Chapter 39 - ✦Star-Stock [2]✦

The asphalt was cold, biting through the thin soles of Kang-joon's indoor slippers as he and Gun-woo stepped out into the biting night air. Twenty stories above, the penthouse had felt like a fortress of glass and light, but down here, in the shadows of the streetlamps, the world felt claustrophobic. The black car sat idling at the curb, its exhaust puffing white plumes into the dark. The man leaning against the driver's side door didn't look like a victim. He looked like a debt collector from a nightmare Kang-joon had spent ninety-seven lives trying to outrun. He was thin, his face etched with the grey pallor of long-term desperation, and his eyes were fixed on the entrance of the building with a hungry, predatory intensity.