The Jealousy Fight (2)
The young noblewoman sitting across from Ethan, chatting away merrily, felt her expression harden in record time. It didn't take her long to notice the drink being poured directly onto the crown of her head.
“Kya—kyaaaak?!”
Only belatedly sensing the sticky liquid trickling down her face, the nameless noblewoman rose from her seat, cradling her head in her palms—but by then, the sharp sting of alcohol was already wafting from her scalp.
“Ri, Lilith…?”
And there was Ethan, equally bewildered by my behavior, his eyes darting down in confusion.
My original plan had been to casually chase off the noblewomen who kept throwing themselves at him, then get into a fight with Ethan afterward. What I'd just done deviated from that script so completely that even he looked lost.
Yeah, it's a little—okay, a lot—different from the plan. Whatever. We're doing it this way now.
The moment I'd flipped an empty glass over a woman's head, chasing her off 'discreetly' had stopped being an option. The only silver lining was that I'd grabbed the white wine instead of the red, so at least her dress wasn't ruined.
For a split second I considered dumping the remaining red over her too, but decided that would be truly beyond salvaging—so I just drank the rest of it instead.
Huh, weirdly orange-ish for a red wine… eh, probably all the same.
So there I was, an empty glass in each hand, while the nameless noblewoman with wine dripping down her scalp glared daggers at me… ugh, whatever, I'm just calling her the White Wine Lady from now on. Too much effort otherwise.
Anyway, the White Wine Lady, still radiating the scent of white wine from the top of her head, shot a razor-sharp voice in my direction.
“Wh-what is the meaning of this?!”
“What.”
“…What, you say?”
“Yeah, you heard me right.”
Up until a moment ago I'd only been looking at her profile, but facing her head-on now, the pig intestines she'd been shoving at Ethan earlier suddenly seemed impossible to miss.
Fucking bitch. Fine, I set the stage so she'd seduce him, but there are lines you don't cross. Who told her to slobber all over something that isn't hers?
Okay, Ethan's technically not mine either, but still.
Why is my head so hot…? Is it the alcohol…?
Lilith's body surely couldn't be as much of a lightweight as Agnes or Nathalie. However strong a wine was, it was only so strong—no wine on earth should be able to get you drunk off a single glass.
Wait, were there wines that strong? I hadn't caught the label when I grabbed it earlier, though I vaguely remember something with a brand name printed on it.
Convinced the wine couldn't possibly be the culprit, I wiped my mouth off and locked eyes with the White Wine Lady in front of me. Either way, if I wanted to start a proper jealousy fight with Ethan, she had to go first.
“Wh-what is this insolence?! H-how can you douse someone in their drink and then stand there so shamelessly…!”
“Ah, sorry. My hand slipped.”
“A-a slip?! You call that a slip?!”
“It is, though. Just like how you shoved your pig-shit-stained lips at Ed was a slip, this was a slip too. Am I wrong?”
“Pig sh—d-did you just say what I think you said?!”
Why was it that noblewomen's catfights used the exact same playbook everywhere you went? The stale, predictable insults nearly pulled a yawn out of me.
Still, my original plan—spreading rumors of discord between me and Ethan far and wide—was flowing along nicely in one direction or another. The stares converging on me amid the commotion were practically palpable from every corner of the hall, without even needing to turn my head.
Sorry to the White Wine Lady for making her the unintentional sacrifice, but she'd been the one to pull that pathetic stunt on Ethan first. Call it her own karma coming home to roost.
“Shut your mouth. The pig-shit smell is vibrating.”
“Don't slander me! Wh-what has gotten into that filthy mouth of yours, anyway?! How can you call a person sh—excrement and…and—buttholes and such! As a noble young lady, aren't you even a little ashamed to lack the most basic refinement?!”
“Then I suppose cooing about whose breasts are bouncier to a man who's clearly spoken for counts as refined?”
“…Ha! So that's it—you were dragged here without even understanding what kind of gathering this exchange is! Come to think of it, with a filthy personality like yours, no wonder your fiancé has to come showing his face at events like this.”
I actually did know. This exchange was, quite openly, a venue for these half-witted noble boys and girls to score a night together, and in that market, a somewhat cruder approach tended to read as more attractive.
Telling the man you fancy to his face that 'you'd be surprised how impressive I am once the dress comes off,' or a noble heir bragging to a young lady that 'riding is my specialty—I can stay in the saddle six hours a day,' were among the more sanitized methods of showcasing one's charms. The more overzealous types, like this woman just now, went straight for the full-body approach.
By that logic, what the White Wine Lady had done to Ethan wasn't strictly forbidden at an exchange like this—but honestly, that wasn't the reason I was angry.
I'd been fully prepared to let her flirt with him for the sake of the operation. It was that mouth of hers. That she'd pressed it, fucking shove it against—
Ethan's.
…Somehow my head just wasn't clearing. Maybe I got too worked up, too immersed in the role.
“I can understand why Lord Blackwood would grow sick of a woman like you. What good are a pretty face and big breasts? The refinement and character a noble lady needs most are an utter mess.
From what I hear, House Rosewood is barely a baronetcy. The notion that the daughter of a mere baronet should play at being the fiancée of the Blackwood ducal house is laughable—”
Crash!
