179 - The Evil Husband (15th Anniversary Edition) Chapter 179
179
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Aileen bit her lip tightly. But tears flowed again. Cesare naturally licked away the flowing tears. He lightly pecked her cheek, and she involuntarily turned her head away. Cesare asked in a languid voice.
"Don't you want to kiss?"
Aileen whispered, tears still streaming down her face.
"I don't want to..."
But it was a meaningless answer. Cesare kissed her even as he heard her refusal. Aileen, too, accepted his lips without avoiding them.
He bit her lips roughly, almost violently, and thrust his tongue inside. Aileen barely managed to inhale and exhale, not knowing how to breathe.
Throughout the kiss, Cesare looked at Aileen. His eyes, trying to capture everything without missing a single detail, were not those of the Cesare Aileen knew.
Gone was the gaze of the perfect and arrogant hero of the Traon Empire, Archduke Erzeht. Gone, too, was the leisurely and relaxed way he looked at Aileen. She was unfamiliar with this man who revealed his rupture without hiding it.
Aileen still couldn't believe it. Not his love, nor the reality of the present.
Her feelings for Cesare were so natural, but she thought the opposite could never exist. And now Cesare was dying because of her.
The weight of the truth that had poured out overnight was too heavy. Aileen just wanted to deny everything. If only she could turn back time, too. If only she could go back to before Cesare chose to abandon himself...
Her thoughts were cut short.
Cesare gasped for breath. He looked down at Aileen with flushed eyes and smiled.
"You still haven't given up."
He placed his hands on either side of Aileen's head and moved his body slowly.
"There's no way, huu, to turn it back, Aileen."
Aileen struggled. Her body, already heated, awakened pleasure too easily and quickly.
She flailed her hands in dizziness, but the only thing she could grab was Cesare in front of her.
Aileen clung to Cesare's arm and moaned, sobbing. Cesare's smile deepened as she uttered a moan filled with pleasure.
"Or... will you also perform a Burnt offering for the gods? Sacrificing dozens, hundreds of lives as living sacrifices?"
Aileen, who had been struggling slightly, stiffened. Her legs, which had been awkwardly curled up, stretched out straight. She stretched her toes straight and trembled, and the Shackle hanging from her ankle jingled.
Aileen slowly turned her head back through her dazed consciousness. As if waiting for it, Cesare pressed his lips to hers.
Cesare quietly sucked on her lips and licked the roof of her mouth with his tongue. The kiss was endlessly gentle.
When their lips parted for a moment, Aileen slowly closed and opened her eyes. And she bit the flesh inside her mouth hard to feel the pain. She desperately hoped it was a dream, but all of this was still a vivid reality.
"Cesare..."
Cesare quietly gazed at Aileen. He waited, knowing that the words coming from Aileen were not what he wanted to hear.
"I will definitely... save you, Cesare. Somehow..."
"No, Aileen."
A twisted smile formed on his lips as he uttered a cruel declaration.
"You must not do anything."
The words he uttered without hesitation, knowing that Aileen would be hurt, were sharp. Cesare thought that she would surely be in pain, perhaps even look at him resentfully.
But the tearful golden-green eyes did not waver in shock. Rather, they firmly set their resolve and looked at Cesare.
"Even if you say that... I won't give up."
She looked like a sprout that would never be broken, no matter how much it was slashed and trampled. Aileen said with her plump lips.
"You raised me like this, Cesare..."
A hollow laugh burst out, and strength entered his hand.
He knew. She said she would save him, but there was nothing Aileen could do. Aileen, who had grown up with a good nature, could not harm others. Her slender body was not strong enough to take someone's life.
There was no way that Aileen, like that, could stain her hands with blood to perform a Burnt offering to the gods. Even if she miraculously performed a Burnt offering, there was no way to save Cesare. Because all the deals had already been made.
Cesare, too, had briefly harbored the same desire as Aileen. A desire to continue his life with Aileen without paying the price to the gods.
How could he not be greedy? In the returned time, he had Aileen. His desire to watch her future as the Grand Duchess and a pharmacist of renown was more than earnest.
Thus, he tried to block the way for the gods to intervene in human affairs, but the gods sent a warning to Cesare by destroying the Pantheon. A warning that Aileen's life would not continue unless the price was paid.
When he saw the ruins of the collapsed Pantheon, Cesare abandoned his desire for life. He was now fully prepared for death.
Even the great Archduke Erzeht had to follow the fate given by the gods as a mere human. So Aileen could not save him either. Of course, she would not be able to defy the gods.
Why? Looking at the golden-green eyes that were staring at him with firm determination, Cesare wanted to believe Aileen's words.
It felt as if her words that she would fight against the gods and save him with her small and delicate body would really come true. Even though it couldn't be.
Futile delusions were the most distant and miscellaneous thoughts in Cesare's life. He always preferred logical and clear things. But when he saw Aileen, he kept harboring strange hopes.
Just as Aileen believed that The Prince, His Grace the Grand Duke, would save her in any situation...
To hide his weak hope, Cesare made the golden-green eyes blur.
Cesare reached out with his other hand and turned Aileen's head back. He looked into the golden-green eyes that had completely lost their reason and blurred, and kissed her.
Saliva was flowing from her lips, which were untidily parted. He licked the clear saliva and put his limp, protruding tongue back inside. He greedily ravaged her mouth, licking her weak palate and probing her soft uvula.
Aileen did not immediately regain her senses. She only trembled intermittently and panted.
Covered in his traces, Shackles on her ankles, Aileen lying on the bed in the Grand Duke's Residence was more than satisfactory. He felt an urge to stay with Aileen forever in this perfect space, untouched by anyone, like the Brick house in his dream.
His world was always perfect if only Aileen existed. Just like in his dream.
"Cesare..."
But Aileen always brought him back to reality. Hearing her voice calling him, Cesare willingly responded.
"Yes, Aileen."
Even though they had mingled their bodies to the point of fainting, Aileen still had eyes that did not give in. Even if he tormented her more, made her cry, and made her a mess, she would look at him with the same eyes. She would shine her golden-green eyes with futile hope until the end.
As Aileen said, she was the child he had raised. Cesare confessed sweetly.
"I love you."
Aileen did not respond to the tender whisper. But it was okay.
