***
Ding.
I heard an untimely bell ringing in the restaurant.
The employees, who were cleaning up in the kitchen, tilted their heads, and one of them opened the door and headed to the place where the bell was heard.
Then at the restaurant where he arrived, he shook his shoulders in surprise.
“Hey, Miss Hilise?!”
It was Hilise who was sitting in front of the table and holding the bell with her chin propped.
She saw the employee and put the bell back down on the table.
“I missed dinner because I was going out for a while. I’m finished with the important things, so please make something that can be cooked easily.”
The news of her escape from the window had already been heard by the employees in the kitchen.
But he couldn’t believe she showed up at the restaurant again with such a casual look!
“Yes, yes…! I’ll be ready in a minute!”
However, it wasn’t the employee’s business to ask about it.
He quickly left the restaurant after responding to Hilise.
Then he hurried to deliver Hilise’s orders to the chef in the kitchen and called the servant outside to tell Ricardo the news.
It wasn’t long before the dish made for Hilise was on the table.
“I’ll put the main dish up in a minute.”
It was difficult to prepare a proper dish right now, so she put soup, bread, and salad on the table first to soothe her hunger.
Hilise was worried that the main dish would be too late, but Hilise didn’t care and started eating the soup first.
“Hilise!”
Just then, Ricardo arrived at the restaurant.
He stopped walking when he saw Hilise sitting calmly.
She glanced at Ricardo, who appeared in front of her, and without looking away, picked up the bread in front of her and dipped it in the soup.
“Where the hell have you been all this time?”
Ricardo got a little closer to Hilise.
There was a gap between when he confirmed that the window of Hilise’s room was open and when he heard that she was in the restaurant.
Ricardo chillingly asked Hilise where and what she had been doing.
“Do you know how surprised everyone was to hear that you disappeared? People are still searching outside for you.”
He didn’t mean to speak to Hilise with such a questionable tone from the start.
However, as he watched Hilise eat peacefully, the anger inside him started to rise.
It was made worse by Hilise’s response to Ricardo’s remarks, saying that he was irrelevant.
“You did something useless. Tell him to come back in.”
He grew desperate to know if there was anything else he could say.
Still, Ricardo tried to calm himself down and asked her again. “Where the hell did you go without saying anything? Did you break the wall by the window? Why did you go outside? If you had any business outside the mansion, at least you should’ve told me before you left, leaving as you please…”
Then suddenly, he caught sight of the blood on Hilise’s clothes.
Ricardo’s words, which continued like an interrogation, suddenly stopped.
Looking closely, Hilise’s face and hands were also covered with red marks.
Ricardo’s face became hard.
“What’s that on your body? It seems to be blood, except it isn’t yours….”
“Ricardo.”
Ricardo’s question was followed by a second thought.
Hilise softly sighed, pushing the bowl of freshly emptied soup and the basket of bread aside.
Ricardo flinched at the sound.
“Why do I have to report that to you?”
This time, Hilise added, holding a salad fork in her hand.
“I’m not even a dog with a leash.”
Her words made Ricardo’s body stiffen.
“You really, you can’t just talk like that? I’m just worried….”
However, while speaking in such a critical tone, Ricardo paused momentarily.
It was because he felt very strange that what he casually said was aimed at Hilise.
“Worried?”
It was then that the silky smile leaked out of Hilise’ lips.
“Worried, who are you worried about?”
She looked at Ricardo as if she had never heard such a funny thing before.
In front of that gaze, Ricardo was again engulfed by the same emotion that had captured him in Hilise’s room.
Ricardo’s expression shifted as soon as Hilise looked at him with glassy eyes and recited.
“Ricardo, how many times have I had to feel like a bug in front of father and you, don’t you know?”
In an instant, his body cooled down.
“You don’t even know how dirty Father and you normally look at me.”
This was the first time he had heard a story like this from Hilise.
Ricardo was embarrassed by this situation, and he felt like he had a stone lodged in his throat.
“Yes, I don’t want to talk about the nasty past, but let me tell you one thing now that it’s like this.”
Then, finally, from Hilise, the story of the not-so-long past
The moment the memory was forced out:
“Do you remember Gabrielle’s 16th birthday party? She had taken Mother’s precious earrings with her and brought them out with her.”
“Why are you bringing up a story from so long ago?”
Ricardo blocked Hilise from continuing with a cold face as if he were defending himself.
When she saw it, Hilise tilted her head at an angle.
Perhaps in the past, Ricardo’s reaction would have discouraged her and she would have closed her mouth.
No, she wouldn’t have talked about this in the first place because that would make him feel uncomfortable.
But now, Hilise didn’t dwell on Ricardo’s reaction at all and continued with the story she wanted to talk about.
“At that time, you were so frighteningly angry that Gabrielle became embarrassed and lied. She said I took those earrings out and gave them to her as a gift.”
It was probably the first time Gabrielle had faced Ricardo’s anger.
Diego and Ricardo usually listened to Gabrielle’s words, but they wouldn’t let her touch those. It was a remnant left by the mother of Hilise, who had passed away.
In particular, even their stepmother was not allowed to handle the jewelry left by Hilise’s mother.
So there was no need to explain how Ricardo was angry with Gabrielle, who has snuck it out and wore the earrings.
Ricardo, who was waiting at the door to escort Gabrielle, was the first to discover the earrings in question, and he believed that if Diego had discovered them first, there would have been a greater uproar.
“What did you do then?”
Ricardo’s color faded to black in the old memory that was recalled again.
“Then you immediately came to me and slapped me across the face without even knowing if Gabrielle was telling the truth.”
That was the reason why Ricardo was reluctant to remember the incident.
At that time, he was so angry to see Gabrielle wearing his mother’s belongings.
Therefore, he had no time to consider the circumstances before and after the eyes were turned to him.
The day remained Ricardo’s biggest blemish in his life.
It was the day when Ricardo’s mask as Gabrielle’s always sweet brother, was peeled off, and it was also the first and last time he gave Hilise an impulsive slap.
“……yes, I admit I made a mistake then.”
Ricardo had been regretting it all this time.
“But it’s already over. Do you have to bring this out again?”
But while past mistakes were being recited in Hilise’s mouth like this, he was seized with shame that offset all other emotions.
The silent voices heard Ricardo’s offensive words.
“Yeah, it’s over. The man who worked in the mansion proved that he saw Gabrielle sneaking belongings out of her room.”
The fork in Hilise’s hand flicked up and down meaninglessly and tapped the plate.
Then the small noise that occurred scratched Ricardo’s nerves.
“Gabrielle was scared as things got bigger and admitted that she did it. So later, when I heard the commotion, my father ended it.”
“That’s enough, Hilise.”
“Remember what my father said afterward.”
“I told you to stop.”
The cracked low voice cracked the air somewhat roughly, threateningly.
But Hilise’s words were not interrupted by anything.
“You’ve forgiven and praised Gabriel for being a straightforward and nice kid who can admit mistakes, haven’t you? On the contrary, the employee was fired.”