Chapter 92: The Mayor’s Wife (2)
It had been a while since Kang Ra-Eun had entered her own room. Despite it already being over half a year since she had moved out, her room was the exact same as she had left it in her high school days.
“Why is Dad not emptying this room out?” Ra-Eun asked.
She could not understand it.
Kang Ra-Hyuk answered, “He said he’s leaving it because you’d need a place to rest if you ever come to visit like right now. And it’s not like Dad has a lot of stuff. He doesn’t have anything in particular to put in there to the point that he would have to empty it out.”
“Then I guess the same would go for your room once you move out.”
“Probably.”
Even after the refurbishment, Ra-Eun’s room would stay as her own.
“When is Dad coming?” she asked.
“He said he’d be back in time for dinner.”
“There’s still quite some time, then.”
It was currently 2:30 PM, a long while until dinnertime.
“What do you wanna do? Shall we go for a drive? I bought a new car,” Ra-Hyuk said as he showed Ra-Eun his car keys.
He had only bought it three days ago, hence he was itching to drive it at any chance he got. Ra-Eun giggled and flatly refused Ra-Hyuk’s offer. She wanted to do something else instead.
“I want to go to Starlight Road. It’s been a while.”
To Ra-Eun, Starlight Road was as comfortable as her own home. The place was filled with her high school memories, so she always stopped by whenever she visited her old home.
“Well, sure. Let’s go. Shall I drive us there?” Ra-Hyuk asked.
“Why take the car when it’s only a five-minute walk?”
He wanted to take the car using any means necessary, but he could not break Ra-Eun’s stubborn attitude. Ra-Eun was the most loud-spoken member of their household, hence Ra-Hyuk had no choice but to leave the opportunity to drive the car for another time.
***
Seo Yi-Jun brightly greeted the Kang siblings as they arrived at Starlight Road.
“Welcome, hyung! Noona!”
“How’ve you been?”
Yi-Jun had recently slept over at Ra-Eun and Yi-Seo’s house, so Ra-Eun did not feel like it had been a while since she had seen him. Yi-Jun’s gaze unconsciously focused on Ra-Eun.
“You’re extremely pretty today, noona.”
“Stop talking nonsense. It’s just because I haven’t been able to remove my makeup after my shoot.”
Ra-Eun still reacted sensitively to people saying she was pretty. The siblings took their seats and Yi-Jun himself brought the drink that they had ordered, plus a cake that they had not ordered.
“We didn’t order this,” Ra-Eun mentioned.
“It’s on me. Please enjoy.”
Ra-Hyuk lightly laughed as he watched Yi-Jun go back to the counter.
“How lucky am I to get to eat free cake thanks to my beautiful little sister?”
“Shut up before I kick you on the shin.”
Ra-Eun really might have kicked him on the shin if she wasn’t wearing heels. They could hear a loudspeaker outside as they were spending time in Starlight Road after a while.
- Please choose #1, Lee Chun-Tae! I will do my best for the people of this city!
A candidate’s voice pleading for votes filled the neighborhood despite it not being election season yet. Ra-Hyuk pulled out his smartphone to check the date.
“Is it that time of the year already? Oh, it must be that. The Incheon mayor by-election. You know about it, right?”
“Yeah.”
There was no way Ra-Eun wouldn’t know. She especially knew Lee Chun-Tae who had just passed them very well since she had met him several times before becoming a high school girl.
Lee Chun-Tae looked like an incorruptibly pure person on the outside, but he couldn’t be more filthy on the inside. As proof of that...
‘He got along very well with Kim Han-Gyo.’
He was one of the main individuals who followed Kim Han-Gyo. Ra-Eun would not sit idly by and watch as Lee Chun-Tae became the mayor of Incheon. However, his approval ratings were overwhelming; he alone possessed over 60% of it.
“Lee Chun-Tae will probably win this by-election,” Ra-Hyuk remarked.
He was more than justified to think as such from the objective statistical data. Even if the data was only an estimation, the data itself could not be ignored. Even in the future that Ra-Eun knew, Lee Chun-Tae would become the new mayor of Incheon through this by-election, and Kim Han-Gyo’s influence would grow.
Ra-Eun had no intention of letting that happen. There was only one way to stop it, and it was to get Jang Tae-Hwan, the second candidate and the only one who even has a chance against Lee Chun-Tae, elected.
“You’re going to vote, right?” Ra-Eun asked.
“Me? Yeah.”
“Who are you gonna vote for?”
“Umm... not sure. I haven’t really thought about it.”
Ra-Eun was not able to vote since she was already registered as a resident of Seoul, so she asked Ra-Hyuk in her stead.
“Then vote for Jang Tae-Hwan.”
“Jang Tae-Hwan? That’s fine, but will he even be elected?”
“He will be.”
Because Ra-Eun was going to make it happen.
***
“...”
Reporter Ahn Su-Jin looked through the package that Ma Yeong-Jun had given her yet again. They were materials regarding Lee Chun-Tae this time.
