Chapter 125: Taste of Love |
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Hair, redder and beautiful than a rose, ran down between her elegant fingers in silk gloves.
“Ha…”
Monica realized she could muster this expression when confronting Alan, but resolved not to be caught off guard again.
It was her first time seeing Alan like this.
“……Alan.”
Alan appeared unusually disheveled, with a shirt haphazardly buttoned. His typically sharp gaze, akin to a well-honed knife, now seemed vacant, as if devoid of life.
Once meticulous in his appearance, Alan now appeared disheveled, a departure from his usual immaculate self. He resembled a wilting flower, his once vibrant demeanor fading away.
Only then did Alan look up at Monica, his pale blue eyes were dim.
“What is this, Alan…….”
Monica went to the office to meet Alan and was informed that he hadn’t been out for more than two weeks. At that shocking information, Alan’s warning to her not to come to him was completely forgotten by get. She had no choice but to turn the carriage straight down the road and run to the mansion.
She wondered what had happened but this was the case. He didn’t even look drunk.
“Did you take any drugs?”
“Pfft.”
Alan chuckled softly. He had always harboured disdain and a sense of inadequacy towards Prince Bentley, who frequently indulged in drugs and alcohol. Therefore, it seemed out of character for Alan to suddenly engage with drugs.
It didn’t even seem like there was a problem with his business. A gentleman named Anderson, who was filling Alan’s vacancy, kindly explained that the Leopold’s unit in Lunos has been operating stably after undergoing a major division of duties
Then what the hell does this mean? Monica was heartbroken seeing his pathetic face. As if he has lost his love.
The fact that she was not the reason made her heart ache again.
“You’re still drunk.”
Then Alan said,
“With something so fragrant that it can’t even be compared to that.”
“…… what?”
It was then that Monica’s beautiful face was strangely distorted.
No way.
Alan’s warning not to come to the mansion, aside from her reluctance to admit it, it was clear that it was because of Melissa Collins, who lives in the outhouse. Of course, Monica still didn’t know what was so special about her.
However, today Willam had delivered Alan’s words that she can come in instead of making a troubled face as usual. She wondered if his heart had softened a little when she appeared after a long time, but looking at his condition, it didn’t seem like that.
This might be….
Monica licked her trembling lips.
“…did she leave? Without you?”
“…….”
This silence seemed to carry a positive connotation.Monica, who had been biting her lips with unknown anger, asked again,
“Do she leave alone?”
“What should I do, then? She said she wanted to go.”
“……do you know what you’re like now?”
She thought it was good news that the woman who was a thorn in the eye disappeared. However, the poor face of him who realized love, the painful breath he exhaled, cut Monica’s heart.
Rather than jealousy for that woman, the grief of Alan’s crumbling appearance was incomparably greater.
“She went back to Sourne, if I’ll go and….”
Monica became greatly excited and raised her voice, as if she were about to catch her and offer her before him. It was such a ludicrous situation that even she couldn’t believe it.
“Monica.”
It was Alan’s cold, low voice that extinguished the fire in her mind.
“Didn’t I tell you? Fix that habit.”
“If I bring her back, it would be good for you too……! I’ll bring her in and she’ll face the consequences, Alan. How dare she leave you alone…….”
Wouldn’t that help Alan a little bit to regain his original form? All will be well if he returns back to being the noble and high Alan Leopold.
First, bring her back and make her apologize for her disgusting behavior, and then kick her out of the way. Then everything will be in place again.
However, Alan’s answer easily trampled the plan.
“I sent her.”
“What?”
“You can’t even lay a finger on her because I’ve planted a person. Don’t think nonsense.”
“Ha…”
Even in the midst of all this, he’s still trying to protect that woman until the end. Monica’s lips twitched.
“What if she doesn’t come back? Are you going to stay messed up like this?”
She pleaded with her blue eyes eagerly shining.
“For you, it’s all about business, Alan. But this isn’t like you right now—”
“Monica.”
Then his muffled low voice cut off her words, his mournful beautiful face moved sideways slowly.
“Not, now.”
“Why the hell? What is she…….”
Monica, who sat in front of him as if collapsing, raised her trembling fists onto the table.
“Why would you let that woman shake up your life and ideals?”
“She’s more than what I’d been searching for.”
“No, I don’t think so.….”
It was almost painful now. Her thin shoulders trembled. Even though his voice was familiar enough to be heard in her dreams, the confession made by his lips was tearfully unfamiliar.
And at that very moment, Alan’s luscious lips said the words she hated to hear the most.
“Leave.”
“Alan!”
