Chapter 54

Chapter 54

Leonard tightened his fingers around the back of Irenea’s neck, and the slippers dangling from her toes fell to the floor one after another.

Following Irenea’s lead, Leonard shifted his weight onto her.

Pinned beneath him, Irenea kissed him feverishly.

When their lips finally parted, the two of them exhaled the breaths they had been holding at the same time.

Irenea pressed against Leonard’s chest and climbed back on top of him.

“How about that? Do you think you’ll be a little closer to my type next time?”

“I’ll certainly try, but…”

“But what?”

Taking advantage of the moment when Irenea tilted her head in confusion, Leonard suddenly caught her hand and pulled.

With a startled squeal, Irenea toppled over and landed beside him.

He turned onto his side, looked at her, and held out his left arm.

“There’s no need to rush. Take your time.”

“Hmm… But I’m in a hurry.”

Irenea puffed out her cheeks before letting out a little breath through her rounded lips.

Even so, as though she intended to respect Leonard’s wishes, she rested her head on his arm.

Then she took his right hand and began gently caressing his fingernails and every knuckle with both of hers.

“I like your hands.”

“My hands?”

“Mm-hmm. They’re big, rough, and strong…”

Irenea brought Leonard’s hand to her face and pressed her cheek against his palm, rubbing it affectionately.

Just as she’d said, his hands were rough.

Worried that he might somehow mar Irenea’s delicate skin, Leonard instinctively flinched.

In response, Irenea deliberately pressed her face against his hand even harder, rubbing it with obvious relish.

In the end, Leonard surrendered.

“Let me do it. I’ll do it.”

“You will?”

Irenea regarded him with an unconvinced look, then released his hand and gently closed her eyes, as if to say, Go on, then.

Leonard quietly gazed down at her lovely face, which seemed to glow white even in the darkness.

If she were a flower, she would be one that had grown in a greenhouse.

Her skin was so delicate, as though she had been raised in comfort and safety, sheltered from the harshness of the world.

Unlike the woman who had appeared in his dream.

‘I don’t know what you expected when you brought me here, but I have no value to you anymore. It’s not too late, so just ask me for money.’

He was grateful that the woman who had said those words existed only in his dreams.

Leonard gently caressed Irenea’s cheeks, flushed with excitement and anticipation, then impulsively pressed a kiss to her lips.

As though she hadn’t expected it, Irenea’s eyes flew open in surprise.

At that very moment, Leonard tilted his head and pulled her firmly closer by the back of her neck.

Robbed of her breath, Irenea’s chest rose and fell as she reached around to embrace Leonard’s back.

In the process, their lips met even more deeply.

It wasn’t some childish kiss in which their lips merely touched before parting.

It was a kiss in which their every inhale and exhale mingled as one.

In truth, it was closer to a raw, instinctive gesture than a kiss.

Unaccustomed to this sort of intimacy, Leonard could only rub his lips against hers before finally pulling away.

“Haah…”

His cheeks were flushed as he released the breath he’d been holding in one long exhale.

It wasn’t because of excitement or anticipation.

Despite his lack of experience, he knew all too well that he’d been embarrassingly clumsy.

Watching him, Irenea burst out laughing.

Leonard, who had already been wishing the ground would swallow him up, furrowed one eyebrow and asked,

“Why are you laughing?”

“Just because you’re cute.”

“…Was I really that bad?”

“I said you’re cute.”

At Irenea’s smiling eyes, Leonard’s expression grew even more strained.

“I mean, I didn’t kiss you good night and wish you sweet dreams. Isn’t calling me cute practically an insult?”

“Then what would you prefer? That I call you beastly?”

“Isn’t that obvious? My wife likes rough men.”

At last, Irenea burst into laughter.

“Oh, what am I going to do? You’re even cuter now.”

“…Fine. I see I’ll have to try even harder from here on out.”

With a thoroughly disgruntled look on his face, Leonard climbed fully over Irenea.

Feeling the mattress sink beneath the hand he planted beside her head, Irenea wrapped her arms around his neck.

“Are you finally getting impatient?”

“I’ve started to feel a sense of urgency. If I make one wrong move here, I’ll spend the rest of my life being treated as cute by my own wife.”

“You don’t want to spend your life being doted on by me?”

“I suppose it wouldn’t be such a bad life, but…”

His orange eyes briefly lost focus, as though he were imagining what such a life might be like.

Gradually, however, a heat began to kindle in them.

And there, reflected in his eyes, was Irenea’s image.

Not the gentle warmth of a fireplace, but an intense heat that threatened to consume and burn everything in its path.

“For now, my goal tonight is to hear you call me a beast.”

“I’m looking forward to that.”

Irenea tilted her head back to follow Leonard’s lips as they moved down.

The feel of his lips against her neck was rough, yet gentle.

“You’d better… work very hard. I’m not going to call you beastly unless you really earn it.”

“Come to think of it, Kiri was always worried about you. She said the Marchioness never seemed to get much sleep at night.”

Leonard smiled, his eyes crinkling as he took off his robe.

