My Ex-Husband Came Back Crazy - Chapter 27

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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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Episode 27
Chapter 3. Upheaval (7)
The First Night of Marriage with Lucius was a disaster.
A night far too quiet, all the day’s heat now settled and gone.
Celia, fresh from the bathroom and having shed the heavy remnants of the wedding, stopped abruptly in her tracks.
At the far end of her gaze, bathed in moonlight spilling through the windowframe, Lucius sat perched at the foot of the bed.
He had abandoned his usual rigid posture, leaning back at an angle, one leg stretched out lazily with the other crossed over it—a posture that seemed wholly at odds with the weight of the night.
“What are you doing here?”
Lucius lifted his head as though noticing her only now, a beat too late.
Celia found herself holding her breath at the sight of his gaze—something weary in it, the boundary between iris and pupil blurred and indistinct.
In that moment, Lucius rose from the bed with deliberate steadiness and spoke.
“Because today is…… the First Night of Marriage.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
Celia made no effort to hide her displeasure, like a beast whose territory had been breached.
At the sharp edge to her voice, Lucius’s brow furrowed. The air in the room, lit only by a few candles, grew heavy and still.
They regarded each other in silence.
Though they had been together all day playing the part of marriage since early morning, it was only now that the other’s reflection appeared in eyes that had never once met.
“Don’t you think it’s strange to ask such a thing?”
He parted his lips briefly before continuing, his gaze cast downward.
Celia held herself rigidly upright, her fingers clenching the fabric of her robe. The cloth crumpled softly under the pressure, and at that small sound, Lucius’s attention shifted toward her.
“Either way, I’ve had to look at your face all day and I’m exhausted by it. Leave while I’m still being polite.”
Celia pushed past him and claimed the bed for herself.
Though he seemed to yield easily, Lucius soon stood gazing down at her for a long, measured time.
“……?”
His face, devoid of feeling, betrayed no expression.
Yet as the silence deepened, the light in his eyes shifted—subtly, but perceptibly.
Cold, and far too still…… there was something discordant in that gaze that made her swallow hard without meaning to.
‘What’s wrong…… why is he like that?’
He hadn’t looked entirely well even at the wedding, but now there was something beyond words—a profound wrongness about him.
She wondered if something had happened, but nothing came to mind except that she’d seen her father earlier.
‘Besides, why should I care how he feels?’
His silence always felt like a judgment, and it grated on her nerves.
At the same time, an inexplicable unease seeped beneath her skin.
In this room, where people had painted expectations and imaginings onto the words “First Night,” the mere fact of standing alone with him was causing her patience to drain away like sand through an hourglass.
“I’m not a beast. When a person speaks, you could at least pretend to listen.”
The moment she felt she could endure him no longer, her words came faster than her thoughts.
“Don’t you dare think that just because we’re married in name only, you can do with me as you please.”
Lucius’s gaze, which had been carefully directed elsewhere, suddenly fixed upon her.
As though captured—instantly, completely.
The air between them congealed in an instant. The room seemed to shrink, a sudden pressure bearing down.
“Remember that this marriage is a Contract and nothing more. In three years I’ll be gone from this wretched Windmere, and that’s final.”
As his gaze pursued her relentlessly, heat began to simmer in the depths of her chest. With each breath she drew, instead of cooling, it blazed hotter, swelling until she felt she might burst.
“The day I leave this place—I can barely contain my excitement. Do you understand?”
She raised her hand to her lips in an elegant gesture, her mouth curling into a scornful smile.
The instant those words left her lips, something shifted—as though a tightly sealed door had shattered from within. His pupils darkened, becoming murky.
The balance of power she had believed herself to hold reversed entirely in a single moment.
The smile that had clung to her lips vanished as if cut away.
“……Ha.”
A breath, low and slow.
Without thinking, she lifted her chin higher.
“Celia Brickwell.”
He, who had been so restrained until now, stepped forward.
His approach was measured and deliberate, though something raw lay beneath it.
The sound of his footfalls stretched out between them. Celia looked up at him, her own chin rising incrementally as he drew nearer.
As his shadow closed the distance, something unnamed and fearful suddenly coiled within her.
“……Lucius?”
An ill feeling swept across her.
“Lucius Windmere. You know as well as I do that this marriage isn’t real.”
Was he actually going to…… go through with the First Night?
The possibility she had set aside long ago suddenly surfaced, and color drained from her face. Her heart, which had been racing with alarm, stopped dead as though plunged into ice water.
“You—”
“Don’t come any closer……!”
