< 21>
Dante was seen there, not having touched the cake even slightly.
Dante had a very complicated expression. It was as if the current situation was agonizing.
The cake was delicious, and he had even received praise from Seymour, so why that expression?
‘Does he hate cake?’
No, that couldn’t be it.
As far as Rowena knew, there was no such thing as a child who hated sweets.
However, Dante eventually stood up from his seat without even touching the cake.
“Huh? Dante. Aren’t you eating the cake? It’s delicious.”
“I’m not eating it.”
The answer that came back was cold for some reason.
Dante looked at the cake and Rowena in turn, then eventually turned around.
“……You have plenty of that yourself.”
The words that followed came out in a voice that somehow seemed to lose its strength.
Click. The door closed behind Dante’s back, and Rowena blinked with her fork still in her mouth.
‘Strange.’
If nothing else, one thing was certain.
What dwelled in Dante’s eyes as he looked at the cake was clear conflict.
‘He definitely wants to eat the cake. Why won’t he?’
Rowena retraced the events that had just happened one by one.
And suddenly.
‘Could it be……?’
One thought flashed through her mind.
The library of the Duke of Somerset’s mansion.
Dante’s hand, which had been flipping through the pages of a book, came to a halt.
No matter how much he read the words, they wouldn’t enter his head; he had been spinning around the same part for the third time already.
Dante knew the reason. It was because there was a face that wouldn’t be erased from his mind.
‘Rowena Whitfield.’
The string of tension, which had briefly loosened after being deceived by that innocent face, came back to life the moment he heard Seymour’s words.
Seymour had simply intended to commend Dante, but to Dante, Seymour’s words sounded exactly like an expression of affection for Rowena.
It took less than a minute for the joy of being praised by his uncle to wither away.
‘She is a child I brought in to make my successor. Do you dare insult Somerset?’
This time the target was Count Devon, but next time, the one hearing those words could be Dante.
Because Seymour had the ability to take away everything Dante was supposed to have.
And Rowena would hold the things taken from Dante in her hands and smile innocently again.
‘I can’t trust anyone.’
No, he must not trust. Dante had seen the attitudes of adults change in an instant several times after his parents’ death.
The head maid, who had always looked after Dante affectionately, was caught trying to run away after stealing his mother’s valuables, and a fellow who had been his father’s friend tried to sneak into the family to exert influence.
If it hadn’t been for the Dowager Lady Hayworth and Seymour, Dante would have had to just watch all those sights.
‘Of course, I am always grateful to those two.’
Still, Dante could not fully trust even those two.
How could he know if they were coming to him saying they would protect him, while secretly embezzling Graham’s fortune behind his back?
To a child who had experienced too many things in an instant after his parents died, there was no such thing as a trustworthy adult.
Even the servants who always looked after Dante were objects of distrust to him.
He was sick and tired of living in the fear that he might lose everything and be kicked out at any moment.
‘I have to do my part quickly.’
Dante suddenly thought of the strawberry Fraisier cake he had left behind.
It had certainly looked delicious. But wanting to eat such things was not adult-like.
If he appeared like a spoiled child, and if by any chance he came to be hated because of it…….
‘……No.’
Dante shook his head as if trying to break the chain of thought.
‘It will be fine if I act like I have until now.’
He would just have to live holding his breath, as if he were there but not there.
Just as he was calming his heart with that thought.
Tap tap tap.
Hearing footsteps, the library door burst open.
“Dante!”
“……Rowena?”
Dante frowned deeply. The heart he had finally managed to calm surged at once.
Why did that girl always have to appear at times like this to torment him?
A sudden, undeserved resentment arose, but Rowena smiled brightly, ran over, and grabbed Dante’s hand firmly.
“I knew you’d be here! Now, let’s go!”
“What on earth are you talking about. Where would I go with you?”
Dante snapped sharply, but Rowena started chattering, unbothered.
“You see. Listen, Dante. I just saw it. Green grape apples going into the kitchen!”
“……Green grape apples? Do you mean Snow White Apples?”
An apple variety improved to have a green grape scent, ‘Snow White’.
It was famous for having a very white hue, unlike an apple.
And also for its extremely expensive price.
“But what about it.”
“What do you mean what about it? They’re green grape apples, Dante!”
Rowena narrowed her eyes and smiled mischievously.
“We have to steal and eat them!”
“……What?”
Dante doubted his ears for a moment. But seeing that the hand she held was warm, it seemed it was still reality.
“I was going to sneak into the kitchen, but the kitchen was so big it wouldn’t work. So I need someone to keep watch. You keep watch for me. If we succeed, I’ll share half with you. It’ll be fun, right?”
“I wondered what you were talking about……. Why would I do that?”
Dante was genuinely dumbfounded and shook off her hand roughly.
He felt that way even more thinking that a girl like this would become the successor to Somerset. It was even contemptible.
“If you’re going to do such a thing, do it alone. Don’t drag me into it.”
“But it’s only fun if we do it together.”
“Fun?”
Eventually, Dante’s precarious patience reached its limit.
“Of course you can do it for fun. Because everyone likes you! But I’m not!”
If Rowena got caught stealing apples from the kitchen, an apology would be enough for her to be forgiven.
At most, she would just stand in a corner as punishment. To her, that would be all.
But it was not so for him. He must not show such immature behavior, and he must not act in a way that would make him hated.
The emotions that had been building up until now burst through the dam and came pouring out.
“If I do something like that, I might be abandoned by my uncle. Do you understand? It’s different from you! I—”
“Why would the Duke abandon you?”
“……What?”
Dante furrowed his brow. But Rowena had the same expression as always.
That characteristically innocent and lovely face. A mischievous expression, with her two plump cheeks full of laughter that seemed ready to burst out at any moment.
Rowena giggled as if this situation was funny, then said:
“I’m the one who was brought in to give the title to you. Why would the Duke abandon you?”
I knew it would be like this.
You dummy!
The clue was the fact that Dante had not eaten the cake.
‘There were always kids like that back in Townsend too.’
Children who didn’t eat their snacks during snack time and gave them to other kids instead, or who left their seats first.
They surely must have wanted to eat the snacks too.
The common point of those children was this:
The fact that they tried to act more mature and upright than the other children and were very conscious of others’ opinions.
‘And the fact that they were children who hadn’t been in Townsend for very long.’
Rowena had been in Townsend since she was very young, so young she couldn’t remember. According to the teachers, she had been there since she was a newborn.
So Townsend was like Rowena’s home.
But the children who came in when they were older were different. To them, Townsend couldn’t be a home.
Whether in a good sense or a bad sense.
‘They said they thought they might be kicked out of Townsend if they even caused trouble.’
But those children usually become troublemakers just like the other kids before even a month passes.
The method was simple.
‘You just have to let them know they won’t be kicked out!’
Once they cause trouble once, the problem is solved more easily than expected.
Because once they realize the consequences of the thing they feared so much are nothing special, they tend to relax from then on.
And in Rowena’s eyes, Dante was no different from those children.
“Dummy, I entered this family to marry you! To make you the next Duke of Somerset!”
☆▪︎▪︎▪︎▪︎☆
