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Chapter 28
Stillness passed as their eyes met each other, and Rosalind quickly turned her head as if she was turning away.
Soon, she reached out her hand and brought the tea that the maid had brought to her lips. She wet her mouth with warm tea and slowly opened her lips. It was a calm and distant voice as if it were telling an old story.
“…Four years ago, I liked the Duke. Maybe, it was because I didn’t receive love, so even when I looked at you, I could tell that I missed you. It’s humorous, but at some point, I’ve been a little confused as to whether this kind of heart is love or ugliness. I wanted to be loved so much.”
A bitter smile lingered on her gentle lips.
“Though, not now. I forgot everything. I’m loved enough, and I’m in love.”
Her love was Leo.
Leo Alicia, her one and only precious son. If she hadn’t had children, her days without Kyle would have been much more difficult and harder. It was very difficult for her to become a mother, though it was also such a joy and precious thing.
A heavy and lovely job of becoming the only mother for a child and endlessly giving away the love she has.
However, he frowned slightly as if he understood it differently.
“If it’s love, you mean the guy whom you said you only spent one night and left?”
“…Yes.”
“That irresponsible…”
He bit his mouth, unable to speak. There was a slight twist in Kyle’s calm expression. It was a pretty familiar face.
Her husband was always a gentle man, although he was also difficult to deal with. Instead of getting angry, he would reveal a sarcastic and subtly twisted judgement. There were times when she thought it would be better for him to get angry and scream.
Rosalind, who had been grappling with such past moments, decided not to rectify his misunderstanding. Whether he misunderstood or not, he is no longer related to her.
“Is it really that man’s child?”
“Then, who do you think this child is? Did you think that for the rest of my life, I would only look at the Duke?”
“Well. What’s certain is that I can’t even imagine having anyone else by my side than you.”
It was an unexpected answer.
Because he always remembered Kyle with other women, especially Olivia.
The funny thing was that the unexpected answer didn’t feel strange.
It had been like that ever since. He was a man whom she couldn’t get her hands on. When she dressed up and expected him to praise her, he did not say that she was pretty, and when she asked for a divorce due to infertility, he refused to listen.
At the time, Kyle thought that his words were complex and incomprehensible because she had unrequited love, but he must have been a difficult man to understand.
“Come back to where you are supposed to be.”
“…Duke.”
Her voice was quite clear and calm.
“There is no such thing as a place where I should be. Where I want to be, I have decided.”
“Even though I know this may sound funny, I have regretted losing you over the past four years. I shouldn’t have been harsh, or I should have held you tight so you couldn’t leave the house. What if I had gone to the pier a little sooner, what should I have done to have you by my side? What the hell was wrong? I keep asking unanswered questions and asking again and again…”
The end of his words was blurry.
He looked like he was really getting sick of it.
“It was difficult every day because I couldn’t even sleep properly because of the memories that weighed on me. Somehow, I didn’t look for you so desperately because I was just a little regretful.”
He stared at Rosalind. She only had a calm face in his eyes.
“…I need you.”
Of his complex and many emotions that flooded in his mind as he recalled her, the most vivid one was ‘need.’
Just as a tree needs land to take root, and the fish desperately needs the sea to breathe, so he needed her…
“What I’ve come to realize over the past four years is that I don’t need anyone else in life. The most necessary and desperate thing to live life is to be unshaken and strong in yourself. Others only enrich your life, but they cannot be your whole life. Especially the relationship between men and women. We are already done.”
A calm yet resolute voice echoed through the air.
“As I said before, I liked the Duke. I learned to love through the Duke. I fell in so deeply that I was a little afraid of how far it would end. It felt like being swept away by a wave, being dragged by unfamiliar emotions. I thought that love is the feeling of being overwhelmed by everything. Though now it’s not a wave, it’s just a calm wave. No, there is no water left to dive. Over time, everything eventually becomes dull.”
Uttering so, Rosalind gently bowed her head towards him.
“Then, I’ll get going now.”
She moved on, leaving Kyle behind.
She could hear a voice calling her from behind, but she pretended not to hear and just moved forward.
‘I keep asking unanswered questions and asking again and again…’
There was a time when she, too, wandered around like that. How can she get him to look at her, what should she do? Unanswered questions tormented her endlessly.
