"What?"
Thalia looked at her sister, still unable to believe what she had just heard.
"I said, erase his memories! Erase everything from the moment he stepped into my office!" Tiara gritted her teeth, fear and anger mixing in her voice.
"But, sis—"
"No buts! Have you ever heard of the legend of the Living King of Hell? That's him!"
"Living…" Thalia frowned, tilting her head as she tried to process her sister's words. "Living what?"
"Ah, never mind. Just do it. I don't want to lose you…" Tiara turned Thalia by the shoulders, pushing her toward the door to chase after William Carter.
Thalia glanced back at her sister and nodded weakly, even though she didn't fully understand where all that fear was coming from.
Rushing toward the elevator, she finally spotted William standing there, waiting for it to arrive.
"Mr. Carter, wait!"
But the moment William turned his head toward her, she froze a few steps away from him.
'Damn it! Why is he wearing sunglasses inside a building?' Thalia thought, her brows knitting together as she slowed her steps, suddenly feeling a strange resistance creeping up her spine for no clear reason at all.
William stood there quietly, one hand resting in his pocket while the other hung loosely by his side, his posture relaxed as if he had all the time in the world.
The moment Thalia stood in front of him, he lowered his sunglasses slightly and signaled with his eyes to his assistant, who immediately understood and left without a word.
He pushed the sunglasses back into place and looked at her. "Yes, Miss Thalia. May I help you?"
"Hmm…" Thalia clasped her hands together, looking at William while her mind ran wildly, trying to think of a way to make him take off his sunglasses. "How tall are you?"
"Sorry?" William tilted his head slightly, clearly caught off guard by the sudden and completely unrelated question.
Thalia blinked, then straightened a little as if she had just asked something perfectly reasonable, even though her brain was still scrambling for a proper excuse.
"I mean…" she started, buying herself a few seconds, her eyes quickly scanning him from head to toe as if she was calculating something very important. "You look tall, so… hmm, I need to prepare myself with proper-inch heels so it would be comfortable… hmm, you know, for us…" she pointed at herself, then to him.
"Proper? Heels? Us?" William furrowed his brows slightly, trying to connect her words so they would make sense.
"I mean…" She shifted her body, acting chummy. "To be compatible with each other…" she moved closer to him, "I need to—"
"It would be one hundred and ninety centimetres. Or six feet two?"
Thalia blinked. Her sentence—gone. Just like that.
"Oh," she muttered, slightly thrown off as she nodded, pretending like that information was exactly what she needed. "That's… good to know." She then looked up. "I guess I need more than three inches." She laughed awkwardly.
"For what exactly?" William leaned down, their noses almost brushing against each other as his voice dropped just slightly.
Thalia froze completely. Her brain stopped.
But her legs stepped back as if it were an instinct. "Uh… I am five feet… hmmm…" she rolled her eyes upward, not really familiar with the feet unit, "one hundred and fifty-two centimetres…"
She nodded to herself slightly, as if that calculation was somehow important, even though her thoughts were already spiraling in a completely different direction.
"Oh… I can see that…" William gazed at her and straightened himself. "And if you mean… kissing… I can just—"
He suddenly swept her up.
Thalia's eyes widened instantly, her hands instinctively grabbing onto his shoulders as her body lifted off the ground without any warning.
"W-What are you doing?!" she gasped, her voice breaking slightly as her feet dangled in the air.
William didn't answer immediately.
Instead, he adjusted his hold on her just slightly, one hand firm at her waist, the other supporting her with ease, as if lifting her required no effort at all.
"Now," he said calmly, lowering his head just enough.
Their faces were far too close.
"You won't need the heels."
Her chest was rising and falling too quickly, but she needed to calm down and think.
'Glasses!'
She instantly tried to reach for his glasses when William suddenly leaned to her ear and then he back to face her before muttering, "Shall we try?"
He tilted his head and leaned in for a kiss, leaving Thalia's eyes widening once again, her lips frozen as they brushed against William's.
Seeing how stunned she was, William's lips moved slowly, deepening the kiss as he held her in place.
Thalia's fingers stiffened against his collar, her mind completely blank as everything she had been trying to do vanished in that single moment.
The glasses.
The memory.
The reason she chased after him was completely out of her brain at that moment.
All she could feel was—Him.
Her heart pounded loudly in her chest, far too fast, far too chaotic, as if it no longer belonged to her.
For a brief second, she remained frozen, her mind still trying to catch up with what was happening, her thoughts scattered and completely unreliable.
But then something shifted.
Her fingers, which were still gripping onto his collar, tightened just slightly as if grounding herself in that moment and letting herself stay instead of pulling away.
Her lashes trembled, her eyes slowly lowering as the initial shock faded into something quieter, something unfamiliar yet not entirely unwelcome.
And without realizing it, she responded.
Hesitantly at first, like she was testing something she didn't understand, her breath uneven as she leaned just the slightest bit closer instead of retreating.
The moment her lips responded, William's lips curved into a faint smirk, and he deepened the kiss, his hold around her tightening just enough to keep her steady in his arms.
The space between them, already gone, felt even smaller.
For a moment, it felt like the air itself had disappeared, like her breath had been stolen without warning, leaving her with nothing but the warmth pressing against her lips and the steady presence holding her in place.
Just when she was completely immersed in the way he kissed, he pulled away.
She blinked and looked at him. 'What the heck? Why did you pull away, Mister Retired Mafia?' But of course, she could only ask that in her mind.
"So, Miss Thalia Kim, our height difference won't be a problem, right?" he asked.
"Uh—ah…" She was caught off guard by the question and could only nod in embarrassment.
He smiled, then pushed his glasses back into place again. "How about my glasses? Do you still need me to take them off?"
Thalia froze. 'Wait… does he know?'