Chapter 045. A Suffocating Moment
Before she could even realize what had touched her lips, a large hand gently enveloped her head.
Soon after, the other hand wrapped around her waist, pulling Deborah’s body even closer.
It was an act that flowed together so naturally, like water.
In the midst of her mind being stolen away, a hot breath suddenly felt beyond their touching lips.
Smack, smack.
The light kisses that had briefly left her upper lip returned to gently suck and nibble at her lower one, and in that instant, *haa…* a ragged sigh escaped from Deborah’s mouth.
At the sound of that sigh, the hand gripping her waist tightened with even greater force.
It was then that the kisses wandering exploratively around her lips deepened.
The soft sensation delving into her mouth sent a shiver through her entire body in that moment.
Her first kiss in her life, the dizzying and utterly novel sensation she was feeling for the first time.
The man’s scent piercing into her mouth and nostrils made her head spin as if it were whirling around.
What was happening right now, why this situation had suddenly arisen—those thoughts had long since vanished from her mind.
The only thing that burned hot in Deborah’s head was the fact that the one giving her this tremblingly soft kiss was that man, the Chester Duke.
“Mm…”
As the gentle rubbing inside shifted to stroking the inside of her palate, a sweet nasal sound poured from Deborah’s mouth.
Deborah’s hands, clutching his firm arm, gripped tightly with force, and in that way, the hot ecstasy continued for a long while.
As if they were the only two left in the world, that endless moment was shattered by a sudden sound.
“Duke!”
The voice echoed loudly through the quiet garden, and the tongue intertwined inside her mouth flinched and trembled.
“Duke! If not here, then where on earth have you gone…”
At the voice drawing even closer, their lips finally parted.
The lips separating with a wet sound finally allowed her hazy mind to begin clearing bit by bit.
“What in the world…”
Deborah, looking at the man before her with a gaze shaken in confusion, suddenly startled and pulled away from his embrace.
“……”
“……”
A precarious silence hovered between the two of them.
It was a suffocating stillness, as if the moment just before had been an illusion.
“Duke?”
In that instant, the voice came from even closer.
Before she could recognize that the owner of the voice was Robin, Deborah hurriedly turned her body around.
And Deborah ran madly through the garden.
Lest anyone notice, lest they grow suspicious of her fleeing from this garden like she was escaping.
She raced through that moonlight without even catching her breath.
* * *
“Ray?”
At the sound of his name being called, Raymond’s gaze slowly shifted toward her.
“What are you thinking so deeply about? You didn’t even hear me calling you.”
At the cautious air of concern, as if wondering if there was something worrying him, Raymond paused for a moment.
*Not again…* Raymond’s brow furrowed for an instant, but that lasted only briefly; he quickly returned to his usual expression and gave Eleanor a light smile.
“No, I was just lost in thought for a moment.”
At the smile that appeared on her beloved son’s face, the same smile settled on Eleanor’s face.
It was after breakfast, as they had moved to the drawing room to drink tea.
Conversations had flowed back and forth as usual, but Raymond couldn’t concentrate on them at all.
No, thinking about it, he’d been in this state ever since last night.
The moment he let his guard down even a little, his thoughts inevitably raced back to that garden from the night before.
The slender waist that fit perfectly into one hand.
The hair that flowed softly over his fingertips.
And… finally, those lips he had indulged in.
Each one, rising vividly in his mind as if engraved there, those sensations from moment to moment endlessly eroded Raymond’s consciousness.
In the end, he had crossed the line.
The line he had ruthlessly drawn with his own hand.
He had struggled so desperately not to cross it, acting so harshly and ruthlessly, yet in the end, like a fool, he had followed after her persistently and finally devoured that woman’s lips.
It was bound to end like this—he had boasted so confidently, full of bravado.
He wanted to dismiss it as just the alcohol, but he couldn’t, no, he had no reason to.
The resolve he had built so solidly had crumbled in a single instant.
