My Ex-Husband Came Back Crazy - Chapter 16

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 16
Chapter 2. A Complication (6)
Stepping into the garden with Lucius left behind, Celia found herself confronted with an unexpected scene.
“Evandor Brickwell!!”
At Celia’s harsh cry, the woman half-buried in his arms startled violently. Frightened beyond measure, she gathered her disheveled clothes and fled in a flurry of hurried steps.
From the space still thick with ragged breathing and whispered murmurs, Evandor unfurled himself like some beast, rising to his feet.
“Sister. Even if we are family, spying on your brother’s private affairs is hardly becoming behavior.”
“…Since when has the imperial garden been your bedroom?”
“Then shall we call it a nocturnal indiscretion?”
Evandor answered without the faintest trace of shame, as if propriety were a concept entirely foreign to him.
Celia, struck by the scandalous sight she’d stumbled upon, found herself unable to bear it and covered her eyes with both hands.
His formal tailcoat had lost nearly all function. The jacket slipped from his shoulders, one side draped in irregular folds, while his white shirt lay half-unbuttoned, exposing his chest. His exposed neck, traced with knife-sharp veins, was further emphasized by the necktie hanging limp and useless at his throat.
“Don’t be so angry. There’s nothing to be gained by dwelling on your adult brother’s romantic entanglements, is there?”
As he spoke with a smile, a deep, distinct dimple carved itself into his left cheek.
“You are the heir to Brickwell. Will you let your wandering and private conduct tarnish the family name?”
He grasped the dangling necktie and pulled it free, tilting his head as if her words were amusing. His eyebrows furrowed in mockery.
“And you, sister—can you say you are acting in Brickwell’s interest?”
Celia looked up at him as if not understanding his meaning. Evandor, having stripped off his damp gloves, fixed her with a colder gaze.
“You’re hardly in a position to lecture me right now.”
He gestured behind her with a flick of his eyes. His gaze traveled far off, toward the banquet hall where light still spilled through.
It was a subtle jab dressed up as reproach—suggesting she had no business censuring him when Lucius awaited her attention elsewhere.
“He manages well enough without me. He won’t be careless enough to let his memory loss slip—don’t worry about that.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about. Everyone knows Lucius’s temperament is such that he’d be unlikely to discover his lost memories anyway.”
“Then why are you telling me—”
“While he’s lost his memory, you should make him lean on you and you alone.”
……
“If this place is broken, think how confused and frightened he must be. You should comfort him, ease his pain, and make him see only you.”
Evandor tapped his temple twice with his forefinger, the gesture deliberate and measured.
Still without a shred of consideration, respect, or propriety—Celia trembled, as if grinding metal shards between her teeth as she spoke.
“No. I won’t do that.”
The laughter that had been playing at Evandor’s lips faded abruptly.
“You can’t be serious.”
“Not serious? You spoke of selling myself to Lucius—you couched it in flowery words, but I heard it. I won’t do such a thing. I will find what Father desires, but I will do it my way.”
“You would refuse an easy path when it’s offered to you?”
“When did selling one’s body and betraying one’s heart become easy?”
When Celia did not look away, the muscles running from Evandor’s neck to his shoulders gradually went rigid.
“Even if it were Father’s command?”
His other glove now removed, his hand touched her bare shoulder. What began as mere contact grew steadily firmer, and Celia’s eyes sharpened dangerously.
“…Let go!”
“It is Father’s command. A Logistics Commission—or failing that, if you could simply enfold that man within your skirts, how many things might change.”
As Celia twisted against his grip, Evandor’s expression grew colder by degrees, emotions draining from his face.
“Don’t think of resisting Father’s judgment. Even my patience has limits.”
He growled the words low and dangerous.
Damn it all—the magic word “Father” was steadily draining Celia of her defiance.
Only after Evandor had scraped away at her pride, drawing and drawing until blood came, did Celia finally yield. She pressed her lips together as if sealed with glue, crumpling the hem of her skirt in her fist—and only then did Evandor smile, a thin, satisfied smile.
“Sister, you don’t wish to disappoint Father either, do you?”
She turned, as if rotating on a pivot.
“Though I doubt Father would confine a grown woman to the wardrobe anymore, or drive her to the stables in winter as he once did.”
“…Don’t presume to dredge up the past.”
He paid her no mind and extended his hand, pointing the way toward the banquet hall where light still poured through the doorway.
