Then let’s try this.

「Don’t you miss Volterra?」

The language of Volterra, the empire Lafreia admired. He was curious how elegant pronunciation would sound in that warm, rounded voice.

「You speak Imperial?」

「It’s practically a common tongue on this continent. Necessary for doing business at any scale.」

「You’re remarkably fluent. I’d believe you were Volterran.」

「You flatter me. Which of the two languages do you find more comfortable?」

「Oh, both are fine for me. I hold Volterran citizenship, but I was born in Lafreia. That’s actually why I’m teaching the children languages.」

Speaking in Volterra’s native tongue, she sounded exactly as he had expected, like a lively and refined young woman.

Listening to her chatter on after that, Carlyle gladly stamped Iris Mora with the mark of ‘high quality.’ With his time and resources invested, she could rise to the level of a masterpiece.

He had finished sketching the picture in his mind of ‘Iris Mora, lover of Carlyle Berthheimer.’ They arrived at the smoking area at around the same time.

“Well then, have a good day. And thank you again for today.”

The smile in Iris’s farewell held a certain practiced quality to it, the kind of face she likely showed people she had met on business. But the gratitude itself seemed genuine, and she bowed her head politely.

“Until next time, Miss Mora.”

Carlyle drew his cigarette case from his br*ast pocket and looked down at her as she lifted her head.

When would they ever meet again? Iris’s head tilted slightly.

“Um…… yes, until next time.”

She just gave a suitably vague answer.

Carlyle lit his cigarette, smiled faintly, and nodded.

❖ ❖ ❖

Ruben handed his employer the file on Iris Mora about a week later. Sitting in the back of the car, Carlyle flipped through the bound papers and stopped at one particular page.

“Gambling?”

His voice rose at the end with the kind of interest of someone hearing a piece of low gossip for the first time.

“Yes. Her only family is a younger brother enrolled in a private medical school, and he’s gotten into gambling. His debts are growing quickly.”

“Does Iris Mora know?”

“It seems not. According to the moneylenders, the brother brags that his sister thinks the tuition is just going up, so she’ll keep sending more money without question.”

“……Ha ha ha.”

What luck. Thanks to a younger brother wasting a medical school mind on something so pathetic, his plan had just gotten easier.

Carlyle thought back to the numbers Iris had been writing on the chalkboard. Tuition at a figure that made no sense against her salary. He had wondered what extraordinary studies someone named Henry was pursuing, only to find he was just an idiot learning life’s lessons at great expense.

And the woman who was cutting her own food budget to pay for it without a shred of suspicion was equally pitiable.

She trusts him completely.

But someone’s unfortunate circumstances were the highest-yield clause in any investment, the one that returned the greatest profit for the least outlay. Carlyle closed the file and handed it back to Ruben in the front seat.

“Is that all, sir?”

“I don’t need the rest.”

While Ruben tucked the papers back into his bag, Carlyle checked his wristwatch.

Five in the afternoon. The woman would be near the end of her workday by now.

“Any appointments after this?”

“There’s a weekend sports section briefing at nine.”

“Then take me to the Convent School.”

The driver changed course at his word.

The school sat in the affluent district upstream along the Ifley River. It took nearly an hour to get there from the center of the capital, where the offices were clustered.

Teachers were filing out of the front gate one by one. Iris appeared thirty minutes later.

“……Mr. Carter?”

Iris’s eyes went wide the moment she spotted Ruben standing neatly beside the car at the school gate.

Ruben smiled warmly and gave her a small bow. Iris smiled back and dipped her head in return. The memory of the lipstick surfaced at almost the same moment, making her regret having acknowledged him at all, and just then Carlyle stepped out from the back.

The people nearby began stealing glances the moment he appeared. Carlyle paid them no mind and turned the corners of his eyes toward Iris.

“Here we are again, Miss Mora.”

“……Hello……”

Iris bowed to him as well, but her puzzled eyes stayed fixed on his face. Her expression made it plain she was asking what on earth he was doing here.

Carlyle let out a low laugh.

“Have you eaten dinner?”

“……Me?”

“Yes, Miss Mora. You’re the one I’ve been waiting for, all this time.”

Before she could ask why, Carlyle opened the back door.

“People keep staring. Want to get in for now?”

“……”

Iris’s head turned back and forth a few times. He was right.

Surely he wouldn’t try anything strange with this many people watching. She stared at the dark interior visible through the open door, hesitated for a moment, and climbed in. Everyone else said even riding in it once was lucky, yet strangely, this was already her second time in his car.

The door closed the moment the President settled into the seat beside her. Iris pressed herself against the window. He was perfectly polite, but it was simply instinct.

“I wanted to have a conversation with you, but a letter seemed too slow, and I didn’t have your home address, so I came without any plan.”

“What…… kind of conversation?”

“Aren’t you hungry?”

“……Well……”

“I haven’t eaten dinner. We could go to a hotel restaurant, or keep it simple at the office. Whatever you prefer.”

Iris’s brow creased slightly. She reconsidered the assessment of ‘perfectly polite’ she had just made.

There was something odd about it, the feeling of having walked into a trap. He had, with a pleasant expression and the skill of a practiced handler, maneuvered her neatly into two options. It felt awkward to tell someone who had been waiting without eating to just go on their way.

“Then somewhere simple……”

In the end, Iris chose the option that would at least take less time.

The car headed toward the very heart of the capital’s center. People, automobiles, and horse-drawn carriages were packed in everywhere. They passed lit-up shops and grand buildings, and then the Royal Museum she had only ever heard of came into view. The car stopped around there.

The moment Ruben stepped out, staff came pouring out of the building next door. Ruben opened the back door, and Carlyle stepped onto the pavement and extended a hand toward Iris inside. She found it slightly off-putting, but she took the hand and stepped out. Then she looked up and swallowed.

A vast white marble building that took up nearly an entire city block stood before her, with the press company’s insignia hanging in a row along the front. Only three people had gotten out of the car, yet the number of people coming to receive them looked well over ten.

The moment the President began to move, the sound of dozens of shoes striking the ground followed in his wake. It seemed as though each person took turns reporting something to him. The same sense of displacement she had felt at the school’s anniversary event returned, the feeling of being the only one standing in a different world.

Inside the building there was also an elevator she had only ever heard about, but the only ones who got in were Iris, Carlyle, and one person who appeared to be the operator.

“There’s a guest, so later.”

The rest dispersed at Carlyle’s word. Ruben had also disappeared at some point.

‘I should have just taken the stairs…… I’m terrified……’

Iris was the only one who had gone pale beyond mere tension, as the lift climbed toward the fifth floor where the President’s office was. She bitterly regretted having stepped in without thinking.

The lift stopped just as her hands were beginning to tremble. The door opened, and Iris darted out ahead of him as though fleeing, making Carlyle smile to himself.

Another secretary stood outside the President’s office, and she too rushed over the moment she saw him, opening the door and taking his jacket. He seemed to do nothing with his own hands.

The secretary offered to take Iris’s bag and coat as well, but she declined.

“Have a seat.”

Carlyle gestured for Iris to take the sofa at the center of the room and walked over to the whiskey cabinet. Iris looked around the large office and settled carefully onto the sofa.

From the moment they had arrived at the building until now, the world had seemed to revolve around him. She could understand, just a little, why people said even one ride in his car was a stroke of luck.

And I threw a joke at a man like this about being Lafreia’s darling. The sudden weight of it, the embarrassment, made her hands fold together in her lap of their own accord.