"I am not an invalid, and I certainly didn't ask for a food taster."
Min-ho's voice is a whip, cracking through the silence of the VIP suite. He's sitting upright now, his back against the pillows, watching me with an expression that borders on loathing. On the over-bed table sits a tray of steaming abalone porridge, provided by the hospital's premium nutrition wing.
I don't look at him. I can't. If I meet those cold, stranger's eyes, I'll lose my nerve. Instead, I carefully dip a clean plastic spoon into the bowl, taking a small, deliberate bite.
"It's a safety protocol," I say, my voice steady despite the way my heart is trying to kick its way out of my ribs. "The kitchen staff at this hospital is vetted, but mistakes happen."
"Mistakes?" Min-ho lets out a dry, jagged laugh. "You've been standing by that window for three hours like you're expecting a sniper. You intercepted my water. You checked the seal on my IV bag twice. You aren't acting like a wife, Lee Hana. You're acting like a prison warden."
I swallow the porridge. It's bland and tastes like ash in my mouth. "I'm acting like someone who wants you to stay alive long enough to regain your memory."
"And what if I don't want it back?" He leans forward, the movement sharp and aggressive. "Every word out of your mouth sounds like a script. You tell me we're married, yet I feel nothing when I look at you. No warmth. No recognition. Just a persistent, annoying sense of 'wrongness.' If this is my life, I'd rather stay in 2021."
I flinch as if he'd slapped me. Persistent. Annoying. Those are the words he uses for the woman who once held him while he cried after losing his first major case.
"You don't mean that," I whisper.
"Don't tell me what I mean!" he snaps. "I am a Prosecutor. I deal in evidence, not sentiment. And the evidence right now suggests that you are a very skilled, very obsessive woman who has somehow inserted herself into my life during a gap I can't account for. Why are you really here?"
"I'm here because I love you," I say, finally looking at him.
He doesn't even blink. "A hollow statement. Anyone can say that. If you loved me, you'd respect my request for space. Instead, you're hovering. You're suffocating me."
"I'm protecting you!" I move toward the bed, my good hand reaching out instinctively, but I stop myself before I touch the railing. "Min-ho, the 'janitor' in the stairwell wasn't a hallucination. The black sedan in the garage wasn't a mistake. There are people who want the Red File, and they think you still have it. They think you're a threat."
"The Red File," he repeats, his brow furrowing. "Again with this spy novel nonsense. If I was in such danger, why aren't there police officers at my door? Why is it just you and that lawyer, Ji-hoon?"
"Because the police can't be trusted," I say, my voice dropping to a whisper. I scan the ceiling corners, looking for the tiny, tell-tale blink of a hidden lens. "The Park Group has tentacles everywhere. The moment we call for a formal guard, we're signaling to the mole in the department that you're vulnerable. I'm the only one who knows the tactical layout of this wing. I'm the only one who doesn't have a price."
Min-ho stares at me for a long beat. For a second, the prosecutor in him—the man who looks for the lie in the eyes—seems to waver. He looks at my sling, at the red stain beginning to seep through the fresh bandage.
"You're bleeding again," he says. It's not soft. It's an observation, like he's noting a smudge on a legal brief.
"It's fine."
"It's not fine. You're messy. You're chaotic." He sighs, rubbing his temples. "Go home, Hana. Wash the blood off. Sleep. If I'm in as much danger as you claim, your presence in a sling isn't going to stop a professional."
"I'm not leaving."
"Then sit down and shut up," he says, turning his head toward the window. "Your breathing is distracting me. I'm trying to reconstruct my closing argument for the 2021 embezzlement case."
I sink into the armchair in the corner, the one that's become my fortress. I don't sit back. I stay on the edge, my eyes darting between the door and the vitals monitor. Every time the door handle rattles, my hand twitches toward the heavy metal carafe on the nightstand. It's the only weapon I have.
An hour passes in agonizing silence. The only sound is the rhythmic hiss-whoosh of the air filtration and the distant squeak of cart wheels in the hallway.
Suddenly, Min-ho speaks without turning his head. "The dog."
I blink, startled. "What?"
"You said we have a dog. In the 'future.'"
"A Golden Retriever mix," I say, a small, genuine smile tugging at my lips. "His name is Gureum. Because he looks like a little cloud. You found him tied to a pole outside the courthouse on a rainy night. You swore we were only fostering him for a week. That was two years ago."
Min-ho is silent. He's looking at his hands, his thumb tracing the place where his wedding ring should be. "I hate dogs. They're dirty. They require a schedule I don't have."
