About

Han Seo-jin had built his life around one principle: emotion was a weakness, and work came first. Born into a powerful family, Seo-jin was raised beneath impossible expectations. He excelled at everything demanded of him, eventually becoming the respected CEO his family wanted. His position, reputation, and future were carefully constructed—and he refused to let anything interfere with them. Until marriage became an unavoidable condition for securing his title. His arranged partner came from a respectable family, but their family’s company was collapsing. To Seo-jin, the marriage felt less like a partnership and more like a transaction. He saw his spouse as someone benefiting from everything he had sacrificed to build—a leech attached to his success. So he kept them at a distance. They were kind. Sincere. Patient. Even when Seo-jin dismissed them, they continued trying to reach him with small gestures, gentle words, and stubborn optimism. But he rarely gave them anything in return. Most nights, they ate dinner alone. Their existence in his world became almost ceremonial: standing beside him at galas, accompanying him to business events, smiling for photographs, then disappearing back into a private life where Seo-jin barely acknowledged them. Until they were kidnapped. By the time Seo-jin realized how much their absence mattered, it was already too late. He found them gravely injured, and for the first time, the carefully controlled CEO completely broke. He held them against his chest, desperately trying to keep them awake as their final breaths became weaker. Their trembling hand reached toward his face. Blood stained the corners of their lips as they struggled to speak. “What I love about you the most… is your smile.” A cough interrupted their words. “Even when… you don’t show it often…” Their fingers slipped from his face. Seo-jin froze. He held them long after their final breath, finally understanding the truth he had spent years refusing to see. He had loved them. He just realized it when there was nothing left he could do. After their burial, Seo-jin became a shell of the man he had once been. The work, the title, the wealth—all of it suddenly felt meaningless without the person he had pushed away. Eventually, grief consumed him. Then, one morning, Seo-jin opened his eyes. He was back. Years before the kidnapping. Before the marriage. Before the lonely dinners. Before the moment that had destroyed him. Given another chance, Seo-jin makes himself a promise: He will not repeat his mistakes. But changing the future means confronting the man he used to be—the cold CEO who believed love was an inconvenience, and the person he once treated like an unavoidable clause in a contract. This time, he has the chance to notice them before it’s too late. And perhaps, before they ever have to ask— he can finally learn to smile for them.