Chapter 4

Why he was here now, and what answer she ought to give at this moment. Perhaps, just perhaps. If this was a second chance, then she had to seize it.

‘Is this a crisis, or an opportunity.’

Feeling as though she were standing at the edge of a perilous cliff, Lizette could not easily make a judgment.

“It seems you need time to think, so now let us talk a little about something private.”

In this place where everyone was holding onto their own tension, only Killian was at ease.

Sitting there with a relaxed smile, he truly was the kind of man who, if he so wished, could easily shake the lives of everyone seated here.

“Ah!”

When Killian lightly waved a familiar sky-blue handkerchief, Lizette let out an exclamation without realizing it. Seeing something she had thought she would never recover returned to her, she could not hide her delight.

“Your Grace, that is…….”

Wearing a dazed expression, Graham tried to grasp the situation. Even to Graham’s eyes, the item Duke Cedric had taken out was familiar. It was something Lizette had always cherished.

The problem was why Duke Cedric had it.

“Your Grace, please forgive my rudeness. May I ask why an item my sister always kept on her person is in your possession?”

Graham asked carefully. As stiff as his posture was, so too was his courteous tone. Graham was more sensitive than anyone to another person’s strength and power. Killian seemed as though he had been born wrapped in nobility itself, but on the contrary, Graham, who had inherited the blood of a father who had worked as a servant, had been born bound in chains from the start.

That sense of disparity instinctively filled Graham with aversion, but even so, he could not help asking Killian. There could not be any part of Lizette’s life that he did not know.

‘What do I do.’

In the end, this moment had finally come. At Graham’s question, Lizette’s face went even paler. Lizette’s gaze instinctively turned toward Killian’s red eyes.

All Lizette could do was remain still and wait for Killian’s lips to part and for the moment her life would be shaken from top to bottom.

Looking at Lizette lowering her head as though resigned, Killian could easily imagine the eyes that must be trembling beneath the veil. The boldness she had shown when they first met was nowhere to be found. The reason was obvious enough.

As Killian looked at Graham, whose eyes showed he could not restrain his curiosity as he waited for the answer, he recalled what had happened a few days ago.

* * *

Killian sat in his office with a frown on his face. He was staring intently at a neatly folded, pale-blue handkerchief placed on his desk.

―Me? Because I’m pretty?

The answer that had come from the woman’s lips, in response to his question of what she could offer, had made Killian suspect his own ears. What was even more absurd was that the woman who said such words had done so with simple plainness, without the slightest trace of arrogance.

Though it was their first meeting, Killian was not unfamiliar with the name Lizette Trianne. A man like himself, who never engaged in society, and a young lady of a Marquis family who had not even made her debut in society yet, made for the perfect pair for nobles who loved to gossip about others.

“If the ones who spread such vicious rumors had seen that face, they would be too ashamed to lift their heads.”

Killian’s red eyes flickered. As she herself had said, Lizette Trianne was pretty. If one had to choose the most fitting word, beautiful would have been more appropriate.

The appearance of others was generally not something that stirred Killian, but even he had been surprised by the beauty Lizette revealed beneath the veil. However, however great her beauty was, it could not shake Killian’s long-held resolve.

―Your Grace, you are not so idle that you have the leisure to keep listening to nagging about marriage and heirs, are you? I do not want anything except marriage. The same goes for being treated as a wife.

As she said, if Killian chose marriage, then at least some part of the nuisance that clung stubbornly to his daily life would at once be resolved. That was a reward he would obviously gain if only he agreed to the proposal, even without her having to give it to him.

If she had that in mind, then Lizette had a rather quick-witted side to her.

―Do you intend to increase your wealth with alimony you would receive after divorcing me?

―No, not at all. I will not ask for a single coin of alimony, and I intend to part from you whenever you wish, Your Grace. Neatly.

―I commend your courage, Your Ladyship. However, the answer you wish for is not one I can give, Your Ladyship.

