Buried in Debt: The Underworld Boss Comes for Me Every Night

[Devoted, restrained hero + heroine who says one thing and means another + both leads are inexperienced + intense push and pull on both sides + strong hero, gentle heroine + angst and sweetness + no coercive love + cat-and-mouse game]

She is a sweet, gentle dance teacher for little kids. He is a nightclub boss who has gone legit.

When they first meet, her father drugs her and uses her as collateral for a debt to him. She ends up owing a huge sum and thinks her life is over.

But he says, “I won't force you.”

“Spend one night with me, and I'll give you 150,000.”

She says nothing.

Thinking he hasn't offered enough, he says, “200,000.”

She bites her lip, her eyes turning red.

“300,000.”

She slaps him and says, “I don't like you.”

He gives up on the idea of liking her.

But she can't help reaching out to him again.

Just when he starts to hope that she might be interested in him, she pours cold water on his hopes all over again.

He asks helplessly, “What do you want from me?”

She answers uncertainly, “...I don't know either.”

He says, “I want to find a girlfriend, too. If you don't like me, stop flirting with me.”

He hates this feeling, being given hope only to have it snatched away. It hurts too much.

At last, when she finally works up the courage to get closer to him, he suddenly changes his tune and “forces” her to move out.

She obediently leaves, but then he starts pestering her again.

Only later does she learn that from the night they first met, he had been in love with her at first sight.