CH 14

She didn’t smell like strawberries now, but like herself.

It was obvious, since they used the same soap in the bath, but it was strange.

This woman, with her own scent, kept drawing him to her.

First with her eyes, then with her nerves, and now with her heart.

Without realizing it, Nikolai impulsively ran his fingers through her luscious strawberry blonde hair.

He couldn’t help but smile at how cute her bouncy curls were.

“You look good.”

“What do you mean, all of a sudden?”

“You’ve been sleeping lightly or not sleeping at all, and now your complexion looks like you’ve had a good night’s sleep.”

Boris had said as he was about to enter the room.

Nikolai had fallen into the deepest sleep he’d had in a very long time before the assassins came.

It was a strange phenomenon.

What was this woman?

This was the same woman who, trembling with fear, had taken on an assassin with an empty gun and no gunpowder to save herself.

Then I remembered Katya’s words from earlier.

“I saved your life, we don’t owe anything to each other anymore.”

In retrospect, I felt a little bit of a pang of regret.

If anything, I wanted Katya to owe me more.

I want to keep tangling with her.

Preferably as deeply as possible.

***

That night, Katya had a strange dream.

An ancient pyramid she’d only seen in books came crashing down on her, pinning her beneath it.

When she woke up, she groaned at the heavy weight still pressing down on her, and opened her eyes.

“Huh? What is this?”

A mountain of thick, heavy blankets had been piled on top of Katya’s body.

It was a dream that reflected reality to some extent.

“This is why I have nightmares!”

She had just managed to pull the blanket off her body when the door opened and Nikolai walked in.

He carried a small table in his hand.

“What the hell is this. Did you do this, Nikki?”

Katya asked, pointing to the tower of blankets crushing her lower half.

“Ah, I saw you at dawn and you were shivering. You had a low-grade fever.”

Walking over to her, Nikolai set the table on the nightstand and sat down on the edge of the bed.

He casually placed his hand on Katya’s rounded forehead.

Her face was half hidden by his large palm, up to her eyes.

“Thank goodness you don’t have a fever anymore.”

Nikolai had shakily paid extra and brought out every blanket in the warehouse to cover her, so she’d been sweating in her sleep.

Every time she would slip her legs out of the blanket in her sleep, Nikolai would carefully tuck them back in.

It turned out that the cold germs, intending to invade her body, were completely thwarted by Nikolai’s exceptional defense.

“Aren’t you grateful?”

“Uh, well, thank you.”

Katya scratched her cheek in response to the question that somehow seemed to be asking for a compliment.

“Now eat your breakfast.”

Nikolai set the table in front of Katya as she sat up in bed.

From a distance, it looked insignificant in his hands, but up close, it was surprisingly spacious.

It was piled high with dishes of all kinds, enough to break a limb.

She could smell the delicious smells through her slightly clogged nose.

“I don’t know what you’ll like.”

Soft potato soup, borscht with its vibrant red color from beets, and hearty ukha fish soup, were all present.

There were three soups alone, plus roast lamb, roast goose, and grilled trout.

It was an unimaginable feast for a small, shabby inn out from of town.

“Did you really order all of this?”

“Well, the owner and I had a little spat yesterday, and he apologized for what happened, so this is his way of showing his sincerity.”

It was a lie that wouldn’t have worked for most people, but Katya knew Nikolai as a good and noble citizen, so she didn’t question it.

“Well, that’s unusual. Maybe he’s nicer than I thought.”

“Come on, before it gets cold.”

“…….”

“What’s wrong, you don’t like it?”

Nikolai asked, a little nervously.

“It’s a bit much for breakfast…….”

“I guess so.”

As she tried to suppress her laughter, the image of Laika playfully dropping a toy ball merged with his face, creating a unique blend of amusement and mischief.

“—But I like them all, I just don’t know what to eat first.”

With a confident demeanor, Katia firmly grasped the tray and spoke.

She usually ate a simple breakfast.

But when she thought of Nikolai, who had worked so hard to get this much, she knew she had to shove it in, even if it meant making room in her stomach somehow.

“Well, since you have an empty stomach, I’ll start with this.”

Notably, Nikolai’s expression brightened, and he placed a spoon in her hand before pointing towards the ukha soup.

Eventually, she scooped up a spoonful of the clear broth and popped it into her mouth, and at that moment, Katya felt like she was in heaven.

Objectively speaking, it was nothing compared to what she usually ate at the Duke of Smirnov’s, but perhaps the market vendor had referred to it as a side dish.

To Katya, this ukha was the most delicious dish in the world, more so than any other wild seafood.

