22. Cornered Prey

— Clatter, clatter.

Inside the moving carriage.

Adeline closed her eyes tightly while holding her trembling hands.

‘I shouldn’t have gone back to get the seal.’

She had planned to take only the seal and find another way somehow, but Adeline was now being forcibly taken away by the knights who had come to the villa.

“We will keep your belongings. Please get into the carriage quickly.”

She had hurriedly put the seal into the small bag she was carrying, but even that was taken from her.

‘It’s just a luggage bag, surely they won’t search through it?’

Adeline carefully lifted the curtain hanging in the carriage.

‘One inside. Five outside.’

Through the window, she could see five knights. To send so many knights just to capture one woman. Adeline briefly considered ways to escape but quickly abandoned the idea.

When first captured, she had been devastated, thinking the Marquis had finally found her. But the armbands of the knights surrounding her belonged to the Torpeo duchy.

“We’ve come to escort you. Please tell us what belongings you need, and we will bring them.”

Adeline recalled what had happened earlier. Though they maintained a respectful attitude toward her, the knights didn’t give her the slightest opportunity to escape.

Adeline turned her gaze to the knight sitting across from her, sitting upright.

Unlike the knights surrounding the carriage outside, the knight inside wasn’t armed. Only the lightly worn armband confirmed he was a knight of the Torpeo family.

Adeline understood this was a kind of warning that they wouldn’t harm her as long as she didn’t try to escape.

“Excuse me, knight? Where are you taking me?”

Adeline asked the knight with an innocent face.

“I only received orders to escort the lady to the duke’s residence.”

From the knight’s words, Adeline deduced that Duke Torpeo had returned to his residence and that his memories had returned.

‘Lady, he says.’

Adeline, who had been anxious about whether the duke with his recovered memories might have realized she was the Credion lady, felt somewhat relieved.

If he had known she was the Marquis’s daughter, he would never have called her “lady.”

‘Right. It was just that one time at the debutante ball.’

Even the Marquis hadn’t recognized her disguised appearance, so how could the duke, who had only met eyes with her once at the debutante ball, possibly know who she was?

Adeline recalled the lie she had told the memory-lost duke in the past.

“I… I’m a commoner! I… I fell in love with you without knowing you were a noble, and we had to run away because of our different social statuses.”

She had blurted out anything to escape the situation at that time, but who knew it would help her like this? Adeline seemed to see a path that wasn’t there before, thanks to her own unintentional foresight.

‘Yes. It’s still fine for now.’

Nothing could be determined with certainty yet.

Even if the duke’s memories had returned, she was the one who had saved and cared for him. Adeline planned to request that he allow her to hide as the commoner Del after assessing the situation.

How much time had passed?

The carriage, which had been traveling day and night, eventually slowed down and then stopped.

Adeline, who had fallen asleep from the exhausting journey, barely opened her eyes at the light coming through the suddenly opened door.

Beyond the door, she could see the large ducal castle in the Torpeo territory.

⁕⁕⁕

Adeline entered the duke’s residence with light steps, following the butler who had come to guide her.

Adeline walked through the corridors of the duke’s residence, following the butler.

‘Stay calm.’

Adeline walked in slowly with her hands neatly folded. She had clasped her hands to stop them from trembling, but it seemed to appear differently to the servants of the duke’s residence.

“My goodness. She looks like an angel.”

“Wasn’t she brought from Horn? The duke bringing a woman? And a commoner at that. Is he planning to take her as his mistress?”

“Shh. She’ll hear you. But still, for a commoner, her posture is quite upright. Anyone would think she’s a noble daughter.”

“If the duke himself brought her, she must have reason to be proud.”

As she walked through the corridor, Adeline heard the maids whispering. She deliberately pretended not to hear and kept her gaze fixed straight ahead.

From the servants’ whispers, Adeline confirmed once more that the duke still believed her to be the commoner Del.

‘He was someone who pointed a knife at me when we first met.’

Though Adeline had been captured, she was now being treated with respect.

While feeling elated that the situation was turning in her favor despite the duke’s recovered memories, Adeline was also extremely nervous about this moment that felt like a gamble.

Guided to the reception room, Adeline sat demurely in the prepared seat.

She appeared outwardly calm, but the reality was different.

Placed in the large reception room, Adeline was so tense she couldn’t even hold the teacup prepared in front of her.

She clasped her hands tightly together to hide their trembling.

‘This is driving me crazy……’

As if denying her trembling hands, Adeline fixed her gaze on empty space.

Perhaps due to Adeline’s beautiful appearance, fortunately, to the servants’ eyes, she merely appeared to be leisurely enjoying the view through the window.

