Chapter 62

On the day of his escape, Gi-hyeon had abandoned his brand-new car at the rest area, grabbing only a bag stuffed with cash and a few items saturated with Jo Yeon-oh’s pheromones before bolting straight for the public restrooms.

Tugging his ball cap low to obscure his face from the security cameras, he slipped inside and immediately accosted the first middle-aged man he encountered.

“I’m so sorry,” he had pleaded, layering his voice with manufactured panic. “I got separated from my group and lost my phone. Could I possibly borrow yours for a second?”

Convinced of the emergency, the man had readily handed over the device.

Gi-hyeon quickly dialed Yang Jisu. When the call went unanswered, panic clawed at his throat. Just as he debated returning the phone, Jisu called back. Gi-hyeon instantly unloaded a highly condensed version of his desperate situation. Despite the wildly abrupt demand for sanctuary, Jisu merely complained about being short-staffed and rattled off an address, which Gi-hyeon immediately burned into his memory.

“Thank you,” he told the stranger, erasing the call history before returning the device.

The man acknowledged Gi-hyeon’s polite bow with a nod and exited the restroom.

Wasting no time, Gi-hyeon ducked into a stall and climbed onto the toilet bowl to access the high window. Using a window inside a locked stall eliminated the catastrophic risk of witnesses. The opening proved excruciatingly tight for a grown man, forcing him to shove his bag through first before contorting his body to follow. Scraping the skin off his forearms against the rough frame hardly mattered. Although the drop was precariously high, he managed the landing without breaking anything.

Dusting himself off, he circled behind the building and approached an outdoor kiosk selling hiking gear near the restroom entrance.

“I’ll wear these out,” he told the clerk, purchasing a set of hiking pants and a shirt, a bucket hat, a thin balaclava, and a rugged mountaineering backpack.

Inside the makeshift fitting room, he dumped the contents of his old bag into the new one, aggressively stuffing his discarded clothes in on top. When he finally emerged, he successfully passed for a robust, dedicated hiker. While covering half his face and the nape of his neck in the sweltering heat raised some suspicion, plenty of enthusiasts wore balaclavas to avoid sunburns, providing him the perfect cover.

The clerk still raised an eyebrow.

“Oh my, are you really wearing a balaclava in this heat?” she asked.

“I feel a cold coming on,” he lied effortlessly, slapping down crisp cash.

Although she looked thoroughly unconvinced by the correlation between a respiratory virus and a UV-protection mask, she simply asked if he needed a cash receipt.

Gi-hyeon shook his head.

The entire point of paying in untraceable bills was to vanish; asking for a receipt was a fucking joke.

Offering a perfunctory nod, he left the kiosk and strolled into the main rest area building at a meticulously average pace. He grabbed some light snacks and a bottle of water, burying them in his pack. Stepping back outside, relief flooded him at the sight of numerous express buses idling in the lot. Scanning the destinations, he boarded a Honam-bound bus heading for the Mokpo Terminal and brazenly accosted the driver.

He spun his web of lies without hesitation. “Sir, I hitched a ride with a friend to catch this bus because I was running late. I lost my phone and couldn’t buy a ticket online. I have cash. Can you please let me on?”

The driver clicked his tongue in stark disapproval. “Aigoo, you can’t be doing that. But fine, just get on. Jeez…” Despite the grumbling, the man accepted the cash.

Securing an empty seat on his very first attempt felt like a stroke of sheer luck. Settling in, Gi-hyeon devoured the bread he had purchased and promptly closed his eyes. He vaguely registered the bus stopping at another rest area, but his pregnancy-induced lethargy kept him chained to his seat. He slept practically the entire journey, only waking when they finally rolled into the Mokpo Terminal.

Hauling himself off the bus, he hunted down a payphone to contact Jisu. The receiver reeked of cheap, old-man aftershave, nearly triggering his nausea, but he had no choice but to endure it. Swallowing the bile rising in his throat, he completed the call, only for Jisu to instruct him to wait for another hour and a half.

Hanging up, Gi-hyeon wandered the surrounding area with unexpected tranquility before ducking into a small diner. He ordered a simple bowl of ramen and a roll of kimbap, but the remarkably delicious kimchi spurred his appetite, prompting him to consume far more than usual.

The owner, delighted by his ravenous display, even gifted him a free bowl of rice to mix into the broth.

After settling the bill, he hit a nearby drugstore to stock up on survival essentials, grabbing a toothbrush, razor, shampoo, soap, and face lotion, before retreating to the terminal to await his rescue. Even when the clock ticked thirty minutes past their agreed-upon time, he remained rigidly in place, his eyes glued to the entrance.

“Hey, Second Lieutenant So!” Jisu finally bellowed after another grueling forty-minute wait, striding over with a massive, booming laugh.

He offered zero apologies for his extreme tardiness, but he did commandeer Gi-hyeon’s heavy pack and throw it into the trunk. Throughout the drive, Jisu interrogated him about absolutely nothing. It wasn’t an act of profound empathy for Gi-hyeon’s sudden resignation; the man simply didn’t give a shit. That inherent lack of curiosity was precisely why Gi-hyeon found him so comfortable to be around. His complete absence of authoritarian arrogance made him a refreshing anomaly among typical Alphas and military men.

“There’s a room I used to rent out to the foreign laborers at the nearby factory, but they all got deported for illegal entry, so it’s empty,” Jisu had explained. “You take it. Help me out with work, and I’ll waive the rent.”

“Yes, sir,” Gi-hyeon had readily agreed.

Dozing off in the passenger seat, he had eventually woken up at his new hideout.

“How the hell did you manage to leave your phone behind?” Jisu muttered before instantly waving off his own question. “Ah, whatever. Save the sob story for later. We’ll grab a drink then. I’m too fucking busy right now.”

Tossing Gi-hyeon a burner phone registered under his own name, Jisu dumped him at the promised rental room and immediately sped off.

Left alone with the door code, Gi-hyeon booted up the phone and checked his GPS, realizing he had landed in a region closer to Haenam than Mokpo.

He really dragged me far out into the sticks while I slept, he mused.

***