CH 33.2

“It’s been a while, Lady Libelois. No, I should call you Mrs. Cromund.”

“I didn’t know you two would come all the way to the North.”

“The Grand Duke personally invited me. He said he would congratulate us on our engagement.”

Siena’s luscious red lips fluttered like a snake. Salton, who had stood by her side, bowed his head in accordance with the etiquette.

“Long time no see. Miss Angroanne.”

“Oh, Sir Salton. You need to correct her title.”

Sienna smirked, as if she didn’t like Anne’s intimate call.

“Welcome. You have come a long way, so I hope you have a good time.”

“Where is the Grand Duke? I need to pay my respects. Does he have to stay in bed because he’s old? Then I’ll have to go there and greet him.”

She only wanted to greet, but that cheerful voice full of laughter was mocking Anne.

Anne gently raised her lips.

“Do you . . . Really want to?”

“He invited me all the way to the north, so it is not polite to not give my greetings. Could you introduce us?”

Seeing Sienna’s victorious expression, Anne smirked.

For first timers visiting the North, they did not know the Grand Duke’s age. Sienna wanted to say that Anne had taken the name Grand Duchess from a dying old man.

“I will let him know that you have come. By the way . . . He is a very scary man, so you have to be careful not to touch his heart.”

“Don’t worry about that. I am well aware of etiquette toward the elderly.”

Anne had been experiencing this for a long time as conversations in the capital’s social circles flowed in this way.

As he quietly watched the conversation between the women, Salton turned to Anne. There was a hint of affection in his soft, dark brown eyes. At the same time, the music was changing to a soft accompaniment song.

“Would you like to dance a song with me?”

At that question, Anne blinked hard. Sienna rolled her eyes openly at Salton, but he held out his hand regardless.

It wasn’t strange for her to dance as Anne was the host, but Anne pondered for a moment if she dared to dance with Salton in front of Sienna. But, she accepted, because it wasn’t bad for her to talk to him.

“I will.”

* * *

The Grand Duke, who was sitting on the top seat, languidly raised his eyelids.

After the meeting between the feuding brother and sister, Daymond set out to find them, and unintentionally overheard their conversation. Leaning against the half-open parlor door, he heard was something he had never realized before. The traces of the corporal punishment that Anne had hinted unconsciously came to his ears.

I knew that the Count raised his hand arbitrarily the day she came to the North, but has she been dealing with this since she was young?

It was Daymond’s daily routine to trample on Anne and treat her with force, but he was also not as heartless as a stone statue. He gave her bitterness, but only he could do so.

It was when he saw Anne’s face in a form he had never seen through the door, that made him react. The only expressions he had ever seen on her was perseverance through tears, but there was a bleak depth of sorrow on her white face. A woman who was as dry as firewood on an open fire, was revealing her feelings.

He felt strange when he saw the woman, who had been stubbornly holding on with such an ignorant face, shedding tears over such a thing.

When he came to his senses along with the sound of a bang, the wooden door had completely lost its place.

Did I become soft?

He was bewildered that his sudden action got him involved in a useless matter. Why was he so angry that he wanted to kill Robert? Whatever happened between Robert and the Grand Duchess, Daymond did not have to care. Even if Anne was in the right, what he should have shown was a completely indifferent attitude.

Daymond wanted Anne to be unhappy here. He wanted to give her the same sense of helplessness that the marriage was ultimately her hell.

He was going to let her know that inviting Robert in the first place is also useless if she was to try to dig up information . . . But, what was this situation now? In the end, he ended up helping her.

That he was emotionally agitated and stood by the woman . . . The aftermath it brought annoyed him.

You unsightly man. Did you want to be a good husband?

He ridiculed himself on the inside. Had he known this would happen, he would not have called Robert.

Daymond voluntarily passed all the excuses about Robert to Anne, who was nothing more than one of his belongings. He was the cause, but he didn’t change anything.