“Now… it is okay now. Please let go.”
“It is not okay.”
Even as the man, whom she had known only as cold-blooded, gently cupped her face with tender hands and wiped away her tears, Scáthach could do nothing but sit there, powerless and uneasy.
“Why are you crying?”
“Because it is unfair.”
“What is unfair?”
“Everything.”
Casar sat perched on the edge of the bed, staring fixedly at the woman whose face remained damp and glistening with tears.
He knew she was not a murderer. But if she felt so wronged that she cried…
“Do you deny every single accusation against you? Even the claim about your affair with my father?”
Attila had argued vehemently that Casar’s father would never have kept a mistress, but Casar himself had refused to jump to conclusions about matters between a man and a woman until he could interrogate them personally.
Attila had called him a cold-hearted bastard, but Casar had not cared.
Thus, even seeing her glare at him with those reproachful eyes, clearly offended by his crude question, he still insisted on hearing her answer.
“Answer me.”
“No.”
“Really? The case report says you visited the villa as casually as if going for a meal.”
“I went there about once a week just to leave medicine. I would put it in a drawer and leave without ever seeing him in person.”
“I see.”
Casar stared unblinkingly at her as she explained herself clearly and earnestly, though her face was still flushed with anger, then let out a dry, meaningless chuckle.
“So you were not having an affair with him, and you did not kill him either.”
She nodded but looked at him with uncertainty in her eyes.
“Then… you would probably want to leave right away.”
“Of course.”
“Shall I tell you how you can be released?”
Casar’s gaze dropped slightly lower than her anxious face, and the corners of his finely shaped lips curled upward.
He looked at the long scar he had etched onto her body four years ago, a day she could not even remember now.
Bring proper sleepwear?
At past midnight, Peron was summoned to the lord’s bedroom, utterly bewildered by the Duke’s order to fetch proper women’s nightwear, and was now preparing Miss Iriel’s crimson silk slip.
Even while the lord was away at the military academy, Miss Iriel would occasionally visit Lindkoem to enjoy hunting and relaxation.
From the beautiful Lindkoem forest to the Lineva River cutting through its dense woods, it truly lived up to its reputation as the former capital of the Ebern Kingdom. Thus, despite the mansion lacking a mistress, there was still a fair amount of women’s clothing available.
Still, Peron, who privately assumed Miss Iriel would one day become Lady of Blachnatt, was deeply uncertain whether it was appropriate to deliver the future lady’s undergarments to the Duke’s current mistress.
But then again, what choice did he have? It was the Duke’s command.
Moreover, ordering proper sleepwear at this hour…
Considering how last night the lord had shielded the prisoner’s body from Peron’s sight, it was clearly evident the Duke intended to spend a passionate night with his newly acquired mistress.
“Um, Your Grace… I have brought it, but… I seem to recall you mentioned these were Miss Iriel’s favorite garments… Is that alright?”
Though Iriel, a noble lady of one of the Ten Houses, would never have told a butler something so trivial as these are my favorite clothes, Peron still hoped his words might, even slightly, restore the lord’s usual composure that had vanished in the presence of a beautiful woman.
But the lord’s indifferent gaze, looking down from a height at least a head taller, only stared coldly at Peron below. Peron swallowed hard and quietly stepped backward.
The lord’s icy stare clearly read, Does any of that even matter? And the door shut with a definitive bang.
The Duke’s proposal was simple.
She would not attempt to flee, even without handcuffs, and in return, he promised to let her leave the mansion as long as she showed no suspicious behavior. The only problem was that this arrangement apparently applied even inside the bedroom.
Thus, asking for proper women’s sleepwear, instead of his robe that slipped off with the slightest movement, was hardly an unreasonable request. Or so he had thought, until just a moment ago.
“Um…”
When the woman, who had lingered in the bathroom for a long while, finally called out to him in a tiny, timid voice, Casar set aside the document he had been reading and walked toward her.
Peeking out just her face from behind the tightly gripped bathroom door, she looked up at him with a flustered, uncertain expression. She seemed to have changed clothes already, so why would she not come out?
When Casar tilted his head slightly, the hesitant woman finally spoke.
“Is what you prepared really proper sleepwear? It seems a bit different from what I meant…”
He had clearly instructed the butler to bring exactly what the woman wanted: proper sleepwear. So what was wrong with it?
“I did not check the design myself. Do you not like it?”
“It is not about the design… Well, actually, it is… but this just does not seem right.”
“How picky.”
Scáthach, who had never once complained even while drifting through slums after her kingdom’s fall, snapped at the Duke’s remark and did something she would normally never do.
She took off the man’s robe, the one she had clung to like a lifeline.
In truth, it was a sort of defiance. After all, the Duke himself had claimed his honor was so great he would never lay a finger on a commoner like her.
“Am I still being picky now?”
Casar’s eyes, normally unshakable, widened momentarily, and without thinking, he jerked his head sharply away.
The crimson silk slip, barely covering her chest with just a palm-sized scrap of fabric, left the lush curves of her body fully exposed, and its short hem, ending just below her hips, revealed the pale, bare skin of her inner thighs.
“What are you doing?”
Though he barely managed to avert his eyes, a wave of heat surged uncontrollably below his navel.
“You called me picky, so I wanted to check if you misunderstood what I meant.”
The woman before him looked genuinely angry, not the slightest hint of seduction in her eyes.
Yet even as she stared at him with what seemed like disdain, as if questioning whether this could possibly be proper sleepwear, his arousal refused to subside.
He wanted nothing more than to strip that scrap of fabric off her and pin her beneath him right then and there. No matter how disciplined he was, this primal, bodily reaction lay beyond his control.
“If I have to stay with you in the bedroom, would not this outfit make things even more awkward?”
