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Chapter 14
Chloe stood in an awkward half-posture—neither properly sitting nor fully standing. She carefully moved her hands, trying not to damage the fabric, but the tightly stretched stockings wouldn’t come loose.
“Why is this happening?”
“My stocking is stuck on the chair.”
Kaidan abruptly stood up and walked over to Chloe. Even then, she was still struggling with the chair.
“Should I just tear it off?”
“No.”
The snagged part of the stocking was around her calf. Because her skirt wasn’t long, the tear would be clearly visible.
“What’s so bad about a torn stocking?”
“It’s not proper.”
Kaidan shook his head lightly and knelt down in front of Chloe.
“Excuse me for a moment.”
With his much larger hands, he grasped the stocking. Through the thin fabric, their skin touched.
The contact made her strangely hot. Kaidan, kneeling in front of her and carefully touching her leg—his hands kept drawing her attention.
“U-um, it’s fine now.”
Embarrassed, Chloe tried to push him away. But Kaidan firmly held her leg, and she lost her balance, collapsing back into the chair.
And that was when the uninvited guest arrived.
“Kaidan!”
A loud voice rang out as the door burst open. The woman who entered was Rosetta.
“I’ve thought about it, and I just can’t understand—”
Her confident voice faded as she trailed off. She had frozen at the sight in front of her.
“W-what are you two doing right now…?”
For a brief moment, she was only shocked. Then her face slowly turned as red as her hair.
Chloe was slumped in the chair, while Kaidan was kneeling in front of her, holding her leg. The scene was enough to spark inappropriate misunderstandings.
“W-wait, it’s not what it looks like!”
Only then did Chloe realize the situation and quickly pulled her leg away from Kaidan’s grip.
At that exact moment, the already-frayed stocking tore completely. It had happened because of her sudden movement.
“……”
A large hole gaped where the stocking had torn. Her attempt to fix the situation only made it look more indecent.
“How can you behave so shamelessly in a public place…!”
“It’s not like that. Kaidan, explain yourself.”
“There’s nothing to explain. As you can see, I was just fixing a stocking.”
Kaidan’s words did not help at all. In the end, Rosetta covered her mouth and rushed out of the room.
“Wait, Miss Crimson!”
Chloe called after her desperately, but Rosetta was already gone.
“I’m doomed. Completely doomed…”
A marriage rumor with Kaidan was bad enough, but now there would likely be talk of scandalous behavior in public.
“We’re not doomed yet. If you accept my proposal.”
“Do you even understand what kind of misunderstanding we just caused?”
“What’s there to be embarrassed about?”
Kaidan shrugged, genuinely puzzled.
“Our first meeting was at a hotel. A man and a woman alone in a hotel—there’s only one reason for that.”
“……”
Annoying, but true. The Cent Hotel was known for being a place where young noble couples often met. On that day, she and Kaidan had even acted like a pair of ridiculous troublemakers.
Still, Chloe, at twenty-seven, was not an age where she should feel ashamed of being alone with a man in a hotel. Her previous marriage had already made her indifferent to such things. That didn’t mean she welcomed scandalous rumors, however.
“I dug my own grave.”
“Correct. We’ve crossed a point of no return.”
Kaidan smiled faintly, his lips curling upward.
“Thanks to you.”
“Ha…”
At this point, she couldn’t even blame Kaidan. She had poured oil onto the fire he started.
“Now I’m also in a difficult position unless I marry you.”
“……”
“So you should take responsibility for me, don’t you think?”
She wanted to argue, but everything he said was true. If it had been someone else, they might have run away, but Chloe was not that kind of person.
The thing she hated most in the world was irresponsibility.
[Chloe, I will love you for the rest of my life.]
Some might call her foolish, but Chloe didn’t want to become someone like Duer.
“Alright.”
She made her decision and spoke with determination.
“I’ll do it. The marriage.”
“Such a responsible attitude. Very admirable.”
“Don’t mock me.”
“I’m sincere. How disappointing.”
Kaidan smiled, his eyes narrowing slightly. His normally sharp gaze softened.
‘Our future child would probably be very beautiful.’
If they inherited Kaidan’s genes, the child—boy or girl—would undoubtedly be strikingly handsome or beautiful.
“Oh, right.”
Chloe clapped her hands as if remembering something.
“What is it?”
“There’s something very important we need to discuss before marriage.”
Kaidan returned to his seat and looked at her expectantly.
“Children.”
But his expression cracked the moment she spoke.
“…Pardon?”
Kaidan asked blankly.
“I’m talking about children. Offspring. Are we not going to have them?”
Drip.
Yellow tea spilled down Kaidan’s chin. Chloe silently handed him a napkin as before.
Wiping his mouth, he spoke.
“You are… quite an extreme person.”
They had barely cleared the stage of rejection, and now she had immediately jumped to children. Kaidan could not possibly have anticipated such a leap.
“Think about it. If we’re discussing marriage, how can we not discuss children?”
“That’s true, but still…”
Chloe watched him curiously as he unusually hesitated. His ears were slightly red.
“Are you embarrassed? Me bringing this up? You didn’t think about this before proposing?”
“It’s not that… but jumping straight to children without any transition is embarrassing.”
Chloe folded her arms, observing him as he pressed his ears.
At first, she thought he was just a shameless man, but maybe not.
“Go through marriage once. You’ll be like this too.”
Of course, that required going through a fair amount of hardship.
“Your goal is to become head of the ducal house, right? Then you need an heir. But I… don’t intend to do anything like that with you.”
“Ahem, I’ll respect Chloe’s wishes. I never intended to force such responsibility onto you.”
“Really?”
“What I want is to become duke myself, not to rely on my children inheriting it. As for heirs, we can adopt someone from a collateral branch after I inherit the title.”
His tone was calm, but strangely cold. There was no warmth regarding family.
‘Well, when siblings are fighting over succession like it’s a bloodbath, I suppose there’s no room for familial affection.’
Even she and Melvin were practically on the verge of splitting apart.
“Anything else you want from me?”
“Let’s see… there are too many things to list.”
Marriage was not a game. It bound people—and families—through documents. And when such a serious matter was being arranged privately, there were countless things to consider.
“I think it would be best to draw up a contract.”
Chloe took out paper and a pen from her tote bag. Despite coming from a small bag, the paper was perfectly crisp.
“I can understand the pen, but I didn’t expect you to carry paper too.”
“My job requires me to write things down often.”
On the blank sheet, she wrote neatly and upright.
<Premarital Contract.>
It was only five words, but they were enough to reveal her personality.
The handwriting was extremely precise and orderly, much like its writer. Seeing the firm dot at the end of each word, Kaidan let out a soft laugh.
“Why are you laughing?”
“The handwriting is similar to my father’s.”
Chloe’s brow furrowed.
“…That’s a compliment, right?”
Meaning it looked old-fashioned? But a duke’s handwriting should be impeccable.
“Something like that.”
A thoroughly unsatisfying answer—but Chloe didn’t argue. There were more important matters at hand now.
