“By the way, Count Rigelhoff, this man is not usually cunning. To the extent that I wonder if he deliberately spread rumors that he might be on the side of Archduke Langston.”
“What do you mean?”
“After annoying Duke Ludwig by spreading such rumors, he asked for his innocence to be trusted and offered a marriage alliance. Isn’t it amazing that he took the place of the Duke’s in-law so easily?”
“What? Such a despicable thing!”
Damian chuckled and drank his tea again. However, Layla’s frown did not straighten.
“But what good news is that? It doesn’t change that Count Rigelhoff became the son-in-law of Duke Ludwig.”
“Aww, our naive Layla. Do you know that not anyone can become a Duke? Duke Ludwig isn’t that easy.”
“Don’t spin around, tell me quickly!”
Damian grinned and leaned toward Leyla.
“Of course, if Count Rigelhoff quietly saves himself for the sake of her daughter, whom she gave away as her hostage, she will probably not miss out on the position of the son-in-law of Duke Ludwig.”
“What? Are you kidding me now?”
“But Count Rigelhoff is greedy. He had been jealous of Duke Ludwig before. After all, that person will do something before the end of the year, and Edith Rigelhoff will be just blindfolded and thrown away.”
Not many people knew about it. Everyone in society knew that Count Rigelhoff loved his daughter dearly. But Damian knew one more thing besides the rumors about the relationship between Duke Ludwig and Count Rigelhoff. He still couldn’t forget the scene he accidentally witnessed while attending a party of a countess’s family.
“Stupid bitch! You can’t do it right!”
“Now, I was wrong, Father!”
Countess Rigelhoff, who usually listened to his daughter’s words, hit Edith fiercely on the head, and Edith, who usually had a proud nose in front of her father, shrugged his shoulders and begged for forgiveness. At first, he thought he might have misunderstood, but a conversation that couldn’t be mistaken continued.
“How many times have I told you that it is not Ray Barton but young Earl of Everton? Make sure to approach the young Earl of Everton! You have to get information about the cost of the Anchorage Bridge order. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Father. Sorry. I won’t make a mistake this time.”
After watching the two of them for a while, Damian was convinced.
‘Edith Rigelhoff’s proud villain image was completely made up!’
The voluptuous and beautiful Edith was so gorgeous that she caught the eye wherever she went, and there were many men who coveted her. And Edith enchanted those men and gave them information for her father.
“Nonsense! If Count Rigelhoff is talking about that girl, Edith, he’ll die!”
“Everyone thinks so. But this is solid information. Wherever you go, don’t tease me carelessly. Because this is extremely okay?”
“Huh. Okay!”
Damian smiled at the sight of his younger sister, who had not been able to overcome her temper until now, and nodded her head calmly. Then he added kindly.
“Be patient, Layla. Killian Ludwig and Edith Rigelhoff’s marriage is valid until this year. I’ll give you the seat next to Killian Ludwig, as we’ll get the iron ore distribution right from their family next year.”
Layla’s face brightened.
“Brother…!”
“So stop crying. No man likes a woman with wrinkles between her eyebrows.”
“Huh! Thanks brother!”
Layla smiled happily as she showed her charms to her brother, as if she hadn’t known when tossing the teacup and misbehaving her.
* * *
For a while, she lived peacefully, being guided around the mansion by Philip and figuring out little by little about the Duchess’s work to help in the future. It may have been more peaceful because she tried not to actually run into each other while observing the three main characters. She decided to take care of Killian’s words lightly. It’s a character that was set up like that in the first place, so what was she supposed to do?
“Ah, the weather… Woahh.”
Closing the book she was reading, she stretched out and yawned. Apart from her precarious situation, this moment was so peaceful. Since she grew up, there hadn’t been a day when she hadn’t worried about money. But now she didn’t have to worry about money, work, parents or older brother. She felt like she would live only after she died. Suddenly, she became curious about what happened after her death.
‘What would my older brother do after I fell down the stairs and died?’
At that time, her brother’s pupils were not normal. The eyes of a complete gambler. She couldn’t see anything like reality in her brother’s eyes. Always looking only at the golden castle in the faraway fantasy and following it. If he lost that much money, you might realize that it was a mirage that would never be caught, but at the gambling house, it seemed that someone would win money from time to time in order not to lose a hukou like an older brother.
