An uneasy premonition kept rising within her.

And Lacy knew that her uneasy premonitions had never once been wrong.

Even so, she shook her head and tried to look again, telling herself it was not true, that she was thinking about it the wrong way.

Rafez would never do that.

And yet she kept feeling it.

And he knew it too.

The answer Rafez claimed he did not know—Lacy could feel it.

But until Rafez found that answer himself, she would pretend not to know.

No matter how long it took.

Even if, in the end, he never found the answer.

No, she hoped he would not find it.

She hoped that, in the end, that passion would cool.

Even now, and even from now on, she would keep trying for that.

* * *

“You said you had nothing to say, but I still have something to ask you. You can at least tell me what you saw at that time.”

After much thought, Rafez eventually decided he would have to bring the suspects face-to-face and figure out who was lying.

But before that, he wanted to check how the cook, Jeff, who had insisted until the very end that he had nothing to say, would answer if asked the same thing.

“No, I have nothing to tell you.”

“What?”

“I didn’t see anything.”

However, he answered with a calm expression.

Rafez felt as if he were speaking to a wall.

“Your Highness, I was not in the kitchen at that time.”

“What do you mean?”

“It was not my working hour, and I was in my room. I only entered the kitchen after the tea had already gone out.”

“Then why were you taken in as a suspect? You should have said it wasn’t you. Why have you stayed silent until now…”

“I did say, of course, that it wasn’t me. But the head chef and everyone else all said I was with them.”

“What?”

Rafez could not understand what he was saying.

If Jeff’s words were true, then he had been unfairly dragged into something completely unrelated and had been confined as a suspect until now.

So why had he stayed quiet without saying anything?

“No matter how much I insisted it wasn’t me, everyone looked at me as the culprit instead. They said I was lying even though I had been there with them… In my eyes, the other four looked more like accomplices. But even if I said that, would Your Highness believe me?”

So he had given up and remained silent?

Jeff had not worked at the Grand Ducal House for very long.

So he had assumed his words would not be accepted and had given up. But he did not seem to understand just how serious this matter was.

If he were truly branded as the culprit, it was something that could cost him his life.

“I see. It is hard to believe.”

Rafez nodded.

At his response, Jeff also lowered his head, as if he had lost all hope.

“But even so, you should have said it. You should have come to me first and told me.”

“…Your Highness.”

But at Rafez’s following words, Jeff raised his head again.

“Yes, I can’t believe you. Not entirely. You may be the culprit. But if you were, I don’t think you would have stayed still like this until now. Unless that was what you were aiming for. In that case, you must be quite impressive.”

“No, Your Highness. I truly didn’t do it!”

“Yes. That is what you should have said.”

If he had not spoken with Jeff, he might have missed a major clue.

Until now, Rafez had only been searching for the culprit among the suspects. But now, that might not be the case.

Jeff had not been there.

Then what if someone else had pretended to be Jeff and carried out the scheme in the kitchen?

But for now, it was still only a hypothesis.

He still had to uncover Molton’s movements and Juni’s suspicious behavior.

“Mollys, call the rest of them in now.”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

* * *

All five suspects had gathered, and while everyone stood tense, Rafez opened his mouth.

“Let us go over this again from the beginning. Juni, you said you were the first one to take out the teacups and teapot.”

“Yes, Your Highness. That’s right.”

“What? That can’t be.”

Molton immediately refuted her.

“Jeff must have been the one who set them out. I clearly saw his back.”

“Is that so? Are you certain? Jeff says he never entered the kitchen at that time.”

“Your Highness, that is a lie. I saw Jeff leaving after finishing the tea preparations. The head chef is right.”

“When I entered the kitchen as well, there were four people there. So I’m certain Jeff was there.”

Following Molton, the other cooks, Rustel and Scott, also said they had seen Jeff.

At the same time, they sent sharp looks in Jeff’s direction.

They seemed to suspect Jeff was the culprit because he was lying, but Jeff merely kept his mouth shut.

“Then who took out the teacups? Are you saying it wasn’t Juni?”