Monica screamed at him. Her blue eyes were wet with fear.
“Listen, Monica. I’ll sort everything out with Leopold. I’m going to slowly pull out of the business.”
“What’s wrong with you, really…….”
“Because it’s not at all close to my ideal.”
Alan’s face was only calm.
“Of course, it’s the same for you. Now that we’re seeing each other again,”
“Alan, Dad…… You said you’d punish Ian Leopold in the most brutal way. So you have to hold the whole family and make him kneel down…….”
“No. It’s all pointless now.”
Alan froze her with a voice as fleeting as the wind brushing against branches.
“The woman who came from another world to meet me had taught me that I was blind.”
“What the hell is that…. Are you serious?”
“I have no religion or big dreams. I was just born as a person to dedicate my life to one person.”
He smiled with glassy eyes as if he were about to shed tears. Like a crashing wave.
“If a life is given to be consumed in the end, there is no way to spend this body and soul more valuable than that……….”
“…….”
“No, I’m sure.”
Monica felt her breath catch in her throat. She knew all too well the meaning behind his words, as painfully clear as it was. She had harbored emotions of such purity and fervent love herself, ones that she had nurtured over time. It wasn’t even a sentiment that could be embraced in a short span.
When did I ever assert that it wasn’t love? At what point?
Monica’s heart was tumultuous, a blend of deep affection and resentment, yet amidst the chaos, one fact stood out like a beacon cutting through the darkness— he was suffering from an absolute, undeniable love right now.
A love so immense that it was impossible to defy or resist……
“……what if she doesn’t come back?”
“I have to live with the feeling of atonement.”
“Alan, what do you mean by atonement?”
Monica trembled at his strange words.
“If she doesn’t come back, it’s all my fault. So you do the same.”
“……what do you mean?”
“It means to repent and live. For wiping a person out of the world.”
“…….”
Suddenly, Monica’s vision blurred. Was her attempt to completely deceive Alan Leopold from the beginning an act of arrogance…….
Her trembling hand brushed through her sunset-coloured hair with an anxious expression. Monica’s crimson lips quivered.
“Do you think I wouldn’t have suffered? It wasn’t my choice to fall in love with you.”
“…….”
“I can’t hope you feel the same way as me, so I just…… Have you ever tried to understand how I’m barely being satisfied just to be by your side?”
Of course Alan never did. However, Monica’s words aroused a strange sympathy in his heart. The subject was different, but he also learned the harshness of love.
Unaware of his feelings, Monica was pouring out her innermost thoughts that she thought she would never tell Alan in her life, like a broken dam.
“Have you ever imagined how it feels to be loved by everyone in the world, yet the one person you love doesn’t love you back? Because of you, I…”
Monica wanted to stop talking, but the suppressed emotions surged forth uncontrollably, like an arrow released from a drawn bow, directing itself towards her only love.
“Because of you, my heart has become completely rotten! I wish you could see that I’ve had unwanted lovers, and I made one of them nonexistent, all because of you…”
“Monica.”
“For the rest of my life, just to receive that glimmer of gaze…..….”
“Whatever excuse you make, it’s up to you.”
Alan said with an unwavering demeanour. His cool, steel-grey gaze felt excessively indifferent. It seemed to convey a sense of pity towards the woman, who lowered her head in the misery of laying bare her soul.
“At least I want you to stop ruining yourself for me.”
“How come……? Because it’s so ugly?”
“Because I have committed an indelible mistake to a person who is more noble than anything in the world. There is no room for my atonement.”
Unbelievably, Alan’s voice sounded as noble as a devout old man’s prayer. But he’s an atheist, so his prayers must be for…….
“Please…”
Monica has lost all her will to confront him. All that was left was a plea.
“Please don’t tell me to leave. Do you think I can live without you?”
“You’re asking me that?” (Alan)
“You wouldn’t be unaffected if I suddenly disappeared, either.” (Monica)
“You might even manage to ask about my well-being from time to time.” (Monica)
Alan murmured softly,
“If I were to stop seeing Ian Leopold through you.”
“What do you mean, I…… I’m his daughter. How…….”
Monica, with a red face, clenched the hem of her dazzling silk dress.
“I don’t think you really killed him. So meet him and apologize, Monica.”
“If you’re talking about Abel Maurice, I don’t know anything……!”
As Alan reached out to the golden bell on the table, Monica added urgently.
“Now that he’s completely gone, there’s no way to know where he’s gone! If he’s really dead, then there’s no apology—”
“Look for him. You have to show that much sincerity.”
The icy man laughed silently.
“And maybe in the process, you too…….”
You too might be saved like me.
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