Chapter 39
The carriage jolted harshly over a stone, but Elisa didn’t flinch.
She rested her head against the window like a puppet with a broken string, staring blankly at the world outside.
The scenery blurred as it rushed past, dissolving into a haze, as if she were wandering through a fog.
“Count Leslie was meticulous—he insisted that you must never be told this.”
Howard’s words repeated in her mind, hazy and disjointed, echoing through the fog of her thoughts.
“That’s why Ethan couldn’t say a word to you. Even as it ate away at him from the inside, even as it rotted him, he kept his lips sealed. All because of that damned condition.”
Each word hit her like a blow, leaving her mind a stark, empty white.
Though she understood his language, it felt foreign, as if she were hearing it in some strange tongue.
Once it all sank in, her chest tightened unbearably.
She tried to breathe, but her throat felt blocked, as if the air refused to pass through.
Her frozen lips couldn’t utter a single word.
Worse than the shock was the guilt—knowing now that she had spoken harshly to Ethan without realising the truth.
She saw his face, eyes wounded every time she lashed out, his lips twitching as if wanting to speak but never able to.
She remembered the helpless sighs, the resigned expressions when he could not tell her.
And Elisa squeezed her eyes shut, overwhelmed.
At the time, she hadn’t understood his actions.
She hadn’t even tried.
She had been too consumed with resentment and blame for his silent departure.
Now, knowing the reason, the shock and regret were unbearable.
She could scarcely imagine the depth of the pain Ethan must have endured all this time.
“Ugh…”
Elisa clutched her chest, letting out a breath almost like a moan.
Her body trembled, consumed by despair.
It was the same as four years ago—the same hollow, abandoned feeling she’d felt when Ethan left her.
But there was one difference: she couldn’t cry.
Perhaps her body knew she had no right to tears.
“Why couldn’t he have just spoken honestly…?”
The thought made Ethan seem both foolish and stubborn—but in a way, it also felt like him.
He was someone who carried responsibility seriously, who strove to keep every word he once spoke.
Her father had known this too, which was why he had imposed such a cruel condition.
Elisa was furious at her father—for luring Ethan to the battlefield with sweet words, for keeping this secret all this time.
But what she couldn’t forgive most of all was the truth: her father had never intended to keep his promise.
That was why he had rushed her into marrying Derek, desperate to prevent her from reconnecting with Ethan.
How could a person be so shameless?
Elisa ground her teeth in frustration.
She wanted, more than anything, to confront her father.
And yet, above all, what she wanted most was to see Ethan.
To hold him, exhausted from surviving a blood-soaked battlefield, and whisper how relieved she was that he had returned safely, how proud she was of him.
To tell him that her claim of moving on had been a lie, that she had still loved him and had only been afraid he might leave again.
“First… I need to apologise.”
She knew an apology wouldn’t heal the wounds she had inflicted, wouldn’t erase the suffering he endured—but she had to do it.
This was for herself as much as for him.
Even now, I’m selfish…
Elisa forced a bitter smile and gently stroked the head of the child sleeping on her lap, Noah, his hair as black as her father’s.
She longed to see Ethan, longed to speak to him, yet he was far away in the Moro Kingdom.
She felt both disappointment and relief.
Had she faced him now, with all this turmoil unresolved, she would likely have broken down, weeping foolishly instead of speaking.
She resolved that she would straighten everything out before Ethan returned—arrange her heart, settle her thoughts—so she could greet him unburdened.
That was the only way to atone for the pain she had caused him with her harsh words and actions.
Yes.
Before Ethan’s return, everything must be put in order.
By the time she had calmed her racing mind and steeled her heart, the carriage had arrived at Count Leslie’s estate.
Elisa lifted Noah from the carriage, marvelling at how peaceful his sleeping face looked—so calm that it almost contradicted the tears and cries he had shed earlier.
His breathing was even, and he showed no sign of pain.
“Please have the doctor check on Noah. He cried so hard, he almost had a fit.”
Handing Noah to the waiting nurse just in case, Elisa instructed with care.
The nurse nodded, cradling the child gently as she entered the mansion.
“Where’s Father?”
Following behind, Elisa asked a maid who had come to greet them.
“He’s in the study, speaking with Mr. Grenville,” the Countess Leslie replied, answering in place of the maid.
Could Mother know something too?
“I come straight to Father as soon as we return home… Is something wrong?”
“I heard something shocking.”
Her mother, speaking first, gave Elisa the opening, and she responded without hesitation.
“I heard an absolutely shocking story—about how Father treated Ethan terribly.”
“What on earth are you talking about? What did your father do to him?”
The Countess’s eyes widened in surprise; she clearly knew nothing.
No wonder—unlike her husband, she wasn’t cruel enough to pull off such acts and ignore them for four years.
Elisa shook her head, concluding that the Count must never have told her.
“I only heard it secondhand, so I’m not certain. I’ll confirm with Father whether what I heard is true,” Elisa said. “He’s in the study, right?”
“Yes… Though he said it’s an important matter and that no one is to enter the study…”
“It’s fine.”
Elisa climbed the stairs with determined steps, silently vowing to push past any secretary or guard, just as she had before.
Luckily, no one was blocking her this time.
Reaching the study, she took a deep, steadying breath.
Calm down, Elisa.
She reminded herself not to let her emotions take over.
If she stormed in blindly, her father would spin her words around against her.
She had to approach this carefully, step by step.
Without knocking, she opened the study door.
“…What?”
The Count’s face darkened at her audacious entrance.
Derek Grenville, seated across from him, looked equally startled.
Don’t get carried away.
Stay calm.
She had repeated this mantra hundreds of times—but the instant she saw her father’s face, all her composure evaporated.
The fury she had barely suppressed surged like molten lava, devouring even the carefully prepared words in her mind.
Her voice refused to follow.
“Elisa?”
Derek’s cautious voice broke through the tense silence.
Standing there, speechless, Elisa finally snapped out of it and strode over to her father.
“Opening the door without knocking? A soon-to-be bride behaving so disrespectfully… tsk, tsk.”
The Count, holding a teacup, spoke with a mix of irritation and exasperation.
The word marriage was like a blade to Elisa’s chest, severing the last tenuous thread of reason she had clung to.
“Father, why did you do such a thing?”
She clenched her fists so tightly that her knuckles turned white, her voice trembling with barely restrained anger.
At last, noticing the severity of his daughter’s state, Count Leslie set down his teacup and looked up at her.
Their gazes collided violently in the still, suffocating air.
In that frozen silence, the father and daughter stared each other down with razor-sharp intensity, each unwilling to yield.
Their eyes were like blades, pointed and perilous.
“First, calm down and sit, Elisa,” Derek interjected, easing the tension slightly. He gently took her arm and guided her toward the sofa.
“I know exactly what you did to Ethan,” Elisa spat, violently shaking off his touch.
