Evelina caught sight of the letter she had skimmed through again.
「 Your Majesty, I am your servant, but Your Majesty has received a daughter who is irreplaceable to me as the queen. I am Your Majesty’s father-in-law. Therefore, please respect our family, which became Your Majesty’s in-laws.
I have raised my daughter for more than 20 years. For more than 20 years, she’s been more precious than my life. Please allow me to talk to her in person. How can you separate a father from his daughter? I don’t think I can live because I can’t hear directly how the child is doing.
My wife fell ill because she was worried about her daughter. I’ll give you anything you want. I’ll do it if you ask me to return my title. So please let me see my daughter. Let me check if the child is doing well. I beseech Your Majesty to hear this humble servant and his undeserving pleads.
I beg of Your Majesty to permit us into the Imperial Palace. 」
Evelina’s hands trembled. Her father’s handwriting was right there no matter how she looked at it.
She had seen her father in the throne room a few times as minister. Also, she saw her mother in the emperor’s office.
She guessed that he wouldn’t let her see him on purpose. But she couldn’t believe her father asked him this much and he ignored him.
When she saw the letter in person, she felt disillusioned that she was physically attracted to Kaiden.
No matter how good he was, he hated her family. For him, the Marquis of Logias was the enemy family, and she was the daughter of that hateful family.
She was too careless with him.
Even now, how happy he must be to separate her and her father. How ridiculous she must have been to look like she was falling for him like an idiot.
She felt a lump in her throat when she faced reality.
She tried not to forget and did not let go of reality, yet she unintentionally put her mind at ease for a while. She thought it was fortunate that she was able to come to her senses before making a mistake.
At the same time, after she died, she was worried whether her parents would be okay, so her heart became more stuffy.
So she folded the letter she had read back and put it in his coat as if she hadn’t seen it. Then, as if nothing had happened, she was served, took a bath, and lay down.
~~~~
– Click
Evelina glanced at Kaiden, who came back around the time she was about to fall asleep. He had washed up somewhere and was wearing thin clothes. Then she turned around. As if she was displeased by his entry.
She kept trying to pretend she was asleep.
“I’m sorry I’m late. You’re already asleep.”
He whispered very affectionately in her ear in a really low and quiet voice as if not to disturb her sleep.
She hated him for the way he tried to separate her from her father, hidden behind his kindness.
How funny would that be? It must have looked like she loved him for taking revenge on her family.
She didn’t know she was in a position to continue acting. But now, it was too much for her to face him. She thought she would forget acting and resent him if she talked to him.
But that shouldn’t be the case. Then her father and mother might die because of her. She wanted to save her adoptive parents that raised her more preciously than their daughter, even though her death was inevitable.
So she was trying to hold it in. She was afraid that the moment she saw him, she would forget her act and give an honest response.
She had never seen anyone so quick-witted. If she could not control her emotions while talking to him, there was no way he wouldn’t notice her strangeness.
His red eyes moved as if to test her, and every time she was anxious that he might read her mind.
It was all too much now. She just wanted to fall asleep.
Even so, she hated this situation of not being able to go to the bedroom of the Empress’s Palace. If she fell asleep in the bedroom of the Empress’s Palace, she would have to start all over again.
“Have a good dream, Lina.”
She heard the sound of Kaiden’s footsteps walking toward the sofa after gently kissing her cheek.
So she had to force herself to sleep on a sleepless night. The sound from the sofa also seemed to tell her that he couldn’t sleep.
~~~~
In the morning, Evelina calmed down a little and got up just as he did to make up for yesterday.
“Lina? Was my voice loud?”
He panicked when she got up and saw her. It was a sound that she couldn’t hear if she fell asleep.
She couldn’t sleep all morning. But it was enough time to calm down. She closed her eyes, recalled her situation, and calmed her heart.
“I’m Kaiden’s wife. I want to help prepare breakfast.”
Even as she said that she didn’t feel good thinking about how much he would laugh at her. However, she tried to smile prettily so as not to be seen through. Because he didn’t recognize her adoptive father as his father-in-law, there was no way he would consider her his wife.
