After the Duchess Successfully Committed Murder

A cool, aloof widow who seems one way but is another, a master of fishing for attention x a wolfish, ruthless, black-hearted yet devoted pursuer (the domineering, old-fashioned ex-husband who seems barely human) Duke Villier was dead. He had fallen from his horse, and the startled animal had trampled his skull to pieces. The royal family could not believe that the “Sword of the Empire,” renowned for his ruthlessness and skill in battle, had died in such a ridiculous accident. They sent Reese to investigate. On Reese’s first day at the Villier family estate, the duchess, veiled in black, received him in the church. She was an extraordinarily beautiful, young, fragile widow. Her husband’s death seemed to have drained away all her vitality, leaving sorrow and fear forever hidden in her lake-green eyes. The first time Reese saw her, he thought of the tulips in the royal gardens last year, trampled and ruined by an early snowfall just as they had begun to bloom. The duchess said little. It seemed her throat had once been injured, and she always wore a black lace choker. When speaking to others, she kept her eyes lowered and her hands, covered in long silk gloves, folded neatly in her lap. Reserved, yet captivating. There were many rumors about the duchess among the Empire’s upper class. They said that when the couple married, she wore a full sixty kilograms of jewelry. They said she was timid and devoted, and wanted only to stay at the estate by her husband’s side. But when Reese lifted her veil, the face he saw was one he knew all too well, a face he had longed for day and night and hated with gritted teeth. Six years ago, in a desert city, he had gone there on behalf of the royal family to collect taxes. The governor, eager to curry favor with him, had presented him with a frail blond slave who had concealed his appearance in order to survive. The boy really had been beautiful. His status was low, and he seemed so dependent on Reese, as if he would let anyone do whatever they pleased with him. Reese admitted he had been bewitched. He bought the boy piles of jewelry and gold ornaments, and had even planned where to put him once they returned home. But that hateful little liar had fled that very night with all the gold and silver he could carry. Reese withdrew his hand and rubbed the lingering warmth between his fingers. He was not particularly interested in finding out how the slave boy from back then had become the lofty duchess. He only wanted to know how Lorin Shaliye would make up for everything that had happened. With that in mind, he smiled at the widowed Duchess Villier, his teeth gleaming white, like a male wolf slowly circling a succulent prey. Yet the flock of crows above the estate kept circling. The black birds watched everything inside the windows with blood-red eyes, keeping their gaze on the wife who had betrayed him and now meant to cheat on him. She had murdered her husband, then grown intimate with a man with whom she had been involved for years while still in deep mourning... The Villier family had never had a wife so wanton. He would give Lorin a lesson he would never forget. Widow fiction. The ex-husband and Reese Ilino are essentially the same person. Content warning: pregnancy and childbirth; the pursued is not what he seems. I just couldn’t find anything to read, so I decided to write a little myself. Theme: Don’t wait for the storm to pass. Learn to dance in the rain instead.