This was instinct.
This was the kind of pull that made men burn down cities and call it longing.
“You okay?” Jaewan asked.
Still no answer.
“Yeah, no, that’s cool. You just looked like someone ran over your cat.”
Seungho muttered, “I don’t have a cat.”
“Exactly.”
Another beat.
“You gonna book the villa?”
“Already decided.”
“And the ring?”
Seungho didn’t blink.
Jaewan whistled under his breath.
“Damn. You’re really gonna let this one kill you, huh?”
“If he does, I’ll die warm.”
“Ugh. Gross. Don’t say things like that. My lunch is coming up.”
But there was no venom behind it.
Just the subtle glow of relief in Jaewan’s voice—the warmth of a friend who thought he’d never see the king bleed again, much less ache like this.
They didn’t say more. Didn’t need to.
But that night, in the quiet of his office at the top of Yeol Holdings, while the city glimmered like a bruised constellation through the floor-to-ceiling windows, he stood at his desk and reached for his assistant’s direct line.
“The Yeol villa,” he said simply. “The old one. The estate outside of town. I want it for the 22nd. Overnight. No staff. No press. Make sure the kitchen is stocked. Light the hearths.”
A pause. Then—“Just us.”
He didn’t want to startle him.
He didn’t want fireworks. Or presents. Or godddam balloons.
He wanted to build a room so warm the fox could walk in without flinching.
A place to land. To rest his fire-bitten bones without defending them.
A place where memory didn’t have to be spoken to be shared.
Later—after the call, after the schedule was adjusted and the retreat marked in discreet ink—Seungho opened a private tab on his tablet and typed a phrase he had never dared before.
“Twin rings, male engagement, elemental themes.”
He scrolled through options with the same look he wore on corporate battlefields.