His expression was already brimming with satisfaction.

“I’m glad my wife isn’t one to lose sleep at night.”

As though there were no need for any more words, their lips met in a long kiss.

And so began a wedding night that would not end after just one night.

Usually, when a couple married for political convenience spent their wedding night together, they would return to their separate bedrooms afterward and go to sleep.

After all, sharing a bed was nothing more than an obligation to produce an heir—no more, no less.

Of course, not every couple was like that.

When two people married because they loved each other, it wasn’t unusual for the bedroom door to remain closed even well into the following afternoon.

That, too, was perfectly commonplace.

But staying cooped up in the bedroom for two or three days was taking things a little too far.

When it happened to someone else, people would giggle and remark that the couple must be terribly, terribly close.

But hearing it about someone you actually knew was another matter entirely.

It was downright embarrassing.

“Oh my! Oh my! You’re saying you’ve run out of bedsheets?”

And not just anywhere, but at the Blair Marquessate.

Surely they had stocked up on plenty of spare bedsheets.

So why had they run out and come here to buy more?

“Well, we’ve had quite a few guests, and it’s been raining nonstop for the past two days. The laundry simply won’t dry.”

“That’s true. The rainy season is already over, so I can’t imagine why it’s pouring like this. But it’s not as though we can hang the bedsheets up to dry inside the house, either.”

The fabric shop owner kept chatting without pause as she wrapped up the cotton intended for bedsheets.

Even though Julie had come prepared for it, the woman’s endless chatter was enough to wear her out.

‘She’s certainly going to spread the rumor far and wide.’

It would probably take no more than a day for everyone who mattered to hear about it.

The Marquess and Marchioness were apparently quite the passionate couple.

‘But why does Lady Linia want this story spread in the first place?’

If it were me, I’d be terribly embarrassed to have something like this going around.

Julie loaded the rolled-up cotton onto the carriage, thinking that nobles really were a different breed.

Her next stop was a shop selling bath oils.

She was also debating whether or not to visit a lingerie shop afterward as she set the carriage in motion.

Mary’s face was positively radiant as she left the bookstore.

She was practically skipping, humming a cheerful little tune as she went.

The elderly coachman, who had been waiting with the carriage on a road a short distance from the bookstore, let out a hearty laugh when he saw her.

“Looks like you finally found the book you’ve been waiting for.”

“Yes! It’s finally here—the final volume!”

She had been reading the series ever since she first entered the Baldwin ducal residence, which meant it had taken nearly ten years for the story to reach its conclusion.

The characters—the protagonist and their companions—were wonderfully distinctive, and the dungeons they explored were described in such exquisite detail that reading the books made her feel as though she were adventuring alongside them.

And now, at last, this grand journey was coming to an end.

She couldn’t wait to find out how their story would conclude, yet she couldn’t help feeling a little sad, too.

“Ah… I want to read it right now…”

“Then shall we head back to the ducal residence?”

“No, Miller asked me to buy something for her.”

If she had been riding in a covered carriage like the one her young lady used, she might have managed to read at least a page or two on the way.

But the carriages used by the servants had no roofs.

Still, she supposed she should be grateful that she was allowed to ride in one at all.

With the elderly coachman’s help, Mary climbed into the carriage.

Hugging the book, which had been carefully wrapped in oiled paper, she turned to him and made a request.

“Please take me to an embroidery shop around here.”

“Nearby? Hmm… Does it matter which one?”

“No. I just need to buy some ribbons.”

“Then let’s go to Gretchen Street.”

With a cheerful click of his tongue, the elderly coachman set the horse in motion.

There were so many people about that the horse couldn’t move at a fast pace.

The carriage, pulled along by the single horse’s steady clopping steps, wasn’t moving very quickly.

Thanks to that, Mary had time to chat with the elderly coachman.

“Gretchen Street?”

“That’s right. You know the place where they’re building a station for that enormous iron carriage—whatever it’s called, a train? They’ve been saying they’re going to build a commercial district nearby, and quite a few shops have already opened for business.”

When he explained that, since few people knew about the place yet, there was no need to wait in line at most of the shops, Mary nodded.

The moment the horse stopped in front of the embroidery shop, Mary hurriedly jumped down from the carriage.

However, she couldn’t go inside.

It wasn’t just that the line stretched all the way from somewhere in the distance to the shop’s entrance.

There was also a sign on the door announcing a temporary closure.

“My goodness… What on earth is going on?”

The coachman had said there weren’t many people in this district yet, so what was all this?

Could the embroidery shop have put up the temporary closure sign because of this very line?

Mary approached one of the people waiting and asked what the line was for.

“Oh, the Blair Beauty Salon is handing out promotional samples right now.”

“You mean people have lined up this long just for samples…?”

“Oh dear, you’ve never received one before, have you? They’re not just ordinary samples. Besides, if you’re lucky, you might even get ‘that.’”

“That?”

“It’s a little something.”

Apparently, it wasn’t the samples themselves that had drawn such a long line, but rather ‘that.’

Mary grew curious.

What on earth could it be?