It Turned Out to be a Useful Fraudulent Marriage Chapter 14 - 2. Cinderella Who Loses Her Mother at a Young Age, Her Stepmother, and Her New Older Brothers

Eric was dreaming about a woman.

 

Emily Orleans. Eric’s biological mother and the deceased Duchess.

 

The dream was set about 20 years ago.

 

Four-year-old Eric threw a small rock at his friend’s face who took his toy, leaving him bruised.

 

“Eric, why did you hit your friend?”

 

Emily spoke to Eric with a stern face, one he rarely saw from her. Eric was very intimidated and stared at the ground, crushing the weeds on the ground with his feet. He didn’t dare look up.

 

Unlike her usual self, Emily didn’t hug Eric up or ruffle his hair. Feeling upset by this, Eric pouted.

 

Emily asked again. “Why did you hit your friend, Eric?”

 

Eric was annoyed with everything. So he shouted back. “He touched my horse first! It’s his fault! It was stupid to stay quiet when someone took something from me or hit me!”

 

Eric, overwhelmed by his anger, shouted at her. But when he looked up and saw Emily’s face turn pale, he quickly covered his mouth.

 

‘I… I did something wrong.’

 

As Eric thought that, Emily asked Eric again with her face brimming with tears.

 

“Wh-who… who told you that?”

 

She gripped Eric’s shoulders tightly. “Who told you that? Answer me, Eric!”

 

Eric tilted his head and looked up at her.

 

“F-father did….”

 

At that moment, Emily’s expression hardened.

 

Even now, Eric couldn’t fully understand why his mother had been so terrified that day.

 

His father’s advice to respond to violence with violence wasn’t entirely correct, but it wasn’t anything too unusual for the old-fashioned teachings of aristocratic fathers.

 

So, Eric always remembered it as the beginning of his mother’s madness.

 

“N-no…. If someone steals from you or hits you, you should protest. You should speak out, the truly foolish thing is to retaliate in the same way.”

 

Nevertheless, Eric still remembered the sight of his mother crying.

 

“But father said that being kind is weak, and being weak is bad….”

 

“No.”

 

His mother’s resolute eyes—those deep brown eyes—he remembered them as well.

 

“Living kindly is never a foolish thing. It’s the world that’s wrong for not rewarding those who do good things.”

 

And he also remembered the echo of her mother’s words, spoken as she looked directly at him with those eyes.

 

Those words would remain in Eric’s soul for a long time.

 

Just as Eric reached out his hand to get a closer look at his mother, the dream showed him another woman.

 

Emeline Wedgwood.

 

The timeline now shifted to about two months ago.

 

It was when Helena Wedgwood, Philip Wedgwood, and Emeline Wedgwood visited the Duke’s mansion at the invitation of Duke Orleans.

 

When Eric first saw Emeline Wedgwood, he didn’t think of her as a ‘crazy woman’ or a ‘strange woman’ as he does now.

 

Her face looked simple and innocent, her shoulders slightly hunched, and her voice was small.

 

With her round, glimmering eyes, she looked utterly flustered, as though she didn’t know what to do even when the servants brought out tea or showed them around the house. At that time, Eric couldn’t take his eyes off Emeline.

 

‘Why is she so flustered about everything?’

 

He felt frustrated and even angry at Emeline for not standing up to the servants, who treated her with subtle disdain.

 

Her mother, Helena Wedgwood, seemed more interested in catching the Duke’s attention than paying any mind to Emeline.

 

‘A woman more fixated on marrying the Duke than her own daughter.’

 

Philip wasn’t much different. He was more interested in coveting the Duke’s belongings, indifferent to his sister’s timid demeanor.

 

When Emeline got hot tea spilled on her by the servants—whether it was a mistake or intentional—while their father was away, even when Lily stepped in to scold the servant, Helena and Philip remained unbothered.

 

Emeline, with a shriveled-up expression, muttered, “Well, it could happen. People make mistakes in everything they do.”

 

“You’re so kind, Lady Emeline.”

 

At that moment, Eric saw Emeline’s face harden at Lily’s words. What was it? Her expression felt as though all that innocent country bumpkin act was a complete lie, and in its place was nothing but coldness.

 

Emeline, her face now openly showing disdain, looked at Lily, who was frantically trying to wipe down her dress, and muttered, “Kindness is something only people with power can afford, anyway.”

 

She must have thought Eric hadn’t heard because he was standing far away.

 

A woman who hated being called “kind.” Yet, she pretended to be so kind.

​​

Eric returned to his office, feeling uneasy about this strange woman.

 

‘Being kind is a weakness….’

 

The image of Emeline’s shrunken face overlapped with his childhood memory of his father’s words.

 

He got up from his seat. In any case, if a servant had deliberately spilled tea on a guest of the duke’s family, it was something that needed to be addressed.

 

Eric headed toward the stables, where the servant in question was supposed to be, following another maid’s instructions.

