Chapter 54

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Translator: Harry Potta

Chapter: 54

Chapter Title: Reunion

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Annblin Grace Brita.

This vile woman.

Edgar swallowed a curse under his breath.

Tennis was a sport that prized dignity and honor above all. A scandal like this would surely strip her of her tournament eligibility. Forever.

A precarious tension hung in the air. No one even breathed. Everyone simply watched anxiously, wondering who would break the silence first.

Who would open Pandora's box?

Edgar and Irene's gazes met. The onlookers gulped.

Would the Marquis Lancelot speak first, or would the princess?

It was then, amid the suffocating tension that made even watching feel breathless.

The door suddenly burst open from inside. Everyone's necks stretched out like turtles.

"You summoned people and then kept them waiting, Princess."

"......"

The one who emerged from Pandora's box was none other than Duke Johann Leopold.

Johann gazed down at the peacefully sleeping Olivia with quiet eyes.

'We've secured Miss Blanchett.'

The report from the sparrow he'd assigned to Olivia was utterly absurd.

Kidnapped, of all things.

After the Blanchett earldom incident, he'd authorized intervention in emergencies involving surveillance targets.

As a result, she now lay not in room 3016, but in his private suite's bed.

Not content with kidnapping his wife, the culprit had tried to ruin the Leopold Hotel's opening gala. Along with his reputation.

How dare they.

Johann yanked his tie loose, then pulled up a chair.

In the faint light of dawn breaking late, his wife's sleeping face was bathed in a soft, predawn glow.

Beautiful.

That must have been why he'd been able to marry the first woman he'd ever met. Because she was beautiful.

Were they after Olivia?

His calm gaze slowly traced her face.

Why?

Before their marriage, he'd never once peered at his wife's sleeping face like this. Not even once.

It felt strange.

Johann slowly reached out his arm.

How much had this pretty face cried? How broken had it become?

Diane Brooke.

That damned woman had been behind all those incomprehensible actions.

The realization soured his mood once more. He clenched and unclenched his fist before lowering his hand.

Then his long fingers gently swept her spilled chestnut locks behind her ear.

Olivia's nose wrinkled. Her long lashes fluttered, then began to move slowly.

Olivia dreamed.

It was a dream of when she was truly herself.

She lay in a cold room, waiting for her mother to return from an outing.

The sunlight pouring through the lattice door papered with rice paper shifted from clear to golden to red, then to pitch black, but her mother never came.

Tears trailed from the corners of her eyes.

She was cold, hungry, scared. The moment she thought scared, the black darkness took the shape of a black glove and engulfed her.

Olivia jolted awake with a sharp scream. Ragged breaths poured out. Cold sweat dripped down.

"It's alright."

A voice echoed in her ear. The low murmur carried weight. Her racing heartbeat slowed.

"You're safe now, Olivia."

It wasn't a hallucination. The soothing voice felt both familiar and foreign in her ear.

Olivia lifted her head toward the sound.

Her head spun. Her mind not fully awake, her vision was blurry.

She rubbed her eyes. Still hazy. After blinking a few times, her focus gradually sharpened.

The dark shape before her took on clear contours.

"!"

Olivia froze solid.

She was certain she'd been kidnapped.

Why was this man here...?

"Don't tell me, you...?"

"No."

It didn't feel real, but it couldn't be a dream. All her senses keenly registered this man.

His scent, his body heat, his breath, his low voice.

...Not a dream.

Above all, meeting his slate-gray eyes staring at her shattered any desperate hope that it was.

Olivia Blanchett's husband.

She'd rather faint again.

"Then, why are you here?"

"Good question."

As Olivia scooted back hesitantly and hit the headboard, she flinched.

Johann straightened his torso, which he'd bent to tidy her hair.

"I should be asking you that. What the hell have you been up to?"

His probing blue eyes finally seemed to take in her appearance.

Olivia yanked the blanket up to her chin, her face flushing crimson with shame.

Quite the peculiar reaction, after three years of sharing a bed.

"W-was it you?"

Her fierce glare wasn't unpleasant.

Better than the shattered glass marble eyes. Though the wary look, as if he were a stranger, grated.

"No."

