Chapter 170: Taking Care of Lonely Little Cosette
Leah was still his maid.
She helped them prepare their new ho, helped arrange their wedding, and helped raise their children.
Those children called her “Aunt Leah,” laughing and playing around her.
She watched Aaron and Elena walk hand in hand through the garden. She watched them smile at each other. She watched them grow old together.
And just like that, an entire lifeti passed.
On the final page of the book, Aaron and Elena were old.
The two of them sat side by side on a bench in the garden, their hands still clasped together. The setting sun fell over them, glazing them in a layer of golden light.
Leah stood in the distance, watching them.
She smiled. It was a faint, gentle smile, so fragile it seed as though a single gust of wind could blow it away.
The book itself was nothing special.
It was exactly the sort of romance novel you could find on any roadside bookstall, with a sword and a rose painted on the cover, telling the story of a fallen viscount’s son and a duke’s daughter.
The young noble was bullied, and the lady stepped in to defend him.
He fell in love with her and struggled desperately to make himself worthy of her.
There were a few misunderstandings in the middle, a few twists and turns, and a few lodramatic scenes of “I thought you didn’t love .”
In the end, the misunderstanding was cleared up, and the lovers were united.
A very ordinary story, but the girls outside loved stories like that, and so did the female students at the academy. By the ti they reached the last page, they would smile knowingly and think, So they finally got their happy ending. How nice.
Cosette stared at that page without moving.
She did not place herself in Aaron’s role.
Nor did she place herself in Elena’s.
She placed herself in Leah’s.
The maid who never once said that she loved him, who stood behind him from beginning to end, who watched him love soone else, marry soone else, and spend his whole life with soone else.
The maid who, in the end, still had to smile and help raise their children.
Cosette’s fingers dug into the page until her knuckles turned white.
Her breathing beca light and shallow, as if she were afraid of disturbing sothing.
It felt as though a stone had been placed on her chest, growing heavier and heavier, pressing down harder and harder. It was so heavy that she could barely breathe, so heavy that her heart began to ache, so heavy that her eyes stung.
If Master also...
If he also fell in love with soone else...
If he also wanted her to stand there like Leah, watching, smiling, helping them...
Cosette’s lashes trembled.
She shut her eyes, refusing to let herself keep thinking.
But the images ca anyway, whether she wanted them or not—
Ryan smiling at another girl.
Ryan holding another girl’s hand.
Ryan pulling that girl into his arms, just as he sotis carried Cosette.
And that girl was not her.
She stood off to the side, wearing this maid uniform, a tea tray in her hands, and a smile on her face.
What kind of joke was that?
She could not do it.
How could she possibly do it?
Just imagining that scene made it feel as though her heart were shattering.
She could never be like Leah.
She could not even stand by and watch.
She only wanted—
She only wanted Young Master Ryan to be hers alone.
Even if it was only sothing she dared think in secret.
Cosette opened her eyes and realized that her hands were trembling.
The book was still lying open across her knees, the final illustration still facing her. Aaron and Elena sat hand in hand beneath the evening sun, while Leah stood in the distance, smiling.
Cosette looked at that smile and suddenly found it unbearable.
Her fingers dug into the page, crumpling the corner.
Lano watched all of this from the side.
Her gaze fell on Cosette’s trembling fingers, on her pale knuckles, on the way she was biting her lip. Sothing flickered through those amber eyes.
But she did not speak.
She only curved her lips ever so slightly.
After a long ti, Cosette finally ca back to herself.
She drew in a deep breath and forced down whatever it was that had lodged in her chest. She blinked hard, pushing back the moisture in her eyes.
“This book...” she began, her voice a little hoarse. “That Leah... she’s so pitiful.”
Lano tilted her head at her. “Pitiful?”
“Yes.” Cosette lowered her head and stared at the words on the page. “She loved him so much, and yet she had to watch him be with soone else. She even had to help him pursue that person, and later help raise their children... How could she still smile?”
Lano was silent for a mont.
Then she smiled, very gently.
“Maybe,” she said, “she thought that as long as he was happy, that would be enough.”
Cosette said nothing.
Her fingers were still digging into the page.
As long as he was happy, that would be enough?
She could not do that.
Just the thought of Young Master Ryan being with soone else made her chest hurt so badly she felt like she might die.
She could not do it.
She truly could not.
Cosette closed the book and set it aside. Then she stood and walked to the window, turning her back to Lano.
The sunlight fell across her, outlining the delicate line of her figure.
She stood there without moving.
After a long while, she finally spoke, her voice barely above a whisper.
“Lano... do you think Master... would ever fall in love with soone else?”
Lano looked at her back, at those hands that kept clenching and unclenching, at those slender legs wrapped in white stockings, trembling faintly.
The corners of her lips curved upward.
“Well...” She rose to her feet and walked over to stand beside Cosette. “I don’t know either.”
Cosette said nothing.
She only looked out the window, at the leaves swaying in the wind.
She rembered the morning Young Master Ryan had left.
He had stood in the doorway and reached out to pat her head. That hand had been warm, so gentle, as if he were afraid of hurting her. He had told her that he would co back as soon as he could.
She believed him.
She had always believed him.
But she did not know whether, when he returned, he would still be the sa young master who belonged to her alone.
Cosette lowered her eyes, her lashes casting a faint shadow across her face.
“Then—” Lano suddenly spoke again, with a sly smile in her voice. “How about we take a look at the second book?”
Cosette turned around.
Lano was already standing by the desk, pulling another book out from beneath the first two.
Its cover was illustrated in color as well, showing a girl in a magnificent dress and a young man in formal evening wear standing together in the center of a ballroom, with everyone around them watching.
“The second one?” Cosette blinked.
“Mhm.” Lano waved the book in her hand, her smile turning mysterious. “Since that first book made you react so strongly, I think... you might really like this one.”
Cosette looked at the cover, and her heart suddenly skipped a beat.
“What is it?”
“You’ll know once you see it for yourself.” Lano handed her the book.
Cosette took it and lowered her eyes to the title.
Dance Beneath the Moon.
She opened to the first page.
The beginning of the story was very similar to the one before.
Again, it was about a fallen young noble with little money left to his na, only an old manor and a few servants. He too had a personal maid who had grown up with him and served him faithfully for years.
But after that, the story beca completely different.
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