“How did he know to come here? Damn it…….”

He looked down at the woman he had almost enclosed within his embrace.

Helena, almost crushed by his forceful push, accepted his gaze not with panic but with calmness, possibly due to déjà vu.

“More nasty rogues passing by, I suppose.”

“…….”

His mouth, which usually responded without hesitation, was unusually sealed. Helena looked at him quizzically, but at that moment, Ian’s focus was entirely outside the window.

Meanwhile, Eugene was pacing anxiously in front of the salon where Helena was located.

Ian pressed his body even more into the corner, hoping to remain in this state at least until the man passed by.

Ian covered Helena as if he could swallow her with his large back. Fortunately, there was a pillar in the center of the shop, which made it look like a man was standing alone from the outside.

Ian exhaled softly while pressing his arms against the wall Helena was leaning on. Helena blinked, feeling a familiar pressure.

Through the slightly opened shirt collar, she could see his chest rising and falling. She wanted to turn her head away from the awkwardness, but his firm hold made it difficult.

The after-shower scent of soap.

The heat rising from his rigid skin.

Drops of water tracing the contours of his muscles.

She couldn’t convince herself why she was recalling that scene at this moment.

‘Is it because it’s been a while since I left Eugene? How pathetic.’

The feeling of occasionally thinking about another man besides Eugene was strange, almost unwillingly so.

Helena tried to erase her complex thoughts and asked,

“You’re being pursued, aren’t you?”

Indeed, it was something she had been curious about. Ian had been cornered like this more than once, and he always seemed cautious about his surroundings.

He would only walk through deserted alleys and was always cloaked with a hood.

The episode at the fruit store seemed to be more than just protective; it was suspicious.

“Did you also steal that money?”

Helena persisted. Ian quickly glanced outside the window and then back at Helena.

They separated from their close embrace.

Ian turned around as if nothing had happened and started looking at clothes.

Helena followed him, but suddenly had to stop as Ian abruptly halted.

In his hand was a naturally glossy green dress. He held it up to Helena and answered,

“Half right, half wrong.”

He passed the dress to a waiting clerk with a faint smile. The clerk seemed familiar with his visits.

Helena’s frown deepened at his ambiguous response. Another dress was presented.

“I merely took back what was originally mine, so I don’t see a problem.”

Even with this additional explanation, Helena’s frown did not ease.

Ian handed the new dress to the clerk and then picked up a dress decorated with frills shaped like flowers.

“Or are you perhaps worried about me?”

“Who would….!”

Helena started to retort but stopped mid-sentence, closing her mouth.

Her expression remained frustrated, but at least her suspicion towards him seemed to dissipate.
Helena didn’t want to be curious about him. She certainly didn’t want to show any signs of it.

It hadn’t been long since she left Eugene, and she couldn’t allow even a piece of herself to belong to this man.

‘Pull yourself together. If you know it’s pathetic, you should stop.’

She pushed away the dress that Ian was holding in front of her, sighing as if to declare that she couldn’t even recover her original state.

“I don’t like flashy things.”

“It would suit you well.”

“…….”

He smiled so prettily… so carelessly.

For a moment, Helena was speechless, her eyes fixed on his neat face.

But eventually, she turned her head away.

“I still don’t like it. It’s too conspicuous.”

A flashy ballroom, swirling lights, whispering laughter.

Even a plain dress carried the weight of her tormented times.

It reminded her of the fable where a fox, unable to reach the high-hanging grapes, consoles itself by saying ‘They were sour anyway.’

Helena thought she was that sour grape.

Of course, the only difference from the fable was that she was genuinely sour.

It was only natural that everywhere she stepped felt like a thorny path. Familiar as it was, it always stung.

‘But I endured, looking only at you, always hoping you would come.’

It was the day she attended a party for the first time in a long while, wearing a dress Eugene had given her for their anniversary.

It was more nerve-wracking than usual, with nobles from Eugene’s paternal side attending.

But from the moment she left the ducal residence, her long dress hem kept getting caught under her feet. A sense of unease turned into outright misfortune when she fell in the middle of the ballroom.

Before she could even register the pain in her wrist, murmurs fell like rain from all directions.

⌜That’s what happens when you wear something beyond your station. No matter how much you dress up, inside you’re just a hollow straw figure.⌟

⌜How much did she want to pretend to be noble…⌟