If the Queen Bee Looked That Damn Hot
An Jihye's lunch invitation wasn't entirely out of nowhere.
From her perspective, it must have felt like I held her life and death in my hands.
Treat me to a meal. Butter me up. Ask me to look out for her.
Figuring that much was perfectly reasonable, I quietly tweaked one of the "relationships" I had set with An Jihye.
And the next day, at lunchtime.
"What's with the sudden meal?"
"…Well, it seemed like I was putting you through a lot of trouble…"
"I wouldn't exactly say I've been struggling."
"……."
See? Playing nice for someone else's sake isn't so easy, is it?
She had to play host to the person who held her fate, so she was smiling — but An Jihye's smile was still awkward.
No… past awkward. The corners of her eyes were trembling, and it was almost frightening.
Even so.
"Shall we go? What are we eating, though?"
"If there's anything you like, Assistant Manager, we can go with that…"
"No. You're the one treating me. I'll eat whatever Jihye likes."
"Then… there's a good pork cutlet place right up ahead. Would that be all right?"
"Ah, perfect."
Even those trembling eyes looked attractive — like the irritation of a queen everyone imagined. Looking down on everything. Ruthlessly cutting away whatever displeased her. And yet adored by all.
"Queen" was a funny way to put it, but the truth was An Jihye had lived exactly that kind of life.
No… calling her a queen felt like putting her on too high a pedestal. Queen bee was about right.
But if the queen bee walking ahead of me looked that damn fuckable—
Her wavy bob swaying. The lines of her tailored women's suit fitting her to perfection. Those outrageously wide hips swaying with every step.
Well. With a queen bee like this, I could understand the men who'd been sacrificed to An Jihye up to now.
She was a queen bee of a completely different caliber.
And that queen bee—
"Two pork cutlet sets, please, and for the Assistant Manager, maybe…"
—walked into the pork cutlet shop, ordered two portions, and was watching my face.
Was there anything else I wanted? Was pork cutlet enough? She was ready to treat me to whatever I asked for.
Under that gaze, I said,
"Ah, that's fine for me."
"Then that'll be all, please."
"Yes, of course."
I waved it off — if I ate any more I'd just feel bloated later.
And then, under the awkwardness that came flooding in,
"I'll get it today."
"What?"
"Come on, it's weird for a senior to freeload off a junior. I'll pay. Jihye, just enjoy your food."
I deliberately raised the level of wariness An Jihye was feeling.
"Forget that. What's the real reason?"
"What reason?"
"The reason you asked me to eat together. Knowing Jihye's personality, I don't buy that you'd buy me lunch just because I was having a hard time."
That was how you got An Jihye to speak her real mind.
When a queen bee like An Jihye lowered her guard, it didn't mean you'd gotten closer.
It meant she thought you were easy. That there was something she could squeeze out of you. That you belonged under her.
So I had to raise the wariness instead — plant the impression that I was one step above her.
That I wasn't easy. That if anyone was doing the squeezing, it would be me. That I was above her.
Once that impression took root—
"…Has the Planning Director said anything about our side, by any chance?"
"The Finance Department? Or Jihye specifically?"
"I'd like to hear about both, if possible."
An Jihye asked about what actually mattered to her — her own safety.
Now that she understood I was "above" her, she was extracting reliability from that position.
"He hasn't said much."
"…Is that so?"
"Yes. After the trouble last time… just that you're doing well. That if you keep going like this, it's fine. That was about it."
"……."
But there was one thing I had to be careful about here.
"…Hmph."
An Jihye wasn't a typical queen bee.
Extremely sharp. Extremely quick on the uptake. Extremely voracious.
And, as a bonus, extremely fuckable.
With a queen bee like that, if I cut the conversation off at "there's no problem," she would absolutely start climbing.
And I—
"But he did say one more thing."
"Who did?"
"Our Director."
"What… did he say…"
—had a sentence that could control a woman like An Jihye.
"He said if she does it again, or does anything else that rubs him the wrong way, to tell him. And that next time he won't look left or right — he'll flip the whole table."
"……."
I delivered that magic sentence, then answered her with a smile that carried almost the exact same meaning as the one An Jihye had worn a moment ago.
Just now, making that little hmph sound, hadn't she been thinking that as long as she kept buttering people up just enough, she'd be fine?
"After Manager Kim Yuhon ended up like that… I'm sure Jihye had some idea what was coming. He was a bit clumsy with the work, sure, but he still held a key position."
"Ah… yes."
"So when the Manager went down… honestly, I was even more worried. That the empty seat would feel too big. But… I don't know if you've been hearing the talk on the Planning side lately."
My sentences were similar to hers — but the depth of meaning was entirely different.
"I told you before, right? That I'm doing two and a half people's work right now."
"…Yes."
"Maybe that's why the Director is taking such good care of me?"
"……."
Eyes down, you fucking bitch.
Even once the pork cutlets arrived, An Jihye didn't seem to have much of an appetite.
And the reason for that… wasn't exactly hard to understand.
"It gets soggy if you let it sit. Eat up."
"…Yes."
She'd thought that as long as she kept going like this, she'd be fine.
And by "this," she meant: do the work well enough. Collect the ordinary praise. Keep the bad talk from coming up.
Ah, and honestly, that was the right answer.
