Chapter 4
“Allow me to draw the curtains so you can rest comfortably.”
“Alright.”
Layla gazed affectionately at Kallion as he closed his eyes without the slightest wariness.
* * *
The next day, and the night after that, Kallion still didn’t appear in the newlywed bedroom.
I had expected as much, so I peacefully sat in the garden and read a book. It wouldn’t be bad to enjoy this leisure for a while.
In any case, word would soon arrive from both houses once they learned that we weren’t living as a normal married couple.
By then, he would be the one to make the proposal first.
With a reluctantly arranged schedule for sharing a bed.
Just then, I heard footsteps.
I raised my gaze in confusion and saw Kallion striding toward me with a scowl.
It shouldn’t be time for either house to send word yet…
When I looked up at him in puzzlement, he sat across from me and asked stiffly.
“What are you plotting?”
We were seeing each other for the first time since the wedding, and his first question was what I was plotting.
“What do you mean?”
“For the entire week since the wedding, you and I haven’t seen each other even once.”
His tone made it sound as though there was no way I would normally behave like that. It also made it clear that he found it extremely suspicious.
I calmly lowered my gaze and turned a page.
“Isn’t that what you wanted as well?”
Perhaps my composure irritated him, because he continued stiffly.
“Tell me what you’re plotting, Heister.”
The way he deliberately called me by my family name instead of my given name made his wariness painfully obvious.
I sighed and closed the book.
I had intended to wait until the time came, but since he seemed so frustrated, I decided to be generous.
“Kallion. It seems this marriage will be uncomfortable for both of us, so I’d like to make one proposal.”
At my curt words, Kallion’s expression subtly hardened.
“What is it?”
“By now, both of our families must have heard that we aren’t living as a normal married couple. For the sake of the transaction between our houses, they’ll want us to fulfill at least the minimum duties of husband and wife.”
Kallion’s expression changed subtly. He looked as though he found it surprisingly reasonable coming from a woman he had thought naive and foolish.
“So?”
I met his unwavering glare and smiled faintly. Then I returned to him the exact words he had once said to me.
“Let’s share a bed only once a month, on an appointed day.”
He stupidly asked again.
“What?”
Had I ever seen him make an expression like that?
Looking at him sitting there utterly dumbfounded, I drove the point home.
“Outside of that, I won’t care where you are or what you’re doing. So let’s take no interest in what the other does in this estate.”
Kallion’s dark brows slanted slightly. He seemed to be trying to determine the hidden intention behind my words.
“How about the fifteenth of every month?”
I leisurely observed his expression as I continued.
I had deliberately chosen the date to coincide with the time when I had conceived Denion.
At my casual proposal, as though we were simply arranging a meal together, Kallion furrowed his brow deeply.
“Sharing a bed on an appointed day? Do you have no pride at all?”
Apparently, he had concluded that I intended to use those appointed nights as an excuse to approach him.
What he thought of me didn’t matter.
“Think whatever you want.”
At my dry reply, he issued a blunt warning.
“You’d better not entertain some foolish idea that sharing my bed will make me fall for you.”
“I bear no such idea.”
At my straightforward answer, he still looked suspicious.
Then he stared at the ground and thought for quite some time.
Nothing I had said was wrong, so as rational as he was, he would accept this arrangement even if he had to suppress his displeasure.
It didn’t take long for him to speak again.
“I accept your proposition.”
Then, as though driving the point home, he added.
“But only on the condition that, just as you said, we don’t interfere with each other in any way.”
The corners of my lips curled softly upward.
“Of course.”
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