Episode 93
Rowena’s proposal was, for her, a kind of gamble. But for Killian, it was the opportunity he needed more than anything. Since he had finished all his business in this country, he had time to spare.
In exchange for setting a deadline, Rowena strictly kept the unspoken rule that she would not run away. In the mornings, she woke to the scent of fresh flowers he had sent, and on fair days, she went out to the courtyard and shared the prepared breakfast with him. At noon, they sometimes walked in the park, and when dusk fell, they went to see concerts or ballet performances. By the time they finished a splendid dinner at a restaurant he had reserved and returned together, it was already pitch-dark night.
Contrary to her expectation that he would be as forceful as he had been the day he removed her stockings, Killian escorted her with more gentlemanly restraint than she had imagined.
When curious eyes turned toward them, he moved them somewhere deserted so Rowena would not feel embarrassed, or naturally shielded her with his own body. Aside from the contact necessary in the process, he did not touch her first or approach her.
“I enjoyed today as well. Have a good night.”
When he stepped down from the carriage, took her hand, and kissed the back of it, he even looked like a devoted man seeing his beloved fiancée home.
“You too.”
Rowena, on the other hand, only coldly withdrew her hand and answered out of courtesy. Though she did not reject him outright, she was as cold and hard as a wall of ice, enough that he might have retreated a little, but Killian rarely gave her the reaction she wanted.
“There are only three days left now.”
At the spiteful addition, silence flowed for a moment. Like pricking him with a needle, like toying with a mouse, Rowena had been unconsciously testing his patience over the past four days.
“Then I’ll see you tomorrow.”
But Rowena’s expectation of what answer would come back shattered the very next moment. Wearing a smile so handsome it made her doubt her eyes, he turned his steps toward the annex.
After watching his retreating back grow distant, Rowena also entered the main building.
“……
This won’t do.”
Standing in front of the entrance and watching the two people return to their respective residences from afar, Cecilia bit her nails. Her heart pounded, and her mouth went dry.
“If this goes on, everything I went to the trouble of preparing will only backfire.”
When she irritably whipped her head around, there stood a man glaring at the backs of the man and woman with eyes no less sharp than hers. With a sulky face, Cecilia ground her teeth.
“What are you going to do, Mr. Tom? What about the plan?”
“……
Don’t worry, miss. Everything is flowing smoothly.”
Tom replied chillingly and took something from inside his coat, holding it out.
“What is this?”
“Read it.”
Unlike when he had first spoken to her, his tone was arrogant and insolent. Though the man’s impudent attitude grated on her nerves, Cecilia soon took the note from his hand and slowly read it.
“Cedric Godwell, scheduled to arrive in port tomorrow. Standing by…… tomorrow?”
Cecilia, who had been reading the note, raised one eyebrow and lifted her head.
“That’s earlier than the original schedule. What happened?”
It was she who had stopped Cedric Godwell when he visited the mansion and was driven out dejectedly. It was also she who had told him she roughly knew the story between him and Rowena, and then led Rowena to the park so the two could meet.
After that, it had been Tom’s work. By heaven’s help, he had once known someone who had suffered from the same illness as a woman named Lauren, and through one connection after another, he informed Cedric Godwell of that news. Then, using the excuse that there was little time left, he urged him to choose Ethelwood without hesitation.
All the while, they had taken every care, anxiously fearing that Killian Devonshire might catch their trail.
In the process, Cedric Godwell and Rowena Philone ended up marrying, and at last, the pretext had been splendidly prepared.
“I spread word that Rowena Philone is being dragged around by Killian Devonshire against her will and forced into his bed.”
“So that is why he is hurrying here sooner than planned.”
“It is fortunate for you as well, miss, since you won’t have to watch that sight anymore.”
The purpose of everything was to frame Killian Devonshire for having killed Cedric Godwell.
Harming Rowena Philone here, in the middle of the capital, would make it easy for their trail to be discovered and for them to destroy themselves instead, and as for the Duke of Devonshire, needless to say, it was impossible.
So it was important to use Cedric Godwell to make it look as though Killian Devonshire had murdered him, and to make Rowena Philone witness it.
“If you wait quietly, what you want will roll right into your hands. So don’t rush me, and wait.”
Speaking as if giving notice, Tom snatched the note back from her hand. As he turned away, Cecilia caught him.
“Wait.”
“What is it?”
“I suddenly became curious. As for me…… as long as I can make those two end things completely and take the place beside His Highness, that is enough. But what benefit is there for you? This is something you are risking your life for.”
“I have a debt to repay personally.”
