“Has she not passed the marriageable age already? To be frank, you’ve been far too unreasonable, my lord. You should have held the ceremony before she was past her prime!”

Noah sank back into the sofa. He was the unreasonable one? It was Adeline who had been unreasonable. Hadn’t this engagement come about because of her in the first place?

He was curious about what Adeline was scheming, but what mattered right now was that he had no grounds to break off the engagement.

“Noah, are you getting married?”

The woman sitting quietly on his lap, watching his mood, asked.

[Noah.]

In that instant, a voice he had long forgotten bored its way into his ears.

Silver hair scattering in the wind, lavender eyes turning back to look at him, red lips curving into a gentle smile.

The moment that devil with her delicate features surfaced in his mind, his mood plummeted.

But Noah was a gentleman with women. He gave the woman who had made him think of Adeline a warm smile.

“Would you like that?”

“I’d rather we didn’t.”

“Then shall we not?”

What was her name again?

There was no reason he’d remember the name of a one-night woman. Noah kicked the leg of the man sitting across from him. The man, who had for once declined the company of women in favor of a card game, turned his head at the kick, read the situation, and quickly mouthed something.

Ah, so her name was Anna.

“Anna, would you go cause a scene for me at my fiancée’s? For my sake.”

“And what will you do for me in return?”

Noah raised an eyebrow. He’d thought her naive, but she was quite bold. Amused by that, Noah gently scratched under her chin. The way one might treat a dog that wagged its tail well.

“Shall I take you as my mistress?”

“Please. What about Celia, then?”

Noah’s brow furrowed slightly.

“She’s not my mistress.”

“Liar. I heard you call her to the manor every day. I have ears too, you know.”

The smile on Noah’s face hardened. It grated on him, the way a one-night woman was sulking as though she were his lover.

Should I get rid of her? While Noah was mulling it over, Anna, who was not entirely without sense, quickly changed her tone.

“I’ll help you. Just please don’t call that awful Celia again. I can do better.”

“Let me hear how you plan to help first.”

Anna leaned in and whispered softly into Noah’s ear. He had asked her to cause a scene, but he hadn’t expected much. Every noble in society knew that an engagement like this wouldn’t be dissolved by something so trivial.

Instead, Anna told him about how someone she knew had recently gotten a divorce.

“The husband demanded a divorce when his wife fell ill?”

Though the method depended on the will of God to cooperate.

“There was no need for them to fight over alimony or any of that. The woman had a terminal illness, after all. So she had no choice but to accept her husband’s demand for divorce. Truly pitiful. She had even treated that upstart like a proper husband.”

Anna stroked Noah’s shoulder with a hand that held a hint of expectation.

“What if you slipped something into your fiancée’s drink?”

“Slipped something in?”

“To make her fall ill. Even if it’s not a terminal illness, who would want to marry a woman with a chronic condition?”

The corner of Noah’s mouth twisted upward.

Even a scoundrel who lived by his instincts knew there were lines that must not be crossed. He had no desire to harm anyone. The thought of hurting Adeline simply because he didn’t want to marry sat uneasily with him.

“There’s a better way than that.”

Noah pressed the cigar against the armrest of the sofa and snuffed it out. Sizzle. The sound of leather scorching black was unsettling.

The air turned cold in an instant.

Anna, noticing this, quietly began to rise.

“Just a moment, I need to use the restroom… Eek!”

Noah grabbed Anna’s wrist as she tried to slip away. She lost her balance and fell forward onto him. He seized the back of her neck in a firm grip.

She couldn’t move, like a hunting dog had clamped its jaws around her nape. The blue eyes she met up close were strikingly clear. Before she could even take them in, she spotted the murderous intent rippling within them and felt a chill run down her spine.

“Wouldn’t it be faster for her to find out that I’m the kind of man who rolls around with any woman?”

“M, my lord.”

“You, in front of Adeline.”

Noah curved the corner of his lips gently.

“If you’re willing to let her see you getting f*cked by me in person, I might just take you as my mistress.”

Anna’s face went white. For a lower-ranking noble, rising in the world meant either marrying into the upper nobility or becoming a mistress.

Noah Miller was a deeply desirable man.

He had everything, and since he seemed to possess good character on top of it all, everyone sang his praises. But as of today, Anna understood.

