He Who Covets the Abandoned Bride - Chapter 50
“Ah…… hmm……”
As Layla couldn’t hold back her moans, only then did Adrian release the union of their lips.
Adrian’s violet eyes that exhaled slightly rough breaths looked down at Layla.
Many things were contained in the small head held in his two hands. Flushed cheeks and quivering eyelids, pretty eyes with shaded pupils underneath, and even wet lips.
As he took in all of that at a glance, he couldn’t help but speak.
“You’re still pretty.”
Even the tips of Layla’s ears reddened at the whisper.
While sucking on the red traces left on her lips, Adrian let out words that would embarrass Layla.
“Tell Maeve not to do this kind of makeup next time. I’ll eat it all.”
“Such words……”
“If you’re embarrassed, should I say it?”
Layla didn’t answer and just closed her eyes as if enduring something.
Doing this really made her feel loved by Adrian. It felt like they had become lovers enjoying a secret meeting before their marriage.
Did he become a playboy while she wasn’t looking?
Just like when he deceived her in the guise of Marquis Millay, it was the same now.
The way of speaking, gestures, actions that made people’s hearts flutter……
Everything seemed so easy for him.
It felt like she would quickly lose herself to a man like this. But now Layla mustn’t do that.
She mustn’t love him anymore.
Because it was presumptuous of her.
However, Layla knew her fate of inevitably being drawn to him if Adrian wanted that from her.
It wasn’t just a matter of the heart.
No matter what anyone said, Layla’s fate was grasped in his hands. It would change form with a single caress of Adrian’s hands.
The confidence underlying his words from some time ago.
If someone else had said those words she wouldn’t know, but for Adrian there was ample basis.
If he set his mind to it, saving Layla’s family, especially Cedric in Fitzroy, would not be a dream either.
Giving the Wessex family a new name would also be possible if it were him.
So Layla mustn’t let go of the man before her eyes. The day she went against his mood, everything would be over.
In any case, it was Layla herself who had said she would follow Adrian.
“By the way.”
“Hmm?”
Seeing the curving of his eyes, Adrian seemed to be in quite a good mood. Thinking it fortunate, Layla lightly leaned against his neck.
“It’s hard here.”
“……”
Layla, who had been wondering if it was okay to do this, checked Adrian’s reaction out of surprise when there was none.
It was because Adrian’s lips covered her lips once more. But this time, he simply made a smacking sound once and smiled, raising the corners of his mouth.
“Can you also let me hear the rest of what you were saying?”
Why did he want to hear it?
However, if this was the duty of invasion that Emperor Heinkin spoke of, Layla had to do it.
“Please go to the bed.”
“Can I interpret that as meaning you trust me?”
Layla gauged the intention of the question and nodded. Then, Adrian’s eyes curved charmingly.
The color reflected in his violet eyes was diverse. Seeing those eyes reminded her of the pure boy he had been in his childhood.
Adrian, who had been sincere to her.
Now so different in both appearance and inside from those days, he crossed the bedroom holding Layla. The shackles must have made him quite heavy, but Adrian didn’t seem to find it difficult at all.
Drawing back the canopy and entering inside, Adrian, who had laid Layla down, finished taking off the shirt that had been clumsily draped.
Chest, stomach, arms. Revealing an upper body that didn’t look lacking anywhere, he propped his hands on either side of Layla’s face and looked down at her.
“I didn’t expect this to happen today either, but should I thank Maeve?”
Although Adrian had been a little annoyed when he first learned that Maeve had brought Layla, he seemed fine now.
He slightly lifted the side of Layla’s skirt. Then, underneath the petticoat, legs as slender as his forearms were faintly visible.
Layla brought her hand to Adrian’s shoulder, receiving his burdensome gaze looking down at her. And she only made a slight gesture of pulling him towards herself, but Adrian responded to her hand signal and lowered his body.
Layla was embarrassed because the room was too bright, but Adrian seemed to like it, showering her face with kisses.
And when those lips went down to her neck, Layla had a premonition.
That Adrian would take her first time.
[This is the timeline separator]Only after the stinging sunlight streaming through the window had draped over him did Adrian open his eyes. Recently suffering from rebound symptoms, his mind woke up so quickly that he wondered if he had ever felt this clear-headed.
But the moment he discovered that Layla, whom he had held in his arms and slept with at dawn, had disappeared, his heart sank and he immediately sat up.
“Is she outside?”
At the question, the voice of one of the attendants was heard.
“Yes, Your Highness.”
As the attendant who entered through the door bowed his head, Adrian was about to ask “Where is the princess?” but shook his head. Instead, hitting the crumpled sheet, he said,
“…… Where did she go from here?”
In fact, from the listener’s point of view, it was a very sudden question, but the attendant answered without showing it.
“After finishing what she had to do, I sent her straight back to her room.”
There was no way the crown prince and a slave could comfortably sleep under the same blanket. It meant that he had sent her away on his own, thinking Adrian had no further use for her.
