I don’t even know what I’m looking for, so what could you possibly know. Olivia regretted not having anything in her hands right now. She glanced behind her back where there was nowhere left to retreat and looked for a chance to run away when he lowered his head.

No.

Olivia, who had squeezed her eyes shut, threw the fist she had been clenching toward his solar plexus. And Ronald Collins fell down magnificently.

By the fist of the malicious reader who had appeared again, Richard Dalton.

***

Only silence lingered for a while in the place where Ronald Collins had left. Olivia rubbed her shoulder that had been grabbed and studied Richard’s face. Whether it was because she kept encountering him once she started being conscious of it, or whether he was really following her around.

That Richard Dalton was qualified to be on Viscount and Viscountess Wickham’s guest list was a fact anyone who knew him would agree with, but being entangled like this every time made it strange not to have such suspicions.

Olivia glanced toward the mansion where Viscount and Viscountess Wickham would be. After thinking of the viscountess who would have wanted Richard Dalton to be involved with her daughter rather than some spinster, she felt a little sorry.

However, Richard Dalton seemed to have no interest whatsoever in such circumstances. That’s why he would have thrown a punch at the face of the couple’s invited guest, and instead of asking Miss Wickham to dance, he would have followed Olivia Jennings.

Ronald Collins had done something deserving of being hit, so if it hadn’t been him, she would have thrown her own punch, but asking Miss Wickham to dance was something Olivia couldn’t do. So he was now neglecting the duties and responsibilities that an unmarried gentleman attending today’s occasion should properly fulfill.

Just as Olivia, who had decided to send him back to the dance hall as quickly as possible, was about to open her lips, Richard stood looking her way with a thoroughly angry face. So this was what the front of the large back she had been watching looked like. His shoulders, heaving with rough breathing, looked much broader than usual.

“Where exactly did all the words I said go? Did you even listen properly?”

“……I’m grateful you helped, but you didn’t need to step in. Even if you hadn’t been there, Lord Dalton, I could have sufficiently—”

“Sufficiently what? Would this even tickle anyone?”

Richard grabbed Olivia’s wrist and shook it in front of her eyes. Her left arm, caught in his large, strong hand, swayed even more helplessly than usual. Olivia narrowed her brow at the pressure transmitted even inside her glove and twisted her arm.

“I’m sorry, but when have I ever asked for help?”

“Are you going to act superior to the end? Why did you follow all the way here without even a guardian?”

“At my age, I am my own guardian. Why would I need someone else?”

“Are you asking me that now? Since you say you’re your own guardian, let me ask. Do you think you properly protected yourself today?”

“……The one who’s clearly threatening me now is you, Lord Dalton, isn’t it? How—should I fulfill my role as my own guardian even now?”

The blue-gray eyes set under thick eyebrows wavered with heat. Richard, who had been standing as if rooted while sending a gaze that seemed ready to devour her, finally released the hand he had been holding.

Olivia lightly rubbed the wrist that had been caught and moved a step away from him. Richard Dalton was no longer looking her way.

“Don’t go around alone next time. If you must follow someone out, get help from a chaperone.”

Olivia, who had snorted, gripped her skirt hem tightly.

“Even when I want to have a secret meeting with a gentleman I fancy? Where in the world would such a rendezvous exist?”

“Are you saying I interfered between you two? A gentleman you fancy? Do you want me to call that bastard back right now? Is that it?”

Richard, who had finally turned her way, raised his voice. Olivia knew the worry in his eyes was sincere, but she couldn’t meekly admit her fault.

Though she knew with her head that she was in a ridiculous situation to maintain her pride, her heart couldn’t give up. She felt like bursting into tears from resentment over why she always showed only such a mess in front of this man. Even knowing it would never help in defending the pride she wanted to protect so much.

“He might not have been a man I fancied, but he was the only man who showed interest in me today.”

“It sounds like you don’t care at all as long as it’s a man who shows interest…… I’ll believe that’s not what you sincerely mean.”

“If I keep weighing this and that, nothing will ever happen in the end. It’s a story a man like Richard Dalton would never understand, but at least in my world, that’s how it is!”

