The End of Gods (A Welcome to the Underworld Novel, Book 4) (18 page)

She supplied a smirk as her answer.

In the two years that Soo Jin was with Ji Hoon, she had never given him her virginity. It wasn’t that he revolted her. On the contrary, she was very tempted to have sex with him. It wasn’t even that she was using sex as a weapon to keep him in order. The simple reason was that after years of training and killing men who attempted to rape her, she had come to treasure every bit of her virginity and wasn’t intent on giving it away so easily. Though she wouldn’t openly admit it to herself three years prior, and though Soo Jin had long given up on the fairytale wish for a Prince Charming, she still subconsciously found herself holding out for that one perfect guy.

She evaluated Tae Hyun’s reaction. It did not elude her how subtle Tae Hyun was when he pulled her hands off of him and locked them down on the table. He wouldn’t let her touch him any further. Like an adept charmer, he knew the skills in making someone weak in the knees—make them break their cold exterior and yearn for you. Much like the sex she withheld from Ji Hoon, Tae Hyun withheld his body from her, only allowing her a sample of the gift she could receive. Although Soo Jin should have found relief in this, she didn’t. He was a master of seduction, the very thing that fantasies were made out of. And unfortunately for her, he was well aware of the power he possessed over her. He didn’t let her touch him, and worse, he didn’t touch her either. He merely stared at her and nearly drove her crazy with his sultry eyes.

She had to rectify this.

She could not allow herself to fall prey to his charms. Being this weak was simply not an option.

“And I plan on being one until I die,” she told him coldly, lacing her voice with malice. “Sorry, seductive one, but the throne is more tantalizing to me than you. You can’t compete with it.”

Offense gripped his eyes. He did not hesitate to combat that statement.

“Can a throne keep you warm at night?” he asked pointedly, his lips drifting just above hers, its curves tempting her own mercilessly. “Can a throne run his lips all over you and worship you the way that pretty little body of yours is meant to be worshipped? Can a throne hold you in his arms and argue with you about the most nonsensical of things while secretly letting you win because all he cares about is making you happy? Can a throne give you phenomenal sex that will always leave you yearning for more? Can a throne give you his heart, what’s left of his soul, and kiss you with such adoration that you forget about the world?” He held her chin, staring deep into her eyes while measuring the answer she would give. “Can a throne do all that to you? Can it really rival me?”

“You think you’re God’s gift to women,” she muttered bitterly, wondering how it was possible that a person could be so arrogant.

“No,” he contended with effortless charm. “Any other women affected by my charms are casualties. I was gifted to you and only you.”

Releasing her hands from his iron grip, he guided her fingers across the surface of his well-built body. He made sure she felt the strength and power that made up his existence.

“This is all yours . . .”

Words from a distant past inundated her mind, whipping her out of any possible stupor Tae Hyun could put her in.

“I’m
not
Yoori,” she scowled, sobering up at the reference of her human counterpart. He had given himself to Yoori and only Yoori. She had not forgotten that; she would never move past it. She would be damned if she was anyone’s replacement. “I’m not the type of girl who allows anyone to sweep me off my feet, nor am I easily charmed. In saying that, I hope me being around you this long is enough to convince you that I’m not interested in you and that I will be more than happy to kill you. Now, if you’ll excuse me . . .”

She hopped off the table in a flash and blatantly ignored the fact that he was standing there, watching her with quiet eyes. She strode away, gathering her bearings and what was left of her logicality. Soo Jin was near the exit when his voice jolted her to a stop.

“I saw the trigger that Yoori watched.”

She spun around. “Excuse me?”

Her breath hitched when she saw that he was holding the heart-shaped necklace her father gave her— the very thing that decimated her amnesia and revived her. The pendant was dancing in midair while the silver chain hung listlessly from Tae Hyun’s index finger. As he stretched his hand out, his perceptive eyes noted her interest.

“In your haste for your grand entrance the other night, you forgot your USB stick.”

Soo Jin berated herself for forgetting something as important as a gift from her father. With her heart racing, she swept across the room and seized the necklace from his offering finger.

A smile broke out on his face—a warm, genuine smile that only the love of his life was ever bequeathed with. “Is it too forward of me to say how human you appeared in that video?”

“Then you watched the end,” she prompted tightly, internally horrified that someone else had seen herself in that pathetic state.

This USB stick held the most important moments of her life in its hands. It was the very trigger for everything that had transpired, and she was appalled that, of all people, it was Kwon Tae Hyun who saw its contents. She was embarrassed, she felt threatened, and now she felt all the more vulnerable standing in front of him. It did not matter that she had gathered her bearings before the video ended. The fact was that she still looked pathetically human in that video recording. It enraged her that it must have given Tae Hyun some sort of unrealistic hope that there was a chance for her to be “human” again.

How sorely mistaken he would be to find out that Soo Jin had promised herself that she would never return to that feeble state in her life.

She would
never
be human again.

“I did,” he confirmed, the warmth still present in his eyes.

Her heart hammering, Soo Jin knew she had to put the hostility back in the air between them. She didn’t need the one opponent she had spent her entire life training to fight to soften up on her.

“Then you know what a big impact I made on you?”

He nodded, a hint of desolation entering his eyes. “You were the one who spread those rumors and brought me back.”

“I am the reason for your
entire
life right now,” she agreed vehemently, wondering why he was being so civil to her when he knew all this. What would it take to push this guy over the edge? “I’m surprised that you’re still pursuing me when I was the reason you came back and killed your brother—when I was the ultimate reason you weren’t able to stay in your precious 1
st
layer with your friends.”

