ITTWACP • NACP

Chapter 69

-Chapter 69-

"Wow, what is this?"

"Cliff!" Lizé greeted.

Cliff feigned admiration as he entered the room of unopened boxes.

Lizé, who had come home with a huge pile of gifts today, hadn't bothered to unwrap them and was staring blankly out the window.

"You look tired." Cliff observed.

"I guess I pushed myself a little too hard."

Sitting down in front of Lizé, who responded with a perky smile, Cliff scanned the stack of gifts.

"Killian has been trying to win your favor again today, hasn't he?"

She shakes her head. "It's not like that. All Killian cares about is Edith, so don't get that wrong."

"Really?"

"Yes. I should have just gone out on my own today, I feel like I've been bothering Killian for nothing......"

With a tired look on her face, Lizé turned her head again and stared out the window into the darkness.

Cliff wrapped his arms around her from behind and pressed his lips to the nape of her neck.

"Lizé."

"Yes, Cliff."

"Do you care about Killian?"

"I always care about Killian and Cliff all the time. I can't do anything for you, but-"

"You know that's not what I'm saying. I mean, can I be your one and only?"

His voice was sweet, but there was a hint of obsession and lust in it that Lizé knew he was trying hard to keep from boiling over.

"What do you mean, Cliff? You know very well that I love you."

"I know. I know but......" Cliff's golden eyes grew as cold as the moonlight on a winter's night. "I want you to trust me completely and rely on me alone, Lizé."

"I do."

"No, you don't. You're feeling some kind of way toward Killian right now," Cliff whispered, nibbling at Lizé's earlobe with his lips.

Lizé shrunk her shoulders in embarrassment, but her expression didn't change much.

"What are you talking about? Why would I-......"

"Sabina." Cliff cuts in. "Are you upset because Killian didn't care even after hearing about Sabina?"

Cliff was referring to the maid who had recently been going around telling the other maids that Edith had tried to kill Lizé.

"Sabina said she saw it with her own two eyes, that Miss Edith poisoned the embroidery thread she gave to me."

"Why did you not tell me that before?"

"T- that, I don't know, for she has suddenly disappeared......"

The maid who came to report Sabina's disappearance insisted that Edith must have had something to do with it.

But before Edith could be suspected, Sabina's behavior was strange.

She'd kept her mouth shut when they were investigating everything inside and outside the mansion to find the culprit, but now that they'd buried the case, she'd started talking about it.

Furthermore, there were questions about when and where she'd seen it, how she'd known what Edith was putting on it was poison, and how she'd known that the object Edith was putting something on was embroidery thread for Lizé.