~Chapter 5~
And even if it weren’t true, the fact that he had abandoned her and run away alone made him someone she never wanted to see again.
The carriage door opened, and Paris, standing at the entrance, smiled and held out a hand.
“I heard from my father that you were coming. I’m glad we didn’t miss each other this time.”
“…”
Maybe it was thanks to meeting the Duchess yesterday.
Rachel closed her eyes and opened them slowly, and managed to lay her hand on top of his. Paris gripped her hand firmly.
“So, I heard you’re here to see my father, my lady.”
“I have something to tell him.”
After getting out of the carriage, Rachel withdrew her hand. Holding the bundle with both hands, she naturally hugged it to her chest, and Paris’s gaze was drawn to it.
“Is that what your business is about? I’m curious—why not give me a hint, just for me?”
“I’m sorry, but it’s confidential.”
“Oh, already keeping secrets from your future husband? That’s too much.”
If he knew what this was about, he wouldn’t say such things.
Rachel glanced up at Paris for a moment, then looked away. Behind him, as before, the Valencia butler was waiting to greet her.
“Welcome, Lady Ingrave. The duke is waiting for you.”
“Lead the way.”
Following the butler, Rachel entered the mansion, Paris naturally walking beside her.
Passing through the entrance, Rachel took in the familiar sights of the estate and paused for a moment.
The familiar hall. The familiar ornaments. The familiar stairs.
All of it was Valencia.
“My lady?”
When she stopped walking, Paris’s gaze followed her. Rachel felt the shape of the evidence in her arms and exhaled a long breath.
As she started moving again, Paris, watching her, laughed.
“What’s this? Are you suddenly nervous at the thought of meeting your future father-in-law? You seem different today, my lady. Maybe I should say you look a little cute.”
“…”
She let it pass and climbed the stairs. The butler led them to the duke’s office.
Knock, knock—
The butler knocked neatly on the closed door.
“Master. Lady Ingrave has arrived.”
A heavy baritone voice came from within.
“Let her in.”
“Please, go in.”
Rachel entered the door the butler opened and gave instructions to Becky and the guards.
“Wait here.”
“Yes, Miss.”
The duke’s office hadn’t changed at all from five years ago.
Antique ebony furniture. Papers piled like mountains on the desk. Sunlight pouring through the tall windows.
The Duke of Valencia sat with his back to the light.
His red eyes turned to her. The duke’s jet-black hair and crimson eyes reminded her of someone from the past.
A head of black hair just like the duke’s.
Eyes even darker, seeming to glow with a blood-red hue.
…Looking back now, she wondered how she never noticed—he and Paris really did look like father and son.
While Rachel was lost in thought, the duke’s crimson eyes, which had been staring at her, turned back to his paperwork. The butler cleared his throat, and Rachel belatedly offered the customary greeting.
“I greet the Duke of Valencia.”
“Welcome, my lady. I’ll just finish reading this, so please have a seat over there.”
“Yes.”
Rachel sat on the sofa the duke indicated. Placing the bundle on the table beside her, she waited a moment until the butler brought tea. Paris, of course, sat across from her.
After a while, the duke set down his pen and moved to the sofa as well, glancing at Paris.
“What are you doing here?”
“My fiancée won’t tell me why she’s here today. I was curious, so I wanted to be present.”
“You’re being foolish.”
At that moment, Rachel opened her mouth.
“Your Grace, could you please clear the room?”
A tense silence fell over the office. Paris stared at Rachel with wide eyes.
“Are you telling me to leave, my lady?”
“As I said, this is a confidential matter.”
Paris’s presence wasn’t in her plans, but sending him away was easy. Rachel looked at the duke, not Paris.
“As I mentioned in my letter, there is something important I must tell you in private. Could you please have everyone else leave?”
“….”
The duke, watching her with a strange look at the repeated request, nodded.
“Everyone out.”
“Father.”
“Leave. Your fiancée says she has something important to tell me.”
“….”
For a moment, Paris looked back and forth between his father and Rachel with clear dissatisfaction, but he left through the door the butler opened. Even the butler left, closing the door behind him, and the office fell silent.
Crossing his legs, the duke looked at her with lazy, crimson eyes.
“All right, my lady. After sending out my son and the butler, what is it you have to say to me?”
Rachel silently pulled the bundle closer and placed it before him.
To be honest, she didn’t like the idea of relying on the duke.
But this was the surest way. If she told him before the wedding, unlike her previous life, the duke would see her as a benefactor.
Compensation for damages.
The annulment.
Anything—he would become a temporary ally for her.
Suppressing the memories that kept surfacing, Rachel thought: above all, the duke would never forgive that woman or Paris.
“First, would you please look at this?”
“What’s this?”
The duke unwrapped the bundle. His face hardened as he read the first page, the doctor’s confession.
Rachel spoke calmly.
“This is a record left by the doctor who oversaw the Duchess of Valencia’s pregnancy and childbirth twenty years ago.”
“….”
“Before dying, he buried it beneath the south wall of his residence. I dug it up and brought it here. This is proof that Paris Valencia is not your biological son, and that Lady Sabannio married you under false pretenses.”
“Nonsense.”
Expressionless, the duke gripped the old paper tightly. His gaze flew rapidly across the contents.
That Paris’s real father was the duchess’s escort knight, Wayne, and that the doctor had been coerced and bribed to submit false reports during the pregnancy.
And at the very end, a record of a secret bloodline test performed on newborn Paris, attached as the last page.
「Match」
The father was the knight, Wayne. After a long silence, the duke’s sharp gaze turned toward her.
“And how am I supposed to believe this?”
“If you perform a bloodline test right away, it will be exposed. As for the authenticity of the evidence, it will be easy to verify by comparing the handwriting with other samples from the doctor.”
The duke squeezed his eyes shut, covering his forehead and letting out a rough breath.
“…I see. No wonder they kept delaying the wedding.”
Usually, the heir to Valencia would marry quickly after coming of age at sixteen, to produce an heir. That was the tradition.
But Paris was already nineteen and still unmarried—the ceremony had been postponed.
It was unusual for Valencia. Rachel added,
“If you find this hard to believe, you can look for other evidence. There are people the doctor told about the location before he died, and traces left from when the duchess attacked and killed him. There are other pieces of evidence.”
She pulled out a note with the locations of other evidence she had organized. The duke took it, examined it, and rang a small bell from his pocket.
No sound was heard, but—
“Did you call for me?”
“…!”
At the sudden voice, Rachel looked to her side.
A black mask. At its tip, a black ring.
It was Valencia’s shadow, the Black Shade. Even before her regression, Rachel had rarely seen this hidden force of the ducal house.
The duke handed over the note.
“Find them. And tell my aide quietly. Also, have a handwriting expert standing by.”
“Yes, sir.”
The figure dressed all in black took the note and disappeared. Likely someone with the power of <Stealth>.
In any case, the hardest part was over.
The duke would collect the evidence himself.
And since she’d acted early, there was no worry about the culprits escaping. Rachel unconsciously clasped her cold fingers together, when she felt an intense gaze from across the table.
“Now, I have to ask. How did you come to know all this, my lady?”
