CH 28.1

Iveca never had to think for long when it came to the question of why she liked Anriq. The answer was too easy. Because he was the only man who talked to her and spent true, meaningful time with her when she needed it most; as a lonely, ostracized girl in the Esselburn estate. Without him, her life would have been much more difficult. Therefore, it was only natural that she gave her heart to him freely.

For the same reason, although much further forward in time, she opened her heart to Daniel too easily. Daniel was warm to her, held her hand, told her that he was her family, and came to meet her when he seemingly had no reason to do so other than spend time with her. He was the one who didn’t make her feel alone. He had presented her a job which she could do well, and cheered and supported her whenever she did that job as well as he knew she could do it.

One didn’t have to be a king, didn’t have to be so handsome, didn’t have to be good in bed. She would have given her heart to anyone if they didn’t leave her unattended. If they wrapped her in their arms and made her feel like they wouldn’t let go, Iveca would have given herself to them completely, whoever they were.

She knew this. But as she pondered the idea of what made her so easy to win over, Iveca realized she had already fallen for it with Daniel, and that pretending not to know whatever she discovered about him had become a painful habit.

If it wasn’t for her quick-witted eyes and her vigilance, she could have been just happy with Daniel’s kindness. If it wasn’t because of her personality, quietly keeping doubts in her heart, she would have grabbed Daniel right away and asked about it. The question that had no easy answer, the one that had been keeping her up at night long beyond any lovemaking session. But Iveca was fiercely all of those things, so she just had to stumble over her words and try not to give anything away.

“Aren’t you sleeping?”

A friendly voice echoed in her ears. Iveca looked up to see Daniel’s face close to hers. She touched his eyebrows, brushed his straight nose, and tucked her fingers slightly into his pretty lips. His eyes smiled as if they were surprised. His tongue licked her finger gently.

Who’s Eve Jean?

She quickly kissed him on his chest to hide the sad question that filled every corner of her body, but not before the others came flooding in like a dam had broken inside her.

She was not having children now anyway, so why did he hold her? Why did he lay her down every night and enter her so passionately, so insistently?

The questions she could not answer were piled up one after another.

Did they want to make it easy for me to give my heart away? Did they all know I would give it up like that?

She did not like subtle and complicated things. Hidden things. She hated not being able to ask openly.

Mother, was I the stable keeper’s daughter?

Questions that she could not ask for the rest of her life poured out of control and stuck in her mind. She kept her face down because she did not want to be caught crying. She kissed his belly, kissed his waist, and kissed him between his legs. Anything to make the questions stop for just a little while.

There was bitterness at the end of the lovemaking this time. The body temperature transmitted behind her back collapsed. Because she wanted more of it. Unanswered questions encroach themselves into depression. She had lived like that for eighteen years, and it was all she had known for that time.

It was all because she put him in her heart too much, too easily. Daniel treated her with the same attitude from the beginning and even let her spend time with Anriq, but she was greedy enough to be depressed all day, over the smallest trace of the woman left behind in Daniel’s life. He gave her affections, and she just needed to do her ‘work’ to him. Surely that was all he needed her for.

The thought alone kept Iveca up all night. When she thought of him, she could swallow her laughter and cried as much as she could, until the dark night passed.

And it suddenly occurred to her that it was love. This was love, whether she liked it or not. A heart that had no choice but to hold on despite knowing that it would hurt.

The difference between vaguely guessing that someone was in her partner’s mind and actually knowing the woman’s identity was too big of a blow. It was too much to not know, and far too much to live with hidden in her heart every single day.

Even her name is Eve. It was the same nickname given to her by Anriq, but everything was completely different from her. There was too much gap between the confident ace recognized by the Bureau of Investigation, and herself who was kicked out with her memories erased due to maladjustment. Her frustration, more than her jealousy, darkened her.

For a moment, she thought she was broken.