And that day, Ariadne never met Jade in the end. Because Kieron—infuriated to the very top of his head—locked her in her room.

“Do not let her leave the room until I permit it.”

His voice was cold, cold enough to freeze ice twice over.

He locked his wife in her room, posted guards at the door, and forbade anyone except the designated servants to enter.

She was only permitted her meals and a single daily visit from the doctor.

Nothing more.

Not even Jay, her only source of comfort.

“You cannot do this, Your Grace!”

Jay had been ordered to be confined to the servants’ quarters. That insolent maid who had dared to raise her voice at him, not knowing her place!

“Madam has tried so hard to treat you well! You never once looked at her, and now you’re imprisoning her?”

“How impudent for a maid.”

“My master is Madam, not Your Grace! If she collapses again, Your Grace will be responsible!”

Jay fought until the very last moment as she was dragged away, which only served to worsen Kieron’s foul mood.

After imprisoning the maid, he turned his back, feeling countless eyes boring into him.

Resentment, anger, fear — every negative emotion imaginable was directed at him.

He had merely punished the mistress of the house for nearly causing a scandal. So why were they staring at him like that?

Above all, Kieron was extremely sensitive to hostile gazes, and feeling them now only made his anger surge.

“Did you send Young Master Derayan away?”

“…Yes. We told him that Madam suddenly felt unwell, but…”

“But?”

With every unpleasant feeling weighing on him, Kieron headed back toward his office. It was at least a relief that Derrick had sent that bothersome Derayan boy away.

“Well… inside the carriage… Young Master Heidel Peyton was with him.”

“…D*mn.”

The moment he understood the implication of those unspoken words, he was consumed by an uncontrollable fury.

They had been friends with her brothers since childhood, too.

That explained why she had brought her brother and why they had arrived together to ask for Jade Derayan by name.

To see how he would react?

A hollow, humorless laugh escaped him.

He had already locked her in her room.

He had even confined her maid. Every servant on the estate knew what had happened, and surely some would gossip about Jade Derayan’s visit.

Now he had learned that her brother had been in the carriage as well.

Didn’t this make it seem as though he had fallen for the woman’s provocation?

His standing within the household would plummet even further.

Soon enough, the Marquis of Peyton would find out about this entire incident.

The Marquis adored his daughter to an overwhelming degree and would storm into the ducal estate the moment he found out.

Given his fierce love for his daughter, who could predict what threats he would make this time?

Just imagining it made Kieron’s head throb.

Tch.

Kieron turned away from the path to his office and instead headed toward her room.

“Your Grace. If you proceed like this, the story will reach the Marquis even more unfavorably.”

“What more unfavorable story could there be? My reputation must already be in the gutter.”

The thought that that woman had orchestrated today’s chaos only exacerbated his headache.

He had thought she was just a simple, naïve girl who could only cope with whatever was right in front of her. Yet she had dared to pull a stunt like this?

The Marquis of Peyton only helped his disliked son-in-law for one reason: his daughter.

Given his sharp, calculating nature, he would never support Kieron without expecting something in return.

That was how precious his only daughter was to him.

For her sake, he would do anything.

He supported Kieron’s business, helped restore the prestige of House Ambrose, and worked both inside and outside the estate to clear obstacles from Kieron’s path.

So if he had heard that she had caused a scandal today, he would never have believed it. He would simply direct all of that fury at Kieron.

Kieron felt rage bubbling up from the very depths of his being.

How much had he sacrificed to live with her?

The succession? The Council’s recognition?

Ridiculous. Those weren’t the true cost.

The Marquis knew exactly what Kieron wanted most as Duke Ambrose.

In exchange for marrying his daughter and providing unparalleled support, the Marquis placed conditions on Kieron that allowed him to benefit without ever casting Ariadne aside.

“Surely the Marquis expected this might happen eventually. Why waste energy worrying about it now?”

Of course he had set such conditions.

Kieron let out a cold smile as he arrived at her door, the entrance to her prison, guarded by two stout knights on either side.

***

How had things come to this?

Ariadne sat numbly in a room she didn’t remember entering. She was locked away, trying to piece together what had happened.

All she had wanted was to escape.