As she backed away, her legs caught the edge of the bed.
Her balance lost, she fell backward onto the mattress. Without time to catch her breath, she lifted her head. The weight of his gaze looking down at her made her heart lurch.
Celia’s eyes darted desperately around the room.
There was nowhere to flee, and the door stood far behind him—escape seemed impossible.
‘Run? Me, running from Lucius?’
As though hearing something utterly repugnant, her face drained of all color.
Feeling the cold sweat trickling down her spine, she clenched her teeth. Her breath came jagged as she curled her frozen fingertips into fists.
“I said don’t come any closer……!”
And then—the table.
A faint gleam of silver caught her eye.
“Wait, let’s talk—”
The moment his shadow closed around her, Celia’s hand shot out, faster than thought. She didn’t realize what she’d grabbed until it had already left her grip.
Thunk!
The dull crack of metal tearing flesh rang out roughly.
“Ugh!”
The Silver Cheese Knife Celia had seized buried itself precisely in Lucius’s left shoulder.
It was, without question, a stroke of extraordinarily bad fortune.
The knife, slightly larger than her own hand, had been sharpened for cutting tougher cheeses, and under normal circumstances Lucius would have dodged it with ease.
A dark red stain spread rapidly beneath the fabric of his robe.
Only then did Celia realize what had left her hand, her eyes widening in shock.
Lucius furrowed his brow, but no sound escaped his lips.
“I told you not to come closer…… so why didn’t you listen to what I—”
To what I said……
Her voice, reflexively spilling from her mouth, became small as an ant’s. Her suspended hand fell uselessly.
Lucius drew a thin breath, his jaw tightening, as he removed the knife and looked directly at her.
“That filthy habit of yours, always acting before thinking—you really ought to break it, Celia Brickwell.”
Clang—
He hurled the knife onto the marble floor, blood droplets tracing an arc as they spattered—pat, pat, pat—across his robe and the bed.
“You’ve slapped my face and knocked me from a horse, but to think you’d draw a blade on me.”
Disregarding the blood spreading across his shoulder, he closed the distance in one stride. His large hand gripped her wrist roughly, lifting it into the air. Her arm swung helplessly, caught in his grasp.
“As if I wanted to be here—”
At the sheer volume of his voice, unfamiliar in its intensity, Celia flinched.
He didn’t finish the thought.
Her face had gone deathly pale before him—rigid eyes, trembling lips, even her fingertips frozen with shock. The sight of her silenced him entirely.
“It’s because of you! You’re the reason! Nothing like this was in our Contract. Why did you just come in here on your own……”
Her words came quick and desperate.
Her breathing resembled that of a cornered animal with nowhere left to flee, her eyes glinting with fear as she looked up at him.
Only then did Lucius understand what misunderstanding she had harbored.
“I was too harsh.”
He parted his dry lips.
“I wasn’t thinking clearly today…… No, that’s just an excuse.”
The strength drained from Lucius’s hand. Celia’s arm fell limply.
“If we sleep separately on the very first night, the whole point of this Contract falls apart. For the sake of keeping up appearances, I thought it would be better if we spent tonight together…… that’s what I came to tell you.”
Celia’s eyes wavered.
Was Lucius apologizing right now?
Why?
Her bewildered gaze flickered between his face and his bloodied shoulder.
“I won’t do anything. I have no intention of it.”
“You…… your wound—”
“I’ll take care of it myself—”
Her sight went dark.
His hand covered her eyes and pressed gently on her shoulder. She found herself sinking into the bed in an instant.
His hand covering her eyes was warm. With her vision blocked, she could smell the blood—the scent of iron hanging in the air, as though being drawn into her lungs with each breath.
“Go to sleep now, Celia.”
When he withdrew his hand, what she saw was Lucius Windmere in profile, his robe lowered from his shoulder, regarding his shallow wound with an unmoved expression.
***
“Do you mean that sincerely?”
Lucius drew closer, bending his finger to cup her chin from beneath.
His height was such that her neck always ached when she had to look up at him.
Celia squeezed her eyes shut and nodded.
“I won’t deny that your words sound sweet to me.”
When he spoke like that, she felt like someone who had come seeking to be held—it was mortifying beyond reason. Heat bloomed across her cheeks, spreading in a thin warmth to the tips of her ears.
“Do you realize what kind of face you’re making right now?”
Lucius traced the spreading warmth with his thumb.
When Celia met his gaze, lifting her eyes to his, his lips curved upward in a smile, as though he’d been waiting for exactly this moment.
“You look like you’d forgive me for anything I did.”

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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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