The Monstrous Grand Duke’s Fake Lady

Chapter 138

Really—said Ez who looked happy while smiling before clearing his throat. He opened his mouth carefully, taking an even longer time than when he had confessed earlier.

“……Vivian.”

“Yes.”

“……Vivian, Vivian.”

As he repeated her name, Ez’s voice began to tremble. When the smile that he had been barely maintaining soon vanished, he sprang up from his seat.

“I feel rather tired today, so I’ll get going. I’m sorry.”

After bowing his head at the right angle towards Vivian, he immediately rushed out. Before she could even grab him, he had already waved at Vivian while still running to the point that his figure became blurry. Then, he turned around once more before disappearing at a very quick pace.

Even after Ez disappeared, Vivian just sat there for a moment. Only until the music had finally stopped and the voices of people gradually subsided.

The next day, Ez worked at the inn as if nothing had ever happened.

After greeting Vivian vivaciously as usual, he cleaned the hall. It was a little red under his eyes, but she pretended not to be aware of it as she believed that was what he might have wanted.

The festival was already over, but the afterglow had still been ongoing. Just like sweetness lingered around their mouths, people were still walking down the street—unable to forget all the excitement from last night. Meanwhile, the inn was busy with the amount of people returning back after enjoying the festival.

It was a peaceful day except for the fact that it had been a little busy—Vivian thought.

It eventually turned into a relatively leisurely afternoon with more people leaving after their stay. Vivian cleared the hall and wholly prepared for the meal before looking around.

Even Ashley had just drank her milk and was now engulfed in a sweet nap. It was such a perfect evening.

By the time for dinner, Vivian began to get busy preparing for the suitable meal. As usual, she served meals for those who were frequent to the inn and put together the meals for guests who were still staying over. Then, she prepared the last dish on a plate before staring at the door.

The door that was to be opened had still been tightly closed. Now, he should arrive. Vivian’s gaze was actually far beyond the door.

At first, she thought that he might be a little late. She still looked over at the door until the diners left their table one by one and eventually, the hall was completely emptied out.

But right until the end, no one had opened the door to enter.

“Ez, what about the guests?”

“The ones who just paid before were the last.”

At that moment, Vivian’s gaze directed to the door once again. The tightly closed door had shown no signs of being opened at all. It was quite hard for her to take her eyes off the door just as if there were some slight lingering feelings.

Right, there must be a day like this—although she had a thought like that, there were no signs of her eyes leaving the same door.

If only you hadn’t been visiting every single day. She turned her gaze away while pushing that troubled mind of hers to one side. There must be things he has to do anyway. Vivian then lightly concluded.

Nevertheless, the next day and even the day afterwards, Knox was still nowhere to be seen.

The inn that had gotten rather free was enough to make Vivian’s trivial thoughts grow even bigger. Even while she was cleaning or chopping the ingredients or even when she was looking after Ashley, she would sometimes look at the door without any specific reason at all.

Whenever she saw the door that had been still closed tightly, she would stay and gazed at it before heaving a sigh. It was as if everything had returned back to the past.

There were a lot of things to do when she had eventually regained her composure, but she just couldn’t get her hands fully on them. It was as if all sorts of concentration she once had were left somewhere else.

Ka-cling. Vivian stopped her hands that were sewing her child’s clothes. Her breath had seemingly stopped as well. Her head was quickly turned, but only an unfamiliar guest was entering the inn.

She had no choice but to admit that she was insanely concerned about Knox’s whereabouts, whom she hadn’t been seeing for days.

And she was all the more worried since of all things, this happened right after she had been cold to Knox. She regretted her arbitrary behaviour that hadn’t been listening to him at all.

But he also did the same thing. Vivian tried to make some excuses.

He was the one who would always come to his own conclusion and act as he desired. So, it wasn’t really wrong for her to act like that for once. Although she never imagined that he would stop coming over just because of her act that one, single time.

Vivian furrowed her forehead. She didn’t like that her very own self was so shaken by his absence. She thought that she had discarded her feelings after she left them buried back at the County. Perhaps she had been seeing Knox for far too frequent.

Otherwise, she wouldn’t be feeling this kind of dull pain for so long. Vivian turned away while pressing down on her solar plexus softly.