“No way…”
His words sounded like love.
She thought that was what she called her own feelings back then. Nonetheless, Rosalind thought that his feelings for her would not be love. It must be a bit confusing and emotional that the woman by his side was gone.
Because…because it was natural. It was only natural that he didn’t love her.
It was natural, like opening one’s eyes, stretching, and washing their face.
To Rosalind, it was only natural that Kyle Spencer didn’t love her.
Rosalind opened the door to Leo’s room with quick steps. As soon as she opened the door, she ran to him and hugged the child in her arms.
The child, who had been playing with toys around, opened his eyes and quickly smiled.
She clasped him in her arms and took a closer look at his body as if checking the smiling child’s face. Her husband’s face, whom she had just met, flashed past the green eyes looking at her. Although the color of his eyes and the nose that draws a rigid line already resembles his father’s face…
Still, Leo was her child.
Leo smiled innocently in her arms and asked with a voice full of curiosity. It was an innocent voice.
“Mom, who is my father?”
Rosalind flinched at Leo’s voice, although she pretended to be as calm as possible, clearing her throat and asked, “Why?”
“That uncle said it before. What kind of person is my father?”
In her mind, Kyle’s face came to mind when the child asked who his father was. Anyway, she muttered a little, saying it was not because of anyone.
“Didn’t I decide to tell your father’s story when you’re a little bigger?”
“I don’t have a father…?”
Seeing Leo’s somewhat gloomy look, she couldn’t continue her words because her heart ached. Then, as if she had made up her mind to do something, Rosalind lowered her body to make eye level with the child.
As she drew closer to the little child’s face, Leo’s green eyes twinkled more vividly.
“Leo, as I said before, your father was a very kind person. Mother met him for the first time on a day when the moon shines as brightly as the sun.”
“Is the moon like the sun?”
“Of course. That light was just like a sun to mother.”
She loved him that night, and she loved his affection…
“Leo’s dad is a very good dancer, and he also taught me to dance well. That night he and mother danced together… and mother fell in love with him. I thought if it was this person, I would want to be with him for the rest of my life.”
Leo’s eyes widened as he heard his father’s story for the first time.
Meanwhile, Rosalind’s voice was as calm as she would tell an old story just before bed.
“Leo’s dad was like a tree with leaves on a summer day. A blue-green color like a light green leaf. When my heart was lonely and troubled, he was a shady resting place. Of course, it was very short.”
Although she was right to say this about him, she didn’t mean the man she had been married to. Kyle… the day she started her love was the sweet Kyle of the night he danced with her. So, the only man she wanted to tell her son was his father was Kyle that night.
In fact, who Leo’s father was didn’t matter to her now. Whether it was Kyle or not, whether it was a playboy or a very sweet and warm person, Leo’s only parents now were her.
“…A tree?”
Leo tilted his head as if it was difficult to understand.
“Yes. Like a big, sweet summer tree.”
She smiled and patted her son’s head. The soft hair of a child felt between her fingers was infinitely lovely like the sunlight on a summer day.
“What kind of clothes should you wear today?”
Rosalind hummed as she looked at the clothes hanging.
Leo was staring at the clothes hanging next to her with a rather serious face. His eyes were quite careful when he looked at the few clothes, and at the end, Leo said “that” and reached out his hand and picked one.
Seeing him struggle to pull his short arms, she smiled and took out the clothes Leo was pointing to and placed them on his little body.
“Let’s see, okay?”
As she squinted her eyes, Leo looked like a sparrow puffing up his chest, showing off. Every single thing he did was cute and funny, and she barely held back her laughter.
Her affectionate voice echoed through the room.
“Whose son are you? The coolest in the world.”
“Really?”
“Yes. With the baron coming today, shall we quickly transform you into a dignified and handsome look?”
“Yes!”
Leo answered, hurrahing as if he was used to it. She skillfully took off the clothes and began to put the clothes on again. Usually, these miscellaneous tasks were taken care of by the maids, though Rosalind liked to dress Leo herself.
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“Wow, you look good.”
When she praised him, Leo smiled as if he was in a good mood.
As she was about to put the least touches on, she heard the maid knocking on the door.
“The Baron has arrived.”
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