Chapter 25
“Thank you, Alice.”
Alice had hidden Juan in the carriage and brought him secretly into the mansion.
There was only one reason.
‘Yes, I can’t let my uncle leave like this.’
It was for reconciliation. For the family.
‘Right. Surely, once Father calms down, he’ll regret kicking Uncle out like that.’
Therefore, she had to stop such a thing from happening.
It was something only she could do.
To soothe the family discord. Something only a person who was both good and strong could achieve.
‘In this house, I’m the only one who can do it.’
As she thought this, a surge of energy began to bubble up within Alice. It was enough to make her forget that the Moonlight Flower business had failed.
And that wasn’t all.
Hadn’t they said it was none other than Uncle Juan who led the crash in the price of the Moonlight Flowers?
She just had to take her uncle back and present him before everyone. Then, all his misdeeds would be revealed.
The arrows of blame would all turn toward him.
Her heart broke just imagining it, but that was the path to realizing justice.
“Just trust me, Uncle.”
Alice squeezed Juan’s thick hand, her eyes sparkling.
“If you wait in my room for a moment, I’ll bring Father or Mother right away.”
“Yes, I’d be grateful if you did that, Alice,” Juan said with a moved expression. “I shall wait here quietly.”
Naturally, Juan did not wait quietly.
As soon as Alice disappeared from sight, he slipped straight out of the room.
‘My brother-in-law will just kick me out again.’
No, he might actually kill him.
Karl had said he would kill him if he ever saw him again.
Juan knew very well what Karl Winzer was like when he was a soldier.
During his military days, Karl was cruel and merciless. He was famous for going out of his way to chase down fleeing enemies just to cut off their heads.
Some even spread malicious rumors that he enjoyed killing.
He lived now as if those days had never happened, but a person’s true nature didn’t just vanish.
In other words, Karl was a man who was more than capable of killing his own brother-in-law!
‘No, Juan Rolland isn’t going to end like this!’
There was still a way to survive.
The Love Potion.
If he could just get Danae to consume it somehow, all the failures he had suffered so far would return to zero.
No, what was zero? He would reach a peak like never before in his life.
Gold and silver treasures he had never even touched would come pouring in.
‘Yes. This is actually for the better. This Juan is a man meant for great things. I’m not a vessel meant to work under a mere brother-in-law.’
So, he braved the risk and headed toward Danae’s bedroom.
However.
“Did you hear?”
He heard the voice of a servant in the hallway!
Juan quickly concealed himself behind a pillar.
“I heard Lady Alice sold Moonlight Flowers to her friends.”
What?
“I heard that too. She sold them for money to the friends who attended her tea party, didn’t she?”
Fortunately, the voices gradually drifted away. They didn’t seem to have noticed Juan’s presence.
‘What did I just hear?’
Behind the pillar, Juan’s lips twitched.
Alice, that cheeky brat. She’d been going around selling Moonlight Flowers behind everyone’s back?
And after doing such a thing, she had the nerve to look down on him?
What would happen if this fact became known?
He briefly considered ways to punish Alice, but soon let the thought go.
‘No. The priority is getting my hands on Danae.’
He crept toward her bedroom on his tiptoes.
After that, he miraculously didn’t bump into anyone else.
‘Heavenly luck is on my side!’
He stealthily opened the door to Danae’s bedroom and stepped inside.
Danae was standing by the window, looking out.
‘This is it!’
He salivated at the sight of her elegant back.
Now, she was his!
“Don’t scream.”
He lunged at Danae from behind. He whispered as he gripped her slender neck tightly.
“If you scream, I’ll shoot.”
Then, he pressed a hard pistol firmly against her lower back.
He felt her delicate body tremble.
That sensation heightened Juan’s sense of exhilaration.
He should have done this sooner.
She was just a girl.
A girl he could overpower with strength, yet he had taken such a long, roundabout way!
“You shouldn’t have ignored my love, Danae.”
Keeping the gun pointed at her, Juan hurried to fumble through his pockets. He intended to pull out the Love Potion.
“This is what happens when you play with a man’s heart. You shouldn’t have trifled with my love!”
Damn it, where was the bottle!
Perhaps because the potion bottle was so small, it wasn’t easy to grab.
“Love, you say?”
Danae spoke up then.
“You have the nerve to package it as love when you’re just after my fortune.”
“Shut your mouth! How dare a mere girl speak so insolently to her husband, who is like the heavens!”
He spat out the harsh words, shoving the muzzle of the gun harder into Danae’s back.
He expected her to be terrified by now, but.
“A husband like the heavens… You certainly dream big.”
Is she laughing?
Juan stopped searching for the bottle and looked down at the top of Danae’s head.
Did she just laugh?
“You.”
Is this girl looking down on me?
“You think I won’t shoot?”
Danae looked up at him with a thin smile. And then.
“Yes.”
She narrowed her eyes into a smile.
“Because you’re a coward.”
“What?”
“Do you even have the guts to pull the trigger? Do you have the confidence to deal with the consequences?”
Juan’s cheek twitched.
He was being looked down upon. By a girl much younger than him.
He was being completely disregarded by a girl the age of his niece.
Just like the many family members who had ignored him, like the many women, like the many people!
“You!”
Suddenly, something inside his head seemed to snap.
“You damn girl, how dare you look down on me!”
Blinded by rage, Juan grabbed Danae’s hair roughly with one hand.
“I can kill you! A fragile little thing like you, I can kill you even without a gun!”
He gripped her hair even tighter as if to flaunt his strength. Danae furrowed her brows as if in pain.
That gave Juan a sense of pleasure.
Yes. How do you like that? This Juan is strong. I can easily overpower a girl like you with my own strength!
However.
“You’re pathetic.”
The voice that came out the next moment was full of ridicule.
“It seems strength is the only thing you have to show off. And even then, only against a woman weaker than you.”
“What did you say?”
“The way you look so proud of yourself is quite a sight, Juan Rolland.”
Danae glared straight at him and laughed.
“If I were you, I’d be so embarrassed I’d want to shoot myself in the head with that gun.”
This wench!
Juan completely lost his mind. He yanked her hair mercilessly and slammed the muzzle of the gun against her white temple.
Should he just shoot her now!
At the very moment that impulse surged.
Bang!
From somewhere—from somewhere far, far away—the sound of a shot rang out.
Juan froze for a second. What was that sound just now?
“Aaaaaagh!”
The realization came a beat late.
Splurt, splurt. As red liquid erupted from his shoulder, Juan realized.
He had been shot!
“Argh!”
In that instant, Bang! Another faint sound of a shot, and a bullet embedded itself in the exact same spot.
“Aaaaaaaagh!”
Two bullets had pierced precisely the same point. It was a pain as if his very bones were being burned. Juan collapsed right there from the excruciating agony.
“He-heek, huff.”
It hurts. It hurts. It hurts so much. I feel like I’m going to die. It feels like my arm is being severed.
Juan gasped for breath, curling his body inward.
What was it? What happened? Where did the bullet come from?
This was a high floor. There was nothing outside the window.
—No.
Across the window, in the distance, there was another window.
He fired from that distance?
And he hit the exact same spot twice?
That was the last thought Juan could process.
He lost consciousness right then and there.
