By Zephyria 
It felt as if a sudden north wind had swept past her back. A chill ran down her spine, and her entire body seemed to shudder. Veronica realized that she had finally fallen into a trap of fate….
“Penelope, Penelope.”
Suddenly, the Count’s voice pierced through her delusions. Startled back to her senses, she found the Count in front of her, snapping his fingers—snap, snap—with a frown on his face.
“D-Duke, no, Count.”
Hurriedly returning to reality, Penelope stammered her response, her arms flailing frantically as she continued.
“B-Bliss Miller? What… who is that? I have absolutely no, no idea who that is, sir. A m-m-misunderstanding! Truly, I tell you!”
Good grief, she’s broken.
Cassian looked down at the housekeeper, who was spouting nonsense without rhyme or reason, his brow furrowed. She must have been so shocked that she was using English that sounded like it belonged in the 18th century, mixing in random dialects, and unable to even utter a single word properly. Her mind must have become a jumbled mess of lines from the dramas she so loved and enjoyed. With a sigh, Cassian spoke.
“Penelope, calm down.”
He continued coldly toward the housekeeper, who was still frantic and at a loss.
“There is only one answer I want. Just tell me about Bliss Miller.”
“I, I don’t, don’t kn—”
Driven by a sense of crisis, the housekeeper tried to keep denying it. However, Cassian glared at her with a chilling gaze, grinding his teeth.
“Think carefully. If you cannot convince me, you will have to take responsibility for it, Penelope.”
At those words, Penelope snapped awake as if she had been splashed with cold water. He was serious. Cassian Strickland, Count Herringer, truly knew everything. Deceiving him and playing dumb would no longer work. Realizing this, Penelope turned pale and collapsed onto the spot.
“C-Count! I’m sorry! Please forgive me, I was wrong! I have committed a mortal sin…!”
Seeing the elderly woman burst into loud sobbing, Cassian felt bewildered, yet simultaneously felt a wave of guilt and pity.
“…Sigh.”
In the end, he let out another deep sigh. In short, all he wanted was for those capybaras to tell him where they had hidden the apples or carrots. He wasn’t asking her to confess where terrorists had hidden their weapons or who their leader was.
And yet, here she was, wailing as if the world were ending, begging for forgiveness.
“Alright, so get up, Penelope.”
“Waaaaah, waaaaah!”
“I said get up. You’ll actually get sick if you cry like that.”
Ultimately, overcome by pity, Cassian reached out his hand to her. Sobbing and hiccuping, Penelope took his hand and dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.
“Thank you for forgiving me. As expected, the Count is so broad-minded… hic.”
“I get it, now sit down.”
As he patted Penelope’s shoulder and guided her to the sofa, she sniffled and obediently sat where he told her to. Cassian sat facing Penelope and poured a glass of water, placing it on the table for her.
“Thank you, Count.”
She sniffled and gulped down the water. In that moment, Cassian’s gaze happened to fall on the handkerchief she had placed on the table, and his eyes stopped. There wasn’t a single wet spot on the handkerchief. When he looked back at Penelope’s face, contrary to the gesture of setting down the cup with a sniff, her eyes were perfectly clean.
These crazy capybaras.
As he let out a deep sigh of self-loathing for being fooled again, Penelope, who had been tapping her face with the bone-dry handkerchief, spoke cautiously.
“Um, but Count.”
When he glanced at her as she tentatively broached the subject, Penelope asked with a servile smile.
“Um, when and how did you find out? I mean, that…”
To Penelope, who couldn’t bring herself to speak plainly and kept reading his mood, Cassian answered bluntly.
“I knew from the start that that brat was Bliss Miller.”
“F-from the start?”
Penelope let out another shriek—heeek! This time, it sounded like a scream born of genuine shock. Only then did Cassian relax slightly, straightening his posture to face her. Right, let’s focus on the matter at hand first.
“Now, tell me honestly. You knew from the start too, didn’t you?”
Penelope opened her mouth as if to say something, but soon lowered her head with a defeated expression.
“Yes, I knew.”
The answer came back obediently. Sensing that she wouldn’t lie anymore, Cassian thought, As I suspected, and asked again.
“Then why did you hire him? You must have known that Bliss Miller isn’t the type of person to do menial chores like this.”
“Yes, yes. Of course. He is the youngest son of the Miller family, after all. But there were special circumstances, so it couldn’t be helped…”
Penelope trailed off and let out a deep sigh. Seeing her expression fill with sorrow, Cassian asked with a frown.
“And?”
“Pardon?”
Startled, Penelope looked up at him. Cassian, still knitting his brows, stared at her and repeated the question.
“And, I asked what those ‘special circumstances’ were. Doesn’t that mean you hired him knowing his identity because of them? Just how incredibly special were these circumstances that you hired him—even going so far as to hide his identity from me?”
This time, Penelope couldn’t even scream. Seeing the elderly woman staring at him with a pale face and an open mouth, Cassian could predict what came next.
“Count, that is…”
Penelope dabbed her eyes with the handkerchief again, but Cassian’s reaction was cold.
“Don’t think you can brush this off by crying, Penelope. It won’t work.”
At the cold warning, Penelope paused and slowly lowered the handkerchief. I guess it doesn’t work twice, she thought to herself, finally letting out a sigh of surrender.
“The reason Bliss Miller came here was because of you, Count.”
“I knew it.”
“Pardon?”
When Penelope blinked at the low mutter, Cassian waved his hand as if to say it didn’t matter.
“Continue.”
Penelope tilted her head in confusion but continued speaking.
“Bliss said he came because he wanted to see you one last time. His feelings were so poignant that I had no choice but to help…”
“I’m asking why.”
Cassian’s patience had run out. When he finally spat the words out while grinding his teeth, a startled Penelope swallowed hard and spoke as if resigned.
“Bliss is getting married soon.”
“Married?”
Cassian was genuinely surprised by the sudden news. Penelope continued, “Yes.”
“It seems there is a fiancé arranged by a promise between the families. It looks like he plans to marry that person immediately upon returning to America.”
Good heavens. Cassian felt a surge of sympathy from the depths of his heart.
Poor soul, to be married to that crazy capybara.
Offering his condolences to a man whose face he didn’t even know, he murmured.
“That’s truly unfortunate.”
“Right?”
Seeing her chance, Penelope quickly jumped in.
“I mean, an arranged marriage while having someone he loves. How anachronistic! It’s truly unfortunate, isn’t it? So pitiful! Oh, such a tragedy…”
“And?”
“Pardon?”
As she began dabbing her eyes with the dry handkerchief again, Cassian cut off her lament.
“And, why did that brat come here? I’m asking why you hired Bliss Miller, even telling me such ridiculous lies.”
This time, Penelope couldn’t answer immediately. Blinking as she looked at Cassian as if she were speechless with absurdity, she eventually asked in a lamenting tone.
“Goodness, Count. Do you still not realize?”
“Realize what, exactly?”
Penelope resisted the urge to beat her chest and burst out in anger.
“Of course he wanted to see the person he likes one last time before getting married! Count, Bliss likes you! That’s why he came all the way here, just wanting to be by your side!”
Silence fell once again. But this time, it was different from before. Cassian simply stared at the housekeeper with a completely blank, stunned expression.