Chapter Ninety-Seven: The New Love
The hospital corridor was a cathedral of waiting.
White walls. Fluorescent lights that hummed a low, relentless requiem. The smell of antiseptic and fear. Taehyun stood motionless before the double doors of the surgical wing, his back to the world, his hands clasped behind him. He hadn't moved in three hours. Not when the doctors came out with clipped updates. Not when the nurses brought coffee that went cold in his grip. Not when Jihan placed a hand on his shoulder and murmured something about hope.
The doors were still closed.
Victor was still inside.
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The Cost
The administrator came with a clipboard and a practiced, somber expression. He was a small man with wire-rimmed glasses and the kind of voice that had delivered bad news so often it had worn smooth, like a river stone.
"Mr. Kim." He stopped a respectful distance away, his eyes flickering to the entourage of dark-suited men lining the corridor. "The preliminary estimates for Mr. Victor's care—the surgery, the ICU stay, the specialists required—"
"How much?" Taehyun didn't turn. His voice was flat, hollow.
The administrator named a figure. It was obscene. The kind of number that made ordinary people's lives crumble, that forced families to make impossible choices between debt and death.
Junho, who had been slumped in a plastic chair, sat up straighter. His eyes were red-rimmed, his jaw tight. "We don't fucking care about the money." The words came out rough, scraped raw by hours of waiting. "Just treat him. Whatever it costs. Whatever it takes."
Minho, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, nodded once. His expression was unreadable, but his knuckles were white where they gripped his own elbows.
Jinwoo, for once utterly silent, just stared at the surgical doors like he could will them open through sheer force of will.
Taehyun finally turned. His face was a mask of exhaustion and control, but his eyes—his eyes were hollow. "He gets the best," he said quietly. "The best surgeons. The best equipment. The best room. I don't care if you have to fly in specialists from overseas. I don't care if you have to buy an entirely new wing of this hospital. He lives. Do you understand me?"
The administrator swallowed. "Yes, Mr. Kim. Of course."
"Then stop standing here talking about money and go save my brother."
---
The Surgery
The hours crawled.
Word spread through the underworld like wildfire. The Lee Consortium had crossed a line—not just by targeting the wives, but by nearly killing one of Kim Taehyun's own. Retribution would come. That was a certainty. But for now, in the sterile quiet of the hospital corridor, there was only waiting.
Sara arrived at some point, her face pale, her eyes swollen. She had driven herself, which was a miracle given how badly her hands were shaking. She didn't say anything. Just sank into the chair beside Junho and stared at the doors.
Arshi came too, despite Jihan's protests. She was pale, still in shock, her hand pressed protectively over her belly. Jihan hovered beside her, his arm a constant presence around her shoulders, his eyes never leaving her face. He had almost lost her. He wasn't letting her out of his sight.
I sat between Sara and Arshi, my shoulder bandaged, my arm in a sling. The wound was superficial—a graze, the doctors said. I'd been lucky. The scarf Arshi had pressed against it had probably saved me from worse.
Lucky.
The word felt obscene, given what Victor had sacrificed.
---
The surgical light above the doors switched from red to green at 4:17 AM.
The surgeon emerged, still in his scrubs, his face lined with exhaustion. He looked like a man who had just run a marathon—or fought a war. His hands, when he removed his gloves, were steady, but his eyes told a different story.
"The operation was successful." The words landed like stones in still water, sending ripples of relief through the corridor. "We were able to repair the damage to his lung and shoulder. The bullet in his thigh missed the femoral artery by less than a centimeter. He's stable."
Taehyun's shoulders dropped—just a fraction, just enough to show the weight he'd been carrying. "But?"
The surgeon's pause was a sentence in itself. "He suffered significant blood loss. There was a moment—" He stopped, choosing his words carefully. "His brain was without adequate oxygen for longer than we would have liked. He's been placed in a medically induced coma to reduce swelling and give his body time to heal."
"A coma." Junho's voice was flat. "How long?"
The surgeon shook his head. "It's impossible to say. Days. Weeks. Sometimes longer. We'll monitor him closely, run tests, adjust the sedation as needed. When his brain activity shows improvement, we'll begin the process of waking him."
"And if it doesn't?" Sara's voice was small, barely audible.
The surgeon met her eyes, and his silence was answer enough.
---
The hours blurred together.
Visitors came and went. Jihan took Arshi home—she needed rest, needed to be away from the sterile smell of death, needed to feel the safety of her own walls. Sara and I stayed.
