The Creditor Is My Husband? - Chapter 27

“You look so pretty, Kitty. You’re really clean now. Oh! Thank you. It must have been hard giving it a bath, right? Did it scratch or bite you?”

Giselle, while talking to the cat, thanked the head maid. The head maid, looking at her, smiled and shook her head.

“No, future Madam. It was too gentle to be called a stray cat.”

“Excuse me? Future…”

Giselle, repeating the head maid’s words unconsciously, quickly waved her hands.

“Oh, please don’t call me that. I’m not in a position to be addressed like that yet.”

“You’ll soon be the mistress of the Taylor family, so it’s good to get used to it. Lucas has also asked us to prepare the wedding as quickly as possible.”

The butler interjected into the conversation between Giselle and the head maid. He, too, had a contented smile on his face.

Giselle turned to the butler and quickly bowed her head.

“Oh! Butler, I didn’t greet you properly earlier. I’m Giselle Anticia. I’ve caused a lot of trouble on your day off.”

“No, future Madam. It’s rather a pleasure to meet you like this in advance.”

The old butler’s face blossomed with a smile. Embarrassed by his reaction, Giselle blushed.

“Ah! Although it’s late, let me formally introduce myself. I am Bushin. I serve as the butler, albeit inadequately. Earlier, I was so flustered…”

He couldn’t describe how shocked he was when his usually calm master got out of the car with a pale face.

Moreover, he almost fainted when he saw bloodstains on Lucas’s clothes.

Of course, he managed to regain his composure upon realizing that the blood wasn’t his master’s.

But that was short-lived, as he was even more astonished to see the lady supported by Lucas getting out of the car.

Without asking, he knew who she was. He had seen her face countless times in the newspaper clippings he had collected daily.

The future mistress of the Taylor family, Lady Anticia. It was none other than her.

“By the way, how is your wound?”

“Thanks to you, I received good treatment.”

Giselle, flustered by the old man’s concern, answered awkwardly and then fell silent.

An awkward silence ensued.

‘Am I the only one feeling awkward here?’

She alternated between looking at the butler and the head maid, who were gazing at her warmly, and then awkwardly rolled her eyes.

Receiving warm gazes from people she had just met, which she had never even received from her family, felt strange.

As Giselle scratched her nose to avoid their gazes, the cat, which had been held by the head maid, suddenly meowed and jumped to the floor.

Giselle, who had been at a loss due to the awkward atmosphere, brightened up and reached out to the cat.

“Come here, Kitty. We’ll live together now.”

But the cat, with a sullen expression, looked at Giselle and then turned its head away, jumping onto the sofa.

“Oh! That, that sofa looks expensive…”

Giselle was the one who was startled, not the cat, which nonchalantly climbed onto the sofa.

“Kitty? Come down. Don’t dig your claws in, okay? That sofa looks really expensive.”

With a worried face, Giselle crouched in front of the cat. But the cat glanced at her and then turned its head away again.

Hmph! Traitor!

The cat’s tail tapping the sofa showed it was still upset with her.

“Oh, haha… It seems really upset. For being brought it here.”

Feeling embarrassed by the reaction, Giselle spoke awkwardly and then turned back towards the cat.

“Are you mad?”

Sorry. I did it for you.

How would you survive there alone without me?

Giselle, as if whispering, spoke softly to the cat, gently tapping it with her finger.

Each time she did, the cat’s ears perked up, and its body flinched.

If it really hated it, it would have quickly turned around and swiped its paw at her, but since it didn’t, it seemed the cat secretly liked her touch.

“…Pfft.”

While those watching the not-quite-confrontation between the future hostess and the street cat barely held back their laughter, Fernan was the first to wave the white flag.

“Haha! I can’t hold it in any longer! I really can’t!”

Hearing Fernan’s giggling, Giselle was startled and turned around. Then, she quickly turned her head after seeing Lucas, the butler, the head maid, and the physician all looking at her.

Her slightly hunched shoulders and the way her neck shrank spoke volumes about her embarrassment.

“Well, I was just… trying to soothe the cat.”

“Leave it be. It’ll get better with time.”

Lucas chuckled and approached her. Giselle, fanning her flushed face with her hand, pouted.

