Peach of June - Chapter 8

Count Rosemond at least didn’t lie. He really treated me like a jewel.

He brought other women into our castle. Sadistic sex and orgy parties were rampant in the castle, but he didn’t do that to me.

The reason he couldn’t do that to me was that I was his ‘top jewel’. It’s not right to scratch a jewel.

He was afraid I would play with another man. While coveting other women and even bringing them into the castle, he locked me in my room. Like a jewel locked up in a safe.

He really made me just lie down and do nothing, as he promised. Not letting me do anything. I couldn’t get a step outside the castle.

What do I do in my room every day? I can’t do anything. There’s nothing to do but put on jewelry, try on clothes, and dress up.

When I tried to read the book, he took it. When I tried to write in my diary, he also took it.

He doesn’t care what I like or where I find joy. To him, I literally am a ‘jewel’ to be proud of, not a person. I’m just a woman who has to sit pretty and still. Reading and writing letters are also not allowed.

For a ‘jewel’, thoughts and opinions are a luxury. Everyone he hires with his money keeps an eye on me. Life is like hell.

He just collected me as if he were collecting precious jewels. I looked happy, but it was all acting.

A woman who shines like a jewel sitting next to him at various prom, palace events, and tea parties. A woman who lives in hell but sits gracefully with a smile.

Did I have to marry Antoine Güell like the first time?

No, I was very lonely in my marriage to him. Love seemed to sparkle for a moment and then disappeared. Poverty completely ruined my life.

So should I be content with my marriage to the Count of Rosemond now? Because I can use the money however I want?

Was this really the two men’s fault?

I didn’t know until the wedding that the name of Count Rosemond was Phil. It is natural to be unhappy because I married someone I don’t know well.

Isn’t this all my fault? It is my fault that I made the wrong choice. How stupid of me to fail at something as important as marriage twice like this?

So what choice should I make? Antoine? Rosemond?

Or the Duke Julien Renal, who didn’t even look at me?

On my fortieth birthday, the Count of Rosemond went on a honeymoon trip with his mistress, Camilla. I knew who he was going with and where he was going, but I pretended not to know and saw him off.

“I’m sorry, I happened to be on a business trip on your birthday. It’s dangerous, so don’t leave the house.”

“I heard that sister Bella is in critical condition after giving birth to her third child. I miss her and worry about my nephew and niece. Can’t I visit them for a while?”

“I told you to stay home.”

His eyes turned scary. I already knew I couldn’t go anyway. His attendants and servants will keep me stuck in this castle.

He hugged me lightly. Then he smiled proudly and kissed me forcefully. The smell of his body that lingers on me is disgusting. I can’t believe it’s a warm hug that I’ve longed for so much in my previous life.

Humans are very strange creatures. Even though we are so close like this, I feel like we are infinitely distant. I may look insanely happy, but I am dead inside.

Entering the jewel room he had decorated, I looked at the jewels that add up to millions of rubles.

He called on the best decorators in the empire to install chandeliers, candlesticks, and antique mahogany furniture to redecorate the castle. The lace maker promised to decorate my dress in the latest fashion with crystal beads and fine chemical lace from the capital.

These are all my happy fortieth birthday gifts, but I am not happy.

I tried on a new dress. A purple dress that tightly wraps around the waist and spreads below the waist makes my eyes more beautiful.

Lavender, which is not produced on this territory, is brought at a high price and grown everywhere. As Bella said, when surrounded by lavender, my eyes seem to shine a little bit purple. It is a dreamlike landscape.

Beautiful but sad eyes. My wavy and voluminous hair cannot be this shiny and luscious, unlike in my previous life when I was drenched in poverty.

But there’s no man to hug me tenderly. Do we really need kindness? Wouldn’t it be better to live alone?

Just once, please, just once, I want to live again. I wasted two golden opportunities by making a rash choice. I mean, I ruined my life with my own hands.

If I could go back to when I was seventeen, I would never marry anyone. I was too young to know it then. I thought I had to get married. I only learned that I had to choose a man and get married unconditionally in the magical summer and that there was no other option.

Now that I think about it again, there are other options. I just didn’t know at the time. I could have disobeyed my father and rebelled. He wouldn’t kill me, I am his daughter, though.

I didn’t have to marry anyone if my heart wanted no one. Please, please, I want to go back.

Wearing a beautiful dress that will amaze anyone, I looked in the mirror and silently pleaded. Next to the mirror is an expensive pale blue vase ordered from a southern country.

Lavender neatly planted in a pot is long dead. Lavender doesn’t last long in the weather here, and the maids have dried the flower from the beginning and left it in place. Just like Rosemond did to me.

Although it is dry lavender, the scent is strong. The dazzlingly strong scent of lavender pierced the tip of my nose again.

“You saved me, and you granted my wish, but why am I being so stupid?”

As always, flowers can’t answer. I closed my eyes for a moment and then opened them as I smelled the scent that comforted me in silence.

Someone is in front of me. This is not a jewel room.

“Leah, what are you doing? Do you sleep standing up?”

The fresh scent of lavender tickled the tip of my nose. It is in the middle of the lavender forest on Riverrun Island.

I sat down and cried. Sister Bella was perplexed.

“What’s going on? Leah, what happened?”

“Sister.”

“Why are you like this, Leah?”

“Sister, I was too frivolous.”

“Don’t cry, Leah. What are you thinking about? Come on, look, talk to your sister.”

My sister hugged me. She embraced me in her slender arms and patted my back. Yes. Even if it’s not a man, there are many people who will hug me; mother, father, and my dear older sister Isabella.

My third life has begun. I made up my mind.

“I will never marry again. I will live with my sisters on Riverrun Island for the rest of my life.”

This time, I will never ruin my life with marriage.