Between the heavy scent of women’s perfume and the forceful grip of his hand, anger quietly crystallized across Celia’s face.
“Don’t make this difficult, sister. We’re simply talking about using a crippled Lucius. If you just do as Father asks, there’s no reason those pretty eyes of yours should ever cry again.”
“Evandor Brickwell!”
He finally withdrew his hand from her shoulder and, with that same force, shoved her away.
“Think of Brickwell. Nothing else. No schemes.”
Celia lost her balance for a moment and nearly stumbled on the stone floor.
As she righted herself, Evandor—his back to the moon—drove one hand deep into his pocket and waved the other lightly in dismissal.
“Remember what matters.”
***
Once Celia had gone, the smile drained from Evandor’s face, leaving it cold and empty.
He watched her receding figure until it diminished entirely into shadow.
“Young master, what do you intend to do?”
A servant who had been watching from the shadows emerged to ask him.
Evandor, designed by the iron discipline of Brickwell to suppress emotion and obey command alone, withdrew a well-aged cigar from his pocket. The servant waited with dutiful patience for his answer.
“Leave her be.”
“But—”
“What, do you mean to go to Father and tell him his daughter is disobeying orders?”
Evandor, the cigar between his lips, raked his fingers through his hair and asked coldly. The servant flinched at the sharp edge in his voice and stepped back.
He drew deeply on the unlit cigar. His cheeks hollowed, dark shadows settling into the curve.
“She’s acting without thinking again, thrashing about. Leave her alone. This time, let’s see how far she’ll go.”
He’d quit the habit years ago, back in his youth. Yet whenever troubled thoughts soiled his mind, he found himself gnawing the end of a cigar like this.
“Young master……”
“Father will learn of it soon enough anyway. I have eyes scattered throughout Windmere. Let it be for now.”
A father’s chains cannot be shaken off so easily.
Celia, unable to acknowledge this truth, had endured countless “lessons” under Brickwell’s strict discipline.
Locked in the wardrobe as penance, forced to sit at meals and given only scraps left by the family, forbidden to speak, made to kneel for hours on end.
It would have been simpler to submit.
Thanks to his sister, Evandor had learned the value of easy surrender.
He had witnessed every consequence she paid for defying Father—witnessed it all—and could not bring himself to make such a choice.
“Oh my, Lord Evandor?”
“What are you doing here?”
A group of young noblewomen passing through the garden caught sight of him and burst into delighted laughter.
Heedless of his disheveled state, they approached and easily buried their faces against his chest, draped their arms around him, and spilled sweet whispers from between their rouged lips.
“…Just been abandoned, I’m afraid.”
“A lie!”
“We’ll believe it anyway! Why don’t you come enjoy ourselves with us?”
Evandor shook the cigar lightly from between his lips and tilted his head back. His blue eyes gleamed like a quiet lake against the cascade of stars.
“No, I’m not in the mood for it.”
Evandor turned away from hands that would ordinarily have delighted him.
A blind moth that flies into the flame again and again, knowing full well its end—that was his sister, Celia Brickwell.
She had always been this way since childhood.
Before Father, she never wilted easily; she always met his gaze directly, brazenly unyielding. All young Evandor could do was stand quietly behind her, holding his breath.
“Damn it all.”
Cunning and malicious, my sister is more ruthless than anyone.
“She has a gift for darkening one’s mood.”
A talent for rendering him pitiful—keeping him in this drowning stillness, accomplishing nothing.
Between the thick perfume and the acrid smell of cigars, Evandor quietly closed his eyes as if sinking.
***
“Foul mood” hardly began to describe it.
Pushed back into the banquet hall by Evandor, Celia carried her unresolved fury and cast a cool eye across the room.
Yet the atmosphere in the hall seemed somehow more turbulent than when she had left. The looks people cast her way carried an edge different from usual—a subtle, strange current.
‘What is this?’
But she soon recalled her original purpose: finding Lucius.
He was always surrounded by a swarm of people eager to curry favor, so she thought she would spot him easily enough.
“Lady Celia…! Or rather, the Princess of Windmere.”
Just as she was turning toward where the crowd seemed densest, someone called her to a halt.
Celia turned at the tedious address, her expression flickering with mild irritation.
And upon recognizing who had spoken, a thin wisp of surprise crossed her face.
“It has been so long. Is this the first time we’ve met since our engagement was dissolved?”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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