Living as the Villain’s Stepmother - Chapter 211

The darkness of nighttime made its way to the garden as Lila sat behind her desk. In contrast to earlier, she hated how quickly time was passing by.

Usually, she would finish around 10 documents in this time frame but now she had barely gone through one. Her desk was a mess of unsigned documents.

“Nothing’s helping,” she said out loud.

The work she normally enjoyed became a tedious task she wanted to postpone. Her mind was already preoccupied.

She dug her face into her hands at the end between all the documents and sighed deeply.

Is it really the right call to reveal my plan to Hizette, or should I stick to not giving him the entire story?

Making decisions was always tough. The uncertainty of the decision made and the fear she had to face in the future made her hesitate. She couldn’t push it back forever though. If she took too long Hizette would start checking up on her to make sure she hasn’t escaped yet.

If I don’t go out, then would Hizette report what I told him to Lacias right away? Or would he quietly come to find me again?

There was no reason to be risky. If even the slightest hint was given to Lacias then he would immediately realize her plan thanks to his sharp intuition, and he would most likely assign someone to follow her.

After going through the situation in her head one more time Lila stood up. “Let’s just face it for now.”

In the end, Lila was suitable for dealing with these situations and her suitability shined through when it came to talking with other people.

“Where are you going, ma’am?” The young voice of a maid stopped Lila’s train of thought as she walked out of her office.

Lila cursed in her head; she was wearing a shawl that was clearly meant for leaving the mansion.

“I have a bit of a headache so I’m going to go for a walk. I’ll come back soon so you don’t have to follow me.”

“You’re saying you have a headache?” she asked in a worried tone.

“It’s just a mild headache from work stress so I was hoping you wouldn’t report it to the duke.”

If Lila didn’t add this, the news of her headache would become an unfixable illness to Lacias’s ears.

The maid’s face became visibly relieved after hearing this. She seemed happy to not have to report such news to the duke.

“Ok then, could you tell me how you feel after coming back from the light walk?”

“Will do,” she lied.

Lila surprised herself with how easily she lied to the maid. It was almost as if she had been lying her entire life.

*

The cold outside air made Lila shiver. She was too used to the comforting warmth of the mansion. She wrapped the shawl around her shoulders and headed toward the garden.

She didn’t specify where they would meet but knowing Hizette, Lila knew he would hide where she was likely to show up.

She decided to walk to a secluded part of the estate instead of waiting for him to show up. After taking a few steps Lila suspected someone was following her so she quickened her pace. Her suspicions were confirmed when she heard another pair of footsteps behind her, so she turned around to face them.

“Did you tell Lacias as little as… Hizette, what happened to your face?”

Lila raised her voice in between her sentence. One of Hizette’s cheeks was bruised in purple.

“It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing. Did you get hit?”

Lila stretched out her hand towards Hizette’s cheek. Right before her hand touched, Hizette moved his head away.

“Touching my face could be a little… Sorry.”

Lila didn’t realize it hurt him that much. “Oh, my apologies.”

“I wasn’t hit. Just a vein popped.”

Lila had a confused look on her face. “Huh? Why would a vein pop all of a sudden?”

“….” For some reason, Hizette wasn’t expecting her to follow up on that question.

“It’s obvious that it happened after you met Lacias one-on-one so why won’t you tell me?”

Hizette clenched his teeth unnoticed as he saw Lila cross her arms and her eyes becoming colder. “Seems like my Lord became angry due to my poor choice of words and burst my ear area. It happened so fast that I couldn’t dodge it.”

“What kind of poor choice of words?”

“It’s not something that happened today so you don’t have to worry about it. It was just something personal.”

He seemed to be telling the truth so Lila decided to not press on it further.

“So what was that you said earlier? I kept thinking as I was waiting for you. But no matter what I thought about I knew it could only mean one thing.”

Lila frowned without realizing it, she was hoping he would find an excuse in his mind. “Why do you want to hear it from me? If that’s what you think so be it. It’s not something you want to be involved in, trust me.”

“I have a duty to protect you.” Hizette restated.

“You have plenty of duties that don’t involve me so why are you being so sensitive about me.”

“Am I overreacting? Not knowing my place?” Hizette answered with a heated voice.

Lila felt that wasn’t how Hizette normally reacted to her words. “Yes. It seems like you don’t know your place.”

“…Then I’ll keep on going for a bit.”

So he never planned on staying in his place. Lila smiled, she had a small feeling inside of her that Hizette wanted to help her but she wasn’t sure.