IDIBC Chapter 38

A Kiss Like Him

“That dress…”

Ricardo’s voice, like scraping metal, suddenly jolted me awake again.

“Is it the Duchess’s work?”

“Ah…”

He separated me just slightly from his body and looked me over as if appraising me. Unable to bear that cool, unfamiliar gaze, I squirmed again, trying to escape from him.

“Please let me go.”

Just when I thought he might obediently release me, Ricardo grabbed one of my retreating arms, tucked it under his armpit, and pulled me even closer into his embrace.

Only then did my mind snap back to alertness.

“Yes, this dress was given to me by the Duchess.”

My heart pounded as if it had risen to my throat, unbearable. Yet the words asking him to let me go wouldn’t come easily.

As I was agonizing over what to do, his hand slowly approached and grasped my chin. Then he lifted it up gently.

“Along with the handkerchief.”

Unlike me, who was trembling like a ship caught in a storm out of sheer terror, his cool face showed no expression whatsoever. I wanted to find even the smallest emotion on his face, but Ricardo only gazed at me with those deep eyes.

I was reflected in Ricardo’s jet-black pupils. The transparent image of myself inside swayed aimlessly. Then soon, resignation appeared in his gaze and the strength drained from his hand.

At the same time, the world came crashing back as if shattering once more.

The sound of horse hooves striking the ground reached my ears in a steady rhythm, and I felt the vibration of wheels scraping the floor. The sound of rain, which had seemed to come from somewhere far away, now rang in my ears.

I could instinctively tell that he would let me go just like this.

First came the release of tension that had been squeezing painfully at my skin, followed by an inexplicably empty feeling.

But I never stepped aside from fear. When I felt afraid, I stood even more boldly in front of it.

So that fear wouldn’t consume me alive.

“Rica.”

I called to him with a deep breath.

He still stared at my lips without answering.

In that moment, it was I who broke through the boundary Ricardo had drawn in one swift motion and invaded his lips first. What he wanted to do to me didn’t matter now. That didn’t matter at all.

I always cease to be myself in front of Ricardo.

His lips, which felt unreal, were much softer than I remembered. Imagining he might push me away at any moment, I squeezed my eyes shut. The clumsy kiss that crushed rather than caressed made a soft sound and soon parted.

Just as I was turning my head away, unable to look at his face, he gripped my chin in his hand, turned my face, and immediately crashed his lips against mine.

Before I could even close my eyes, I captured in my vision that dizzying moment of Ricardo tilting his head and approaching. My body froze as if turned to ice, unable to move at all. Soon my eyes closed and everything turned pure white as if the entire world had been extinguished.

When everything was erased, only Ricardo remained. The unfamiliar sensations he gave me awakened my entire body, drumming through me.

The feeling of a single finger touching and leaving my back, the breath exhaled as he precisely targeted the most sensitive part of my waist, and then his lips crashing strongly against me as his palm cupped the back of my head.

His lips, which had suddenly surged in and completely invaded, withdrew slowly, unlike their arrival. Murky breaths spilled out as if vomiting, but I couldn’t bring myself to open my eyes.

The lips that had touched once gently overlapped again.

What had been calm movements deepened in an instant.

Was the person I was kissing really Ricardo? Was this person, who burrowed in relentlessly as if it wasn’t enough, really the same person I knew?

The passion that had poured in like a wave gradually became gentle and deliberate. He filled every gap without any deficiency, yet took away as much as was desired.

The kiss, too, resembled him.

Always sudden, dizzying, and then sweet and surprising. But flawless in every way.

Just like how he suddenly appeared one day and greatly stirred up my life, his kiss rendered me helpless in the same way. It felt like my life was being turned completely upside down once again.

It was a dizzying sensation I could no longer endure.

“Stop…”

The feeble resistance I muttered lost its strength to his actions, which seemed anxious as they ravaged. I pushed slightly with the hand placed on his chest, but even that lost its will when his fingers dug into my hair.

At this moment, there was nothing that could stop him.

The world spun dizzily and then even that flickered hazily when the carriage stopped.