‘Maybe he took my wallet first. It would be nice if he could have hidden my corpse in a suitable place, but there is a high probability that he would have left it as is…’
If the time here and there passed the same way, her brother would probably have been caught by now. There was no CCTV in the old multi-family house she lived in, but there was a luxury apartment complex across the street. There was no way that not a single image of her brother was captured on the dense CCTV from the entrance.
‘I’d rather be caught, punished severely, and come to my senses…’
She hoped so. Not out of vengeance, but because she wanted her brother to at least do his part as a human being.
‘Would Mom and Dad be sad?’
Her parents, who farm in the countryside, were responsible for dressing, feeding, and taking them to the hospital until their siblings graduated from high school, but basically, they weren’t very interested in their children’s affairs. She didn’t want to know how much her brother or she studied, what their friendships were like, what their dreams were, and what their worries were. And even though she knew that her brother was addicted to gambling and borrowed money from her, she was indifferent.
‘Maybe he thought it was just a nuisance. I’m still a human, so I pretended to cry, but…’
The’d rather not be sad. Because they love their children so much, it would be more of a headache if they lost the will to live because of her death.
‘Mom and Dad must have taken a deep breath for a few days. They must have cared more about my brother than the dead me.’
In addition to her family, she thought of people at work and her ex-boyfriend, but it didn’t leave much impression. Everyone would have been surprised by her death, but they would have quickly forgotten. She felt a bit lonely at the thought that no one would have cared about Choi Sona’s vacancy, but it was rather fortunate when she thought of the people who remained.
‘Yeah, that’s it.’
After thinking about it, she decided not to worry about the people in her previous life anymore. Then, as she let out a sigh, Anna told her that the Duchess was looking for her.
‘Let’s calm down. Now is the time to worry about dealing with the people in the current life, not the people in the previous life.’
Having become a bit sentimental from recalling the events of her previous life, she stood up with a firm heart. The Duchess delivered the welcome news in a generous voice to her, who had visited her with the face of a true daughter-in-law.
“Edith. As you asked the other day, I called the dressing room. They are supposed to come tomorrow morning, so if you have anything to order, think about it in advance.”
“Oh, already? Thank you for listening.”
“What gratitude? Thanks to that, it’s been a while since Nana and Rize have been able to match their dresses.”
As expected, Lize was not an opponent to be overlooked.
‘Oh, come to think of it, wasn’t this an episode from the original story?’
She called the dressing room to fix my dresses, but the original Edith called in to order an expensive dress. And then, Lize was called to that spot, and it seemed like Edith and Lize’s face-to-face competition took place…
‘Wow, that’s creepy. Regardless of my intentions, the episodes of the original work are steadily continuing, aren’t they?’
It really gave her goosebumps. She asked to call the dressing room without much thought, but that’s the flow of the original story…
‘How did this episode go?’
She tried to gather vague memories. Perhaps the two of them each ordered a dress design they wanted to wear, but Lize found a design that suited her perfectly and commissioned it, and Edith seemed to have ordered a frenzied dress with everything in it to beat Lize. There was no way that the dress that was ‘two much’ would have been okay, and after all the compliments on Lize’s dress continued, the pissed-off Edith got angry, saying that the level of the dressing room was poor. And it led to the ending where Killian, who heard the story, made fun of Edith.
‘Well, I’m not buying a new dress, so the result will be completely different.’
She thought lightly of it that way. After that, she spent time figuring out which dress to leave in the dressing room, and thinking about where and how to fix it.
And then, the long-awaited next day.
“Miss. Someone came from the dressing room. I will take you to the drawing room of the Duchess.”
“Ah, they’re finally here! Thanks, Anna.”
Excited, she followed Anna into the drawing room of the Duchess. Lize was already in the drawing room.
“Thank you for inviting me, Mother. Hello, Miss. Lize.”
“Oh, hello!”
Lize seemed to be glad that she greeted her first, so she jumped up from her seat and greeted her. It’s been a long time since she had seen her face, but when she saw it again, it’s dazzlingly beautiful.
‘You should get used to it soon… I feel like I’m going to go crazy every time I see it.’
She almost made a stupid face again, but managed to cover it up with an awkward smile.
How do you feel?
