Chapter -3

The Ones Who Watch Too Closely

Lia didn’t flinch when she opened her locker and found a white rose inside.

She only stared.

It wasn’t a confession. It wasn’t even romantic.

It was a message.

The stem had a clean cut.

The petals were too perfect.

And tucked beneath it, hidden so precisely it almost made her laugh, was a handwritten card.

> “You look calm, but your silence screams.

Let me hear it.”

—K

She closed the locker softly.

Behind her, footsteps.

She didn’t need to turn to know who it was.

> “Do you send every girl flowers, Mr. Daejin?”

Kael leaned against the locker beside hers.

Smiling. Always smiling like he wasn’t holding a loaded gun behind his back.

> “Just the ones who ignore me.”

> “You don’t like being ignored?”

> “No one’s ever done it before.”

> “Now you know how the rest of the world feels.”

She walked away.

He followed.

> “Tell me something real,” he said as they passed through the quiet courtyard.

> “Like what?”

> “Your favorite sin.”

Lia paused.

Then turned to him with the faintest smirk.

> “Control.”

For the first time, Kael’s smile faltered.

From across the fountain, Yoon Haneul watched everything.

The way she never looked surprised.

The way Kael leaned in, but never touched her.

The way her eyes stayed empty, even when her lips curved.

He wasn’t sure what he was seeing.

But it wasn’t innocent.

Back in her dorm, Minji tossed herself onto Lia’s bed.

> “Okay, confession time. Kael Daejin is officially stalking you. Are you secretly a princess? An heiress? A lost mafia daughter?”

Lia smiled faintly.

> “Maybe I’m just cursed.”

> “Or maybe he’s cursed.”

Minji flipped onto her back dramatically.

> “You really don’t feel anything when he looks at you like that?”

> “Should I?”

> “Uh, yeah. He looks at you like he’s either gonna kiss you or kill you. And somehow I’m rooting for both?”

That night, Kael stood in the shadows of a rooftop across from her dorm window.

She sat there again—window open, tea in hand, face unreadable.

He watched for a long time.

She never looked up.

In a hidden warehouse below the city, Ji-Hwan reviewed a file.

He wasn’t interested in Kael.

He was interested in Lia.

> Park Lia.

A name that didn’t exist ten years ago.

A girl with no connections, no family, and a bank account too clean.

He tapped the photo.

> “You’re hiding something, little ghost.”

He smiled.

> “Let’s see what happens when I start removing your shadows.”

Back on campus, Yoon Haneul cornered Lia after class.

> “He’s dangerous,” he said.

> “So are you,” she replied.

> “I don’t kill people.”

> “You just watch them.”

That silenced him.

> “Why him?” he finally asked.

> “What makes you think I chose him?”

> “Because you don’t do anything you don’t mean.”

She looked at him then—really looked.

And he flinched.

Because for one second, her eyes were made of ice.

That evening, Kael sent another note.

No rose. Just a single page left on her café table while she worked.

She didn’t see who dropped it.

But she knew it was him.

> “If I burn for you,

would you finally bleed for me?”

She folded the note neatly.

And smiled.

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