The car ride was unusually silent. Dae-Hyun hadn't told her where they were going until they'd already left the Han residence. He'd simply said, "There's something I want you to see," and Soo-Ah, lulled by the quiet conviction in his voice, had not asked again.
Min-Seo was in safe hands—left with the team of the most expensive, medically trained nannies on the continent, all discreet and precise, chosen by Dae-Hyun not just for their professionalism but their airtight loyalty. He left nothing to chance. Not anymore.
The vehicle pulled to a stop an hour outside the city. It wasn't a public cemetery. Not some mournful concrete lot stacked in stone and grief. This place was something else entirely—hidden from the public eye, veiled behind a wall of cherry blossom trees in full bloom, petals trembling like whispers in the wind.
There was a single path.
Stone-laid, winding through a serene expanse of manicured green. The air smelled of soil and wind, of memory, of things that once were.
Soo-Ah felt her lungs tighten.
She stepped out of the car and instantly, the silence around them felt sacred. Unshakable. Unbreakable. No words passed between them.
Dae-Hyun simply extended his hand, and she took it.
They walked side by side through the small garden, and with each step, something in her began to quake. Her body remembered this place. Not through experience—she had never been—but through dreams. Through the weight of what she hadn't been able to face.
Then she saw it.
Min-Jun's burial site.
Not a tombstone.
A monument.
A small shrine, carved from pure white marble, surrounded by flowering bushes and soft lanterns that never extinguished, powered by hidden solar lines. His name was engraved with delicate gold lettering across the stone, and beneath it was etched:
Min-Jun Kang"A light that flickered too soon, but warmed us forever."June 12, 2023 – July 23, 2024
There was a bench nearby—worn smooth by time, but immaculately clean. Flowers rested at its base. Soo-Ah could tell someone came often.
"I come every week," Dae-Hyun said softly, as if reading her mind. "Twice, sometimes. I always bring new ones."
Soo-Ah fell to her knees.
Not from dramatics, but because her legs simply gave out. The grief she'd walled away all this time shattered like glass under her ribs. Her hands trembled as she reached for the headstone, touching the grooves of her son's name as if trying to etch it into her skin.
And she wept.
Not the quiet tears of recovery. But the violent sobs of a mother who had never said goodbye.
"I never got to see him," she choked, her body trembling uncontrollably. "I never got to hold him when he died. I didn't even get to say goodbye."
She clenched the grass with her fingers, nails digging into the earth.
Dae-Hyun knelt beside her.
His arms didn't wrap around her. Not yet. Instead, he placed his hand over hers, steady and unmoving. It wasn't to comfort—it was to anchor. He knew the difference now.
"I held him," he whispered. "Until they pulled him from my arms."
Soo-Ah looked at him, eyes wide with tears.
"You never told me—"
"I couldn't," he said, voice cracking. "You were gone. And I was… I wasn't me anymore. I didn't want you to wake up to that monster."
She stared at him, breath shallow.
"You were never a monster."
"I was," he said simply. "You just never saw it."
Her sobs returned, but he pulled her to him this time, his body folding around her like armor.
"I buried him here because I didn't want him to be alone," Dae-Hyun murmured into her hair. "I bought this land. Had it turned into a private resting ground. No press. No guests. Just him. And me. And now you."
Soo-Ah cried harder, her fists gripping his shirt.
"I miss him so much."
"I know," he said, closing his eyes. "So do I."
They stayed like that—husband and wife, kneeling before the son they had lost. No bodyguards, no boardrooms, no billions. Just two broken people clinging to the memory of a child who had smiled like the sun.
When the tears slowed, Soo-Ah looked around. "This place… it's beautiful. So peaceful. Like he's sleeping."
"I didn't want him to be in a place of mourning," Dae-Hyun said quietly. "I wanted it to feel like he's still growing. Still part of us."
Soo-Ah took a deep breath. "You've been carrying all of this alone, haven't you?"
He didn't answer. He didn't need to.
She leaned against him, wiping her face. "I'm sorry I wasn't there for you."
Dae-Hyun finally smiled—a slow, tired, honest one. "You're here now. That's all that matters."
That night, when they returned, she watched him cradle Min-Seo with a tenderness so raw, so painfully gentle, it made her heart ache. He kissed their daughter's forehead and tucked her against his chest, humming the lullaby he used to sing to Min-Jun.
Soo-Ah sat on the edge of the bed, watching them both, and whispered to herself:
"He's the father our child deserves."
"He's the man I almost lost."
"And I won't lose him again."