If she'd actually been doing it that way, An Jihye wouldn't be picking at her pork cutlet like this right now.
Nothing to feel guilty about.
Of course… even then, she still wouldn't have escaped my hands — the ones that could set "relationships."
But.
"I covered for yesterday's mess, by the way."
"What?"
"The Director did end up shouting, actually."
"……."
"But it wasn't because of Finance or Jihye, so you don't need to worry."
"How…"
"I sold out our Team Lead. To be fair, he had been vague about things."
An Jihye had made a "mistake" yesterday.
If you actually broke down the share of blame, it was probably something like nine-to-one with that idiot Team Lead… but still.
An Jihye had made a "mistake," and the content of that "mistake" was failing to do the cross-check.
Yeah. A stretch. It was a stretch.
"I don't know if Jihye's noticed, but our Team Lead's been getting a little… unhinged lately. You know that?"
"Ah, no."
"I think he's starting to get nervous. As for why… well, if you say you don't know, there's not much I can do, but there's something there."
But so what if it was a stretch?
What exactly could she do about it?
Aside from trembling and looking away — what could she do?
Failing to do the cross-check that was essential to the document process was a hard fact.
"You've been doing well lately, Jihye. Honestly, back then I was pretty pissed too, and I said some unkind things about you, and, well… it was what it was. Ah, but these days, nothing but good things come up when your name does."
But I'd covered for it.
Me. The me sitting right in front of her.
So she needed to crawl, to shake, to bang her head on the floor.
I was trash-talking the Team Lead, but to An Jihye those words could mean something else entirely.
No.
"Just keep doing what you're doing, Jihye. Lately even our Director has a good view of you."
"……."
The second you fall out of my favor, you're fucked.
I have the ability and the backing to make that happen.
So you need to stay under me.
Sharp as she was, An Jihye would absolutely take it that way.
Why?
"…I'll do my best."
Because that was how she'd lived her whole life.
She was grinding her teeth as she said it… and with anyone else I might have flinched, but not me.
If anything, looking at those eyes got me sexually excited.
Naturally.
"If you're done, let's get up."
"…Yes."
Getting whipped, getting cursed at, even getting hit — that wasn't my taste.
If anything, it was the other way around. And before long… I had a feeling I'd be able to grind An Jihye under me the same way.
But not yet.
"…Thanks for the meal."
"How about just buying me a coffee instead?"
"Ah, yes. That… yes."
I paid for the two pork cutlet sets, and we went straight into the café attached right next door.
"What would you like, Assistant Manager?"
"I'll have… an iced latte."
"One iced latte and one iced americano, please."
…Come to think of it.
Lunch was always somewhere near the office, so this place we came to for coffee afterward was somewhere I ended up a lot.
And the part-timer working now—
"Uh… that'll be nine thousand won."
—was looking at me with a distinctly sour expression.
I knew exactly what that look meant.
It was the same face the motel clerk had made when I'd walked in with Park Eunseo and Chu Yeonju.
This café part-timer even seemed to remember me coming here with Park Eunseo and Chu Yeonju.
Well, of course.
"Iced latte and iced americano."
Park Eunseo, Chu Yeonju, An Jihye — all three of them were beauties you couldn't easily forget after seeing them once.
And watching me walk in one after another with women like that, even one-on-one, the part-timer's eyes were asking the question.
"Thanks, Jihye. I'll enjoy it."
What the hell makes you so special that you keep cycling through women like that and showing up here?
So I answered with my eyes too.
"…Thank you. Please come again."
Just do your job.
Hostile or not, the part-timer at least did the work properly — when I took a pull of the iced latte, the rich taste of the milk hit me right away.
It really was a good place.
Which put me in a good enough mood that I said,
"Jihye."
"Yes?"
"You're doing good work. Don't push yourself. Just keep going like this. That's all you need."
I'd tossed out something vaguely like praise without thinking, and only after saying it realized I'd said almost the same thing during the power struggle at the pork cutlet place.
Maybe that was why.
Hearing it, An Jihye lowered her head slightly, eyes deep in thought.
I really hoped that thought was that thought.
Anyway.
"What about you, Jihye?"
"Yes?"
"Heading straight back to your desk? Or are you going to rest somewhere?"
"Ah… I… what about you, Assistant Manager?"
"I'm going to rest a bit in the lounge before I head up."
We'd come back to the company, and it was time to part ways with An Jihye.
But An Jihye—
"…Assistant Manager."
"Yes."
"Ha. There's just one thing I wanted to ask."
"Go ahead."
—caught me, as if there was still something more she wanted to say.
"…So does that mean… you talk to the Planning Director about things like me?"
"Ah, yes. Word gets through whether I want it to or not. Jihye and I bump into each other on work constantly."
"Could you… maybe put in a good word?"
"That's… a little difficult. Credit is credit and fault is fault… but I don't go around inventing things that didn't happen, so you don't need to worry about that. Everyone knows holding grudges over that kind of thing at the company only backfires."
"No, that's not…"
"Well, good luck. I'm heading up."
But I turned my back on An Jihye with a coldness that bordered on ruthless.
And to my retreating back—
"A-Assistant Manager!"
"Yes?"
Just like before.
An Jihye, eyes trembling, said in a very small voice,
"Um… what do I have to do for you to speak well of me?"