rather sober style.

Slowly, he nodded. "And don't tell me it's not that bad, I know how it looks like."

"I won't say it then." And she hadn't asked how he had gotten it either. "It's a shame you cover your face so much, though, you have really good bone structure."