Without even a moment to notice it was slowing down.

When he separated me from himself, rough breaths burst through my chest.

Ricardo looked at me with indecipherable eyes for a moment, then put strength into the back he was holding and pulled me back toward himself.

As he patted my back soothingly, I felt how utterly disheveled my breathing had become. I pressed my hotly flushed forehead against his violently pulsing neck and spent a long while catching my ragged breath.

Ricardo stole another kiss on my upper lip, then coaxingly on my lower lip, fairly once each, before beginning to straighten my completely ruined clothing.

Startled back to my senses, I hurriedly pulled my body away from him and moved back to my seat.

As I moved quickly to get out, Ricardo stretched out his arm to block me from leaving.

“Not yet.”

“Why?”

“Your face… is too red.”

“Ah…!”

At those words, I hastily covered my cheeks with both hands, and he squeezed his eyes shut.

****

When we returned to Count Enehaz’s estate, it was already late at night, but the ballroom was still full of people. No, perhaps there were even more people than when we had left.

Some, unable to contain their passion, were enjoying trysts in corners of the garden, and the balconies were already completely full.

While there were groups staggering drunkenly, there were also clusters of yellow roses stomping their feet, still unable to find partners.

But when Ricardo and I entered, all eyes in the hall turned to us.

“Lord Ricardo, Young Duke of the House of Gardarelli Rochester, is entering.”

The impact of that single sentence was tremendous. As if this entire ball had been held for him, everyone’s gazes and steps turned toward him. And by extension, to me standing beside him.

He led me to the center of the hall and waited until a suitable song came on.

In the meantime, Ricardo received the handkerchief bearing his family crest from me, and soon tucked it neatly into the pocket on his chest.

The opened beast’s maw immediately disappeared into his pocket, but I was at a loss as to how to close my own gaping mouth.

As people watched him lead me here and there around the hall, exclamations poured out from all directions. The ladies at least showed the courtesy of opening their fans, but the men openly displayed their astonishment.

“So the rumor about a woman who helped Rochester’s manifestation is true.”

“Could it be that the saintess doesn’t exist separately?”

The sounds of people chattering reached me in a dizzying jumble, but Ricardo seemed to pay no mind to any of it.

He kept his gaze solely on me, and each time new music played, he asked with his eyes whether it was a song I could dance to. When the melody changed for about the third time, we entered the dance floor.

That song was a famous dance tune widely used even in the principality, one that was like the first chapter of dance instruction that every noble learned first.

I never thought that being forced to learn dancing by Sabrina would come in handy like this.

Before matching steps with him, I worried about how foolish I might look, but once the music began flowing, those thoughts vanished far away.

With his perfect lead, my feet rose from the floor as soon as they touched it. I didn’t particularly feel like I was exerting any strength. Everything felt so dizzying, as if none of it was my reality.

As soon as the dance ended, Count Enehaz approached us.

He was a short, stout middle-aged man with an ordinary appearance that somehow didn’t suit this glamorous ball.

However, only his eyes glinted unpleasantly, revealing a greed that suggested he would never let go of the prey before him.

Ricardo introduced me to him as the woman he would be engaged to. I smiled awkwardly, but when Ricardo mentioned the imminent engagement date, I couldn’t maintain even that barely drawn smile.

Ricardo was the heir of the Rochester family with a predetermined companion. So although he must have had many questions, Count Enehaz couldn’t extract anything.

It wasn’t that he didn’t try. But every question was dismissed before the sentence could even finish, and he wasn’t even permitted to offer superficial compliments.

Of course, no one else there dared approach Ricardo either.

“Are you cold?”

He had kept his arm around my waist the entire time, and when he asked that, I only then realized I had been trembling faintly for a while.

“No.”

He looked down at me for a moment, then removed his outer coat.

When he carelessly placed it on my shoulders, I felt completely buried in the garment. Was it thanks to his warmth? My trembling body seemed to calm down a bit.

As I struggled to adapt to the atmosphere and finally let out a breath, Ricardo pulled the waist he was holding tightly and whispered in my ear.