Marriage Mate: 33

A brief silence passed. Han Yu-young asked again with a dumbfounded expression.

“…What?”

“Don’t make me say it twice. You heard me.”

Choi Do-won muttered with a faint trace of irritation on his face. Regardless, Yu-young frantically tried to process what he had just heard.

So, he’s saying he’ll grant my request? But why all of a sudden?

As he stared blankly at Do-won, unable to grasp his intentions, Do-won continued in a businesslike tone.

“But there’s a condition.”

“W-what… kind of condition?”

At this point, if Do-won had asked for one of his kidneys, Yu-young felt like he would have given it up without hesitation. His eyes, filled with hope, looked straight at Do-won.

“I want you to do the same for me.”

“…Do what?”

“Pretend to be my lover.”

Yu-young’s eyes widened like a rabbit’s.

I… pretend to be the team leader’s lover…?

He couldn’t even begin to picture it. As he stared up at Do-won, full of questions, Do-won added an explanation.

“You don’t have to do anything right away. You don’t even have to meet my parents.

“It’s just that I can’t use your name as I please, so I’m asking for your consent in advance.”

But before Yu-young could fully process that, a phone started ringing. This time, it was his.

“Y-yes, hello?”

-Where are you? Why aren’t you here? You’re not thinking of messing around, are you?

“I’m not! You already stationed bodyguards all around the hotel anyway, didn’t you?”

—Ahem… Regardless, get down here quickly.

As if things weren’t already confusing enough, his father’s urgency made his head feel like it was about to explode. Yu-young steadied his voice and responded as nonchalantly as possible. He needed more time to talk with Do-won.

“Al…right. Just give me 20 minutes to fix my hair. It got messy while changing clothes…”

—Your hair? Should I send a stylist?

“No! That won’t be necessary. I can fix it myself.”

—Fine. There’s still plenty of time before the meeting, so take your time.

Whether his excuse worked or not, his father ended the call in a much calmer tone.

At least he had bought himself some time. But if he stalled any longer, his father would likely storm up to his room. He had to sort out this situation before that happened. Looking blankly at Do-won, Yu-young spoke up.

“T-team leader… Let me try repeating what I understand. Or correct me if I’m wrong.”

Do-won raised an eyebrow leisurely, signaling him to go ahead.

“So… You’re going to pretend to be my… um, my lover in front of my father. And I don’t have to do anything except let you tell your parents that we’re dating. Is that correct?”

“Correct.”

Do-won’s calm response left Yu-young speechless. He already knew the man was as stiff as a board, but he hadn’t expected him to propose something like this with such a businesslike expression. At this point, he wasn’t even sure if they were at work or a hotel anymore.

How on earth was he supposed to act all lovey-dovey with this stiff guy? Hugging a pole on the street and calling it his lover would be easier.

But that was a problem for later. Right now, there were bigger issues to deal with. The first was Do-won’s outfit—he was still in his training clothes.

Where on earth could they get a suit in 20 minutes?

With a worried expression, Yu-young asked, “Um… Team leader, won’t that outfit be a problem?”

“You said 20 minutes, right?”

Glancing down at his watch, Do-won spoke with an indifferent expression.

“I’ll take care of the suit. Don’t worry. Let’s focus on coordinating our story.”

“…What?”

Yu-young’s eyes widened again. His face turned bright red in an instant. Do-won looked at him with an exasperated expression.

“What are you thinking? If we’re pretending to be lovers, we at least need a script. How long we’ve been dating, where we met—those kinds of details.”

“…Oh.”

“You really don’t look the part.”

With a light scolding, Do-won pulled out his phone and made a call. He was asking someone to prepare a suit. Watching this, Yu-young, still flushed red, grabbed Do-won’s arm and pulled him toward the room.

“T-team leader… Ahem. I don’t have any ulterior motives, but let’s… go inside. We can’t have this conversation out here.”

“Alright.”

Unlike Yu-young, whose face was burning, Do-won remained expressionless and nodded without hesitation.

Leading him into the room where he had changed earlier, Yu-young awkwardly stretched out both hands and gestured toward the bed.

