14. Want a Taste?

Adeline leaned against the quiet bedroom as her heated emotions gradually subsided.

After realizing she had been oversensitive, Adeline couldn’t take her eyes off the bedroom doorway.

She waited for him to return, but until the moment she fell asleep, Casis never came back to the bedroom.

Perhaps due to the exhausting day, Adeline dozed off while waiting for him.

Even after a day had passed, the pouring rain continued relentlessly.

When Adeline opened her eyes in the morning, her body felt heavy like a water-soaked cotton ball.

“Cough. Cough.”

With a sudden thirst, Adeline struggled to get up to find water.

As Adeline rose, something fell from her head. It was a wet towel.

Someone seemed to have nursed her all night, as spare towels and a basin were neatly placed on the bedside table.

Adeline reached for the fallen wet towel but stopped. She noticed the bandage neatly wrapped around her right hand.

She hadn’t even thought about rewrapping the ruined bandage from last night.

‘He must have come by while I was sleeping.’

It seemed he had nicely wrapped it while she was asleep.

A feeling of guilt spread through her for no reason.

Adeline tried to leave the bedroom to find the duke.

She certainly tried to get up, but Adeline lost her balance with a sudden dizziness.

Unintentionally, she ended up sitting back down on the bed.

“Am I sick?”

Adeline had engaged in a chase through the pouring rain last night.

The thin dress was insufficient to protect her from the cold rainwater.

There was also the fact that her body had relaxed after being tense while hiding from the knights.

Perhaps because of this, the previous night’s chase had left her with body aches as a gift.

The world seemed to be spinning, but Adeline gathered her senses again and carefully left the bedroom.

She couldn’t find any trace of Casis anywhere on the second floor.

Only the sound of pattering rain could be heard. The second-floor corridor with the bedroom and study was filled with silence.

Adeline gripped the railing and took the stairs to the first floor one step at a time.

As she got closer to the first floor, a savory smell from somewhere stimulated Adeline’s appetite. Adeline moved her steps following that smell.

At the end of the trail was the kitchen.

In one corner of the kitchen, half-cut vegetables were placed disorderly. And next to them, she could see the back of a man busily making something.

“Mel?”

Her voice barely came out.

The duke, who was stirring something in a pot, turned around at the raspy voice calling him.

“You’re awake?”

He spoke somewhat coldly as he strode over and placed his hand on Adeline’s forehead.

“You should be lying down. Why did you come out?”

Adeline closed her eyes at the cool sensation on her forehead.

“It’s cool.”

Like an oasis found in a desert, Adeline grabbed the duke’s hand.

It was an unconscious action, wanting to feel the coolness a little more.

“It’s not that my hand is cool; you’re hot right now.”

The duke frowned as if angry.

“I’m making soup, so wait in the room. I’ll bring it to you.”

“I want to stay here.”

Adeline didn’t want to go back to the desolate second floor alone.

“There’s nowhere to sit here.”

Though there was nowhere to sit, perhaps due to her illness, Adeline stubbornly replied.

“Still.”

At Adeline’s persistence, the duke sighed as if giving up on persuading her.

“Fine.”

Suddenly, he began looking around as if searching for something.

The duke looked at the table next to the window and cleared away all the ingredients piled on it.

After covering the clean table with a large tablecloth, he strode over to Adeline.

“Hold on.”

The duke lifted Adeline by the waist in one swift motion.

In an instant, Adeline found herself sitting on the table covered with the tablecloth.

“Sit here.”

Adeline couldn’t tell if her current feverish feeling was due to her fever or the duke.

The duke, who had lifted Adeline onto the table in one go, began to focus on cooking again as if nothing had happened.

A sweet scent was added to the savory smell.

He seemed to have finished the soup as he turned off the heat and scooped some soup into a small spoon.

“Want a taste?”

Adeline stared blankly at the suddenly offered spoon and nodded. Then she reached out with her left hand.

But he didn’t just let it pass. He raised the spoon high enough that Adeline’s hand couldn’t reach it.

“Say ah.”

The duke grabbed Adeline’s hand that was reaching for the spoon, lowered it, and wrapped it together with the table.

In an instant, her hand was trapped between the table and the duke’s hand.

While it was the duke himself who blocked her hand, he playfully asked.

“No hands?”

The duke came closer and closer, and eventually Adeline received the duke’s soup.

“Is it delicious?”

Surprised that it was more delicious than expected, Adeline answered sincerely.

“It’s really delicious.”

Seeing Casis smile genuinely at her compliment, Adeline was reminded of yesterday’s events.

Had she spoken too harshly? Adeline brought out the words she had been keeping in her heart.

“Um, Mel, yesterday…… I was too sensitive. I’m sorry.”

