The Whipping Maid of House Calley - Chapter 139

“I’m fine, so go on ahead. Your husband must be waiting.”

“Come on, how could I do that?”

Even as she refused with her words, Molly’s hips shifted restlessly.

Molly’s husband, who worked as a supplier, started early in the morning but got off work early instead.

Recently, for the first time since working at this estate, Molly had been leaving work earlier, enjoying a newlywed life where she had dinner with her husband every day.

Knock, knock.

“Oh! He’s here.”

Molly spoke softly to Sheila with a bright expression.

The door opened, and he appeared.

After greeting Cedric, Molly left, and Sheila, who had already finished preparing for the walk and was waiting, stepped out of the room first with a sulky attitude.

Cedric grinned and followed behind her.

“Judith hit a new maid today. It had been quiet for a while, but it started again. So I went to see Judith and talk to her. I took two experienced maids away from her, so I felt some responsibility.”

Cedric explained why he was late.

‘What is this? Is he telling me I should feel responsible too?’

Sheila’s thoughts, which had only recently begun to consider that Molly was helping her, twisted again.

“Allen will be entering the monastery soon, so he should be preparing, but he keeps going out and playing. At this rate, I don’t know if he’ll be able to endure life there.”

This time, Cedric spoke about his concerns regarding Allen.

All Sheila could think was, ‘So what?’

“Come to think of it, everyone bearing the Calley name is a mess, don’t you think?” Cedric asked.

Sheila didn’t respond. Even arguing with him drained her energy, so she kept her mouth shut and just went along with the walk.

“At times like this, isn’t it customary to say no out of courtesy?”

Was I supposed to say no…?

Sheila was flustered by his complaining tone. Then again, it was said that one shouldn’t speak carelessly about someone else’s family, so by staying silent, she had ended up agreeing with his criticism.

“Ah… no….”

For the first time in a while, Sheila parted her lips, fumbling over her words.

Cedric looked at her flustered face and smiled softly.

“I’m joking.”

After saying it lightly, he turned his gaze forward again. Sheila’s face flushed red.

“Did you know? When my grandfather was still alive, things weren’t this much of a mess.”

He continued speaking.

Ever since they started walking together, he would talk like this to himself, whether she answered or not.

Most of it was trivial things like what happened that day or stories about his family. Things Sheila didn’t need to respond to.

“In any case, when my grandfather was alive, it was like that. I was quite a cherished eldest grandson.”

Cherished?

At a word that didn’t suit him at all, Sheila’s eyes filled with disbelief this time.

Noticing her expression as he glanced back slightly, Cedric added, “I didn’t say I was cute. I said I was cherished. Those are completely different things.”

Maybe it was because of the sunset, but to Sheila, his smooth cheek, like a statue, looked slightly flushed.

For a moment, Sheila found him unexpectedly a little cute.

‘He looks like that, and he’s even cute? Isn’t that unfair?’

Cute… The more she thought about it, the more absurd it felt.

‘Still so annoying.’

He’d brought up family on purpose, then even mentioned his late grandfather so she couldn’t bring herself to criticize him. He was definitely plotting something again.

‘Maybe that face of his is the trick….’

For the first time in a while, she recalled the conversations of the older maids she used to share a room with.

“Men are best when they’re handsome, anyway.”

“Best? What’s that supposed to mean, are you going to eat his face to live?”

“I’m serious. Just looking at his handsome face can calm a thousand years of anger, you know?”

Maybe that was true….

It didn’t mean she forgave what he’d done to bring her to her knees, but before Fred sold her to him, she hadn’t hated the man who dragged her into the punishment room that much.

“As I said, my grandfather doted on me quite a lot. Even when he went to have shoes made, he’d always take me along and have them made in the same design. And he tried to teach me many things. He probably didn’t put that much effort into his own son.”

Before she knew it, Sheila found herself listening to his voice again.

Despite the difference in their status as a noble and a maid, stories about family were something Sheila could easily relate to.