Meaning he hadn't kidnapped her or stripped her clothes.

Even after his denial, his former wife stared at him dubiously.

"Then who?"

Olivia pressed again, eyeing the man warily as he gave a curt denial.

"We're investigating."

The man with soft golden blond hair—the brightest shade she'd ever seen—replied calmly.

That was why her gaze had lingered so long on him.

"Where is this?"

"My hotel."

"......"

Johann was nonchalant.

Olivia, meanwhile, felt the world go dark, her heart pounding irregularly. The second most shocking revelation.

A h-hotel, of all places.

She dreaded tomorrow's newspapers. At least she hadn't walked in proudly on her own two feet. That was the only silver lining.

"I need to go."

Olivia kicked off the blanket she clutched like a lifeline and rose.

A hot summer night breeze blew through the open window.

The white curtains billowed, and the sheer fabric over her half-risen body fluttered. Johann's gaze slowly followed the motion.

"Stay and sleep."

Johann pressed gently on her rounded shoulder, easing her back down as he spoke.

Her trembling eyes looked up at him. Seeing himself reflected purely there satisfied him.

"Stay and sleep."

"No."

Her crisp refusal held no hesitation. Her sea-blue eyes were midwinter ice.

That unyielding gaze felt alien, like she was someone he didn't know.

"I have to go."

'Can't you stay? Stay, Johann.'

It had been Olivia—you—who'd begged him like that, clinging as he left the bedroom after they'd finished.

Now Johann Leopold was the one pleading. Pathetically.

"......Reporters are swarming outside."

Spouting such a lame excuse felt idiotic.

"Stay and sleep."

His smooth baritone carried weight, his attitude imperious and brusque.

At the word "reporters," Olivia, who'd been lowering her feet to the floor, froze.

She was hypersensitive to reporters. That was why her impulse to bolt had deflated.

One wrong move, and she'd be embroiled in an irreversible scandal.

Not content with secret trysts with her ex-husband's rival, now the shameless woman spends the night with her ex and his fiancée.

Olivia's brow furrowed in horror. Even imagining it was too lurid and stimulating.

"I can slip out the back."

"They're there too."

Olivia bit her lip.

Of course. Who'd be stupid enough to exit the front?

She wanted to dash out right then, but dawn was too secretive a time.

Perfect for twisted imaginations to branch out wildly.

An uncomfortable silence stretched. In the dim dawn light, the man still stared at her.

His gaze held no force, yet it felt suffocating.

"......Anne will worry."

Olivia broke the silence, averting her eyes.

Sorry to this body's original owner, but it was a relief he'd been indifferent as a husband.

If not, you'd have noticed too easily. That the woman before you wasn't Olivia Blanchett.

Still, it terrified her. Those firm slate-gray eyes gazing down were suffocatingly persistent.

"I sent someone."

"......"

Olivia looked up at him.

"How did you know?"

"Know what?"

"......Where I live."

A chill ran down Olivia's spine.

How did he know the hideout Edgar had kept secret from the press?

"No way...?"

"The coachman told me."

The man replied as he draped his coat over the bedpost and undid his collar buttons.

His tone flowed naturally, as if it were nothing.

"Ah!"

Olivia's bristling eyes softened.

After rescuing her, his former wife had treated him like a kidnapper and lecher from the start.

"I'm sorry."

"No need."

Though it was true he'd assigned people for background checks.

"Why would he do this?"

"We'll find out soon."

Olivia frowned.

'Escort her politely.'

The signature below was unmistakably his handwriting.

Why had the McDowell coachman had that letter? That's when she remembered the man she'd completely forgotten.

"Edgar."

His name slipped out in her mind. Their eyes met simultaneously. The man's steady gaze weighed heavy.

"......"

The slate eyes beneath thick brows narrowed slowly.

As the displeased—or angry—man rose, his long shadow fell over Olivia.

Instinctively, she yanked the blanket to cover herself.

He approached.

Why...?

Facing his massively imposing presence, her heart raced.

Was her mimicry of Olivia Blanchett's memories too clumsy?

As he stopped right before her nose, her mind went blank white.

The next instant, he reached out and leaned down.

Olivia unwittingly held her breath.