From the man who had shaken her heart without meaning to.

She wanted to escape from the man who had given her the faintest glimmer of hope yet refused to spare her a single glance.

She wanted to escape the man who had crushed her so easily and dismissed her as if she were nothing.

She just wanted to get away.

Away from him.

Away from the ugly scandal he himself had spoken of.

She wanted to meet her friends and see her beloved family without fear.

She wanted to enjoy peaceful days, waking up without a sigh and not having to force herself to be strong.

She wanted to spend her time without worrying those who cared for her.

That was all she wanted.

Only that.

But Kieron — Kieron, who seemed to dislike her so much — hated it even more when she tried to distance herself from him.

If not, then why?

Why would he go so far as to imprison her?

“What kind of absurd emotion is that supposed to be?”

She truly couldn’t understand him.

When she shouted that she wanted a divorce, he stared at her as if he were the one who had been hurt.

His features had twisted with anger when he ordered her confinement, as if she were the one abandoning him.

He locked her away as though imprisoning her were the only way to keep her, even though he had never truly looked at her from the very beginning. Not once.

Ariadne simply couldn’t understand Kieron.

What did he think of her?

Had he ever thought of her at all?

Or were his emotions really as clumsy and tangled as Derrick always said?

Was he really a man who didn’t understand his own heart?

Her thoughts kept veering off in strange directions, and she couldn’t stop them.

She had to think of something, because if she didn’t, she felt like she would fall apart.

Just this morning, she had woken up with her heart fluttering with excitement. She could never have imagined that the day would turn out to be so awful, so suffocating and so hopeless.

Curled up on the sofa, hugging her knees, Ariadne stared blankly at the far wall.

Could a single day really change so much?

Could emotions twist themselves into something this painful and chaotic?

Feeling her strength drain away, she pressed her face against her knees. And still—still, she realized—she had expected something.

When she had finally opened up, she had hoped that he might say something.

Maybe he would finally tell her how he felt. Maybe he would shout back, argue back — react with the same intensity that she felt. Maybe he had feelings for her that he had simply never shown.

She had hoped for something — anything.

But all she received was silence.

In the end, she was the only one who opened up.

His response — if it could even be called that — was to imprison her. As though imprisonment could count as a response. As though silence could stand in place of words.

It was a refusal.

It was a clean, decisive severing of their relationship.

Before she married him, she had never imagined that having an honest conversation could be so difficult.

Her parents had always believed that communication mattered; they loved talking with their children.

Ariadne cherished those long talks where the words would flow for an hour or two once she began, where she could open up and find and offer comfort.

Of course, she could never reveal all her insecurities, and nor could he. She never expected to know everything about him. Not even half of him.

All she wanted was for him to tell her what she meant to him and why he treated her the way he did — just the simplest truths. But instead of speaking, instead of offering even a single honest word, he only grew angrier.

And he locked her away.

“Did Jade get home safely…?”

She wanted to disappear.

Ariadne let out a long, trembling breath when this thought surfaced.

If he wouldn’t even consider having a conversation of this magnitude, then perhaps there truly was no way to ever speak with him again.

And if he wouldn’t even let her see her closest friend…

Then maybe it was better to let everything go.

To give up before she rotted any further on the inside, before her wounds could deepen beyond repair. While she still had the tiniest fragment of affection left and enough of herself to walk away.

Maybe ending everything now would hurt less. It would be as though he had already released her and let her go.

“So even now, you’re worrying about another man?”

The icy voice cut through her thoughts like a blade.

She jolted upright, her eyes wide, and turned to see Kieron standing there, watching her with a face as cold as ice.

‘When had he come in?’

“He’s my friend. Of course I’d worry.”

Her heart twisted painfully with anxiety, yet her voice was flat and dry to the point of lifelessness.

Then Kieron answered, his voice even drier and more devoid of emotion than hers, as if he were tossing the words carelessly into the room.

“We’ll see whether he’s really a friend or not.”

There wasn’t a hint of mockery or sarcasm in his tone, yet to Ariadne, it sounded harsher than any insult he had ever directed at her.

More cutting than any direct accusation.

Without meaning to, she let out a faint, hollow laugh.