“Here…”

…Now that he thought about it, offering this spot to his superior felt a bit awkward. Yu-young’s outstretched arms quickly moved past the bed and pointed toward the chair in front of the table.

“Please… sit here.”

“You should sit as well, Assistant Han.”

Do-won perched lightly on the chair and began speaking in a swift, precise tone.

“Let’s say we’ve been dating for about a year. I think that amount of time is enough to make it seem like a relationship with marriage in mind, and it wouldn’t be too strange if we broke up.”

“Uh, Team Leader. Wait, wait a second.”

Yu-young hurriedly waved his hands to stop him. Do-won’s logic was sound, but there was another issue at hand.

“Uh… I’m sorry, but there’s something I haven’t told you. I didn’t mean to hide it on purpose—I just didn’t have the chance earlier.”

“What is it?”

“Well…”

His lips suddenly felt dry. What if this made Do-won back out? But at this point, there was no way to hide it—not when he had to face his father in just 20 minutes. Yu-young forced the words out of his mouth.

“…My father… The man you saw earlier—that’s him.”

For once, Do-won’s eyes widened slightly. A heavy silence lingered for about five seconds before he spoke.

“Are you saying… President Han San-chul of SC?”

“…Yes.”

Do-won pressed his lips together briefly, then exhaled sharply.

“That’s surprising.”

Despite his words, his momentary flicker of surprise was brief. Still, those few words carried a lot of meaning, and Yu-young could guess what was going through his mind without him needing to elaborate.

Something along the lines of: Your father is a company president, so why are you struggling like this?

But there was no time to explain his circumstances in detail. Fortunately, Do-won didn’t seem to be demanding further explanation. Yu-young quickly continued.

“…Anyway, my father is aware that I didn’t know you before. So a one-year relationship won’t be believable.”

Do-won nodded immediately, understanding the situation.

“Then let’s say we fell in love at first sight. We’re not serious yet, but we have mutual feelings for each other.”

How could someone say something as romantic as love at first sight in such a stiff tone?

Still, Yu-young didn’t argue and simply nodded. That settled the issues of how they met and how long they’d been together.

“Then… when is the suit arriving?”

“It should be here any moment now.”

“Alright, shall we start getting ready to go out?”

“Wait.”

As Yu-young flusteredly fidgeted in a rush, Do-won grabbed his wrist and calmly spoke.

“From what I remember during, your father is an Alpha. Am I right?”

“Ah, yes. But why…?”

Yu-young’s eyes briefly widened before his brows furrowed, and he slowly nodded. He had immediately grasped Do-won’s intention.

“…Pheromones…”

“With our pheromones this mismatched, we won’t fool anyone.”

This was bad. Yu-young bit his lip with a troubled expression.

What now?

As Do-won pointed out, lovers naturally have frequent physical contact, which causes their pheromones to blend over time, forming a distinct bond.

While the most natural way for this to happen was through marking, a deep physical and emotional connection could produce a similarly strong fusion.

This made it easier to regulate each other’s heat or rut cycles.

Their claimed relationship timeline was only a few days at best, so they didn’t need that level of closeness, but they did need to show at least some level of intimacy.

Yet, their pheromones were completely separate, aggressively asserting their individual presence instead of blending. The fact that they were both dominants made it even worse—there was no sign of compatibility.

At this rate, they were no different from strangers who had just brushed past each other on the street.

“S-so… what do we do?”

Yu-young asked anxiously, looking down at Do-won, who was still seated. There were only about ten minutes left.

How were they supposed to make their pheromones resemble a couple’s in that short time?

His parents had watched him grow up his entire life. There was no way they would be fooled by anything half-hearted.

Do-won pondered for a moment, then let out a short sigh. Slowly, he rose from his chair.

As his tall frame loomed right in front of Yu-young, the sheer presence of him felt overwhelming. Just as Yu-young instinctively tried to take a step back—

A firm arm wrapped around his waist.

“Assistant Han.”

The moment Yu-young’s eyes widened—

His body was pulled in close.

“Looks like we need to match our lips as well.”