“Thanks to that, I grew up learning my grandfather’s values, like an old man in a young body.”

At the phrase “old man in a young body,” Sheila showed even stronger agreement.

At her reaction, Cedric let out a hollow laugh as if he couldn’t believe it and continued, “As you might have felt, the only one who poured affection into me was my grandfather. My mother believed that since she had given birth to three sons in a row, she had done all she needed to do, and my father was jealous of me for monopolizing my grandfather’s affection.”

Cedric paused for a moment. The memory of being locked in a dark attic at night, threatened and abused, flickered through his mind.

He skipped over that part and moved on.

He had no intention of trying to gain her sympathy with stories of being abused as a child.

“I didn’t have any major complaints. My grandfather’s expectations, my father’s jealousy and envy, and the way my mother and younger brothers looked at me were all things that felt natural to me from the moment I was born.”

The voice of the man born as the eldest son of a count’s family, a position anyone would envy, broke softly by Sheila’s ear.

What would it feel like to be born with a predetermined ‘use’ from the start?

Sheila hadn’t been born that way, but after her father died, she had been placed in a situation where she would be sold if she didn’t prove her worth.

When Cedric stopped in his tracks, Sheila also came to a natural halt.

The distance between them had grown much closer than on the first day.

Because to hear his low voice as he spoke, she had to stay close to him.

Cedric looked at Sheila.

When he did, Sheila turned her head away. He lifted her chin and made her meet his eyes.

“By the way, have you thought about what I said last time?”

Sheila’s eyes wavered.

“Instead of just lying there, think about what cards you hold. What I and your brother have done to you. And what you can do.”

Sheila opened her mouth hesitantly.

“…Are you telling me to report you, Young Count?” Sheila asked.

If she reported this, she could have Fred, who sold her, punished along with him.

It meant she could punish him legally, not through something illegal like a contract killing.

A different light returned to Sheila’s blue eyes for the first time in a while.

“Do I even have the right to tell you what to do or not to do?”

His gray-blue eyes fixed directly on Sheila as he asked in return.

“The only thing I can tell you is to think about how you can live well. Whatever decision you make, I’ll respect and support it.”

After releasing Sheila’s chin, Cedric straightened the collar of her clothes.

“Let’s keep walking.”

He took the lead again.

Sheila matched his pace and started walking again.

***

“Sheila, that maid has a good-for-nothing brother?”

After hearing the report from a suspicious informant, Alfonso laced his fingers together and fell into thought.

‘So it’s certain he declared he wouldn’t marry because of Sheila.’

Alfonso had been more dissatisfied than ever lately.

It wasn’t enough that he had thrown away Eloise, the perfect bride, he even declared he wouldn’t marry at all, and all because of a mere maid.

The Cedric who returned from studying abroad was completely different from the Cedric he knew.

Before, he always made cold, rational decisions. That was why Alfonso, despite feeling a sense of rivalry, could never recklessly aim for the position of heir.

But now it was different.

The fact that he declared he wouldn’t marry because of a mere maid, while having a perfect match like Eloise, proved that.

Alfonso didn’t want to acknowledge his brother, who made such poor decisions, as the next head of the house.

On the day Cedric told Eloise about breaking off their engagement, Alfonso rushed to the hotel at her call, and while comforting her, ended up spending the night with her.

When he returned to the estate the next day, filled with anger, Cedric had already left for Lotas.

After that, Alfonso spent the night with her several more times.

On the last day, as she lay in Alfonso’s arms, biting her nails anxiously, she said,

“I can’t keep staying like this. My father won’t stay quiet.”

“Don’t worry too much, Eloise. As soon as Cedric returns from Lotas, I’ll persuade him.”

“Alfonso….”

Eloise looked at him with moist eyes.

“Thank you for comforting me.”

“It’s not just comfort. I will make sure he marries you.”

Alfonso said it as if making a vow to her.

Even after spending several nights together, Eloise was still a woman who was meant to become Cedric’s wife.