At Adeline’s single apology, the duke felt as if all the resentment he had been holding was resolved.

He smiled brightly.

Looking at the duke’s smiling face, Adeline couldn’t face him directly due to embarrassment.

Her cheeks, already red from the fever, spread to her entire face, turning even her ears red.

Finding this irresistibly cute, the duke leaned more and more toward Adeline.

It was too close.

As they leaned more and more toward each other, just as Adeline’s back touched the window.

Crack, something breaking was heard, and Adeline’s back leaned further backward.

“Del!”

The duke, who quickly grabbed Adeline’s waist, lifted her and safely put her down.

Whether due to the closer distance between them or the surprise of almost falling backward, Adeline’s heart pounded.

The duke, looking at the window, pointed.

“Oh my, the window is broken again.”

The hinge of the old window was causing trouble again. Every piece of wood forming the window frame was worn out.

The rain that had poured heavily seemed to have accelerated the corrosion of the window frame as rainwater flowed through the gaps.

The already weakened window frame couldn’t withstand the weight of the two people and detached from the hinge.

As a result, the window was left hanging crookedly.

“The study window too, we need to fix it.”

“Yes, we need to fix it.”

Adeline agreed with the statement that it needed to be fixed.

“Other places might be like this soon too. Let’s call a repairman.”

“That…… no.”

But she could only say no to the suggestion of calling a repairman.

“Del. Is there a reason why we can’t call a repairman?”

The duke felt something strange again.

The window broken by the lightning-struck tree was not something an ordinary person could fix.

Also, fleeing in the rain as if being chased by something.

Getting angry even at him who came out in the middle of the night to meet her.

And now again saying they couldn’t call a repairman to this house.

Adeline was clearly hiding something.

“Del. Are you being chased by something?”

At the duke’s direct question, Adeline inhaled sharply and stopped. Indeed, it was too much to just insist unreasonably.

‘Ah, I don’t know.’

Thinking she couldn’t hide it anymore, Adeline closed her eyes tightly and spoke.

“We are hiding, that’s right.”

At Adeline’s confession, the duke opened his eyes wide.

“Hiding?”

“Yes. We’re being chased.”

“By whom?”

Adeline opened her mouth after a long pause.

The duke had come here injured by someone, and Adeline had fled here to escape the crown prince.

It wasn’t entirely wrong to say they were being chased. She just stated a different reason for being chased.

“We ran away because our families opposed us.”

Adeline decided to add a bit more to her lie, having already deceived him about being lovers.

Thus, Del and Mel who had eloped despite family opposition were created.

“Our love didn’t cool despite family opposition. So we eloped……”

Unable to think of anything more to say, Adeline paused and then hastily concluded.

“Anyway. Because of that, people from our families are looking for us.”

“Being chased?”

Adeline’s words seemed somewhat clumsy, as if hastily put together.

But the memory-less duke couldn’t pinpoint exactly what was strange.

“Is your family so well-known that even repairmen would recognize you? We’ve been to town before……”

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

Not expecting him to dig into details, Adeline continued to evade.

“If we don’t want to be discovered, we need to live in hiding.”

At Adeline’s words, the duke pointed out a flaw.

“Then, why didn’t you tell me from the beginning?”

Adeline was flustered again but continued speaking, pretending to be calm.

“I didn’t want you to know about such sad things, especially since you lost your memory.”

“……I see.”

Though something unsettling remained in a corner of his heart, the duke decided to let it go for now.

The sick Adeline was more important right now.

“But, isn’t it fine as long as we don’t get caught?”

“What?”

“I understand that we’re being chased. But I need to take you to a physician.”

The duke placed his hand on Adeline’s forehead, which had become even hotter due to their argument.

“You’re a fireball. Let’s go see a physician first.”

“We’ll be discovered! Your hair color and red eyes aren’t that common! Ah……”

Adeline shouted with all her might but soon reduced her words as if dizzy.

“Choose one of two options.”

The duke raised his finger as if he had no intention of listening to Adeline’s stubbornness anymore.

“One. We disguise ourselves and go see a physician.”

“Two. Or you pass your cold to me.”

As he said the second option, Casis’s lips approached within less than a hand span from Adeline.

Adeline’s face flushed red, coloring not just her face but even the tips of her ears.

“Indeed. I should pass it on right now.”

Adeline couldn’t hide her embarrassment as Casis came even closer, though there was no more distance to close.

“F-first one!”

Adeline extended her hand and blocked Casis’s lips.

“Good thinking.”

Casis, whose mouth was blocked by Adeline’s hand, showed a grin.

With a smacking sound against Adeline’s palm, Casis’s lips were distinctly felt. The tingling that started from her palm traveled to her heart and tickled one side of her chest.