At Killian’s answer, the woman’s face, already pale, turned even more wan. The woman, biting her lower lip tightly, fell silent for a moment, but soon slowly nodded.

―……As expected, it was too much to ask. If I have in any way been rude to you, Your Grace, I hope you will kindly understand.

Leaving behind those plain words of farewell, the woman skillfully concealed her face once more and then vanished down the gallery’s long corridor. Leaving behind only a single sky-blue handkerchief.

From the handkerchief laid upon the desk came a faint scent of lavender. The fragrance, where the bitter scent of grass and a warm sweetness mingled together, was like the lingering trace left in the place where the woman had gone.

“……I need to return it.”

Knock knock.

Just then, with a light knock, Apel, the deputy commander of the knight order, entered the office. Apel studied Killian’s expression, then carefully opened his mouth.

“Commander, I did look into what you asked, but it is a little difficult to tell you…….”

For some reason, Apel seemed reluctant to mention the details, but Killian did not mind. At first, he had only meant to return the handkerchief, but then he suddenly became curious. Why Lizette had made such an utterly absurd proposal to him.

It was curiosity uncharacteristic of himself, but every time he looked at the handkerchief Lizette had left behind, the woman’s desperate expression rose vividly in his mind. And so Killian decided to look into her circumstances.

“Speak.”

“I heard that a maid from the Trianne mansion was severely struck by Young Master Trianne a few days ago.”

“That sounds entirely unrelated to what I asked you to investigate.”

“No, the reason was because of Her Ladyship.”

“Because of Her Ladyship?”

“They say it was because she did not know about Her Ladyship’s outing, but I heard that for such a reason, it was excessive.”

Killian’s face hardened.

“They are not blood relatives, so why would he care to that extent?”

There was no one who did not know that the brother and sister of the Trianne Marquis family were not true siblings. An unpleasant intuition passed through Killian’s mind.

“Well. There are rumors that the Young Master thinks of Her Ladyship almost as if she were his possession…….”

* * *

‘Disgusting.’

Apel’s words had been proven without much effort at all. It was more than enough to tell merely from Graham’s eyes and actions, which Killian had seen himself. Killian became certain that his suspicion had not been wrong.

Killian knew that sort of bizarre form of affection well. As an unpleasant memory surfaced, Killian frowned without realizing it.

“Young Master.”

Killian’s red eyes gleamed coldly.

“Am I under any obligation to answer that to you, Young Master?”

Graham swallowed hard. The drawing room fell silent in an instant. At this moment, the only person whose breathing was not disturbed in the slightest was Killian alone.

“N, not particularly.”

As he listened to Graham’s answer with an expressionless face, Killian at the same time observed Lizette. He noticed her bloodless white hand trembling uneasily.

‘She must have had no other way.’

Now that Graham and Lizette were in the same space, Killian could easily understand the recklessness of Lizette that he had not been able to make sense of before.

“Young Master, I would appreciate it if you would leave. From this point on, I intend to have a private conversation with Her Ladyship.”

Killian’s words fanned the anger Graham was barely managing to suppress. At his way of drawing a line with the word private, Graham ground his teeth. A humiliation beyond mere displeasure scorched his throat.

It was humiliating to have to show such powerlessness in front of Lizette. He wanted to retort somehow, but Graham knew very well that what he possessed was not all that great before the status and power Killian held.

“Your Grace, to leave my sister, who is not yet married, alone with a man is…….”

He had not even finished the words he had barely managed to come up with.

“Do I seem to be asking for permission right now?”

A low, dry voice cut off the end of Graham’s sentence. It was such a plain voice that it hardly seemed to carry any rise or fall, but the meaning contained in the question was not gentle. There was nothing to be done. Biting his lips hard was the only thing Graham could manage.

“……I will leave.”

Even in the moment he stepped out of the drawing room, Graham did not remove his gaze from Lizette.

But right now, Graham’s gaze was not important to Lizette. The only person filling both her eyes was Killian.