“The guilt of killing my own brother resides with me and only me,” he responded calmly. “With or without those rumors, I would’ve found out sooner or later, and the end result would’ve been the same.” He took a second to pause before raising a brow at her. “I didn’t realize I made such a big impact on you as well though.”

The way he said this left Soo Jin feeling uneasy.

“Then you know that you mean nothing more to me than an obstacle to get my coveted throne?”

“I know where I stand with you,” he answered instead. “But all of that aside, there is something I want to speak to you about.”

Soo Jin folded her arms and slanted her head. “What is it?”

“The tape of your father’s murder,” he began seriously. “The one that shows Young Jae working with my brother . . . I need to watch it.”

She arched a defensive and skeptical eyebrow. “Why?”

“Because I want to know why my brother was working with yours.”

“Why?”

What more could she say? She was a bitch in every sense of the word, and she didn’t plan on handing anything over to Tae Hyun unless she felt it was appropriate to. At that instant, it wasn’t necessary to give him anything. It wasn’t appropriate until he convinced her with his next statement.

“Because it’s my life, and I’m tired of being surrounded by secrets that everyone seems to hold from me.”

Despite her best efforts to combat his statement, what he said resonated with her. Secrets. Her life was surrounded by them. Secrets of her own, secrets of her unforgiving society, secrets of others’ pasts, others' actions, and others' mistakes that she not only had to pay for, but her future also had to pay for. Simply put, she was tired of all the secrets as well.

Just show it to him
, her frustrated conscience urged.
Just show it to him and leave. He does too many strange things to us anyway. If we throw him this bone, then he’ll leave us alone
.

“It’s in here,” she said with exasperation, throwing the necklace back at him. She couldn’t believe she was giving in.

Although he caught the pendant easily, he did not catch on to the concept the same way. “There was only one video file in here.”

“It’s hidden,” she told him, grinning pompously. She sauntered back and grabbed it from his hand. With teasing amusement, she asked, “Not such a gorgeous genius now, are you?”

The insult and unintentional compliment came out together before she could filter herself. She mentally cursed at herself and tried to remain cool and collected. Uncomfortably gathering her loose curls to one side, she bent forward to stick the USB stick into one of the ports of the computer.

He laughed amiably at her insult, his eyes lingering briefly to her butt just as she straightened up after inserting the USB stick in.

“I suck with technology. I guess that’s why I have a thing for geeky computer girls who are talented enough to hide files in a USB stick.”

“Was it not part of your training as a 1
st
layer heir?” she asked caustically, ignoring the unmistakable flirtatious tone in his voice. She turned on the computer and looked up at the 60-inch, flat screen TV hanging on the opposite wall. “Is that the monitor for the computer?”

“Yes,” he confirmed as she opened the file. “And yeah, they did train me. I just wasn’t good at it.”

“Ah yes, you would’ve been the perfect guy. If only you were skilled at that,” she mocked, loving that the guy wasn’t perfect and that she whooped his ass in matters pertaining to technology. Soo Jin was competitive like that. In all aspects of her life, she found it a necessity to be the best, and if she weren’t, then she would do anything to get rid of anyone who was better than her. Of course, the majority of the people in her enigmatic society shared this character trait as well. Since everyone’s arrogance and cockiness went through the roof in her world, she did not feel like a tool for harboring such a competitive mindset.

“I guess I’d have to settle with being stupid and charming,” he humored, knowing all too well that Soo Jin was rejoicing in the fact that he was crippled in the technology department.

Soo Jin hid a smile and kept her lips sealed. The bantering would have to end here. Any further playtime with Kwon Tae Hyun was dangerous.

Double-clicking on the second video icon in the folder that just appeared, Soo Jin pivoted around the table and stepped into the center of the room where Tae Hyun stood. Standing beside him, she mirrored his demeanor and folded her arms as well. Soo Jin made sure she was far enough away from him so that he didn’t get any ideas that they were chummy. She was only showing him the video because his bastard of an older brother was involved, and she felt like he deserved to watch it. But after the video ended, she would leave him
.
She did not plan on running into him again until they met for their war in front of the Underworld. By then, any residual feelings, which she knew belonged to her human counterpart, should subside. She would be able to kill him with ease and take the throne that was rightfully hers.

By then, she would officially be a God.

“That’s your father?”

His voice jarred her out of her reverie.

She dragged in a pained breath as her eyes landed on the monitor. She felt the strings of her heart tug for the person she saw on the screen. “Yes.”

A quiet, companionable silence waltzed between them while they observed the video. Her father was walking out of a warehouse with his men in tow. Watching this video still made her heart clench. Nevertheless, for a reason that she hated to admit, the simple and unexplainable fact that Tae Hyun was standing there, approximately two feet beside her, somehow made the experience less painful this time around.

Tae Hyun remained quiet as he watched, his eyes focusing with intensity on not only her father, but also the entire area the camera lens could catch.

Soo Jin eyed him and instantly saw that something had crossed his face—a knowledge of sorts when the video ended.

“What?”

The look on his face was making her curious.

Without saying anything, Tae Hyun went back to the computer, replayed the video, and returned beside her. His eyes were still locked on the monitor.

“What?” she prompted again, curious with his bizarre behavior.

“Who was recording this?” he inquired. When he asked this, the camera shook at an angle as her father walked out of the warehouse.

“Tony,” she answered, reciting what Ju Won told her. “Earlier that day, Hee Jun was planning on executing a small attack on my father. They were planning on recording his moves to anticipate future fights and to determine how Scorpions are trained. But before they could do that, they were unexpectedly interrupted when another attack occurred.”