OIAR - Chapter 68

Sweat trickled down Shioana's spine at Diana Vale's absurd question.

To think she was being misunderstood as Raul's lover.

'The boss is going to be furious.'

Raul was the most powerful figure in District 8, and wasn't she his employer? However, Raul's answer completely defied her expectations.

"Does it look that way?"

Raul, who had been roughly wiping his dagger on the tablecloth, smiled faintly. At his answer, Diana nodded, elegantly raising her teacup.

"You look quite good together. Besides, it's the first time I've seen you with a woman, so it's fascinating."

At those words, Shioana cleared her throat slightly.

'I heard he was so popular.'

Was it all just talk?

When Shioana glanced at Raul, he winked.

"She isn't my lover; she is an exceptionally capable secretary."

The Duke, who had been silent at Raul's words, spoke irritably.

"Since when has anyone been allowed to enter here?"

"You mean me, Your Excellency?"

Duke Bernhard spoke without even turning his head toward Raul.

"You should be taking this restaurant up to, not you."

"It seems you are dissatisfied that a bastard like that is with the noble gentlemen."

Shioana's eyes were blurry as she watched Raul, who kept picking fights.

'I wish it were all a dream.'

Having lunch with Raul and meeting him here—I mean. Clutching her solar plexus with one hand, Shioana suppressed a sigh inwardly.

'I feel like I'm going to throw up, so I can't hold it anymore.'

She stood up from her seat after asking for understanding.

As she walked to the opposite side where the guests were, there was a narrow balcony overlooking a fountain at an angle. Seeing the luggage piled up haphazardly, it was certainly a place rarely visited.

As she leaned her upper body against the railing and took a deep breath, it felt like the indigestion was subsiding a little.

"I wasn't keen on it from the start..."

She should have refused Raul's offer to have lunch until the very end.

As Shioana let out a sigh, the face of a man she had left behind at the restaurant came to mind.

'I didn't make any mistakes yesterday, did I?'

Not only that, but the sight of Diana Vale and the Duke standing side by side was also jarring.

"What do you think you can do by worrying about it?"

As she uttered words of resignation, she felt someone come and stand behind her.

Shioana knew who the other person was without turning her head. He reached out from behind her and buried his face in Shioana's shoulder.

"That's quite a feat. Don't you think so?"

“...Why are you like this?”

Even though it was a secluded place, it was a place where someone could see them. Shioana shook her shoulders violently to break free from Duke Bernhard's embrace.

At her resistance, the Duke tightened his outstretched arms and hugged Shioana's body tightly.

"Am I not enough to satisfy you?"

"I don't understand what you mean."

"Weren't we a couple just now?"

A fire ignited in Shioana's heart at the tiresome talk about lovers. The Duke was merely trying to use Shioana to pay off her debt.

"It's not even real."

"So is that why you came out for a leisurely lunch with a man?"

The Duke's hot breath spread like wildfire near her ears. Clutching her trembling heart, Shioana timidly protested.

"It is none of Your Excellency's business who I have lunch with."

She ended up getting entangled by chance, incurring a strange debt and making a deal, but this was definitely going too far.

His knuckles trembled slightly as he held Shioana, and he could not continue speaking.

It was then.

"What are we doing without even a break?"

"It seems like there are a lot of customers today."

She heard someone's voice.

Flustered, Shioana looked around. She grabbed the Duke's wrist and hid behind the partition in the corner of the balcony.

"What on earth are you doing?"

The Duke's eyes had turned fierce.

The light squeezing through the crack touched his broad shoulders and brushed against his red lips. Standing opposite her, Shioana whispered, struggling to look away.

"Because I didn't want to be seen together."

She knew it couldn't be helped during the banquet, but she would decline any more baseless rumors. Shioana had already found it very inconvenient to go to the market because the butcher had been taken to the dungeon.

Being Duke Bernhard's hidden lover isn't exactly an honorable thing.

'Miss, the neighbor keeps talking nonsense.'

Martha did not tell her everything she had heard, but it was undoubtedly about Shioana. It was entirely her fault, and there was no room for excuses, but she could prevent it from spreading further.

'I am Harriet's only guardian.'

So, she didn't want to get caught up in a scandal.

Shioana bit her lip tightly, steeling her resolve, but the Duke's cold gaze followed her relentlessly.

"Are you afraid he'll find out you're out?"

“Well, that’s not it.”

Shioana, who was about to make an excuse, closed her mouth.

