24K Magic for a Perfect Illusion

Ch 21: Inglewood's Finest Shoes

Rainy Sunday morning in New York City.

Hestia woke up with a gloomy expression on her face, apparently even in her dream last night she still seen Hearthof’s naked body and he was chasing her like a maniac in the very same hotel where they are at the moment.

She knows that Hearthof was under the influence of alcohol but that moment she thinks that he was on his lucid interval and not drunk at all … but why would he show her his phallus?

‘Is Hearthof an exhibitionist? Or it was just his drinking habit to show off his naked body to anyone? If that’s the case then, I should do something about it.’ Hestia thought to herself.

Voyeurism can be cure with a right treatment.

After doing her morning routine, Hestia exited her room with her luggage, they’ll be leaving NYC before lunch and it’s already 9:02 am on the wall clock at the living room of the suite.

When Hearthof saw Hestia, he delivered his prepared speech right away. “I apologize if I ever made you uncomfortable last night, I was drunk and I might have fooled around. I won’t get drunk again, I promise. Please don’t be mad at me.” he pleaded that even think of kneeling in front of her but that’ll be exaggerated so he just holds her hand and make himself look pitiful.

“Apology accepted.” Hestia tapped Hearthof’s hand and smiled at him faintly. “Don’t promise because I know you’ll break it sooner or later. You’re a businessman so drinking alcohol is part of your life when having negotiations with people.” she walked towards the dining area and sat down on the chair to start having her breakfast. “The milk and the sunshine toasts are still hot.”

“I preheat them on the microwave two minutes ago.” Hearthof sat across Hestia. “Our flight might be delay if this rain won’t stop.”

“There ain’t no storm signal, right?” Hestia turned her head on the side to watch the rain through the balcony’s glass door.

“No. I just watched the news an hour ago and there ain’t no report about a storm. It’s just a typical rain.” Hearthof began to eat his meal since he waited for Hestia to have breakfast together.

“Then it’ll stop sooner or later. I just hope it’ll be over before we board the plane. I can’t be absent for work tomorrow. I have a 3pm meeting regarding the progress of our department’s research and I’ll be presenting on behalf of our team.” Hestia shook her head. “We can’t have a delayed flight or else I’ll be doomed at work. I really make everyone my enemies if I don’t show up.”

“Well if your late then I can pull some strings if you don’t like to pull yours.” Hearthof winked his already small eyes.

“Hahaha, don’t do that again. Winking isn’t for you.” Hestia laughed at Hearthof’s hilariousness.

“At least I made you laugh. Now I’m assured that we’re good.”

“Of course, we are. You owned up with your mistake and I accepted your apology, so we’re definitely good.” Hestia nodded.

Hearthof sighed in relief, “I thought you’ll be mad at me and give me a cold treatment.”

“Well, I was mad at you last night until I woke up this morning, but I realized that you were not completely at fault, you were drunk.”

“Yeah, I’m not usually that stupid. Thank you for understanding.”

“No worries. I know you since we were kids. You’re like an older brother to me so I know that was the alcohol doing last night.”

“It’s embarrassing please forget what I’ve done, I really didn’t mean it. I don’t know where the hell I got the confidence to show what I should hide.” Hearthof rubbed his nape timidly.

“Well, you’re not that bad, and it’s not like I’ve never seen you naked before.” Hestia reminded of the past. “Remember the summer of ’64. We were swimming on the pool in our house and you dived in with only your white underpants and when you emerged from the water to eat some snacks … Hahahaha … your underpants became see-through.” she laughed while reminiscing. “I already saw it before Don covered my eyes and told me not to look.”

“Do you really have to remind me one of my embarrassing moments when we were young. I’m only ten that time and you were eight.”

“What can I do I remember everything.” Hestia shrugged.

“Well you should forget it. I would like to bury that memory and not to be dig up ever again.” Hearthof lowered his head in embarrassment as he continued to eat his breakfast meal.

“That’s part of life. Everyone got their embarrassing moments as nobody is perfect. We’re only humans and we’re susceptible in committing mistakes.” Hestia didn’t tease him further as she too had a lot of embarrassing moments before too that she also wanted to forget and never remember at all.

The rain stopped while they were on the way to the airport so there’s no delay in their flight.

It’s just that the flight duration from NYC to Seoul is 14 hours and Seoul is 13 hours ahead from NYC, thus Hestia arrived at the research institute just in time before her presentation.

