Chapter 24 · Half a Minute of Korean

"How much did you understand?"

Jae Min's arm hit the elevator frame before I could step through it. Not touching me. Just there, blocking the gap, close enough that I smelled cedar and hotel soap and something sharper underneath — panic, maybe, dressed up as calm.

"Excuse me," I said. "I have rooms to turn."

"Half a minute of Korean. That's all it takes to sink a hundred million dollars, Miss Santos." He said my name like it tasted wrong in his mouth. "So I'm asking again. How much did you understand?"

The service elevator dinged behind him and shut without opening. Neither of us moved.

The ledger was in my tote, wedged under a stack of pillowcases, and my hand had gone to it on instinct the second he cornered me — like I could protect a dead woman's handwriting with a canvas bag and bad posture.

"I fold sheets," I said. "I don't speak Korean."

"You flinched. On the balcony. When I said *maegak*." His eyes didn't blink. "People who don't understand a word don't flinch at it."