The longer the wait extended, the more Adeline’s confidence diminished. She began to shake her head vigorously as if trying to dispel her thoughts.

‘Ah, I don’t know! It will work out somehow.’

Cornered Adeline was actually in a do-or-die situation.

If this Duke Torpeo didn’t accept her, her fate was obvious.

‘I’m probably doomed anyway.’

Regardless, Adeline, who had nowhere to flee from the Marquis’s eyes, needed to hide behind the duke to buy time. Adeline’s mind became complicated as she wondered what to say when she saw the duke.

Should she gain the upper hand by blaming him for abandoning her after spending the night together? Or should she plead with him to let her stay quietly by his side for the sake of their past relationship?

Just as she was deep in thought, the closed reception room door opened.

— Click.

“See that it’s handled that way.”

A familiar deep voice wrapped around her ears. The owner of the familiar voice was entering while giving some orders to a servant, seemingly busy with work.

Even though the voice wasn’t directed at her, Adeline felt overwhelmed with emotion at that voice.

Forgetting all her previous deep thoughts, Adeline jumped up from her seat and uttered the name familiar to her.

“Me…… Mel.”

The duke, who had been keeping his gaze fixed on the servant while entering the reception room, turned his head straight toward Adeline at that name from her lips.

‘Mel? What is this woman trying to do?’

Adeline shamelessly called him Mel with her pretty lips. The duke’s red eyes stared intently at Adeline. Her pupils trembled yet looked distant, as if seeing someone she missed.

‘Does she think I won’t recognize the Marquis’s daughter?’

The duke sent an even colder gaze toward Adeline, who was deceiving him even at this moment when she had been brought to the duke’s residence.

His lips remained firmly closed.

— Gulp.

Casis shifted his gaze to Adeline’s moving Adam’s apple. She kept swallowing nervously. Adeline was trying her hardest not to move her trembling hands by gripping them tightly.

After slowly observing her tense appearance, the duke eventually seemed to change his mind and slightly raised the corners of his stiffened lips.

“Del.”

After a long silence, a familiar name reached Adeline’s ears.

Adeline relaxed her tensed shoulders in relief at the sight of the duke smiling and calling her Del.

“What’s happening right now? I really don’t understand anything……”

Adeline decided to act as if she knew nothing, fully performing her confusion at being suddenly brought here.

The duke found this situation highly amusing. She was dancing with joy without realizing she was already in his trap.

The duke decided to enjoy Adeline’s performance a little longer.

“Del. Were you very surprised?”

The duke tenderly called the name of his prey, whom he would never release again.

Adeline involuntarily flinched at the affectionate voice penetrating her ears. She continued to pretend she knew nothing.

“How is Mel at the duke’s residence… Could it be that Mel is the duke?”

Adeline, who had lifted her head abruptly, was colorful in her expressions.

She looked tearful, then smiled. And those wavering eyes. The duke watched her constantly changing expressions as if appreciating them.

Adeline didn’t know that the expressions she was trying hard to control appeared rather comical to the duke’s eyes.

‘I must be crazy to find that appearance lovely.’

To perform such poor acting while knowing everything from the start. The duke was greatly pleased to see his prey, already in his grasp, squirming.

“Shall we sit down and talk?”

After seating Adeline, the duke swept back his thick black hair. Then he gazed at her with eyes tinged with blood-red and revealed a friendly smile.

“Mel. Do you know how much I’ve been searching for you? Why did you leave without saying anything?”

Asking why he left without saying anything? Was this something she should say, when she had never shown a single moment of sincerity to him?

‘She intends to deceive me until the end.’

The duke’s friendly smile faded.

Though her squirming was endearingly cute, it was now time to corner his prey.

“Everyone leave.”

At the duke’s command, all the servants left the reception room.

A heavy silence descended on the reception room where only the two of them remained.

Overwhelmed by tension, Adeline emptied the teacup in front of her in one gulp.

The duke, who had been looking at the empty teacup, approached first, breaking the silence.

“Oh my. The cup is empty.”

He began pouring tea into Adeline’s empty cup. His gaze remained fixed on Del sitting across from him.

“Why don’t you tell me now?”

Even though the cup was filled to the brim with tea, the duke’s gaze never left her.

“Why you have my seal.”

Adeline couldn’t understand how the duke knew about the seal she had hidden.

‘Did they search through my belongings?’

Unable to hide her confusion, she could only grip her skirt tightly.

The tea, filled to the brim in the cup, eventually overflowed.

The hot tea mercilessly spilled over, flowing across the table and soaking Adeline’s skirt, but he showed no sign of stopping.

Despite the hot tea seeping through, Adeline remained frozen in place, unable to move.

Because the duke’s gaze, now infused with madness, had bound her, preventing her from moving an inch.