“Do you like making a grand entrance that much?!” Ruby Lee, shouted at Hestia as soon as she sees her.

“The report won’t present itself, go ahead. We’ll talk later.” Anna Ji said with a frown.

Technically the presentation should be a group effort, but it was all on Hestia and the two are just getting credits because they made the executive summary and a part or two that only has a small significance to the report itself.

To be honest, Hestia can do the whole report herself without the two, but they were made as a team and she got no choice but to get along with Anna and Ruby who both graduated from a university in America.

It’s not like she graduated from an unknown university, as a matter of fact she’s a summa c*m laude of their batch in one of the prestigious universities in Korea, Hestia is a KU alumna.

Their department head probably think that the three will make a great team together, since the two are also from prominent families but he didn’t know that it was indeed a one-team.

Hestia went to the stage and started her presentation, “We all know that office works in the company requires consistent attention to repetitive detail, which are also knowns as daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly tasks. According to the test result of the survey I conducted, I mean we conducted, the employees of this company aren’t allowed to have a creative mind …”

The report is about the employees of the Nam Group, who seek the psychology research facility assistance to conduct a test to determine why the company has a high number of negative reviews from their resigned employees that currently affect the Group’s reputation.

Apparently, the resigned employees left their job quietly but then these group of people, had nothing good to say about their previous employer.

‘The high attrition rate of the Nam Group despite being a listed company, is alarming to the current and future employees thus before things get out of hand, the president of the company must change its management in handling people.’ Hestia wanted to say her opinion out loud but she just finished her presentation without telling the man in front of her what to do since the results are conclusive enough for him to know what to do.

“That will be all from me, the rest will be discuss by Anna.” Hestia left the stage as Anna take charge after her.

Well, Anna likes the limelight although she doesn’t want the process of explaining, her role is to deliver the output and entertain the questions as if she herself did everything on her own and that’s how she get her credits from the superiors.

Hestia went to the side seat where Ruby is, since she can’t take her leave yet from the conference room.

“You almost cause me trouble a while ago.” Ruby said in a low voice.

‘I’ve done my part aren’t I?’ Hestia wanted to talk back but she just pretended that she didn’t hear Ruby at all.

There’s no point talking to someone who always find fault at you.

If Anna always take the finale, it’s Ruby who always do the introduction, well she’s only good at the start but just like Anna she doesn’t want to go through the process, so all the hard work only applied to Hestia.

When the presentation finished, the president of the company who asked to conduct the research, invited the executives and Hestia’s team for dinner as a token of appreciation.

Honestly, Hestia doesn’t know how the Nam Group still survive in the industry while they’re facing a crisis regarding to their people.

For her the kind of problem that the company has can be solved by the upper management of the company itself and they don’t need to ask for their research institute to present the problem they have on hand.

It’s an internal matter, so why do they have to get third party to tell them what’s obvious? Is it really hard for them to reach out to their own people?

The conference lasted for an hour and there’s still an hour to go before 5pm, the dinner’s at 6pm but Hestia wants to go home and rest rather than go to the restaurant with Anna and Ruby, she’ll lose her appetite with them around anyway so she’s thinking of an excuse to make for her not to attend.

While Hestia was flipping the pages of the documents on her table, her office door was pushed open.

Of course, the only person who’ll just barged in to her office without even knocking is no other than Ruby, followed by Anna, Hestia knows that they don’t mean any good for her.

“What can I do for you two?” Hestia asked flatly.

“Just because you made it on time doesn’t mean that we forgot that you almost left us hanging earlier!” Ruby snarled at Hestia with her arms crossed on her chest.

“Where were you this morning?” Anna asked with her chin up while looking down at Hestia who’s sitting on her brown leather chair.

“In the plane heading back to Seoul from New York.” Hestia replied as she leaned on the backrest and propped her elbows on the armchair while intertwining her fingers from both hands.

“And what did you do to New York exactly?” Ruby questioned with her brows up.

“I don’t think I need to report to you about my private life.” Hestia said flatly. She’s exhausted from the 14 hours flight and she doesn’t have time to entertain the two.

“You!” Ruby stomped her feet as she gritted her teeth. “Don’t think because you’re a Nevaeh I won’t dare to teach you a lesson.”

