The Husband Who Keeps Showing Up

Thanks to the servants having cleaned up after the event, the mansion was immaculate. Just as Liam had promised, the travel bag that had been placed in Cecilia's grave sat on the desk in the study.

How on earth did that come back? It was almost beyond belief. Davion immediately opened the bag and checked it over for bloodstains first of all.

Wrinkled clothes, her well-worn romance novels, the treats for the animals she doted on like her own children — the contents tumbled out one after another. At the very bottom lay a wad of money tucked inside a paper envelope.

No bloodstains, at least. No medical supplies either — no bandages, no needles.

She was alive. Thank God, truly alive. In the flood of relief that washed over him, Davion pressed his face into Cecilia's blouse.

He could feel the warmth of her lingering in the fabric. He could catch the soft scent of her skin. It was a fragrance he had ached for beyond all telling.

The family seal he'd fastened inside the bag seemed to have done its work splendidly. Because of it, Davion believed without a shred of doubt that the bag had found its way back to his estate on its own.

Only belatedly did he count the money in the envelope. Roughly 950,000 Burnett. He had buried 1,000,000 Burnett as her burial travel money — it would be no exaggeration to say nearly all of it had come back.

If I'd lost this, I'd be all but penniless right now.

Barely a minute after his relief set in, he sank once more into deep anxiety.

Cecilia's health had been poor ever since the aftermath of her surgery. The last image Davion carried of her was of a woman lying in a sickbed. What if she needed a hospital urgently, and he had gone and lost her the money for it?

He didn't care where she was — he only wished he could send this money straight back to her.

"My lord."

Liam slipped in and quietly closed the study door behind him.

Davion hadn't even realized the door had been open this whole time. As he was tidying the bag's contents into neat order, Liam approached and drew a slip of paper from his pocket, handing it over.

"I obtained the address of the hotel the bag was mailed from, from the postman."

That saved him a trip to the post office. Davion promptly shut the bag and made to leave.

"We're going now."

"Perhaps a meal first, my lord? And you really ought to tidy your appearance. Publicly speaking, you are a man searching for his wife, are you not? If you go looking like this, you will certainly invite some unfortunate misunderstandings."

As he said it, Liam pointed at his own chin. Following his cue, Davion rubbed the back of his hand across his face, then belatedly let out a groan of realization.

A rough stubble rasped against his skin. He didn't need a mirror to know what a wreck he looked.

I've been showing Liam nothing but my lowest side lately. Embarrassed, he pressed a hand to his forehead and walked into the bathroom without another word.

Around eight o'clock, the two men got into the motorcar together and set off for the address on the note.

It was hardly the sort of upscale hotel frequented by people with money. Perhaps because of the early hour, the area around the reception desk was deserted, gathering nothing but dust.

A middle-aged man who looked to be the manager stood behind the desk counting money. His eyes lit up the moment two strikingly handsome men crossed his doorway. Davion, naturally — but even the coat Liam wore was from a top-tier luxury house.

Davion set Cecilia's bag on the counter and fired off his question without preamble.

"The owner of this trunk — do you remember what she looked like?"

Disappointment clouded the manager's face the moment he realized they weren't prospective guests. He lapsed instantly into indifference and answered in a tone that said everything was a bother.

"Don't remember."

Davion drew a photograph of Cecilia from his pocket and held it up.

"Look properly. White hair — she would have stood out, I assure you."

"The staff rotate by day here. And we get too many guests for me to remember each one."

"Then might I speak with whoever works the other days?"

"Of course. Come back tomorrow."

Liam, listening from behind, caught Davion by the shoulder and shook his head. With a manager this uncooperative, no day of the week would bring good news.

Money, though, fixes everything. Davion's fingers played over the bills in his pocket. But before he could draw them out, the hotel door swung open and a family with three children came in.

Liam took the bag from the counter in his stead and said sweetly, "It seems we should be stepping aside."

