Chapter 4
“Chloe?”
Having returned home earlier than expected after his schedule was cut short, Dominic couldn’t hide his surprise at the butler’s report.
And with good reason. Three years earlier, the epidemic that swept across the world had left deep scars on his younger sister. Young ladies her own age had died. She had lost the nursemaid she had loved like family. Even their parents had failed to survive the disease.
Unlike so many others who had gradually learned to live with their grief, tender-hearted Chloe had retreated into books. She withdrew into a world of her own, to the point that even holding a conversation with another person became an ordeal.
And yet that very Chloe had stepped out into the garden for the first time in nearly three years. More importantly, she had asked the head maid to prepare tea for two.
“Mrs. Lidden was so overjoyed she insisted I report it to you at once, my lord.”
The butler spoke with a warm smile. Dominic glanced through the tall window at the bright, sunlit day before turning back to him.
“And who is she with?”
“Miss Irene Vanderberg, Lady Chloe’s governess.”
The unfamiliar name lingered pleasantly in his ears.
The early summer garden, bathed in warm sunlight, was filled with the fragrance of roses and the fresh scent of water.
Soft, buttery cookies. Fragrant black tea steeped to perfection. A gentle breeze brushing against their cheeks. It was the perfect afternoon for tea.
That said, the conversation was perhaps a little too spirited for two well-bred young ladies.
“Marrying a scumbag like that is bound to cause problems. I feel so sorry for Emma.”
“I agree, but realistically, marrying into the count’s family is probably the right choice. From a storytelling perspective, it also makes for the cleaner ending.”
“Even so, I’d be disappointed if it ended like <The Playboy Sir Theo>. The heroine is the only one who ruins her life, while Sir Theo just keeps taking mistress after mistress.”
The two of them lost all track of time discussing the latest popular romance novels.
That was how it happened. On her very first day at work, Irene Vanderberg had found herself utterly engrossed in the lurid novels lining Miss Chloe’s library.
From that day on, the hours she spent with Chloe gradually turned into something like a book club.
Delighted (?) by how seriously Irene approached every novel, Chloe began recommending one famous title after another, without end.
A model student since childhood who had always loved reading, Irene Vanderberg put her talent for speed reading to full use, making her way through Chloe’s recommendations at an astonishing pace.
Her employment contract stipulated only three or four working hours a day. Yet once she and Chloe settled down with their books, they would sometimes look up to find dusk already falling.
The first few times Irene returned home so late, the head maid was alarmed and anxiously asked whether something had happened. After it became a regular occurrence, however, she simply accepted it as part of the routine.
Three weeks passed like that. Irene Vanderberg, the innocent reader who had blushed scarlet at the slightest provocation on her first day, had become someone whose expression scarcely changed, no matter what she read.
Gracefully lifting her teacup for a sip, Chloe spoke with a look of quiet boredom.
“That’s just how popular romance novels are. You’ve seen it yourself, Miss Irene. In the end, they’re all stories about ruining someone’s life. Whether it’s the man or the woman.”
Popular romance novels always followed the same predictable formula. A young man and woman fell for each other. Despite the gap in their stations, they gave themselves over to feelings that were somewhere between love and lust, only to meet ruin in the end.
In these third-rate stories, there were usually only two surefire ways to ruin a life.
For a man, it was fathering an illegitimate child with a woman beneath his station, bringing disgrace upon himself or ending up marrying her.
For a woman, it was conceiving the child of a man far above her station, only to be shunned and abandoned.
Popular romances rarely left a pleasant aftertaste. Readers condemned the characters, cursed their foolishness, and delighted all the same in the sensational drama unfolding before them.
“You’ve been reading these for over two years now, haven’t you, Miss Chloe?”
“Yes.”
“Once you’ve read so many of them, don’t they start to feel repetitive? Don’t you ever get tired of them?”
Chloe looked at Irene as though she had expected that question. The corners of her lovely lips lifted ever so slightly before she answered.
“Just when I’m about to get bored, one comes along that’s a little different. Besides, where else can you find entertainment this cheap?”
“…Entertainment?”
“Where else can you watch someone else’s misfortune unfold so easily and so cheaply?”
Even if it was fiction, the idea of taking pleasure in another person’s downfall had never once occurred to Irene.
She could only stare, momentarily speechless.
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