Chapter 44

︵‿୨ ₊‧꒰ა ཐི༏ཋྀ ໒꒱ ˚₊ ୧‿︵

The entire way back to the estate, Adeline gazed out the car window, her thoughts circling back to what happened with Millein.

‘So I really… did love Millein.’

Was there anyone else who had both received a proposal and suffered a betrayal from the very person they had once loved in secret?

Even after his betrayal, the one whose heart still raced from Millein’s kiss was none other than this foolish me.

Once she admitted it, the feeling swelled so large that it was astonishing how she had never noticed it before. But looking back, wasn’t it only natural? After all, she had never been in love with anyone before. Not in her childhood as the heir of the Duchy of Zeller, nor even after her marriage to Julian.

All her thoughts and actions were for the sake of her family.

‘Come to think of it… I never once considered marrying for love, even as a child.’

Adeline had lived her life scrutinizing every personal relationship, unwilling to court even the shadow of scandal, and so she had never recognized her own one-sided love. Perhaps it was because Millein had always been there, ever at her side.

Through all of her school days and childhood, he had always been there.

[ Renée. ]

Calling her by the nickname he himself had given her, his face alight with a gentle smile.

Adeline’s heart had always leaned toward kind and handsome young men like Millein. It was precisely because of this preference that left her unmoved by Jack, though others might well have cast him a glance of desire. And perhaps it was Millein’s influence, more than anything, that had shaped her heart to favor such men.

Of course, even if that were true, it was all a useless story to dwell on now.

‘Get a hold of yourself, Adeline Zeller.’

Since when did she have the luxury of wallowing in the sentiment of an old love? Her life, in the past and now, existed solely for the House of Zeller. Realizing an old love didn’t mean she had the slightest intention of being swayed by it.

Even so, she couldn’t help the heaviness that settled in her heart.

‘I feel strange.’

Was it sorrow? Grief? Or perhaps regret? Anger?

Maybe it was all of them at once.

It was only natural. Adeline, too, had once held dreams, a longing for happiness, and the ingrained habit of guarding her pride.

‘I wanted… to love someone freely, without fear.’

She had always said that love was unnecessary in marriage, yet it was only natural that she had also wished to be bound to someone she loved.

It was just.

‘I had given up on all of that a long time ago.’

If not for the debt, she would have married Millein.

If not for the downfall of House Zeller, she never would have kissed Jack first.

And she would never have had her heart torn to shreds by the betrayal of the one who had cared for her since childhood, the one she had trusted and depended on completely.

‘…At the very least.’

Now that time had brought her back.

Even knowing of every betrayal, she would never have chosen to forgo revenge.

But to Adeline, the House of Zeller mattered far more than any private vengeance.

To stake everything on revenge would mean abandoning what she was sworn to protect. Her pride, her dignity, even her very sense of self—all of it mattered less than safeguarding the House of Zeller.

‘I endured even my marriage to Julian.’

There was no reason she couldn’t endure this as well.

But.

For the past three years, she had cast aside her pride, her honor, even her desire for happiness, and lived on. And at times, Adeline had felt a pain in her chest, as though a stone had been laid upon it. Had it been nothing more than pain, it might have been easier to bear, but it almost always led instead to dreadful tightness, to breathless suffocation.

‘This was something I couldn’t even tell Carlisle.’

Her body now knew nothing of such pain.

But within her still lived the self from three years ago, whose heart had been struck countlessly.

Inside the racing car, Adeline buried her face in both hands. Like a mantra, she whispered to herself again and again, as though to force the words into her heart.

“I’m fine. I’m fine…”

I’ve been given a new chance, haven’t I?

Deception, betrayal… none of that mattered anymore. It would have been better, maybe, had she never become aware of these feelings at all.

These feelings, like having secretly liked Millein…