BOAD 06

6. Please Allow Me by Your Side

My mind stopped for a moment.

Yearning?

Him, no one else, yearning for me?

I stared at him silently, forgetting even to breathe.

The back of my hand, touched by his fingertips that had suddenly reached out, felt uncomfortably warm.

I neither looked away nor bowed my head, just kept gazing at him for a long while.

Only when he gently took my hand did I finally draw in a breath.

“What is it, Your Highness? What are you saying…?”

“I mean exactly what I said, Bee. No, Amelia. I want to get along well with you.”

Leophric folded his eyes into a smile as he looked at me.

His hand softly brushed my hair aside.

Was it just my imagination, or was there a strange tenderness in the way he looked at me?

“So, I will try my best to be the man you want.”

A strange bittersweetness seeped into his voice.

His intense crimson gaze, which had held me still, tightened even more.

Why on earth was he looking at me like that?

“If you like to see me smile, I will smile. If you want kindness, I will be kind. If you ask for my time, I will gladly give it to you.”

The yearning in his eyes grew deeper.

There was absolutely no reason for this feeling to deepen—no reason at all for it to even exist—but these emotions gradually tightened their grip on me.

Invisible hands seemed to hold me from all sides, trying to tether me completely to his side.

Without realizing it, I swallowed dryly, rooted to that gaze.

“So, Amelia.”

His voice, sweet and close to my ear, gradually lowered.

It slipped secretly into my ear, begging me not to turn away.

Even without that, he had already captured all of my attention.

“Please, allow me to be by your side.”

He softly folded his eyes again and lifted a handful of my hair.

Then, as if to show off, he brought it to his lips and kissed it slowly without breaking eye contact.

His gaze was dizzyingly intense, making my whole body flush red.

The heavy look he cast made my face burn, and I clenched the fabric of my gown tightly in my fingers.

“No matter what happens, I will never leave you.”

A smile lingered at the corner of his eyes, dazzlingly bright.

That smile, beckoning like a temptation, made me squeeze my eyes shut.

Leophric Baldini Reinhardt was unbelievably handsome beyond words.

A sharp jawline and nose as if sculpted by the gods.

Long lashes that stirred jealousy among many women, eyes filled with a melancholic depth.

Though his personality was neat and proper, he carried a subtly decadent aura that spurred many wicked imaginations among women.

Especially his sturdy physique, honed by years of sword training and physical exercise, was strangely suggestive even beneath clothes.

Rumor had it there was even a secret group of people loyal to the Crown Prince.

But that was just talk among women who swooned over appearances. I never thought it would ever be my story.

Because I believed only fools who don’t know a person’s true nature and don’t understand what real love is would fall for appearances.

I knew Leophric well enough and had seen my so-called love turn out to be an illusion.

Who could have imagined that I would fall for that handsome face?

“So, is it all done now?”

He smiled with his eyes folded and looked at me as I examined the contract.

His eagerness seemed somewhat suspicious, so I suggested putting the contract in writing.

He said he would be the man I wanted without question and agreed to whichever option I preferred.

At first, he opposed the idea of a contract, saying it was meaningless, but when I said I really wanted it, he finally nodded.

“It looks done. You just need to sign here.”

I handed the contract over. Leophric quietly picked up the pen.

Then, he added a clause at the very end: “This contract may be extended or modified with mutual consent.”

Before I could object, he signed at the bottom.

My signature had already been there, so with his signature, the contract was complete.

Maybe because I wrote the contract so thoroughly…

The clause added at the last minute made it so perfect that it could be notarized by a lawyer without a fuss.

“…You have a talent for captivating people, Your Highness.”

“Then, have you also been captivated by me?”

“I’m not joking. You added a clause I never agreed to.”

“You did the same, didn’t you? Didn’t you think about a contract without discussing it with me?”

I sighed quietly, and Leophric shrugged as if saying “we’re even.”

Wondering if he was angry, I looked at his face, but instead, he met my eyes and gave a charming smile.

“Now that the contract is done, can we talk about something else?”

He reached out and grabbed a wine bottle.

He said he wanted to talk but meant to drink.

I quietly watched and took the glass he handed me.

The wine gently rippled as I swirled the glass.

Will things really be okay from now on?

Watching the wine swirl, such thoughts came to me.