“Tax evasion, and... I can’t believe he even pulled strings for his son to be exempted from military service.”
They were not simply allegations; the package was filled with objective sources.
Su-Jin asked while looking at Yeong-Jun, “Were these provided by the masked woman as well?”
.
Yeong-Jun simply nodded. He did not mention anything related to Ra-Eun.
“All you have to do is to release an article containing the information given to you.”
Then it would naturally become a scoop. Su-Jin looked through the materials in more detail. The package had not only contained information regarding Lee Chun-Tae, but those regarding Jang Tae-Hwan as well. Her eyes widened as she confirmed the name of his wife.
“By Yeo Song-Won... is it the same Yeo Song-Won the actress that I know?”
Yeong-Jun nodded again in acknowledgement.
“My. I had only heard rumors that her husband worked in politics, but I never expected him to be a candidate for mayor.”
Song-Won had not revealed her husband’s identity to the public yet. A small amount of information had been exposed due to the reporters’ persistence, but they had not yet figured out who he was.
“Are you telling me to release this information as well?”
“That’s right.”
“Is this also the aim of the masked woman?”
“Most likely.”
Su-Jin had more or less an idea of what the masked woman was aiming for. Making Lee Chun-Tae’s misconduct public would lower the number of his votes, and exposing the fact that Jang Tae-Hwan was Yeo Song-Won’s husband would raise public awareness of him.
Song-Won was highly favored by the public. Not only had she often made donations and done many good deeds in her career, but she had never been involved in a single scandal either. It was very rare to see an actress who had managed to maintain a sparkling clean image for several decades.
Her image would become even better if it was revealed that Jang Tae-Hwan was her husband, but...
“I’m sure Miss Yeo Song-Won wouldn’t like her family matters made public,” Su-Jin expressed.
She was not wrong, but Ra-Eun had no qualms about ignoring such feelings if it meant she could fulfill her goal. There was also one other reason.
“Now that Jang Tae-Hwan is a candidate for mayor, the fact that Yeo Song-Won is his wife is bound to be revealed soon. We’re simply moving it up. There is no problem,” Yeong-Jun remarked.
Now that Song-Won’s husband had come into the light, it would only be a matter of time until their marital relationship was revealed to the public. Ra-Eun was simply moving it up to use for the election. Su-Jin smiled bitterly, understanding the machinations that the masked woman had built.
“The woman you’re serving is terrifying.”
Su-Jin did not know who the woman was, but one thing she knew for sure was that the woman should not be antagonized.
***
Kim Han-Gyo checked the Incheon mayor by-election results again and again in shock. No matter how many times he checked, all he could see was that they had lost. Jang Tae-Hwan had won by a 1,871-vote difference.
Lee Chun-Tae could only apologize with his head hung down since this predicament had resulted because of his past actions. Even if he had ten mouths, there wasn’t a single thing that he could say.
“...”
Han-Gyo’s rage took the better of him and he smashed his fist down onto his desk. Chun-Tae and the secretary flinched. Han-Gyo’s ice-cold voice filled the office.
“Something’s off.”
“O-Off? Wh-What do you mean, congressman...?” the chief secretary asked carefully.
Han-Gyo said as he buried himself deep into his chair and lit a cigarette, “Ever since last year... no, the year before that, I’ve had this feeling that someone had been purposefully foiling my plans.”
Two years ago. It happened to be around the time that Ra-Eun had returned to the past as a high school girl.
***
Just like Ra-Eun had predicted, Jang Tae-Hwan had won the seat of the mayor of Incheon. She had managed to deal some damage to Kim Han-Gyo.
‘Only after I keep accumulating damage will he get knocked out when I deal a huge one.’
She was setting things up for the future.
“Ra-Eun, the reporters are here,” Shin Yu-Bin said as Ra-Eun was in the middle of checking the by-election results again in delight.
Ra-Eun responded in surprise, “Already? They’re quite early.”
“They said they arrived earlier than they had expected because they left early while fully expecting there to be traffic. What do you want to do? Do you want to get started now?”
The interview was supposed to begin at 2 PM. It was fifteen minutes early, but Ra-Eun thought it was better to get it over with and go home early.
“Yes, let’s do that,” Ra-Eun answered.
“Okay. Just wait here.”
The meeting room door opened again while Yu-Bin was away.
“Good afternoon.”
Reporter Ahn Su-Jin was going to be heading today’s interview. Yu-Bin had gone with Su-Jin’s fellow reporters as a guide while they went to grab the supplies that they needed. In the meantime, Ra-Eun and Su-Jin were all alone.
“Thank you very much for saving me last time, Miss Kang.”
Su-Jin was thanking Ra-Eun for saving her while she was being threatened by a criminal suspect in the dead of night.
“I only did what should’ve been done. You don’t have to worry about it too much,” Ra-Eun replied while maintaining her light smile.
At that moment, Su-Jin brought up something completely unexpected.
“You’re the masked woman whom I met last time, aren’t you?”
1. Hyung is an honorific that Korean men use to address their older brothers or older men that they are close to.
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