She had a point.
Just before he succumbed to the sudden, fierce urge to touch her tender flesh, Casar rubbed his mouth with a large hand and turned away.
“I will have something else prepared.”
Once, during military academy, he had been called up to the podium to demonstrate an enemy’s seduction tactic, the famed honey trap, as part of a tactics lecture.
Back then, even with a scantily clad woman straddling his lap, drenched in heavy perfume, his body had not stirred much. Perhaps because everyone was watching, and he had mentally prepared himself beforehand.
But now, even the symphony playing from the gramophone offered no help at all.
He had not been entirely indifferent to women before. Last night, she had genuinely nestled into his arms, leaving him quite flustered.
So while it was not true he had pushed her away several times, it was true she had clung to him in her sleep, and also true he had not slept well because of it.
Casar closed his eyes, recalling the academy’s endlessly repeated military hymns, striving to suppress the sudden surge of lust. Lakan’s questionnaire, which he had meant to skim before she emerged, lay discarded on the table.
Only after Peron was summoned again and brought a long slip cardigan in the same color did the woman finally leave the bathroom.
Thinking Casar was enjoying the music, she quietly sat on his bed. For the duration of one full musical piece, both sat in silence, listening.
Casar, reclining in his chair with eyes closed, slowly turned his head toward her. Perhaps because it was not Berlioz playing this time, she showed no sign of dislike or tears.
Though she had said she cried because things were unfair, her expression had clearly soured while listening to that music.
Still, while she no longer looked half-naked as before, the neckline remained deeply plunging, enough to reveal cleavage.
Damn it. Casar grimaced inwardly, muttering curses under his breath.
He was not particularly imaginative, so why did her naked body keep appearing in his mind? It felt shameful after chanting that military hymn over ten times in his head to calm himself.
To regain composure, Casar snatched up the glass of cold water on the table and downed it in one gulp, then sat upright.
“Lakan brought a questionnaire. Should you come over, or shall I go to you?”
Feeling it was rather awkward to talk while both sat together on the bed, the woman stood and approached him.
“I will write the answers. Please hand it to me.”
Scáthach sat down with cheeks flushed from belated embarrassment.
Though she did not seriously believe this cool, rational man would do anything to her just because she wore a revealing slip, a separate feeling of self-reproach still crept in.
“Just apply this first.”
Casar pushed the ointment jar, prepared before she went into the bathroom, toward her. He had considered applying it directly to her wounds as he had on the first night, but…
In his current state, he could not even stand up, let alone touch her thighs without reigniting what he had just managed to cool down.
“I will apply it in the bathroom later.”
Scáthach, too, did not want to lift her cardigan in front of the Duke and bare her skin. Even if he would not care about a commoner woman acting without decorum…
“Do as you like.”
“Is there anything else I need to answer?”
“Did you not stay completely silent in prison?”
Well, during her first and only permitted visit, Director Loegal had told her this was a matter she must resolve by meeting the Duke herself, so she should say as little as possible.
If she had known she would be tortured so severely, she never would have promised to keep secrets.
“Did you meet Director Loegal?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Because Director Loegal said he wanted to meet you, Your Grace.”
Hearing this, the Duke tilted his head slightly, but despite his bored expression, his eyes held a faint, feverish glint, as if he had swallowed some mild toxin.
Thus, Scáthach asked him with a genuinely concerned look, as if tending to a patient.
“Your Grace? Are you alright?”
“Yes, I met him.”
Casar deliberately avoided Scáthach’s scrutinizing gaze. Avoiding someone’s eyes, something unthinkable for a man who had ruled over others since birth.
Yet once he started noticing it, he was utterly helpless.
“You seem slightly feverish. Perhaps you should call a physician? I can read through everything and write the answers tomorrow…”
Relieved to hear he had met Director Loegal, Scáthach spoke to him in an unusually gentle tone, full of concern.
“You are a nurse, are you not?”
His male instincts stirred restlessly, warning him what he might do if she stayed close. His mind screamed danger signals, yet he could not bring himself to stop.
“You will nurse me yourself, then.”
So now she was unexpectedly playing nurse. Had she overstepped?
The Duke, propped up against layered cushions at the head of the bed, watched her with persistent intensity. Scáthach lightly pressed the back of her hand against his smooth, handsome forehead.
“You do seem slightly feverish. It is probably not serious enough for medicine, but just in case, you should sleep right away. If your fever spikes later, I could at least place a damp cloth on your forehead…”
Casar grabbed her wrist as she tried to pull her hand away, yanking her toward him. Startled, she nearly toppled forward and instinctively grabbed his thigh to steady herself.
He was just as startled as she was, the spot her hand landed on was far too intimate.
“Remove your hand.”
“Wha—? Ah! This… this…”
Scáthach yanked her hand back in shock. Unless she had imagined it, something unfamiliar had brushed against her fingertips…
Seeing both of Scáthach’s cheeks flush peach-pink, the Duke let out a faint smirk.
“So not all nuns are as chaste as they are made out to be.”
“What are you talking about…? You are the one who pulled me just now!”
“And were you not the one who showed me your bare body first?”
“Who stripped me…? It is because you gave me that strange outfit!”
He could not tell if he truly had a fever, but her face burned as red as his own heated body.
“You are right.”
Facing his straightforward admission, she pouted her lips and shot him a suspicious look, as if asking what trick he was up to.
Her lips were plump and smooth, like ripe fruit. For a fleeting moment, he wondered what they would taste like.
He straightened his torso and slowly wrapped an arm around her waist. When he pulled her slender frame closer, her soft, full body melted against him. Pressed together chest to chest, it was hard to tell whose heart pounded faster, his or hers.
“This outfit is terribly inconvenient in the bedroom, is it not?”