Please Forget Me - Chapter 151

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾.

“Come inside. I’ll call the security for you…”

The security? No, that absolutely can’t happen.

“There’s nothing wrong with me. I just woke up from my sleep…”

“Oh, so that’s why you’re like this…”

“Johann’s gone. I don’t know where he went, but I’m trying to follow him. Could you lend me a carriage?”

There were horses at this house. But the elderly neighbor refused to lend me the carriage.

“It’s too late. If nothing serious happened, why not just wait for your husband to return? Johann’s not the kind of man who’d go out at night and do something reckless without his wife knowing.”

It’s not nothing, I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t. He’s trying to do something reckless behind my back. I couldn’t say anything that might have raised suspicion and put Johann in danger.

“Go home and wait quietly. He’ll be back soon.”

The old man, misunderstanding my tearful face, tried to calm me down like he was comforting a child who had woken up in the night, calling for his mother. No one gives a carriage to a child.

In the end, I didn’t get the ride.

That didn’t mean there was no way to get to the bunker. I had two legs.

I ran down the road. My breath was tight, and my chest felt like it might explode, but I couldn’t stop. I thought that this one step I was rushing through might save Johann, so I pushed through the tremors in my legs.

I quickly reached the edge of the village and didn’t hesitate to head down the forest path toward the bunker. I had rushed out in such a hurry that I had forgotten my lantern. The only light that guided me was the dim moonlight.

An owl hooted persistently from somewhere in the dark woods. The wind howled fiercely, and the branches of the trees creaked as they brushed against each other, creating a cold and eerie sound.

It was like the sound of a car’s wheels driving down a dirt road. In these woods, men who drove cars were as dangerous as wild beasts. And I didn’t have a lantern, nor a revolver.

I knew this was a wrong decision. I was terrified, nearly losing my mind, but I couldn’t stop walking.

“Ah…”

But my will was no match for my body. I was still in the midst of my menstrual period, and I had hardly eaten or drank anything today. My head started to spin, and before I knew it, my knees gave way.

Thud. I collapsed onto the dirt path. When I tried to get up again by pushing myself off the ground, my legs refused to cooperate. The pale moonlight quickly vanished. The owl’s call faded into the distance.

I couldn’t stay here.

How long had I been sitting with my head down, trying to catch my breath, hoping I wouldn’t lose consciousness? The sound of the branches scratching in the wind returned. So did the yellow light.

As soon as I felt relief, I was jolted with fear. It wasn’t the sound of branches; it was the sound of a car’s wheels on the forest road. When I lifted my head, I was blinded by the pair of yellow headlights. The car was speeding straight toward me.

“Stop!”

As I hurriedly got up, the car, seeing me, came to a stop. The back seat door opened. It was only then that I realized, with a jolt to my heart, that the car resembled the one that the Major had driven today.

But the silhouette of the man stepping out from the back seat wasn’t the Major’s.

“Johann?”

Johann quickly ran toward me, looking just as surprised.

“Rize? What are you doing here?”

That was the question I should have been asking. Why did Johann get out of the car? The first thought that came to my mind was that he had killed the Major or was on his way to being escorted after a failed attempt.

But Johann was dressed in a neatly tailored suit, as if he was heading to work, complete with a properly tied tie, and his hands weren’t bound. If he had been captured, he wouldn’t have been able to freely jump out of the car or have brought me along.

I felt relieved but couldn’t relax. I still had no idea what was going on, and I couldn’t ask.

Throughout the ride, Johann held my hand tightly and remained silent. So I stayed quiet too. The officer sitting at the wheel didn’t seem hostile, though.

“Is this it?”

“Yes, it is.”

“We’ve arrived. Please have a good night. We’ll meet again.”

The officer politely greeted us after dropping us off in front of the house. We weren’t even military officers, which only confused me more.

“What happened?”

As soon as we entered the building and the door shut behind us, I couldn’t hold back any longer and asked.

“I’d like to ask you the same thing. Didn’t you see my note?”

Only then did I remember why I had been running through the woods in such a dangerous state late at night, and anger began to rise within me toward Johann.

“I told you not to go!”

“It wasn’t anything serious.”

“Isn’t making me worry about you to death something serious?”

Angry at how calmly he was acting after scaring me so much, I began hitting his chest with my fists.

“Why! Don’t you! Listen to me!”

“I’m saying what needs to be said. I told you to wait at home. Let’s go inside.”

Without even flinching or showing any sign of pain, Johann smiled and grabbed me by the arms, lifting me up and carrying me up the stairs. His calmness only lasted until we entered the house.

As soon as the door closed behind us, he started to get angry.

“Rize, please listen to me. If I told you to wait at home, you should have waited. How dangerous it is for a woman to be out alone at this hour, especially heading into the woods, you know how risky that is. And you’re not even feeling well. Think about what could have happened if it wasn’t me you ran into.”