71. Zero Pillows
“Mmm…”
Katya, who had been traveling in dreamland while leaning on Nikolai’s shoulder, woke up and rubbed her eyes.
When she came to her senses, she found herself in a moving carriage.
Nikolai, who had been looking down somewhere with his head slightly bowed, raised his eyes to meet hers.
“Are you awake?”
“Where are we going?”
“There’s a vacant room at a hotel in town, so we’re heading there. Since we both stayed up all night, I thought we should get some proper rest.”
Nikolai deliberately omitted mentioning that Boris had secured this place.
Though the aide who had done his best would surely feel wronged to learn his achievement was buried.
But that wasn’t what mattered to Nikolai right now.
His eyes moved down again.
Katya followed his gaze and became flustered.
He was looking directly at her legs.
Despite being covered by a voluminous skirt, his persistent gaze seemed to pierce through, making her unconsciously hold her breath.
‘Why has he been staring at my legs so intently since earlier?’
It wasn’t just a mere glance—it was quite blatant.
At that moment, Katya recalled what Alyona had repeatedly told her since childhood.
“All men are beasts!”
“Aren’t there any herbivores? Like squirrels, rabbits, something like that?”
“Though there must be herbivore-like men somewhere, how can we take the time to figure out what kind of man someone is? It’s best to just be careful of all of them at first.”
“What should we be careful of?”
Alyona pondered for a moment, unsure how to answer the little ladies’ question.
“Simply put, young ladies, you shouldn’t trust any man except our Duke!”
Was this the kind of situation Alyona meant to be careful about?
Even without being taught, she could instinctively tell.
That Nikolai’s gaze was somehow different from usual.
‘Plus this man likes me? Wait, so does that mean husbands are okay to trust, besides Father?’
As she quickly processed these thoughts in an instant, Nikolai suddenly reached out to her and grabbed the hem of her skirt.
“Grand Duke, what are you doing?”
“I just can’t stand it anymore no matter how I think about it.”
“What can’t you stand?”
“All my attention has been there since earlier, I really can’t bear it anymore. I need to see it directly. Please forgive my rudeness.”
Katya firmly grabbed his hand that was trying to lift her skirt.
This was an enclosed space, and the man before her liked her and was spouting suspicious-sounding words.
Detecting danger, she stammered.
“S-so what exactly do you want to see?”
“Won’t you allow me just for a moment? It’s urgent.”
Nikolai pleaded with shining blue eyes.
No, so what’s urgent!
“Sorry. I’ll take the slap later.”
Before she could stop him, he lifted her skirt up to her knees.
As the covering fabric was removed, her legs felt cool for a moment.
It was her first time showing her bare legs to a man, which made her feel goosebumps all over.
“Grand Duke, we’re not that kind of relationship yet!”
Katya shouted with her eyes tightly shut.
“Hah… This is driving me crazy.”
At the soft sigh, she opened her eyes.
Nikolai was looking at her legs with furrowed brows.
“Have you been enduring this all this time?”
Only then did Katya realize that her knee was scraped and bleeding.
It was an injury from when she fell on the wooden floor while trying to switch Judith’s rouge case at the hotel.
After spending the night in chaos, the blood had already dried into a scab.
“I didn’t even know I was hurt.”
“It’s my fault. I saw you fall earlier but didn’t pay attention. Only when I saw blood on the front of your skirt while helping you into the carriage did I realize.”
“The skirt?”
When she spread out the skirt, there really was blood on it.
Since she was wearing a commoner’s clothing, it wasn’t designed with multiple layers of petticoats, and the thin fabric had quickly absorbed it.
“I didn’t want to rudely lift a sleeping lady’s skirt, so I waited until you woke up. But as time passed, I kept worrying it might be an emergency.”
“No, then you should have said that earlier instead of speaking without context! You made me misunderstand!”
“I’m sorry. Earlier I could only see your knee.”
He took out disinfectant and ointment from the first aid kit under the seat.
“This will sting a little, no, a lot.”
“Then can’t we just not do it?”
Katya whined before he could even apply the disinfectant-soaked cloth, clearly frightened.
“The wound will scar if it gets infected.”
“Yet you have so many scars on your own body?”
“One scratch on your body hurts me more than the dozens of scars on mine.”
“……”
“I’d rather get dozens more scars on my body than see you get hurt again.”
What kind of feeling was it to find someone else’s small wound more painful than one’s own large wounds?
Katya became curious.
How much must one love someone to feel that way?
Of course, whenever Bianca was sick, she had thought she wished she could be sick instead, but that was different.
Bianca was her family, her blood relation.
