~Chapter 71~
After striking Countess Crenbel with the blade, all that remained was to wait and see what would happen next.
I returned home feeling lighthearted. Baldwin had come back as well. It was still far from the weekend, yet it felt as if the weekend had already arrived.
Before I knew it, the sun was slowly sinking.
The weather, standing at the doorway of summer, was loosening into warmth. In the garden, flowers in full bloom were beginning to droop under the heat.
In the lush green garden filled with the cries of insects, Baldwin was there.
He was walking slowly, his hands clasped behind his back.
From where I stood, he was about twenty steps away. His hair swayed gently in the breeze.
His blond hair was dyed red by the deep sunset. It looked as though he was walking straight into the dying light.
I followed behind Baldwin. One step at a time.
Careful not to let him notice me, I hid within his shadow.
My shadow overlapped with his. I walked over fallen spring flowers scattered on the ground.
What was Baldwin looking at?
I slowly picked up my pace so as not to startle him. Just a little closer.
I lightly brushed the tips of his fingers behind his back. He stopped. I caught his hand, then slid my fingers into his.
Baldwin turned his head toward me and smiled brightly.
His lips moved. He called my name without a sound.
“Anna.”
That voice again.
It felt as though Baldwin was truly calling me. I smiled back at him with the same expression.
“I’m back. Were you taking a walk in the garden?”
Baldwin shook his head.
“Then… were you on your way somewhere?”
He shook his head again.
“Then… were you waiting for me?”
I scratched my cheek as I asked.
He nodded.
I froze for a moment. Really?
We hadn’t even agreed on when I would return. Had anyone ever waited for me like this before?
‘Why are you so late, Anna? Didn’t I tell you to come home early?’
‘You gave me mountains of work. How could I leave on time? What about Egbert?’
‘That lazy fool? Never mind him. Have you eaten?’
‘No, I’m starving to death, Grandfather.’
‘Didn’t I tell you meals must be eaten on time? Come in. I told them to save your veal steak. You like it, don’t you?’
When I’m with Baldwin, memories like these keep resurfacing.
The warmest moments of my life.
Moments when I loved so deeply that I would have given everything.
Perhaps I loved Egbert because I saw my grandfather’s shadow in him.
My grandfather was growing weaker with time, and I was haunted by the thought that one day he would leave me.
I wanted to become family with him. That feeling carried over to Egbert. I believed that since he was my grandfather’s blood, he would resemble him.
But in truth, it was Baldwin in whom I was reading my grandfather.
My longing had taken form.
So it couldn’t be helped that I softened like this.
“What is this? How did you know when I’d come back and waited for me?”
Baldwin shrugged. Somehow, I felt like I knew what he wanted to say.
“Because someday, you’d come back?”
Baldwin nodded again.
“If I come back after you, will you wait for me like this?”
Baldwin narrowed his eyes.
“If I want you to, you will?”
He kissed my cheek. That, too, was an answer.
I held Baldwin’s face and gently pulled him back so he could read my lips.
“Then I should come back earlier. Summer will be too hot, winter too cold. In spring, mosquitoes will bother you, Baldwin. And autumn is lonely. I shouldn’t make you wait too long.”
This time, Baldwin lightly kissed my lips. Then he pulled me into a tight embrace. I gasped for breath in his arms.
Baldwin smelled of greenery. That meant he’d been in the garden for quite a while.
A soft, swelling feeling rose inside me. It was so sweet that I didn’t know what to do with it.
I stood on tiptoe and kissed him. Our bodies intertwined softly, so sweet it was almost overwhelming.
I clung tightly to Baldwin, still on tiptoe. He lifted me up easily, then set me back down.
Our lips met again at an angle.
Thinking it was good that he couldn’t hear me, I muttered,
“This is driving me crazy.”
My heart pounded, my skin burned. Pressed against him, I asked for another kiss.
Only after a long kiss did I finally pull away from his arms.
Baldwin stared at me with eyes darkened by desire. Knowing that I was the one reflected in that gaze made me shy.
I steadied my breathing and stepped back.
If we stayed here any longer, I felt something would happen.
After all, I was probably wearing the same expression as him.
A warm breeze passed between us. The summer air around us felt even hotter.
I took a deep breath to drive away the heat, then met Baldwin’s eyes.
“Let’s go inside, Baldwin. I’ll tell you how I won today.”
I gently took his hand.
Baldwin kissed the back of my hand.
It was a very sweet yes.
Sophia stared at Egbert, whom she was seeing again after a long time.
For some reason, Egbert had come to see her and asked for tea and snacks. His face held a faintly happy smile, full of satisfaction.
It was a sharp contrast to Sophia’s thin, worn appearance.
Sophia felt miserable about her own situation.
Facts she had tried to deny now came crashing down on her. She had desired another woman’s man. Though it was something she should never have done, she had tried to ignore even her guilt.
She told herself it would be fine.
And this was the result.
Egbert had escaped this hell freely, leaving Sophia behind. He returned to a shining world, as if he had never committed such wrongdoing even once.
The self-loathing that shattered her soul was something only Sophia bore.
Sophia let out a hollow laugh.
“You look well, Egbert.”
Her cracked voice slipped out.
“Everything will return to where it belongs now.”
Egbert smiled lightly, sipping his tea with ease.
“Where it belongs…?”
Sophia murmured.
“Yes. You should return to your place now too, Sophia.”
Egbert said brightly. The thought that Anais would soon return filled him with happiness.
He was getting back what he had lost.
And with this, he might even deal a blow to Constantine. Once Anais returned, he planned to immediately recover the money he had invested in Constantine.
For that, he intended to deal with Sophia first.
“Where is my place?”
“I’m not heartless, Sophia. How could I send you back there? A woman who bore a marquis’s illegitimate child living in such a red-light district doesn’t look good.”
“….”
Sophia closed her mouth.
“I’ll give you an annex. Go live there, Sophia. Live quietly where Anais won’t see you. I’ll visit sometimes.”
“Ha.”
Sophia rubbed her face.
“So the Grand Duchess is returning?”
“Grand Duchess? What nonsense! Anais is a marchioness. She’s my wife!”
Sophia laughed weakly. Marchioness? My wife?
What a ridiculous mess.
Egbert was someone who always placed himself at the center of the world.
“I see. So Lady Anais is returning?”
Sophia asked quietly.
“Of course. Anais is devoted to her parents. She can never turn her back on them. To save them, she’d even drink poison.”
Egbert said smugly.
“How could she not come back?”
Threatening someone by holding their parents hostage was hardly something to brag about, yet Egbert spoke as if he were telling a great heroic tale.
Sophia ran her tongue along the inside of her mouth.
She recalled the last time she saw Anais. She had knelt down and begged.
She had begged Anais to give Egbert back to her.
Anais’s words that day, her expression, her movements—everything was vivid, impossible to forget.
Sophia slowly retraced all of it.
“I’ll do as you say. I’ll go to the annex. Will Chris come with me?”
“Of course. I even plan to allow Anais to have a child. She wanted one so badly in the early days of our marriage.”
A sheepish smile crossed the face of the man who had ignored Anais and refused even to share her bed.
Sophia swallowed a bitter laugh.
Allow her to have a child?
Anais should have heard this. She wondered how that clever woman would have humiliated Egbert if she had.
But that would never happen.
Sophia took a deep breath and said,
“I’ll promise you one thing.”
“What is it?”
“Lady Anais will never come back.”
Sophia spoke clearly.
Egbert truly did not know Anais at all.
