Chapter 90

Cecilia asked.

“Huh?”

Rodella asked back stupidly. Cecilia raised an eyebrow.

“Do you realize you’ve only been talking about Aivert? Every topic we start ends up being about him.”

“Huh?”

Was that true?

Rodella, uncharacteristically, responded like a fool twice in a row.

“Wait—don’t tell me, is he the one who told you not to go?”

“Huuuh?”

He never said that!

But judging from Rodella’s reaction, Cecilia looked completely incredulous.

“Did you hit your head or something? Who is he to block someone else’s future?”

“No, he never said anything like that.”

If Rodella had said he did, Cecilia looked ready to whack Aivert over the head herself.

When Rodella waved her hands in denial, Cecilia narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms.

“Then are you going?”

“Well…”

Rodella couldn’t hide her conflicted expression anymore.

“I did say I would…”

But the more I think about it, the more it gets under my skin.

…

‘You, who listened to me without a smile when I spoke.’

‘You… yes.’

‘You didn’t say a single word like, “Have a good trip.”’

‘Of course, it wasn’t a necessary thing to say.’

‘But that bothered me.’

“Just come back.”

‘You came just to tell me that.’

‘But you’re totally fine with me going overseas?’

The thought popped up unexpectedly and flustered her.

Rodella stared blankly ahead, then turned to Cecilia.

“Cecil, this might sound ridiculous, but hear me out.”

“Okay.”

Cecilia listened, arms still crossed.

“I… I can’t stop thinking about Aivert.”

Cecilia’s expression shifted.

It was the kind of look that screamed, Are you serious right now?

“You think it’s ridiculous too, right?”

Rodella gave a dry laugh.

But Cecilia waved her hand.

“No, it’s ridiculous—but not in the way you think…”

“Huh?”

Just as Rodella’s head was starting to spin, Cecilia cut herself off.

“No, whatever. It’s ridiculous, let’s leave it at that.”

Rodella’s thoughts were a mess, so she just started blurting things out.

“Honestly, I had a stupid dream.”

“Right, that dream earlier. The one with the person you wanted to kill.”

Cecilia followed up. Rodella shook her head.

“No, it wasn’t that. I dreamed Aivert gave me a wedding invitation.”

“Cough!!”

The reaction was instant.

Cecilia bent over, caught between coughing and laughing, face hidden.

Rodella kept talking, regardless.

“And after I had that dream, I felt awful.”

“Riiight.”

While Cecilia massaged her forehead, Rodella spoke blankly.

“I don’t know why. I mean, it makes perfect sense.”

“Cough cough. What makes sense?”

As Cecilia calmed down, Rodella started counting off on her fingers.

“Look—he’s one of only two dukes in the Empire, he’s young, not even twenty-five—actually.”

Rodella frowned and raised two fingers.

“Even if he’s over twenty-five, it’s not like it’s a flaw. He’s strong, has a good personality…”

She opened two more fingers.

Cecilia’s expression slowly contorted as she interrupted.

“A good personality?”

Clearly not buying it.

Rodella waved her hand.

“Okay, maybe not to everyone. But he’d treat the person he marries well.”

“And how would you know that?”

Rodella paused at the question.

Well…

“It’s hard to show you in the middle of eating, but should I?”

The words he had said that morning, while eating rare steak, came back to her.

Rodella shook her head vigorously, feeling her ears burn.

“Anyway, listen.”

She hastily unfolded more fingers.

“He’s not poor, he has a bright future, he’s not the kind of guy who’d get injured and come back broken, and his face is…”

Rodella made a sour face.

“I mean, he’s pretty good-looking. Tall, competent, respected by the knights…”

She ran out of fingers to count and lowered her hand.

“There’s really nothing to criticize about him. So if he ends up with another woman while I’m overseas, I can’t complain, right?”

As she kept talking, her temper started to flare.

Rodella gripped the blanket tightly.

“Yeah, but—he!…”

Her hands clenched so hard they turned pale.

That’s when Cecilia suddenly spoke.

“Does it feel weird because you saw him with another woman in your dream?”

Rodella immediately nodded.

“Yeah, it feels weird.”

Weird? That didn’t cut it. A stronger word was needed.

“More like…”

The word that came to her own lips startled even herself.

“…Disgusted.”

And it only became more real when she said it out loud.

“Because he’s your fiancé?”

Cecilia asked.

“Well, we’re going to break off the engagement.”

Rodella replied out of habit—then suddenly felt like she couldn’t breathe.

‘Yeah. He’s someone I should let go of.’

‘So why…

‘I know he’ll marry someone else after we break things off.’

‘I even told him he’d make a fine husband for someone else.’

‘So why does the thought of him smiling at someone else, treating someone else the way he treated me…’

“That’s how it should be, but…”

Even knowing it was natural, then why…

“I don’t like it.”

Rodella blurted it out without thinking

“What?”

Cecilia asked again, and Rodella turned to her, clearly unsettled.

“I’m being weird, Cecil.”

She grabbed Cecilia’s hands.

“Who would even accept a guy with that kind of personality? Sure, maybe he’d treat his people well! But I woke up one morning to find the canopy of my bed torn off and him eating rare steak alone!”

“Wha…?”

Cecilia looked bewildered by the sudden, unsolicited detail, but Rodella kept going.

“He even had breakfast ready for me!”

Now Cecilia looked like she didn’t know what the point of any of this was.

“It’s not that he ate alone, it’s just…!”

Rodella slapped the bed as she shouted.

“Who the hell is gonna date someone like that besides me?!”

And with that, Cecilia struck at the core.

“You two are dating?”

“Cough!!”

Now it was Rodella who choked.

What kind of nonsense is that? You know our engagement is fake!

She should’ve said that.

But instead, her face flushed, her heart thumped, and all the feelings she had when she saw that woman in the dream—

Vanished.

And something else rose in their place.

‘What if I were the woman beside him?’

‘What if I was the one giving out the wedding invitations, not receiving them—and Cecilia was the one attending our wedding…’

That thought, that idea—

Surprisingly—

“…Oh.”

Surprisingly, it didn’t feel bad.

Riding that feeling, Rodella realized something absurd.

She turned to Cecilia with a dazed look.

‘No way…’

It can’t be…

But then, what is this feeling?

Before she could fully sort it out, the words tumbled from her mouth.

“Do I… maybe like Aivert?”

Cecilia’s expression as she heard that was absolutely priceless.