If he hadn’t known, it would have been one thing, but if such a moment came again—
If he were left alone with that woman again, could he really turn away decisively, claiming it was just a fleeting impulse?
No, it wasn’t.
If it were anyone else, perhaps, but now he couldn’t deceive himself.
Now, he had to admit it cleanly.
He didn’t just harbor a momentary, intense lust for that woman that burned hot and then faded.
It wasn’t as if he were some naive youth unable to distinguish such emotions.
Of all things—
He couldn’t erase those thoughts.
Why of all people an orphan, someone of that status, that—
He had never once imagined that such a conundrum would be thrown into his life.
A woman problem, no less, and in this way.
Just as his throbbing head made his brow crease naturally.
“By the way, Ray.”
At the voice brimming with affection, Raymond’s gaze turned back to his mother.
“Lady Olivia is such a lovely young lady, isn’t she?”
Olivia, the existence he had momentarily forgotten, flashed through his mind.
And that made it all the more absurd.
He had spent hours with her yesterday, yet he had wiped her from his memory entirely, while that memory of barely a few dozen minutes replayed endlessly in his head—how pathetic could he be?
‘And yet he’d spouted such nonsense so glibly.’
A wry chuckle escaped him involuntarily.
“Did you think so too, Mother? I’d heard a lot about her, but meeting her in person, she was exactly as the rumors said—bright and lovely, and so incredibly kind.”
Even Cecilia, whose standards were quite picky, had praised her like that, so she must have taken quite a liking to her.
That golden-haired young lady from yesterday.
“How was she for you, Ray?”
Cecilia had interrupted in the middle, so perhaps Eleanor was worried she hadn’t heard Raymond’s actual response, which was the important part.
As Cecilia’s boisterous chatter finally quieted, Eleanor asked again.
Raymond thought for a moment and nodded.
“Well, she was like that.”
It was a thoroughly unremarkable answer.
But despite the perfunctory response, a flush of color soon bloomed on Eleanor’s face.
She was the type who rarely showed her emotions, but she had never once heard that her son liked anyone, so she had been inwardly worried about it.
She had been anxious all along—what if he actually met Lady Constant and didn’t like her? But his response wasn’t bad, so she felt relieved.
Moreover, it was plain as day that Lady Constant, the other party, liked Raymond, so she thought there wouldn’t be any major issues with the two of them getting married going forward.
As Eleanor imagined the two of them having a child, a happy smile soon curved her lips.
And so, perhaps.
Lost in that happy daydream, she didn’t give a thought to what Raymond was actually thinking right now.
No, it wasn’t just Eleanor.
Cecilia, sitting at that table, was the same.
As for who it was that now occupied her son’s—or her brother’s—mind.
The sight of the three people seated around the tea table struck one as strangely peculiar.
* * *
“Anna, you said you saw her up close yesterday—what was she like?”
The mealtime, with hundreds gathered all at once, was as noisy as ever today.
The table where Deborah sat was just as boisterous.
“What?”
At the sudden question, the maid called ‘Anna’ blinked her eyes.
“The Marquis’s lady, I mean.”
“Ah—.”
At the words “Marquis’s lady,” the gazes at the table all turned at once to the maid called ‘Anna.’
“Well, I didn’t see her in detail… Just kind of glanced at her as I passed by.”
At the awkward response, voices rose here and there—*Where’s that ‘kind of’? Tell us what you actually saw!*—clamoring noisily.
“Hmm… Well, first, that hair.”
“Why the hair?”
“Oh my god, I’ve never seen such dazzling blonde hair in my life.”
Anna’s expression turned enraptured, as if recalling that moment’s memory.
“And, and what else?”
“Her skin was so white and transparent, like fresh snow. And her lips—how red and pretty they were. In one word… hmm… like, yeah, like a sweet beauty made of candy treats?”
‘Candy treats?!’
Amid the chorus of admiration from everyone, there was only one person whose expression didn’t match.
It was Deborah.
Deborah’s gaze was sinking darkly.
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By Anna 💓
