“Sir Leon… what on earth are you doing here?”
It was Daryl Rüschino who asked, green eyes blazing. Behind him, one of his attendants slipped away quickly — the same man who had escorted Leon to the carriage not long before.
Leon understood at once. Odette had lured Daryl and his party toward them, then deliberately let her fan fall.
First impressions never lie. A woman I’d sooner never deal with.
Daryl, who had been staring at Leon in bewilderment, shifted his gaze to the folding fan in his own hand — and then, a moment later, caught sight of Odette sitting directly across from Leon.
Daryl’s green eyes ignited with fury in an instant.
“What is the meaning of this, Sir Leon?!”
“Oh my. Lord Rüschino. You picked up my fan. How thoughtful.”
Before Daryl could work himself into more of a frenzy, Odette reached calmly through the carriage window, plucked the fan from his grip, and offered her thanks as if nothing unusual had occurred whatsoever.
“Brother. What’s… happening?”
The voice came from somewhere behind Daryl’s broad frame. At the sound of it, Odette’s smile deepened with obvious pleasure.
“Kasha, I told you, didn’t I? I said handsome men always live up to their faces!”
“What does that even mean…”
Kasha managed to push her brother aside enough to see. The moment her gaze cleared, she recognized both Leon and Odette seated inside the carriage. Her deep pink eyes met Leon’s directly.
And in the same instant, she seemed to have already assessed the situation entirely.
“Lord Leon.”
“Miss Kasha.”
The moment their names crossed each other’s lips, Odette cut in.
“Oh my. Miss Rüschino. Today’s competition was truly impressive — you were remarkable. Congratulations, in any case. Now then, Lord Leon and I haven’t quite finished our conversation, so if you’ll excuse us—”
Without giving either Kasha or Daryl so much as a breath to respond, Odette rattled it all off in rapid succession and snapped the curtain shut.
Daryl’s furious voice erupted from outside, but Kasha said something low and brief, and it ceased just as quickly. Their receding footsteps and the murmur of voices faded into the distance.
And as Kasha’s voice grew farther away, so did Leon’s composure.
He felt an almost unbearable urge to leap from the carriage, catch up to her, pull her around, and tell her — don’t misunderstand.
The trouble was, he could already picture her turning to face him with that placid expression of hers and saying, What misunderstanding?
While Leon was still debating whether to fling open the carriage door, Odette pushed her face back into his line of sight, wearing an expression fit for a viper.
The moment he saw it, irritation flared — and right behind it came nausea, thick and immediate, from the overpowering stench that radiated off her.
“Miss Tyrot. What do you think you’re doing?”
“Oh my. Did I startle you? How silly of me — the fan just slipped right out of my hand. Of all the moments.”
Odette smiled brightly as she spoke, but her blue eyes were not smiling at all.
Leon looked into those eyes and understood. She felt not one trace of guilt or shame for what she had just done. On the contrary — she was watching to see whether Leon had grasped what kind of woman she was capable of being, willing him to reconsider.
He found that utterly repulsive.
He decided there was no longer any reason to continue this conversation and opened his mouth.
“As I said — I will personally repay the funds my father arranged. I’ll take my leave. And furthermore—”
Leon reached toward the carriage door handle and lowered his voice to a warning.
“Never pull a stunt like this again. This once, I’ll overlook it, out of consideration for my father’s mistake.”
At that, Odette’s folding fan snapped up and covered the door handle. Her voice became urgent.
“Do you dislike me? Why? Why on earth?”
Leon stared at her, too exasperated to reply, brow furrowed. Odette, as if arriving at some decision, flung the fan aside.
Then she reached for him outright — before he could react, she seized the fingertip of his glove and stripped it from his hand.
Caught off guard, Leon looked down at his own bare hand, his expression twisting in distaste.
The veins across his knuckles stood out in thick, visible ridges.
He did wear his ring, but the excessive physical contact with Kasha earlier in the day had left his body more sensitive than usual.
Odette studied his hand — noting how the fine capillaries showed through the skin, faintly visible in his eyes as well — and whispered,
“You simply don’t know. You’ve never experienced a real woman. That’s all this is.”
Her immaculately manicured hand, smooth and deliberate, moved toward his exposed skin — slowly, but with predatory persistence.
Just before it made contact, Leon pulled his hand away with undisguised revulsion.
“…!”
Odette withdrew her hand, left floating foolishly in the air. It was the first rejection she had ever suffered in her life, and the crack it opened in her pride was not small. She laughed it off with a dismissive sniff.
“Did I provoke the Holy Knight too brazenly? Or are you truly as unhinged as the rumors say?”
Rattled and impatient, Odette had stopped choosing her words. She had never been a woman of great patience to begin with.
“I wonder.”
Leon replied briefly, still wearing the expression of a man regarding something beneath contempt. Odette’s composure finally snapped.
“How else could you reject me and choose Kasha Rüschino instead? That slow, stuttering, dim-witted, graceless woman? If you were in your right mind — if you had even a shred of sense — how could you possibly not want me?!”