The queen was just a child-bearing livestock that could be replaced at any time. At least for him.
She deliberately tried to take her place. You have to think of it as the worst so that it’s less difficult when facing evil.
“My… wife.”
“Yes, wife.”
Evelina approached him with a smile, pretending to be innocent. She looked straight into his eyes, staring at the thin negligee she was wearing. His eyes rested on her chest. Realizing the flesh reflected in the negligee, he frowned and turned his head.
“That’s what subordinates do.”
He refused in a friendly voice, but when he didn’t make eye contact, she intuitively sensed that he was offended that she fell asleep the first last night.
“It’s fine if it’s a subordinate. I woke up because I wanted to help Kayden get ready, and I wanted to have breakfast together like that.”
At her words, he looked at her again. Evelina smiled shyly, not avoiding his eyes.
“If you wake up early, the day will be hard. Lina is weak and can’t sleep well, so you shouldn’t.”
“I’ll go back to sleep when Kaiden gets ready.”
“I heard you take medicine for insomnia.”
“That’s true, but I still want to help Kaiden. You don’t like how I feel?”
His eyes widened when she asked him imploringly.
“Never. Never. It’s not like that. I’m just worried…”
“Then can’t I just stay?”
“Okay, I made a slip of the tongue.”
When she saw him smile resignedly, she became unconsciously absent-minded.
So she was able to help him prepare breakfast.
The attendants did not come in, and she was able to dress him. As if no one would have the chance to kill him more perfectly than her if she tried to assassinate him. He took off his clothes completely defenselessly.
She thought this relaxation of him came from her body. After washing his face in the morning, his body was in disarray with the defenselessness of the morning. It was like looking at a black leopard.
She wiped his face with a dry cloth. She felt as if she had become a beast trainer. Because he stooped very gently to get her touch.
Her eyes met with his as she pressed down his wet face with a cloth. When his eyes met, he smiled like a picture, and Evelina also smiled reflexively.
“Well…”
At that moment she cringed, thinking he was going to kiss her lips. However, he only touched their lips and fell off, but did nothing more. She gently opened her eyes and he was looking at her with the same expression as before.
Like a beast watching the tricks of its prey.
“Lina seems to care about animals. Am I right?”
She nodded, thinking that his sudden question was meant to break the current silence.
“Then you don’t like hunting contests?”
“I think that’s a little different.”
She didn’t like killing animals for fun. She didn’t like it because she felt afraid that the animals would be her family and her.
“If Lina says no, I’ll change it to another event, not a hunting contest.”
“Which one?”
“Horse racing is good, too.”
She turned white as she recalled three knights he killed at the last horse riding competition and disabled seven knights. He also had a strange habit of beheading his opponent’s horse after winning.
“I don’t like horse racing. I hate it when Kaiden gets hurt.”
She answered like that and sighed.
“Let’s just do it as a hunting contest. Hounders built the hunting ground for this day.”
He nodded at Evelina’s words and said.
“Then I’ll offer you wolf’s fur, Lina.”
Evelina laughed bitterly at Kaiden’s words.
So she helped him prepare, and only after he had completely disappeared could she fall asleep in the bedroom. She was briefly groggy from the drugs.
~~~~
“This part is wrong again.”
Evelina was in her office in the afternoon.
But the part that was wrong last time, She checked three times. It was changed again when she checked it unexpectedly.
“No, why the hell is this…!”
Her chief aide looked at the document in a bewildered manner.
The document was the cost of entertainment for the envoys. It has the details of the payment for the goods to be prepared and the cost of manpower before they came.
“Someone seems to keep messing with the papers.”
Evelina doubted the senior aide when he spoke angrily. But she thought again that if she went up and told Kaiden, his head would be the first to fall off his neck.
“Why don’t you set a trap, Your Majesty?”
But she liked what he said.
“In what way?”
She looked at his words with expectation.
“It seems that this criminal is trying to humiliate Your Majesty in front of the delegation. On the contrary, why don’t we humiliate them?”