But if not for their marriage, Katya would have remained a stranger to Nikolai for life.
“Isn’t it too much to trade one wound for dozens? It would be much better if my knee just gets scraped again.”
“You and I are different.”
“How are we different? Because you’re a man and I’m a woman?”
At those words, Nikolai quietly shook his head.
“I’m someone who originally has many scars. A few more won’t stand out much, but you were raised preciously with only love from your parents. How can I let the precious daughter they entrusted to me get hurt? I have a duty to return you safely to father-in-law when this contract ends.”
“……”
“So this is serious. I’m already starting to regret not sending you home.”
How could she resist when he said it like that?
Katya finally lifted her skirt voluntarily, like paying taxes.
Whenever she squeezed her eyes shut from the sting, Nikolai furrowed his brows as if he was in pain too, and quickly finished the disinfection and treatment.
As he was wrapping a bandage around her knee with ointment, he suddenly paused as a thought occurred to him, then slowly looked up at her.
“By the way, what did you… misunderstand earlier?”
Nikolai drew out the end of his sentence with subtle eyes.
The corners of his mouth curved into a gentle smile.
“I wonder what our Grand Duchess misunderstood so badly?”
“N-nothing!”
“You also said we’re not that kind of relationship yet. Does ‘yet’ mean you’re willing to become that kind of relationship someday?”
“No!”
“What kind of relationship would make it okay? Actually, I’d let you undress me right now if you wanted to. I can allow you to have my body.”
As he said this, he undid the buttons of his chemise with one hand.
When his chest muscles began to show, Katya hurriedly grabbed the spread fabric with both hands.
Then she properly closed it and buttoned it up to his neck.
“It’s stuffy.”
“How can a married man try to expose himself?”
“Can’t I show my wife?”
“No, absolutely not! Make sure to stay completely covered up in front of me!”
“What am I, raw chicken being wrapped at the butcher? Why do I need to be completely covered?”
“It’s just as dangerous since bugs will fly in and make things spoil quickly if you don’t wrap it well!”
“If bugs come, you can catch them for me.”
Nikolai whispered as he tucked her strawberry blonde hair that had fallen on her forehead behind her ear.
“You’re dangerous just as you are, bugs or not!”
“Why dangerous? Because I’m too attractive when undressed and you can’t help but look? You can attack me anytime if you want to. My body isn’t mine anymore but yours anyway.”
“Honestly, you’re the one who made me misunderstand.”
“Me?”
“Why do you look at me so intensely? Your gaze was so suspicious I thought you were going to do something!”
“By intense, you mean like this?”
His playful expression suddenly changed.
Startled by his face that looked seductive just by looking, Katya covered his eyes—the most dangerous part of his features—with her small hand.
With his vision suddenly blocked, Nikolai chuckled without removing her hand.
“Forbidden, forbidden! Everything’s forbidden!”
If one could be charged with crimes by gaze alone, he would clearly be guilty.
Still laughing brightly, he took her hand and gently interlocked their fingers.
“Did I perhaps make you expect something? You should have said so earlier. I’m willing to meet your expectations.”
“I didn’t expect anything!”
Ignoring her protest, he slightly turned their interlocked hands over and languidly kissed her soft back of hand.
“How about it, should we start with a kiss? If you like the classic approach, we can hold hands, then embrace, then kiss. Well, we’re already holding hands now, so should we go straight to the kiss?”
“Why are you really being like this…”
Katya said with a pitiful expression, as if she really couldn’t handle it anymore.
“I’m not the kind of shameless person who would force anything by putting my feelings first on someone who doesn’t have feelings for me. So you don’t need to worry.”
Nikolai finally stopped teasing.
Perhaps because check-ins and check-outs mostly happened in the evening, fortunately, the hotel lobby was quite empty.
As soon as they entered the room, Nikolai took off his outer clothes and lay down sideways on the bed first.
“Come here, Tia.”
“I’ll sleep on the sofa.”
His brows furrowed, seemingly displeased at those words.
“I heard married couples should share a bed no matter what.”
“But I read in a book that they don’t do that in the palace. In any country, the monarch and consort usually have separate bedrooms.”
“That’s why we should share a bed before entering the palace at least. Should we waste this precious time?”
Nikolai stretched out his left arm to the side as though he’s offering it as a pillow, glancing at his arm suggesting she should come lie down and rest her head there.
“Do we have to? There are already 2 pillows.”
Katya pointed at the pillows on the bed as she spoke.
At those words, he grabbed both pillows within reach and threw them straight out the window.
“Now there are 0.”
The crafty snake who had swiftly eliminated the remaining alternatives declared majestically.