In fact, it had been a long time since she’d had anything like this at the Petrozky estate, where Ivan had nearly starved her into submission to him.

Besides, all she had eaten yesterday was a piece of bread.

Even though she was extremely hungry, she had expected her empty stomach to protest, but strangely enough, the food went down smoothly.

After that, Katia started eating hastily, quickly spooning the food into her mouth.

“Eat slowly, you’ll get sick.”

Nikolai said, offering her a glass of water.

“I ate too fast, I didn’t eat much yesterday.”

At that, one of his eyebrows rose in displeasure.

What the hell was this self-proclaimed fiancé doing letting her stay in his villa and not making sure she was fed?

Barely controlling the anger rising inside him, Nikolai spread cheese on a slice of black bread and handed it to Katya.

“You’re not eating?”

“I don’t usually eat breakfast.”

“Really?”

“So never mind me, go ahead and eat.”

It was a lie, of course.

But right now, there was nothing in sight but keeping her full.

His own hunger was so unimportant that it had to be pushed to the back of his priorities.

Besides, just seeing her eating with such a happy smile on her face was enough to quench his anger.

“So there’s fish in such a remote place?”

Katya, who had been concentrating on her meal for a while, suddenly muttered out of curiosity.

Fish was usually a rare treat for commoners unless they lived near the coast or a lake.

Except for the traditional Hersen fish, which was usually smoked, the commoners had no place to store it.

“Ahem. Well… it seems the owner personally caught them from a nearby lake.”

“Really? That’s not something you typically see. He’s quite thoughtful.”

It was a flimsy act, but Katya trusted Nikolai and fell for it again.

In fact, black bread, potato soup, and boiled potatoes were what the inn originally served to its guests.

Other than that, it was a special meal the inn had hastily prepared for Katya at dawn this morning.

Three hours ago.

Unable to fall back to sleep, Nikolai came down to the first floor and found himself in the lobby to do a preliminary inspection of Katya’s breakfast.

“Hey, owner.”

The innkeeper, who had been dozing off behind the counter because there was no one else available to work the shift, woke up and opened his eyes groggily.

“What’s going on?”

“What do you have for breakfast here?”

As he asked, the owner recited the breakfast menu.

“Is that all you’re going to have?”

“What’s your problem?”

Just as he was about to get up in exasperation, Nikolai slapped a sack on the counter.

“I’ll give you everything in it, and you can prepare what I’m asking for.”

The sack was filled with gold coins, glistening with a brilliant light. How much is this?

It was more than three months’ worth of revenue for the inn.

The owner’s eyes widened and he suddenly lowered his stance, his demeanor softening.

“Anything is possible. Anything as long as I have the ingredients…….”

“Even if you don’t have them, you’ll make them.”

Nikolai scribbled a rough list of ingredients he needed and wanted on a piece of paper and held it out to him.

“I’ll see what I can get for the others, but fish is probably out of the question, and even if we went to town, I doubt there’s a shop open at this hour.”

“Are there any lakes around here?”

“Not nearby, but you’d have to go out a lot on horseback.”

“Then draw me a map of where it is. I’ll go, but don’t worry about that, just prepare the other dishes first.”

“What? That far away?”

“Do you have a fishing pole?”

“Sure, but…….”

As soon as Nikolai accepted the map and fishing pole, he opened the door to leave.

But then he turned around and walked back to the counter, as if he’d suddenly remembered something.

“Is there anything else you want me to do?”

“Not that…….”

Nikolai suddenly held out his hand to the owner.

“I’m sorry about yesterday.”

“……?”

“I apologize for being rude.”

The owner hesitantly took his hand and shook it in a reconciliatory gesture.

He had actually cheated the two of them out of their room yesterday, so Nikolai hadn’t actually done anything wrong.

It was the other way around, and the owner’s conscience was pricked and he couldn’t bear it.

Besides, yesterday’s grudge had long since melted away as soon as he saw the gold coins he had paid in advance.

“So, this morning’s breakfast, please be good to me.”

“Of course. There’s a possibility. I do not know if it will be to your taste, but I will do my best.”

“It’s not for me, it’s for the lady who came with me, so I hope you’ll take more care.”

A small smile tugged at the corners of Nikolai’s mouth at the thought of her.

“Because she’s precious.”

He was clearly in love.

There was a subtle difference from yesterday.

The innkeeper had witnessed such things countless times in the course of running the inn.

It was a gaze, particularly common in men among couples who had crossed the line during the night.

His guess wasn’t entirely accurate, but it was a good one.

For Nikolai, the previous night had been a night of connection, a connection that went beyond the usual ‘relationship’ between a man and a woman.