From the attendant’s point of view, it was a natural follow-up, but Adrian felt his anger rising for a moment.
No matter what, they sent her away right after?
Adrian, who was recalling Layla, who had struggled as it was her first time last night, ran his hand through his hair and tried hard to calm his heart.
It was not something he could vent his irritation to the attendant for something he hadn’t done wrong.
“….. I see. I’ll need to change clothes, so send someone in to attend to me.”
With an affirmative answer, the attendant who left was soon replaced by Maeve herself, carrying clothes for him to change into.
Only after Adrian stood in front of the mirror and entrusted his body to her did he open his mouth.
“Why did you do that last night?”
As Maeve draped the shirt over his body and adjusted it to fit, she calmly said,
“Didn’t you seek her out every night even on the ship?”
“You know I didn’t touch her.”
“Lady Layla also seemed to have feelings. Ah, of course for ‘Lord Millay’.”
Hearing the words Maeve added at the end, Adrian frowned. Maeve, who knew Adrian too well, always teased him like this.
“…… What about for me?”
“That I wouldn’t know. But you checked, so you did it, didn’t you?”
This question was also something she could ask because she knew him too well.
Maeve knew very well that the crown prince before her eyes, who showed not an ounce of affection in his hands when he had to, dreamed of pure love like a boy.
Just looking at the situation where he insisted on not having a loveless marriage and couldn’t even proceed with his engagement until this age, it was quite obvious.
Adrian quirked the corner of his lips at that predetermined question. Recalling her from last night, a slight smile threatened to rise.
The way she had nodded her head when asked if she trusted him.
But he didn’t want to act too infatuated. There were still countless things left to do for her, and only after finishing all of them could he feel at ease.
There was also a saying that you never know until you enter the wedding hall.
However, seeing his face, which had been somewhat gloomy until yesterday, brightening considerably, Maeve realized that last night had gone quite well.
Hoping that the two of them would not have any discord, Maeve tied a cravat around his neck. To Adrian, who obediently accepted her touch like that, Maeve casually brought up the next task for him.
“By the way, about Lady Layla, Your Highness.”
“Is there a problem?”
Adrian had been worried since he woke up and didn’t see her. Even though they said they sent her back to her room, he didn’t know where that room was and couldn’t openly look for her during the day, so he was anxious.
Maeve nodded her head in time with finishing his outer garment, indicating that his guess was correct.
“Since her beauty and background are too conspicuous, Your Highness will have to protect her well.”
Adrian’s eyes narrowed.
“Where is Layla now?”
[This is the timeline separator]Layla was kneeling and bowing her head not in the palace reception room she had visited yesterday, but on the dirt floor outside.
It was due to an order to ensure that a slave’s body, and even their shadow, would not touch any part of the palace building.
The Emperor of Heinken stood on the outer corridors of the palace with his hands behind his back, looking down at her like that.
The Male lead Always Seduces Her with His Beauty (Matriarchy)
Xin Jiao Zhou is the leader of the world’s premier sect. She has just experienced betrayal from all sides, was poisoned in an assassination attempt, and faced death squad attacks while the poison was taking effect. After finally clearing out the scum from her sect, she was drugged again while trying to detoxify.
After waking up from a night of unconsciousness, she gained a “beautiful and kind-hearted” husband.
Xin Jiao Zhou: “???”
He fell ill.
She came to see him, bringing breakfast.
As she put down the breakfast and was about to leave, his hand slipped while holding the spoon. “Clank!”
She turned around upon hearing the noise.
He looked up at her, his eyebrows drooping: “My hand… has no strength.”
“Shall I… feed you?” she asked tentatively.
He opened his mouth cheerfully: “Ah—”
Thinking she was drowning, he jumped in without hesitation to save her, but nearly drowned himself. In the end, it was she who swam over to rescue him, giving him air underwater.
After emerging from the water, his ear tips turned red. He lightly brushed his cheek, tucking his sideburns behind his ear, revealing delicate, pink-tinged ear tips. He lowered his gaze, too embarrassed to look at her.
Xin Jiao Zhou: He’s truly beautiful, kind-hearted, and adorable.
A certain someone when disciplining subordinates behind the scenes: “If they don’t obey, just kill them.”
What’s that? She might already have someone she cares about in her heart? A certain someone: Find out who it is, kill them, and then there won’t be anyone.
What? She met a man by the riverside? What? That man even hurt her? A certain someone: Whichever hand hurt her, chop off his entire arm.
Love at first sight without realizing it, gradually falling in love, slowly getting closer…
Family and national grudges, schemes and desires, good and evil, crime and punishment, she and he face the future together, seeking justice with passion!
A naturally dark female lead who could accidentally destroy the world but is actually an honest person VS a weak, pitiful, and helpless but skilled fighter, beautiful white-cut black male lead
My heart is not of stone, how steadfast is your love? — Tao Yuanming “Imitating the Ancients (No. 3)”
— Reading Guide —
Cold female lead & dramatic black lotus with hidden yandere traits male lead
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