The voice, stripped of all its careful embellishment, rang harshly off the ceiling of the carriage.
“Why don’t I want you?”
Leon’s lips curved into something just short of contempt. Odette’s face contorted.
“You should know — my sense of smell is rather acute. Truthfully, the stench coming off you makes it difficult to breathe in here.”
“What — what did you just say? Are you insulting me?!”
The color drained from Odette’s face. It didn’t help that Leon pressed his hand to his nose and narrowed his brows, as though genuinely struggling to endure the smell.
“An insult? It’s merely the truth.”
Having delivered the final blow without hesitation, Leon at last threw the carriage door wide open and drew in the outside air — with pointed, unapologetic relief. He let out a long, deliberate breath, as if emerging from somewhere suffocating.
Then he dropped to the ground in a single motion, as though escaping a particularly wretched prison.
“Don’t forget what I’ve said, Miss Tyrot. No matter how desperate Ossilote’s circumstances may be, we are still a Grand Ducal house. Further transgressions will not be tolerated. And that applies not only to myself — it applies to Kasha Rüschino as well.”
Odette looked into Leon’s beautiful eyes and saw something there she had not expected.
Killing intent. The cold, still lethality that belongs only to a man who has survived true war. It was not something she had any capacity to withstand.
Caught between her wounded pride and genuine fear, Odette faltered. Leon did not wait for her answer. He closed the door.
Bang.
Left alone in the dark, Odette clutched her hands together and crushed the folding fan between her fingers. That made two fans ruined today.
A thousand fires seemed to burn inside her.
This is impossible.
The first defeat of Odette’s life. And the one she had lost to was Kasha Rüschino, of all people. The price of that defeat was nothing less than Leon Aranias.
Unable to contain herself any longer, Odette shrieked in pure, helpless fury.
“Kasha Rüschinooooo! I’ll kill youuuu!”
* * *
The following day.
“Leave.”
Leon sat in the drawing room, regarding Daryl Rüschino steadily. Daryl sat planted across from him like a boulder, glaring.
“I came to see Kasha. Not you.”
“Ha!”
Daryl raised his voice.
“Kasha? Just Kasha? No honorific — nothing? Is my sister so beneath your regard?”
Leon answered the heated accusation with unshaken composure.
“Your sister and I are openly courting. Formal honorifics would only seem strange between us.”
Daryl’s expression flickered for a moment — well, perhaps… — before he recovered himself and reasserted his indignation.
“I never knew Sir Leon could be this shameless.”
“Yesterday was a misunderstanding.”
“A misunderstanding? What misunderstanding? You were sitting alone with a woman whose family had been in marriage negotiations with yours — in a dark carriage, face to face — and right after my sister had knelt before you and declared her feelings!”
Daryl was on his feet before he’d finished speaking, his fury making the air feel smaller. He looked as though he might take a swing at Leon at any moment.
That was when a sweet voice piped up from beside Leon, cutting right through Daryl’s anger.
“Lord Rüschino. Are you fighting with my brother?”
Eve Aranias.
The Grand Duke’s youngest daughter had been sitting quietly this entire time. Her guileless question was enough to make Daryl hastily conceal his clenched fist behind his back.
“Miss Eve. It’s nothing like that — only that Sir Leon made something of a mistake where my sister is concerned.”
“Really? Is that true, Leon? Did you make a mistake with Lady Kasha?”
“…Well, you see—”
Leon faltered, uncertain how to answer. Daryl, meanwhile, let out a thoroughly satisfied huff.
Perhaps I shouldn’t have brought Eve along after all.
Leon felt a quiet, belated regret.
But he hadn’t been able to turn her away. She had heard the news of Kasha’s victory from somewhere and had latched onto him, insisting she wanted to offer her congratulations in person.
She’d already made a bouquet. She even asked the cook to make her sister’s favorite dessert.
Eve had been remarkably firm — a vivid bundle of ranunculus she’d cut from the garden in one hand, a chocolate cake from the kitchen in the other.
Since the curse of lust had forced Leon to keep his distance even from Eve, this was the first time she had so openly asked something of him. He had relented and agreed to bring her along — though he had worried.
And now, it seems that worry was entirely justified.
Looking across at Daryl, who bristled like an agitated bear, Leon sighed inwardly.
He had no choice but to explain himself in front of his youngest sister.
“Immediately after the tournament, as I was preparing to leave, Miss Tyrot made an unexpected request for a private conversation. I agreed, thinking it best to resolve the matter directly.”
“…Resolve?”
“Though the engagement discussions were never my intention, I had declined them on my side. I felt it necessary to ensure there were no lingering misunderstandings between the families.”
Leon’s explanation was so clear and concise there was nothing to pick apart. Daryl stared him down without replying.
But then his eyes fell on the bouquet and cake in Eve’s hands, and it became difficult to keep up his show of pure stubbornness. He relented, though gracelessly.
“Kasha is currently receiving treatment.”
“Treatment? Is she unwell?”
Leon’s body reacted before his mind could — he was off the sofa in an instant. Even Eve startled, nearly dropping the bouquet.