No matter what was said, it was obvious that the Duke would only think what he wanted. In his mind, wasn't Shioana a promiscuous woman obsessed with money?

"I thought my face was your type."

Shioana blinked at the urgency in his voice. She was fed up with his repeated obsession with her taste, wondering how many times she had to tell him he was handsome before he would believe her.

"How could a humble woman like me dare to judge the face of someone as noble as Your Excellency as a matter of taste?"

"Do you like burly men like that guy?"

"Your Excellency, why do you act as if you really like me?"

Unable to bear it any longer, Shioana snapped.

The very act of asking whether Raul liked her or she liked him didn't make sense.

There was no way the Duke could have harbored any ill intentions toward her, dressed in a worn-out dress and with her hands covered in ink.

"Because that is truly how I feel."

"Yes?"

Startled, she let out a loud cry, and just then, the voices of the employees could be heard from nearby.

"Let's just grab a cigarette and head back."

"I have to go downstairs and get some flour."

As the flustered Shioana hurried about, the Duke extended his index finger and covered her lips.

A murmur of voices was heard, and soon cigarette smoke drifted over the partition.

She hid to avoid being caught with Duke Bernhard, but somehow the situation didn't look good at all.

The cigarette smoke was stinging, and the two of them were too close. With the Duke's fingers covering her lips at a distance where their chests would touch with just the slightest movement, it felt like death.

'It's not working...'

Her upper body squirmed as if she were about to cough from the smoke. The Duke, who had been watching her, completely covered her mouth with his open palm.

Shioana raised her head and glared at him, and a mocking smile flickered in the Duke's eyes.

'Since I dragged him in here and we hid, it's my responsibility?'

However, Shioana felt wronged.

It was the Duke who tormented her just because she was trying to get some fresh air due to an upset stomach.

'I can't take it anymore.'

Just as a cough was about to burst out, the Duke's head drew closer, and he kissed the back of the hand covering Shioana's lips.

She was so surprised for a moment that she completely forgot she was about to cough.

'This is a kiss.'

The faint sensation of his lips being crushed against the back of her hand was transmitted to her. At the all-too-familiar feeling, Shioana's eyes were seized with terror.

She tried to back away to break free, but his strong hand grabbed her waist. She couldn't even do that.

Feeling afraid, she did not dare to check the Duke's gaze.

"Each..."

The sound traveled through the Duke's palm and reached her lips. Feeling that she was getting even stranger, Shioana gave up on speaking and simply kept her lips tightly closed.

'This is a precious memory between Etienne and me.'

It was the night she hugged him in the garden.

Intoxicated by Etienne's smooth forehead, thick eyebrows full of alcohol, and red eyes, Shioana had mustered up the courage. However, her attempt at a kiss failed, and while Shioana was fumbling with her lips, Etienne kissed the back of her hand.

'Yeah, it's exactly the same as back then.'

As Shioana lifted her head with a confused look in her eyes, a hot gaze glared at her. Shioana could not even breathe properly and had to press her hand tightly against her heart.

Because she didn't want him to hear the sound of her wildly beating heart.

Before long, the surroundings became quiet, and his hand slowly withdrew from Shioana.

"...Ha."

She felt dizzy from holding her breath for so long.

The Duke, who had been watching Shioana gasping for breath, pushed aside the partition. She frowned intensely at the bright light that suddenly poured in, but the Duke stood facing her directly and spoke.

"Until this whole job is finished."

He turned his back after leaving behind incomprehensible words.

"Because that is truly how I feel."

Shioana, who had barely managed to compose her staggering body, realized that it was an explanation of his sincerity from earlier.

'Terminally ill lovers, terminally ill sincerity.'

She felt pathetic for having her heart flutter at his words that he meant it, without even realizing that.

'It’s just like the devil manipulating my feelings.'

She returned and sat in front of Raul, but she was so disoriented that she couldn't tell if the food was going down her nose or her mouth.

Because as soon as she opened her eyes, she thought of the Duke's hands, and when she closed them, she recalled the touch of his lips.

When she came to her senses, she found herself aboard Raul's carriage.

'...What is all this?'

Looking out the window without thinking, she saw Duke Bernhard in the carriage across from her. Sitting leisurely, his red eyes staring at her were terribly vivid.

'How shameless.'

Shioana showed her discomfort by pulling the carriage curtain shut. Soon the carriage departed, and she kept her back straight, staring only straight ahead.

'It's fine. It's nothing.'

However, contrary to her resolve, the slight trembling of her two hands, neatly clasped on her dress, did not stop.

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