“Yes, I saw the cook’s back too…”

“I didn’t do it, so it must have been Jeff.”

Rustel and Scott also said that Juni had not been the one to do it.

“Juni, what happened? Tell me.”

“No, Your Highness. I… that is, I really did do it…”

Juni was trembling so visibly that she could not even speak properly.

It was to the point where he could not question her any further.

“The Juni I saw was only wiping the cupboard.”

“…In any case, someone set them out. And Rustel prepared the tea leaves and water, correct?”

“Yes. That was something I ordered Rustel to do.”

Molton admitted it first.

Rustel nodded along with him.

“And Scott entered the kitchen, brewed the tea, and handed it to Mollys.”

“That is correct.”

“But, Molton. The accounts of your movements are all different.”

“Pardon?”

“You said you were preparing desserts yourself. Rustel said you dozed off. And Juni said you went to the storage room and brought something out.”

This time, everyone’s eyes turned to Molton.

Molton’s face quickly flushed red, and he seemed unable to hide his panic.

“I dozed off? That’s…”

“Now is not the time to lie, Head Chef. You told me to prepare the tea leaves, then soon after, I clearly saw you sit in the corner and fall fast asleep.”

Rustel had asked him to keep it a secret, but now, as if he had given up, he spoke openly to Molton.

“Your Highness, that is… I must have dozed off for a very brief moment! But I woke up right away and tried to prepare the desserts. That is why I brought several ingredients out of the storage room!”

Though Molton was rambling, he hurriedly poured out his explanation to Rafez.

“Fine. Let us say everything you said is true. But how can you guarantee there was no poison among those ingredients?”

If he had brought out poison hidden in the storage room and dropped it into the teacup while the others were not watching…

It was impossible not to suspect him.

“Your Highness, it truly wasn’t me! I swear it!”

Molton finally dropped to his knees before Rafez and pleaded tearfully.

“I will ask just one last thing. Did anyone see Jeff’s face directly?”

Rafez ignored Molton and asked again.

There were many people who claimed to have seen Jeff working, but what Molton had mentioned was his back.

“When we work in the kitchen, we don’t usually stare closely at each other’s faces. Still, from someone’s back, their side profile, or even a passing glance, we can recognize one another.”

“Among the kitchen staff, Jeff is the only person with that height who wears those clothes, Your Highness.”

Jeff was a man, but he was not particularly tall.

In contrast, Molton was noticeably large in build, and Rustel was also on the taller side.

“…I understand.”

After sending the suspects back down to the basement, Rafez was just about to sink into thought when—

“Your Highness, Nain has returned.”

“Tell him to come in.”

Nain had been going back and forth between the Grand Duchy and his own hideout, continuing his investigation both inside and outside the Grand Ducal House.

Rafez had ordered him to find out anything he could, not only about this incident and the matter of the spy, but also about Lacy’s illness. At this point, even ten bodies would not have been enough for all the work he had to do.

“Your Highness.”

Nain entered and greeted Rafez.

“You came at just the right time. I had something to tell you anyway. It seems I may have found a clue to the culprit.”

“I also discovered something, so I came here in a hurry, Your Highness.”

It seemed he truly had rushed over, because his breathing was uneven.

Nain hurriedly pulled a stack of papers from inside his coat and held them out. Rafez immediately unfolded them.

They were profiles of knights belonging to the Grand Ducal House’s knight order.

As he continued flipping through the pages, he realized there was more than one.

There were three in total.

Their ranks were different, and so were their backgrounds.

“No way.”

Rafez took in the densely written contents at the bottom of the page.

And in the end, he could not stop a hollow laugh from escaping.

“That is not all.”

With a serious expression, Nain took something from his pocket and placed it in front of Rafez.

It was an orange.

A deep-colored orange, round and beautifully shaped.

“…An orange?”

“It was being smuggled out of the Grand Ducal House to the count’s estate.”

Only after smelling it did Rafez know for certain.

Then he met Nain’s eyes.

Nain also nodded.

“It is the culprit.”