“KYAAAAAK?!”
“Ah, sorry. Wasn't listening. Mind saying that again? You're right—I come from a rootless little house and never got schooled in manners, so I'm terrible at controlling my emotions.”
Startled by the shattered glass at her very feet, the White Wine Lady stumbled back a step—and I still had one more empty glass in my hand.
“So then, why were you trying to touch another woman's man's lips? If you'd had the sense to back off gracefully, I wouldn't have gone this far. But no, you had to go putting that filthy mouth on—fucking—mine.”
“Ha! D-did you actually think I'd be frightened by something like this?! And I simply cannot comprehend on what grounds Lord Blackwood's lips supposedly belong to you!
You've managed to hide that violent temperament remarkably well until now, but as you can see, there are plenty of witnesses here to attest to your vulgar character! I'm sure Lord Blackwood himself will take this opportunity to break off the engagement with—”
“You want to know why Ed's lips are mine? Fine. Let me show you why.”
Whirl!
“Mmph?!”
Answering the drunkard's demand to prove whose mouth Ethan's lips belonged to, I grabbed him by the arm and pulled him toward me—and then, right in front of her, kissed him. Openly. Deliberately.
Mwah. Mwah.
“Mmph—hya, hyaah…”
And in case anyone planned to argue that a mere brush of lips didn't count as a kiss, I went for the deep kind, tongue and all, with absolutely nothing left to the imagination.
I devoured Ethan's lips with mine, ran my tongue along them, traded the saliva and breath pooled in our mouths with brazen, unapologetic explicitness.
Thankfully, Ethan caught on to my intent quickly, wrapping an arm around me and meeting my lips just as eagerly. When I snuck a glance from the corner of my eye, the noblewoman's expression was solidifying in real time.
We kept the demonstration up for a good minute or so, until the drunkard's endless chatter fell silent, and our lips glistened, slick and wet.
“Lilith, you smell a little strong. Was what you just drank wine, or was it Brandy—”
“There. See that? Now do you know whose Ed's lips are?”
“…”
“If you understood, then get lost. One more time—I catch you shoving that shit-hole mouth of yours at Ed even once more, and I'll stuff pig dung right into it.”
The noblewoman, frozen stiff in mortified shock, scrambled to collect herself and then fled from us in quick, jerky steps.
“F-fine! I'd taint my own refinement just spending another moment talking to a violent woman like you! G-go ahead then—dye each other's whole lives red or whatever color you like, see if I care!!”
“Wh… what….”
Dye each other's lives red or whatever color…? She definitely just said that, right?
Huh. She's less awful than I expected. Maybe I was a little too harsh on some poor girl who had no idea what was going on. Still, for a non-virgin, she's actually kind of a decent egg.
Once the nameless noblewoman vanished with her incomprehensible parting blessing, the stares surrounding us—every eye in the hall pinned on me and Ethan—hit all at once.
…Ah, right. The operation.
It had diverged from the original plan a little… no, a lot, but one way or another, I'd managed to draw reactions and seize everyone's attention. I'd made a bigger scene than scheduled thanks to my own impulsiveness, but hey—all's well that ends well.
Now all that remained was for me and Ethan to act out a jealousy fight in front of everyone, for me to storm off in isolation, and every preparation would be complete…
“…”
“Lilith?”
“…”
“Your face is red. Are you drunk, or…”
Whoosh!
“S-stay back! Don't come near me!”
God damn it. What's gotten into me all of a sudden?
I'd already felt like my head wasn't working right ever since downing that glass of wine, and now, with Ethan's face suddenly looming right in front of mine, I was thoroughly rattled.
It's worse because of that kiss just now, isn't it….
Granted, it was supposed to prove my relationship with Ethan to the White Wine Lady, but going that far, kissing him that openly, might have been a bit of an overcorrection.
No—honestly speaking, what anyone else thought of it didn't matter to me at all. I was just… embarrassed, in a dozen different ways, to be facing Ethan after what I'd done.
But I couldn't help it, could I? She was the one who'd gone and pressed her lips on him first, uninvited. I couldn't exactly just sit there and swallow that.
It was a genuine crisis—I'd come within a hair's breadth of having Ethan's lips stolen by some woman whose name I didn't even know, who might not even have existed in the game….
“…Ah.”
Right. Yes. Come to think of it, there was something I needed to say to Ethan.
The heat that had bloomed across my face cooled as quickly as if I'd stepped into a blast of winter air, and my newly leveled head began analyzing the near-disaster that had almost unfolded moments ago.
“Ed.”
“Yeah, Lilith.”
“I need to ask you about something. Just one thing.”
“…What is it?”
“Earlier. When I was gone, and that young lady pressed her lips to yours.”
“…Yeah.”
“…Why didn't you pull away? Why did you just stand there?”
It wasn't that I truly, desperately wanted to know.
It was only that—simply that—this seemed like a better way to open our staged quarrel than the topic I'd planned, something that would make the rift between me and Ethan look convincingly real.
“Lilith? Why would you suddenly ask…”
“…Answer me seriously, Ed.”
It was just a question. Nothing more than that.