That image had all been a mask.

“Before that, would you be willing to take my c*ck in front of the men here, as practice? If you run off in shame the moment you actually see Adeline, it’ll only put me in an awkward spot, so I need to check whether you’re all show or not.”

Anna understood instinctively that this man was not speaking idly. Fear flooded her eyes, turning them bloodshot.

“If you can’t do it, shut your mouth and get out.”

Having lost interest, Noah released the trembling Anna. The moment she had her chance, she ran without looking back, tears streaming down her face.

The men who had stopped their card game and were watching Noah’s mood exchanged glances. Noah, who never lost his temper, had lost his temper. On top of that, treating a woman this way meant his mood was very, very foul.

Hoping to ease the stiff atmosphere, they each offered a casual word.

“Why are you taking it out on the wrong person, Noah?”

“Right. If it’s time to get married, then get married. Marriage is a duty too, you idiot. What’s so serious about it? You fulfill your duty on the surface and still fool around on the side. Look at me. Even with that finicky wife of mine, I’ve been at it for three years without getting caught. Fooling a woman is the easiest thing there is. If you really can’t stand it, try the method that woman just mentioned.”

“Yeah, it’s not like you’re poisoning her or anything. What does it matter to you what happens to the Villette lady? Weren’t you singing about wanting to break off the engagement?”

Noah knocked back a whiskey packed full of ice. That woman, and these idiots. Noah was convinced that, being people who chased after pleasure, they must have c*m lodged in their frontal lobes. How else could they encourage something like that?

“I don’t deal in crime.”

The men, thinking Noah was joking, burst out laughing.

But it was the truth.

Noah drank but didn’t do drugs. He could be in filthy, debauched company and still not gamble. He had s*x with women but never by force.

Would he really stoop to something as sordid as drugging Adeline to break off an engagement? Not unless he’d lost his mind.

“Now, if I were the one who fell ill…”

Noah, who had been muttering to himself, raised an eyebrow.

To anyone watching, being in a place like this made him no different from the rest. Albert, who had been staring at Noah with a look of weary resignation as he drew that line for himself, suddenly sharpened his gaze.

It was because he had noticed the change in Noah’s expression.

“My lord. You’re thinking of something… irrational right now, aren’t you?”

“You’re still here?”

Noah turned to look at Albert as though surprised.

“Whatever it is you’re thinking, don’t. You can’t. You absolutely cannot.”

“What makes you think you know what it is?”

Noah caught hold of the thought drifting through his mind and began to give it shape. The more he imagined it, the more he found himself thinking it wasn’t half bad.

By the time he had finished an entire bottle of whiskey, a broad smile had bloomed across Noah’s face.

* * *

Noah’s daily routine consisted of nothing but drinking, parties, and s*x. Whatever official duties he was given, Albert handled them all. In return, he received an enormous salary, so Albert, who was mad about money, had no particular complaints.

But today was different.

Noah had summoned Albert first thing in the morning. When he said he needed to get some work done and told Albert to bring pen and paper, Albert felt a sense of unease.

What’s gotten into him all of a sudden?

On top of that, being told to bring them to the lakeside made it seem even less like he was about to do any normal sort of work.

A short while later.

“Have you lost your mind, my lord?”

Albert’s voice rang out across the lakeside like a thunderclap.

So he’d thought it strange that Noah was actually doing work for once, and it turned out he was planning to send a letter of broken engagement to the eldest daughter of Villette.

Right. Up to that point, it was understandable.

Breaking off an engagement could, strictly speaking, be considered official business. But the strategy Noah had put forward as his method of breaking the engagement was utterly absurd. No, it simply wasn’t realistic.

“You’re going to commit fraud just to break off an engagement? Staking the Miller ducal house on it?”

“That’s the only way that leech will let go.”

Noah shuddered as though the very thought disgusted him.

Adeline Villette.

If it meant he never had to see her again, that woman who clung to him like a leech without even particularly loving him and refused to let go.

“I cannot allow it. This is unacceptable.”

“Then will you marry in my place? You already handle my duties for me, so go ahead and stand in at the ceremony too, and have s*x in my place as well. Oh, and if you have a child for me, I’ll raise them well as my heir.”