“If I didn’t come on time then I’ll gladly accept whatever lesson you want to give to me. Though, you two should’ve worked it out in case one of us can’t make it, that’s what a team should do.” Hestia leaned forward on her table. “But we all know that we’re far from a team as we all work alone and pretend to be working together when the superiors are around.” she sighed helplessly. “I know I caused you two distress for not showing up earlier so I apologize for that, but I made it on time and we did our own part of the report. So, what’s with telling the directors that I didn’t care about the project, that you two both know that I worked hard for?” she snapped and the two were startled with her sudden outburst, as Hestia always keep things to herself.

“Exactly, you wanted us to make fool of ourselves and take all the credits because you think that it’s just fair for you. Don’t you think you’re too scheming … b*tch!” Ruby spatted.

“Hah!” Hestia couldn’t believe that Ruby is a university graduate and from a prominent family with the way she thinks and speaks.

“Did you just laugh at me?!!” Ruby felt insulted with Hestia’s reaction, thus she continued, “So, you admit right? You really thought of ditching us and get the limelight to yourself.”

Hestia only shook her head in response, any word she says will be use against her anyway so better keep her opinions to herself.

“That’s enough Ruby.” Anna reprimanded Ruby from talking. “She’s right. We should’ve figured it out and prepared ourselves with any possibilities. We can’t blame her if she wants to take all the credits all by herself. She thinks that we didn’t do much to contribute and she did all the work. It’s all our fault for not sharing the workload equally.”

Hestia almost believe Anna’s speech when she saw the department head walking towards their direction, her office door is open and Anna’s voice can be hear from his distance.

“Ladies, is there any problem? What’s with the commotion here?”

“It’s Hestia, she thinks too highly of herself and told us that she could do the case on her own without me and Anna.” Ruby stated like a kid whining to her parent.

“Ruby.” Anna held Ruby’s arm and shook her head. “It’s nothing, Dr. Kim. As a team, we can solve it by ourselves.”

“That’s the right thing to do!” Dr. Kim nodded in approval. “I put you ladies on a team because you three are in the same circle, so you understand each other best among your other colleagues.”

“We know, Dr. Kim. All the factors were considered appropriately so we can’t say that you put us three randomly.” Anna said with a charming smile on her face. “Us three, will work out just fine. Isn’t the case we’ve handled just now gone smoothly to our client?”

“Touché. Whatever misunderstanding you girls may have, you can fix it rationally.” Dr. Kim said as a matter-of-fact. “You ladies are a dream team and envies by many, get along together, alright?”

“Of course, Dr. Kim.” Anna answered first as she tugged Ruby’s arm to agree with her.

“Definitely, Dr. Kim.” Ruby forced a smile on her face to agree.

“Yes, Dr. Kim.” Hestia replied perfunctorily.

‘What dream team? The two is no doubt a perfect duo but including me to your so-called team, is more of a nightmare for me.’ Hestia thought to herself.

They are making Hestia a villainess with a vicious mind as Anna and Ruby are the victims.

At the Flow Ride restaurant …

Although Hestia didn’t want to come, she had to accept the invitation because refusing the client’s genuine offer is rude.

While having dinner with everyone, an unexpected guest suddenly appeared in the VIP room that Hestia recognized right away.

‘I really should take interest to the background of my dates.’ Hestia thought to herself as she sighed while trying to make her existence in the room less visible.

But of course, Joo-Hyuk had to greet her in front of everyone after saying hi to his father, who happened to be the client.

“Hestia, we meet again.” Joo-Hyuk greeted her with a charming smile on his handsome face.

“Walter.” Hestia called Joo-Hyuk in his English name.

“I’m glad you still remember my English name. I thought you’ll just forget everything we’ve talked about on our date.” Joo-Hyuk said.

“Son, what are you talking about? What date?” Mr. Nam looking at Joo-Hyuk and Hestia in puzzlement.

“Oh, Mama and Mrs. Nevaeh arranged us on a date. You were on a business trip that day and you were always busy at work so we forgot to tell you about it.” Joo-Hyuk said nonchalantly.

“You brat! You should’ve told me about that!” Mr. Nam hit the back of Joo-Hyuk’s head. “I’m your father. Why did you and your mother keep such important matter from me?!”

“Papa, you’re embarrassing me. I’m already an adult and yet you’re hitting at the back of my head like a kid. Give me some face here, specially to Hestia.” Joo-Hyuk rubbing the back of his head.

“What’s wrong with a father disciplining his wayward son?” Mr. Nam retorted. “Besides these people here are experts in the field of psychology, so they are more understanding than ordinary people. As for you, why did you go to California last Friday?”

“I went to buy, Inglewood’s finest shoes.” Joo-Hyuk replied coolly.