Davion, who had been reaching for his cigarettes without realizing it, met the eyes of one of the children and pulled his hand from his pocket. But just as he and Liam were walking out of the hotel, someone called him back from behind.

"Excuse me."

It was a small woman in a black skirt. The mop in her hands marked her unmistakably as one of the building's cleaners.

"If you mean the woman with the white hair — I remember her. The one with the scar on her face, right?"

Scar?

As Davion's brow furrowed, Liam stepped forward and offered an obliging smile. A capable big-city lawyer to his bones, he was remarkably adept at reading what people wanted to hear.

"Yes, that's her. The postman appears to have mixed up the address, and her lost bag was delivered to us instead. We thought we ought to return it to her."

"Oh, then you can just leave it here. Her husband comes by sometimes asking where the bag ended up."

……Husband?

Davion's expression darkened dangerously.

No. It couldn't be. The back of the woman he'd glimpsed at the inn flashed through his mind again. He had ruled it out — she had a husband, therefore it couldn't be her. But what if it truly had been her?

She'd barely left home — and in that time, Cecilia had remarried?

"Excuse me — sorry, but I have one favor to ask."

His patience finally at its end, Davion pushed past Liam and cut into the conversation. He scrawled a quick note on the slip where the hotel's address was written, then drew a pair of thousand-Burnett notes from his pocket and held them out to the cleaner.

"If that woman's 'husband' happens to come by, could you give him this?"

It was the most desperate plea he had ever made.

"Cissy! Your husband's here again!"

Someone shouted at the top of their lungs from outside the break room.

Cecilia, who had been tearing bread with the staff around a makeshift table, sprang up at once and grabbed her things. As she hurried outside in a fluster, the workers her age came piling gleefully after her.

"Darling!"

Arkan, sitting on the steps at the theater entrance reading a newspaper, waved a hand at Cecilia.

Cecilia's face went crimson in an instant. Behind her, a chorus of rowdy whistles erupted, along with shouts of "He's gorgeous!" Hoisting Arkan up by the arm, Cecilia shot the workers a sidelong glare and growled at him.

"I told you not to come! I just want to make money quietly, that's all!"

Angry as she was, Cecilia looked exactly like a ruffled hyena cub. Propping his crutch under his arm, Arkan was promptly sweating buckets.

"I'm sorry. But a husband can't just lounge around a hotel room eating three meals a day, can he? A man has to do something."

Arkan took her handbag from her. Cecilia glowered at him — then broke into a bright smile and waved to the coworkers seeing her off. They kept up their shrieking ruckus until Arkan turned the corner of the alley.

It had already been a month since he'd joined her. His wounds had healed considerably; he could now walk with ease on a single crutch.

To minimize their contact with the constables who patrolled every corner of the city, they took the back-alley shortcuts nearly all the time.

Cecilia fished the loose coins rattling around in her coat pocket and pressed them into the hands of an old woman sitting in a gloomy corner. The woman, who had been nodding off against the cold, took the coins in her wrinkled hands and said,

"Bless you, miss."

Cecilia smiled and fiddled with her left ear. The moment they stepped back onto the main road, Arkan let out the question he'd been holding in.

"I suppose you've always been unable to pass by someone in need, madam? You give money to beggars nearly every day."

"Oh no. I used to be a dreadful miser. Living with my husband changed me. He was raised wanting for nothing, you see — he understood the value of giving."

At her answer, however, Arkan's face twisted.

……A wife-beater who helps beggars?

That big a gap between his outside and his inside. He didn't know who the man was, but if he ever happened to cross paths with this woman's husband, he intended to beat him until his teeth fell out.

"What sort of work did your husband do? You needn't answer if it's an unpleasant subject."

"Oh, he was a soldier. Deployed twice overseas — to the Kalita region."

"I'm sorry — d-deployed to Kalita?"

Arkan very nearly toppled over backward. He whirled around to face Cecilia, his eyes gone huge as if about to pop out of his head, and shouted,

"I served there too!"