 

“I swear, I’ll just—”

 

It was Philip’s voice.

 

“Calm down. You’ll leave a mark if you hit her.”

 

Helena’s voice followed, two tones lower than the one she had been using in front of his father earlier. Then the maid’s trembling voice was heard.

 

“I-it’s a misunderstanding, Madam Helena.”

 

“A misunderstanding? I saw it all. You spilled tea on my daughter and then giggled about it.”

 

Eric stopped in his tracks.

 

“If you keep acting out like that, I might just tell everyone what you’ve been doing with the coachman in the stables of the Duke’s mansion.”

 

The maid’s face turned pale.

 

“T-there’s no evidence!”

 

“Evidence? Who needs evidence? I can create evidence and witnesses from now on. What do you matter more to the Duke than the truth? It’s the honor of the dukedom.”

 

Helena leaned in close, right in front of the maid’s face, and said, “How dare you touch Helena’s daughter? You’re just an accessory to the Duke’s household. We’re both accessories, so let’s help each other from now on, shall we?”

 

As the maid collapsed to the ground in tears, Philip and Helena quietly made their way back to the duke’s mansion. They didn’t seem to notice that Eric had been watching them the whole time.

 

Emeline, who appeared to have been keeping watch near the back door, spoke as she saw the two return. “I told you to just let it go. What’s done is done.”

 

His mother’s words, that those who are kind should always be rewarded, echoed in his ears.

 

By that logic, Emeline was someone who had to be punished.

 

✵ ✵ ✵

 

Eric opened his eyes.

 

I stood next to the bed, looking at Eric, who was sprawled out with his hands and feet tied, and shook my hand.

 

“You’re quite the late sleeper, Young Master.”

 

Eric flinched and started shaking his tied hands. However, there was no way the strong restraints could be loosened.

 

“My, my. They sell all sorts of tools in the capital. Especially those that will satisfy the fantasies of noblemen.”

 

I pointed to the restraints holding Eric’s hands.

 

“Are you crazy? Why did you take my clothes off?!”

 

Eric groaned, looking down at his bare torso.

 

His well-built abs looked as if they were sculpted.

 

Wow.

 

These were certainly things you wouldn’t find on Philip. I couldn’t take my eyes off Eric as I spoke.

 

“Ever since the first time I saw you, Young Master Eric Orleans, I always thought you’d look better without your clothes on. Like this.”

 

Eric’s expression changed as if he was finally feeling a deep sense of dread. He seemed to realize where he was trapped.

 

This was one of the guest rooms upstairs in the Rose That Blooms at Night, a room with walls all around and a soft bed.

 

This was one of several lodgings with enclosed walls and soft beds on the upper floor of the night-blooming rose.

 

I sat next to Eric.

 

“As I thought. My instincts were right. You look much better like this than in that arrogant uniform, Young Master.”

 

When I tried to stroke Eric’s hair gently, he wriggled as if he was about to bite me. Whoa, scary. I must have tied up a wild beast, not a person.

 

I quickly pulled my hand back and tried to calm the Young Master down.

 

“Let’s relax a little and have a conversation, shall we?”

 

“A conversation? You knocked me out and tied me up!” 

 

Eric looked like he was about to lose it from frustration.

 

Ah, how unfair. I didn’t make him inhale the sleeping gas; he inhaled it himself. All I did was tie him up.

 

Carrying the unconscious Young Master Orleans had been such a struggle that my whole body was sore.

 

They say even doing bad things requires strength. I had only ever been the lookout when my mother and Philip did bad things, so my stamina had seriously declined.

 

“I don’t like swearing, but you’d better let me go while I’m still being nice, Lady Emeline.”

 

“You don’t seem like someone who’s good at swearing anyway.”

 

I scratched the tip of my chin and ignored Eric’s words. I didn’t have time to waste arguing with him. I looked at the window where the morning sunlight was starting to stream in.

 

Two days from now.

 

In two days, my mother would be dragged to her wedding with Duke Orleans, like a lamb to the slaughter.

 

I held up a document I had placed beside the bed and shoved it in front of Eric’s face.

 

“You know what this is, right? That’s why you took it. You must have snuck into the Duke’s office that day and stole it.”

 

Eric’s pupils dilated dramatically. But it was only for a moment. He quickly started searching for an excuse.

 

Instead of listening to his excuses, I walked around the room with the document and said, “I thought about it long and hard last night. Why would Young Master Eric Orleans steal a document that could be a vulnerability to his own family? And why would he come to a place like this with it? And what does this document have to do with Princess Ella, the political enemy of Prince Robert?”

 

I intentionally lowered my voice for the last sentence and made a finger-gun motion toward Eric. It was as if I was pointing a real gun at him now.

 

I narrowed my eyes and smiled at Eric. His face turned pale, and he looked at me as if he were about to throw up.

 

“Bullseye, huh?”