"You bought him a heated bed and a custom leather collar with his name embossed in gold," I counter. "You take him for walks at 5:00 AM because you say the morning air helps you think, but I know it's because you like the way he jumps when he sees a butterfly."
Min-ho's jaw tightens. "Stop. Just... stop inventing these stories. It's manipulative."
"It's the truth!"
"It's your truth!" he roars, turning to face me, his eyes blazing with a terrifying intensity. "Can't you see how terrifying this is for me? I wake up and everyone is telling me I'm a different person! They tell me I love things I hate! They tell me I married a woman I don't recognize! You're trying to erase the man I am and replace him with this... this 'Cloud-walking' version of myself!"
"I'm not erasing you, I'm trying to find you!" I stand up, the frustration finally boiling over. "The man you were in 2021 was lonely and bitter, Min-ho! You lived on black coffee and spite! The man I married learned how to laugh! He learned how to trust!"
"Then he was weak!" Min-ho points a trembling finger at the door. "Trust is a liability! If that version of me is the one who ended up with a hole in his head and a stranger in his room, then I don't want him! I want my life back! I want my sanity back!"
I open my mouth to argue, but a soft, rhythmic clicking sound from the hallway stops me cold.
Click. Click. Click.
The sound of high heels. Expensive heels. The kind that don't belong on a nurse.
My bodyguard instincts surge. I move, despite the agony in my shoulder, stepping between the door and Min-ho's bed. I grab the heavy water carafe, my knuckles turning white.
"What are you doing now?" Min-ho groans, rolling his eyes. "Is it the 'assassin' again? Or just a lady in a hurry?"
"Stay back," I hiss.
The door handle turns. Slowly. Deliberately.
I tense, ready to swing, ready to scream for Ji-hoon, ready to die if it means giving Min-ho five seconds to hide.
The door swings open.
A wave of expensive jasmine perfume hits me first—a scent that feels like a ghost from a past I've only heard about in Min-ho's rare moments of vulnerability. Then, the woman appears.
She is draped in a cream-colored cashmere coat that screams old money. Her hair is a perfect, glossy chestnut wave, falling over her shoulders in a way that makes my own matted, blood-stained hair feel like a badge of shame. She holds a massive bouquet of white lilies—the flowers of mourning, or of rebirth.
She stops in the doorway, her eyes widening as they land on the bed. She doesn't even acknowledge my presence, even though I'm standing two feet in front of her with a carafe raised like a club.
"Min-ho?" she whispers. Her voice is a soft, breathy chime, filled with a delicate, practiced heartbreak.
I wait for Min-ho to snap. I wait for him to demand to know who she is. I wait for the cold, "Prosecutor" mask to fall into place.
Instead, the silence in the room changes. It's no longer heavy with tension; it's suddenly charged with a strange, electric light.
I look back at Min-ho.
My heart stops.
The man who hasn't given me a single kind look in three days—the man who flinched at my touch and called me 'disturbing'—is transformed. His eyes are wide, shimmering with a sudden, radiant warmth. His lips part, and a genuine, breathtaking smile spreads across his face—the kind of smile I haven't seen since the morning of our anniversary.
It's the smile of a man who has finally found his North Star.
"So-hee?" Min-ho breathes, his voice trembling with a level of emotion that makes my skin crawl. "Is it really you?"
The woman drops the lilies. They scatter across the floor like broken glass. She rushes past me, her silk coat brushing against my arm, and I'm too stunned to stop her. She throws herself toward him, and Min-ho—the man who said he hated being touched—reaches out his good arm and pulls her into a desperate, crushing embrace.
"I'm here," she sobs into his neck. "I'm here, Min-ho. I never should have left. I'm so sorry."
I stand there, the water carafe still clutched in my hand, feeling like a ghost haunting my own life. I am invisible. I am the 'stranger' in the corner while my husband holds a woman who, according to the files I've spent years protecting him from, is the daughter of his greatest enemy.
Min-ho looks at me over So-hee's shoulder. The warmth in his eyes vanishes instantly, replaced by a look of such profound, icy dismissal that it feels like a physical blow.
He looks at me, then at the woman in his arms, his choice made before a single word of truth could be spoken.
"Hana," he says, his voice cold and final. "You can leave now. My family is here."
I look at So-hee. She is buried in his chest, but as he speaks, she shifts her head just a fraction of an inch.
She looks at me over his shoulder.
The tears are still on her cheeks, but her eyes are dry. They are sharp, triumphant, and utterly lethal. She doesn't say a word, but the question hanging in the air is louder than any scream.
If I am the shield and she is the sword, who does the man belong to when he's forgotten why he needed a shield in the first place?