“So is that something that needs to happen in the first place? What would people say if they knew? The one who gets hurt isn’t that bastard from earlier, but you. To him it would be a medal, but do you think it would be the same for you? Or do you want to get your name in ‘Issue Daily’ before me? What kind of great ‘inspiration’ do you think that bastard would give you to act so pathetically? I absolutely cannot understand with my common sense.”

In the pouring reproach, Olivia couldn’t even blink. If she closed her eyes even once, the tears that had formed seemed ready to fall. The hot breath pouring from Richard, who had come closer, swept over Olivia’s curly hair.

Richard, standing close by, seemed to notice the moisture glittering around Olivia’s eyes, but he couldn’t offer a handkerchief or anything. He immediately recognized that those tears, which she stood upright and never let fall, were Olivia Jennings’ last pride.

“……I never asked for understanding or anything like that. I gave up on such things a very long time ago. Just…… leave me alone. That’s all I want.”

Richard stopped Olivia again as she tried to pass by and leave the greenhouse. Olivia, whose arm had been caught once more after being grabbed until just before, stood in her stopped position without even turning her head.

“Let me go.”

“Promise you won’t do such dangerous and reckless things again.”

“I can’t.”

“Don’t tell me you’re going to do this again?”

“I won’t promise anything to you.”

“Why are you treating me like this?”

“Isn’t that exactly what I should be asking?”

A sigh finally burst from his lips. Richard, who rubbed his face with his right hand that wasn’t holding Olivia, couldn’t remove his hand from his heated eyes and forehead for a while.

His head really felt like it would split. Considering his usual drinking capacity, it was an impossible headache.

“Promise me.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Why on earth……!”

Richard, who couldn’t bear the conversation that only went in circles, extended his other hand as well. He finally pulled Olivia to him and stood her in front of him, gripping both her shoulders. Though her clouded eyes weren’t looking his way, Richard didn’t turn her face as well.

If someone were to see this scene, the current Richard Dalton wouldn’t be much different from Ronald Collins from earlier. Once that thought occurred to him, the strength in his hands gripping her shoulders loosened a little.

Richard conveyed his intention more clearly, though in a voice calmer than before.

“I still don’t understand why you’re doing such nonsensical things. But—if it’s such an important matter to you, if you absolutely must find someone…… let me help you instead.”

Olivia’s head, which had been acting as if she would never even glance his way, turned at the very moment Richard’s last words left his lips. Olivia’s eyes were colored with shock. Perhaps his words had been misunderstood by Olivia. Richard, who had released her shoulders, hurriedly brought out his next words.

“Of course, I don’t mean I would be your partner.”

“……Thank you. For a moment I thought something was wrong with my ears.”

“At least someone better than a bastard like Ronald Collins…… I’ll find him. So please…… don’t throw yourself into the mud like someone who doesn’t care who embraces her. When you don’t really want that.”

Olivia, who had been simply meeting his eyes without any particular response, tilted her head with her arms crossed. Brown wisps of hair were tangled in curves along her slender, drooping neckline.

Richard quietly looked down at the freckles scattered over her shoulders, which were as pale as her face. Strangely, this helped him find calm. He didn’t know the reason, but anyway, considering how he had lost his reason too quickly in someone else’s greenhouse, it wasn’t a bad effect.

“Why would you suddenly offer to help with a plan you don’t even understand, for a woman who isn’t even family? Where did the person who was preaching until just now to stop that crazy behavior immediately go?”

“Are you now scolding me for not stopping you?”

Richard’s much softer hollow laugh settled low. Olivia, who had also retracted the thorns she had raised, looked at him with somewhat relaxed eyes.

“When you suddenly change your attitude like this… I’ve been consistently strange, but you weren’t like that, were you? Whether the sun will rise from the east tomorrow, I’m suddenly having some doubts.”

“You’re right. I don’t know the reason either. What was I thinking saying such things.”

“If you regret it, you can take it back even now. It wasn’t a proposal I ever expected anyway. Not from you or anyone else.”

“If I take it back, will you promise me? I don’t think so.”

“You’re stating the obvious.”