“Still, it’d be nice if it cheered up quickly. Right, kitty… Ah!”

Giselle, speaking to the cat again, suddenly widened her eyes as if she remembered something. Lucas, watching her with his green eyes, raised an eyebrow.

“Instead, how about we give the cat a name.”

“A name?”

“We’re going to live together now.”

She couldn’t hide her excitement as she answered Lucas’s question.

Finally, she could take responsibility for the cat.

The first step was to give it a name.

While she had been feeding it, she had purposely avoided giving it a name to not get too attached.

She couldn’t be sure she could take full responsibility for it. Even raising one cat had been a daunting task for her.

But now, the situation had changed.

Thanks to her marriage to Lucas, she was going to leave her home, and she had his permission.

Giselle’s eyes sparkled with a different kind of excitement than before.

“What name would be good, Senior? Since its fur is yellow, how about Yellow? Or Cheese?”

“Hiss!”

At that moment, the cat sitting on the sofa, grooming itself, pushed its ears back and let out a warning sound.

Giselle and Lucas’s eyes simultaneously turned to the cat. The cat’s expression seemed somewhat displeased.

“…No way.”

Giselle hesitated in disbelief and called the cat softly.

“Yellow?”

“Hiss!”

“Cheese?”

“Hiss!”

“Kitty?”

When she called it by its usual name, the cat made a grumpy face and turned its head to lick itself again.

Seeing this, Giselle’s shoulders slumped.

“It seems like it doesn’t like the names Yellow or Cheese.”

“How could a cat understand human words? It’s just a coincidence.”

Lucas shook his head with a chuckle, as if it were absurd. But Giselle stubbornly stuck to her belief.

“No, I think it understands me. Right, Kitty?”

“Then why don’t you let it choose its own name? How about asking if it likes a name like Elizabeth…”

“Meow!”

Before Lucas could finish his joking suggestion, the cat meowed.

Unlike its previous aggressive hissing, it purred contentedly.

“…!”

Both of them widened their eyes and looked at the cat. Their gazes wavered in disbelief.

Giselle, her lips moving slightly, carefully called the cat again.

“…Elizabeth?”

“Meow.”

It was unbelievable, but no one could deny it.

The cat had chosen its own name.

* * *

“At least it’s a female. Imagine how awful it would be if it were a male named Elizabeth.”

“Pfft.”

Giselle couldn’t help but laugh at Lucas’s words.

The cat’s name was finally decided as ‘Elizabeth.’

Despite his efforts to suggest other names to avoid the catastrophe of the cat being named Elizabeth due to his joke, none caught the cat’s interest.

It only responded to the name Elizabeth.

After sighing in displeasure, he seemed to have accepted it, comforting himself that at least it wasn’t a male cat.

“Hehe…”

“Stop making weird noises and just laugh.”

“Haha, haha!”

As soon as Lucas finished speaking, Giselle burst into laughter. Her slightly drooping eyes curved even more with her laughter.

Watching her laugh heartily, he couldn’t help but smile and shake his head.

“Haha, whew, haha…”

After laughing for a while, Giselle caught her breath and wiped her eyes with her hand. She had laughed so hard that tears had come out.

“Was it that funny?”

“Don’t you think it’s funny, Senior? The cat’s name is so, haha…”

Just as she was calming down, laughter bubbled up from her throat again.

“Ha… You’re hopeless. Fine, laugh as much as you want.”

He sighed and walked away, leaving her laughing again.

“Wait, Senior! How can you leave the guide behind and walk off like that!”

Giselle called out to the man striding away, leaving her behind.

* * *

“Would you like to tour the house before dinner?”

Despite the small incident with the cat’s name, there were no further issues.
Because of Lucas’s insistence on treating her arm first, she hadn’t properly greeted the mansion’s staff, so they had a formal introduction.
With some time left before dinner, Lucas offered to show her around the mansion himself.

“Hmm? This place is…”

Following Lucas, Giselle stopped in her tracks at the sight before her.

He stepped aside and waited for her, smiling and gesturing.

“Come in.”

“Uh… Is this a glass greenhouse?”

Despite his invitation, she couldn’t take a step, her eyes wide open.