The clause he added about “modifying the contents or extending the term by mutual consent” still bothered me.

In my past life, he never cared no matter what I did, so it was strange that he suddenly wanted to do something.

I thought knowing the future meant only bright days ahead.

But now, it seemed like this was a life with a different meaning.

As I silently swirled the wine glass, he stared at me intently.

“Do you regret it?”

His voice was a little lower than usual.

Maybe not lower, but it felt heavy.

I slowly tilted the glass to my lips and then looked down at the half-empty glass again.

“Do you think I regret it?”

“Because you look like you do.”

“…It’s too late to regret, Your Highness.”

You and me.

Swallowing the words I could not say aloud, I emptied the glass.

“If I had regretted, I wouldn’t have appeared at the wedding.”

It was too late to run away now; I had come back.

Part of me felt sorry for Leophric, who had his life pledged to a woman like me, but I also knew there was no other way.

I finished the remaining wine and set down the glass.

“And regret is something we carry for life.”

Because in life, we can’t avoid making foolish choices.

As soon as I said that, my glass was refilled.

Leophric filled my glass to the brim, then his own.

“But aren’t there things in life you absolutely don’t want to regret?”

“Well, people don’t always make the right choices.”

“At least we’ll regret less than if we chose nothing at all.”

He drained his glass again.

Turning toward me while I was still drinking, he said,

“So I don’t regret this marriage, Amelia.”

His words were heavy with sincerity.

In his gaze that once again met mine, I felt the yearning slowly fill up.

Even without looking, I felt its vividness, and I felt a dry thirst again.

“Since we’re doing this, I want to do it well.”

“Isn’t marriage supposed to be with someone you really want to get along with?”

“Not all beginnings are the same. I chose this, and I intend to do my best to never regret it.”

A faint smile flickered in Leophric’s eyes.

He quietly watched me, still stubbornly fixed on my wine glass.

Then he reached out.

Gently, he took the nearly empty glass from my hand.

“So please, help me a little, Amelia.”

His soft whisper, though gentle, carried a deep emotion that made me turn to look at him.

He smiled softly and slowly bowed his head toward me.

In his eyes, he held my confused expression.

At that moment, the crimson gaze that seemed to bind me again, burning beyond distant, felt overwhelming.

His large hand cupped my cheek, and before I could be startled, his lips touched my forehead softly and moved away.

When our eyes met again, Leophric grinned broadly.

“It’s our first night, so this much is okay, right?”

And that was the last thing I remembered that night.

When I opened my eyes again, faint sunlight filtered through the curtains.

I blinked slowly, waking from a still hazy mind.

I thought I had been talking with Leophric, but when did I lie down?

And why was it already this late…?

I lay there blankly, trying to recall what happened last night.

He kept acting differently from how I remembered, and it felt unfamiliar and awkward; I couldn’t even meet his eyes properly.

I think I was rejecting him in my own way while listening to his incomprehensible words.

His behavior, like he was trying to seduce me, didn’t help either.

In my previous life, he had been so strict about boundaries—what wind had suddenly blown him this way?

I slowly turned my body as my vision cleared.

When I lifted the rustling blanket, something dropped with a soft thud.

‘…An arm?’

A heavy arm fell onto my leg as if it had been hugging me.

Trying to understand the situation, I slowly turned my head.

At the end of my gaze was…

“Hah.”

Leophric lay asleep, a red scratch on his arm.

What had happened before he fell asleep?

I looked at him with a slightly irritated eye and cautiously lifted the blanket.

“When on earth did this happen…?”

Sure enough, the bed sheets were stained red.

I wondered if something had happened while I was asleep, but my body felt fine.

No back pain, no screaming muscles, not even any pain below.

Leophric wouldn’t have done anything to me while I was asleep.

He probably fell asleep after I passed out, and in the meantime, he had cut his arm to prevent rumors.

He sure is meticulous in odd ways.

I smiled softly and gazed at him again.

His closed eyes and the golden hair cattered like a painting on the bed looked like a masterpiece.

I didn’t realize his face was this handsome in my past life.

Thinking of last night that made me realize his good looks anew, I shook my head.

It was better not to know.

Why had he changed so much?

After a long breath, I quietly got up.

No matter how much he had changed, what I had to do next wouldn’t change much.