Damon, the only son of the Preston ducal house, was known as a rake who turned no woman away and let no woman hold him. His name never once went missing from the gossip surrounding scandalous affairs with all manner of loose women.

Nate had not liked Damon from the start. He had the striking looks and towering height that made him enormously popular with women, but he was never her type.

Nate was a young lady with a personality the complete opposite of Damon’s. The slightly unusual detail about her was that she had a masculine name despite her refined appearance, but beyond that she was largely ordinary, and the people she spent time with were mostly the sort who enjoyed quietly drinking tea or reading books.

That she fell into unrequited love with Damon came down to a single trivial incident. And from that trivial incident, five years passed before she knew it.

“Oh? It’s the O’Hara young lady. As expected, she showed up again wherever Damon happens to be.”

“Really. That prim woman must be quite taken with Damon. She doesn’t usually come to low-class parties like this.”

The nobles murmured in low mockery as they watched Nate enter the banquet hall. That she was in love with Damon was already an open secret among the nobility.

Damon sat perched on a windowsill with a young lady tucked under his arm, leisurely smoking a cigar.

The party he attended this time was not a formal gathering of high nobility. It was more the sort where young nobles enjoyed a little indulgence in a looser atmosphere. So no one said a word if someone openly smoked a cigar in the banquet hall or got thoroughly drunk.

Damon drew deeply on his cigar and turned his gaze toward Nate with idle indifference. Nate was looking around the vast banquet hall, apparently searching for him. A noble sidled up to Damon with a grin.

“Hey, Damon. The O’Hara young lady seems to be desperately looking for you. Why not at least acknowledge her?”

But Damon said nothing and drew on his cigar instead. A moment later, white smoke billowed from between his lips like a cloud.

He was only smoking a cigar, yet Damon looked like a beautiful painting. Everyone watched him the way one admires a masterpiece.

In the meantime, Nate finally found him among the crowd of nobles. Finding Damon in a banquet hall was not particularly difficult. He was always at the center of it all.

“Oh, our O’Hara young lady has finally found Damon.”

A noble laughed and said so. The other nobles, bored with their daily lives, lit up as though they finally found something entertaining to talk about.

Damon watched Nate approach and brought the cigar to his lips once more.

‘Come to think of it, a whole season already passed.’

Damon thought, indifferent.

What Nate ordinarily did amounted to nothing more than standing near Damon and quietly waiting for his gaze to find her. Damon would deliberately not look her way and carry on easy conversation with other young ladies instead. If she so desperately wanted to exchange even a single word with him, she could simply come and speak to him herself, yet she never once approached Damon first.

There was only one occasion when Nate, who otherwise did so little to make her presence known, would come and speak to him first, and that was on days like today.

Nate confessed her feelings whenever Damon nearly forgot about her. It was not long ago that he realized the interval was exactly one season.

It was through Nate that Damon realized the cold winter passed and spring arrived.

“Mr. Preston.”

Nate drew close to Damon and spoke in a soft voice. For a brief moment her teal eyes flicked to the young lady from the viscount’s family who was practically nestled against Damon’s side. Whether she noticed or not, Damon smoothly curved the corner of his mouth and greeted her with easy composure.

“Miss O’Hara, you’ve come to the party. You look quite lovely today.”

The other nobles nearby burst into snickers at Damon’s perfunctory remark. And with good reason, because Nate’s appearance was, by anyone’s measure, so plain it was entirely out of place at this party.

Her brown hair braided up in a dull style. A face with only the faintest trace of makeup. A dress with no exposed skin and no vivid color, its only adornment a strip of lace along the neckline and hemline. Even the undergarments hidden beneath those full skirts were probably just as dull as she was, Damon thought.

And yet, for all that, she had more dignity than the viscount’s young lady currently clinging to him with her cleavage on full display.

“Thank you. You look truly wonderful today as well, Mr. Preston.”

Nate’s quiet voice carried through the room. Unlike Damon, who delivered his compliment as a mere formality, Nate’s voice held genuine feelings. Damon smiled pleasantly and replied.

“I’m glad you think so, Miss O’Hara.”

Nate hesitated briefly, then added after a moment.

“…Actually, you always look wonderful, Mr. Preston. And a suit suits you very well.”

A suit? Could it be that Nate O’Hara’s taste ran toward suits?

The “taste” Damon was freely turning over in his head was not taste in the ordinary sense. He meant intimate, s*xual taste.

He pressed the cigar he was holding against the windowsill and snuffed it out. Then he asked Nate in a tone that suggested he already knew the answer.

“Shall I send the others away?”

Damon already knew why Nate came and spoke to him. And whenever she confessed, she always asked him in a plaintive voice to dismiss the people around them.

The nobles who heard Damon’s words grumbled at being unable to watch this entertaining scene up close. The viscount’s young lady clinging to him pouted and asked whether she really had to leave too.

But the answer that came from Nate’s lips was entirely unexpected.

“No.”

Her plain voice spread through the banquet hall. Damon stared at her with an expression that asked what she meant. Nate gave a faint smile.

“You don’t need to send them away. I won’t be confessing to you today, Mr. Preston.”

An answer so matter-of-fact it didn’t sound like Nate at all. Damon found himself frowning without meaning to.

The nobles listening to their exchange let their interest show. Her voice, saying she would not confess to him, carried a strangely resolute weight.

“And perhaps from here on, forever…”

Nate trailed off, dropping her gaze. The whispering around them grew louder still.

Damon opened his mouth with an expression of complete incomprehension.

“What do you mean by that, Miss O’Hara?”

Surely she wasn’t saying she had no intention of confessing anymore. Something like that.

Damon was certain she could never mean that. But her words struck him like a blow to the back of the head.

“I know that because of me, you’ve easily become the subject of other people’s gossip.”

The nobles nearby, apparently stung by that, cleared their throats for no reason. But Damon’s eyes were fixed on Nate alone. She continued, composed.

“I don’t think that will happen anymore.”

“……”

“You see, I’ve decided to let go of my feelings for you, Mr. Preston.”

Every noble who heard Nate’s words went wide-eyed. It was a declaration of farewell, five whole years in the making.