Chapter 58

58 Just a Friend?

Anastasia opted to tell the half-truth again. She whispered in a shaken voice while looking down at her hands, “I had no choice but to come here.”

Caspian felt a sharp prick in his heart after listening to that confession. She wasn’t denying that she would have been loved by Eve.

But she further spoke while shedding her tears because the pain in her wrists was getting unbearable by now, “But I never saw Everard as anything more than a friend. Even if I hadn’t come here, I would have never married him.”

Caspian didn’t hear Anastasia’s heart skipping beats. He knew that this was also the truth. And he knew those tears were real.

What he hadn’t realized yet was that she was crying because of him.

Caspian felt bad for blatantly accusing his wife of having some hidden agenda. He left his grip on Anastasia’s wrist and hugged her tightly. He closed his eyes and apologized, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have doubted your intention.”

Anastasia also put her arms around him. She pressed his head over her chest. She leaned down and kissed his head.

And she further explained truthfully, “I had clearly told Everard that I wasn’t interested in courtship with him. And he never insisted again. He agreed to be my friend. Besides, I sent him letters because he resides in the same boarding house as my brother in Lavinya. And I write letters to him when I write one for my brother.”

Caspian felt even worse after hearing that. He regretted not listening to her first and lashing out at her.

.....

He looked into her forest-like eyes and apologized again, “I’m sorry. I admit that my jealousy took the better of me.”

He gently kissed her chest and looked at her angelic face again.

And he expressed how he truly felt when he heard about Everard, “You are the first woman I am serious about. And I couldn’t stand the thought of you having some romantic feelings towards another man before you came here. More than that, I couldn’t stand the thought of you still having feelings towards that man.”

“Shhh... It’s okay.” The corners of Anastasia’s lips curved up very subtly.

She felt a little happy to know that Caspian was capable of being jealous of another man. And what was more surprising was that he even admitted it openly.

Anastasia caressed his cheek. She leaned down and gave a warm kiss on her husband’s lips.

But Caspian pulled away because he saw something on her wrist.

“Oh, no!” His eyes widened when he saw his fingermarks on them. His fingermarks looked dark red on her pale wrist.

He lightly held her hands and inhaled sharply. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t even realize when...”

Caspian felt disgusted by himself. He truly felt like a monster.

Anastasia pulled her hands away and hid the marks on one of her wrists with her other palm. And she said with a smile on her face, “It will disappear soon. Don’t worry about it.”

Caspian looked at his wife’s smiling face in disbelief. And he asked in a sad voice, “How can I not worry when I am the one who did that to you? And how can you still smile at this monster?”

“Don’t say that,” Anastasia tried to calm him down.

However, Caspian got up and asked, “Anna, get up. Let’s go and see the doctor.”

But Anastasia grabbed onto the chair and shook her head. “The doctors can’t do anything about it. It will disappear soon, trust me.”

Caspian was angry at himself. He held his head and mumbled, “But I hurt you...”

Anastasia got up and put her arms around his neck. And she tried to console him, “My skin is a bit too sensitive than other people’s. That’s all. It didn’t hurt that much.”

“Liar.” Caspian kept on looking at his wife with a sorry look on his face.

Anastasia dismissed him calling her a liar and tightly hugged Caspian. She rested her head on his chest and closed her eyes. She then whispered, “It will fade away.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. So don’t worry.”

Caspian put his arms around her waist as lightly as he could. He feared that he would break his wife if he hugged her tightly. ‘I need to learn to be gentle with her,’ he thought to himself.

After holding each other in an apologetic embrace, Caspian finally handed over the letter to Anastasia.

He waved the torn envelope and said, “It wasn’t addressed to anyone in particular on the envelope. So I thought that the letter was for me. But I didn’t go through the contents of the letter when I saw that it was addressed to you.”

“Thank you,” Anastasia took the letter from him.

She unfolded it and put it on the desk instead of reading it immediately. She didn’t want to make him feel that she was too eager to read the letter. But she also didn’t want him to think that she was hiding something. Hence, she opened it for him in case he wanted to take a peek at the contents of the letter.

However, Caspian put his trust in his wife. He caressed her hair and said, “I still have some agendas to attend to. I will see you tonight.”

Anastasia smiled and gave a nod.

After Caspian left the library, she sat down on her chair. She grabbed the letter and started to read it.

‘Dear Anna,

Before I ask anything else, I believe that a congratulation is in order on getting married to the King of Sorvando. Congratulations, Anna!

Now that the formality has been taken care of, I wanted to know if your new life has been treating you well. As your friend, and as your well-wisher, I cannot help but worry about you.

Your brother and I were both upset when you went away without even waiting to bid goodbyes to us. So you owe us both an apology the next time we meet.

I don’t have much to say in this letter. All I wish is for you to be safe and sound. I hope that the King is treating you well. And I hope that he has been giving you the respect that you deserve.

I also wanted to ask you, are you not scared? Of the new environment and new people? Or have you adapted to your new home? Are you happy?

Write back to me.

Yours Truly,

Eve.’

Anastasia put the letter down on the table. She had deep frown lines in between her brows.

For the first half of the letter, she thought that Everard was worried about her since she got married out of the blue.

However, when she read the questions that Everard had asked, she couldn’t tell whether he knew about the existence of the vampires. Or whether he was asking those questions out of genuine worry and nothing more.

Everard had written the letter to be confusing. He wanted the letter to reach Anastasia’s hand even if the King went through it first.

So he couldn’t afford to straight up ask her if her vampire husband was threatening her or if he was trying to make her his meal. And neither could he say that he was willing to rescue her from the monster’s den.

‘Are you aware, Eve?’ Anastasia sighed.

But she dismissed that possibility since she could somewhat guess that the existence of the vampires was unknown outside of the Sorvando borders. Outside the borders, vampires were merely thought to be mythical creatures and were limited to fiction.

She leaned back on her chair and dwelled upon Everard’s questions.

‘Am I scared?’ she repeated his question in her mind.

‘Of course, I am scared, Eve. I can never afford to lose my guard because I fear someone still wants me dead. The one I can lean on for safety is my husband. But I cannot fully depend on him. I can never tell what triggers him and when he will snap at me.’

‘Have I adapted here?’

She smiled mirthlessly and answered to herself, ‘Definitely not. I feel like I am a guest here. I wonder if Sorvando will ever be my home.’

‘Am I happy?’

She thought back to the times she had spent here in Sorvando until now. There were times when she had cried. And there were times when she had laughed.

However, the only answer she could come up with was, ‘I don’t know.’