For him, a mere half-bastard with no proper fortune, taking revenge on Killian Devonshire was realistically difficult. Even if, by some chance, he broke through the guards and killed him, he was a man who would simply accept death calmly. He had set foot in that kind of world, and he would always be prepared for it.
So the greatest revenge was to give him such despair that he would want to take his own life.
If the woman he loved and wanted so much cursed and hated him. If she lived holding her dead husband in her arms and would not give him even a single glance. If all that belonged to him was resentment and hatred, and every possibility disappeared.
Cedric Godwell’s death would also be punishment for Rowena Philone, but it was the only piece that could bring despair to Killian Devonshire.
“……
Well. Fine.”
Seeing the wild gleam in his eyes, Cecilia hunched her shoulders and hurriedly left.
* * *
The next day, Rowena opened the box as usual and doubted her eyes. When she came out wearing the dress, hat, and shoes inside the box, Killian opened the carriage door. Instead of taking his hand and stepping inside, Rowena pointed at her outfit with her eyes.
“What is this?”
“Does it feel awkward?”
“Are you seriously asking me that?”
It was none other than the outfit she had been wearing on the day she came up to the capital at twenty years old.
The day she transformed from Rowena Philone, a girl from a mountain valley, into the mistress of the Duke of Devonshire. She had thought he had thrown it away just as it was, yet it looked like something she had worn only yesterday.
A fresh wave of emotion came over her, along with a complicated feeling. It was an outfit she had truly loved, so much so that even though she had pawned nearly all her belongings to pay back her creditors, she had kept this one set while being chased around. After all, it was clothing she had bought by selling the eggs of hens she had raised herself and the milk of goats she had cared for since they were kids. It must have frayed and torn while she wandered the streets, but perhaps it had been mended, for it was intact, and strangely enough, her figure was no different from back then, so it fit perfectly.
“Why is this here?”
“I kept it.”
Cutting off Rowena’s words, Killian replied as if asking what the problem was. Narrowing her brow, Rowena pressed him.
“……
Why?”
At the question returned to him, Killian closed his mouth for a moment. He was not ignoring the question; it was a question he himself had not been able to answer until yesterday. Why he had kept, separately and for so long, clothing that had looked to his eyes like nothing more than rags. Why, though he had kept it somewhere out of sight all this time, he had thought of it now and given it to her.
“I thought and thought again.”
“…….”
“If I could meet you again as you were at twenty, what would I do?”
If their meeting on the train had continued just like that. If he had extended his hand at once to Rowena, who had been betrayed by her friend and was suffering, and slowly drawn closer to her.
If he had done that, he reached the conclusion that things would have been completely different from now. It was a futile and useless assumption. It was also an assumption the original him would never have made.
“Let us do this today.”
Killian smiled faintly and proposed gently.
“Today is our second meeting.”
“……
Second.”
“I fell for you at first sight on the train and asked you on a date the very next day.”
At the words that followed, Rowena’s back stiffened. All sorts of emotions surged in. Surprise, anger, sorrow. The greatest of them was the question she, too, had hidden in her heart for a long time.
If they had met differently, if they had built their relationship differently.
It was a question and curiosity she had turned over again and again, separate from her love that had withered away. Silence fell, and toward Killian, who was waiting for her answer, Rowena slowly nodded.
“……
All right.”
Killian politely held out his hand once more. Taking his hand, she stepped onto the footboard and climbed into the carriage.
Inside the rattling carriage, the air was filled with something a little different from before. Rowena opened the window and looked at the streets and passersby rushing past. She had wondered if he would take her to a luxurious café or restaurant as it was, but unexpectedly, the carriage stopped in a modest commoners’ district. As Rowena looked around in puzzlement, Killian opened the carriage door and held out his hand.
“Let’s go.”
“Where are we going right now?”
“You’ll know when we get there.”
When she hesitated for a moment and could not take his hand, Killian reached out and took her hand for the first time in a while.
The place they headed to was an inn bustling with people for the weekend. Seeing the sign for lodging, Rowena’s cheeks flushed, and she shook off his hand.
“Why did you bring me here?”
At her heated face, Killian crooked up the corner of his mouth.
“What are you thinking?”
“What?”
“It is our second meeting, surely you could not be……”
His narrowed eyes gleamed mischievously. Just as the dumbfounded Rowena was about to snap something back, the inn door rattled open, and an employee wearing an apron addressed them.
“Do you have a reservation?”
The flustered Rowena was about to answer no, when suddenly, through the gap in the open door, a mouthwatering, delicious smell tickled her nose.