I don't know why I stayed. I barely knew Victor. He was a shadow, a sentinel, a man who had followed me around for weeks, critiquing my cereal choices and standing too close and making me feel safe in a world that wasn't safe at all.
But he had eaten that raspberry.
He had sat at our table, just for a moment, and let himself be human.
And he had taken a bullet for me. For all of us.
Sara was quiet beside me, her head resting on my shoulder, her eyes fixed on the closed door of Victor's room. The nurses had let us in once, briefly, just to see him. He was a shell of himself—pale against the white sheets, tubes snaking from his arms, machines beeping in the background like a countdown to something none of us wanted to name.
Sara had stood at the foot of his bed, staring at his face—those sharp, cold features softened by sleep, the severe lines of his jaw relaxed, the grey eyes hidden behind closed lids.
She hadn't cried then either.
But I saw her hand reach out, just for a moment, as if she wanted to touch him. As if she wanted to feel the warmth of his skin, to confirm he was still there.
She pulled back before making contact.
"Why didn't you tell me?" I asked softly, hours later, when the waiting room had emptied and it was just the two of us and the soft hum of the vending machine.
Sara didn't pretend to misunderstand. "I didn't know until today."
"When?"
"When he ate that raspberry." A ghost of a smile touched her lips. "He looked at it like it was a bomb. And then he ate it anyway. For us. For me." She shook her head. "I don't even know what that means. I don't know if it means anything. He's… he's Victor. He's a robot. He's a spreadsheet in human form. But when he went down—when I saw him fall—" Her voice cracked. "I felt like someone had reached into my chest and ripped out my heart."
I pulled her close, my arm around her shoulders, ignoring the twinge of pain from my own wound. "He's going to be okay."
"You don't know that."
"No." I pressed a kiss to her hair. "But I know him. And he's too stubborn to die."
___
Sara fell asleep against my shoulder, her face pale, her lips parted, her fingers still loosely tangled with mine. The morning light was stronger now, filtering through the window in pale gold stripes, painting the sterile waiting room in something almost like warmth.
Taehyun had gone to make calls—to the hospital administration, to the private security firm that would handle the aftermath of the attack, to the men who were still hunting for the sniper who had put Victor in this bed.
Junho was asleep in a chair across the room, his head thrown back, his mouth open, snoring softly. Minho had taken over pacing duty, his footsteps a quiet, rhythmic counterpoint to the hum of the machines.
Jinwoo had gone to get coffee. Real coffee, not the sludge from the waiting room machine. He'd been gone for an hour, which meant he'd either found a café far away or gotten lost in his own thoughts. Both were equally likely.
I closed my eyes, just for a moment, just to rest them.
The image of Victor on the pavement—blood spreading, eyes closing, Taehyun's hands pressing against his chest—flashed behind my lids.
I opened my eyes again.
Sara stirred, her head lifting, her eyes blinking in the pale light.
"Did I fall asleep?" she mumbled.
"For a little while."
"Any news?"
I shook my head.
She looked toward Victor's door—still closed, still guarded, still keeping its secrets. Her hand found mine again, her fingers cold despite the warmth of the room.
"I like him," she said quietly. "I don't know when it happened. I don't know how. But I like him. A lot."
"I know."
"He probably doesn't even know my name. He calls me 'the friend' or 'the loud one.' He doesn't even—" Her voice broke. "He doesn't even know I exist."
"He knows you exist, Sara."
"He knows I exist as a security risk. As a variable. As someone who might distract him from his job." She laughed, a wet, broken sound. "I'm a distraction. That's all I've ever been."
I pulled her close, my arm around her shoulders, my cheek pressed to her hair. "You're not a distraction. You're a person. And he sees you. Even if he doesn't know how to show it."
She was quiet for a long moment. Then, softly: "Do you think he'll wake up?"
I thought about Victor. About his grey eyes and his flat voice and the way he'd eaten a raspberry like it was a new emotion he was trying on for size. About the way he'd crouched beside my bed during a thunderstorm and told me that fear wasn't rational—that's why it was fear.
"Yes," I said. "I think he'll wake up. And when he does, you're going to tell him how you feel."
Sara pulled back, her eyes wide. "I can't do that."
"You can."
"He'll probably tell me I'm a security risk and walk away."
"Then at least you'll know." I squeezed her hand. "And maybe—just maybe—he'll surprise you."
She looked toward Victor's door again, her expression softening into something that looked like hope.
"Maybe," she whispered.
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