Achim snapped. As his gaze landed on her, the maid’s shoulders gave a startled jerk. The sharp look flustered the maid into silence, and Achim let his expression soften again as he turned back to Dora.
“What happened?”
At the quiet prompt, Dora cautiously lifted her eyes. She looked back and forth between the maid and Achim as if reading the room, hesitated for a long while, then spoke.
“Ma-Martina…… took my things……”
“Did she.”
At Achim’s perfectly neutral reply, Dora gave a small nod, as if letting her little face drop with it.
A moment later, Achim reached a hand out toward Martina. Martina looked baffled.
Watching Achim — who kept his gaze fixed on Dora while doing nothing more than holding out his open palm toward her — Martina’s face crumpled in displeasure.
“What?”
Achim’s head turned slowly toward her. He looked at Martina and gave his outstretched palm a slight shake.
“Give it back.”
“What?”
“Dora’s things that you took. I’m asking you to return them.”
When Martina only stared back in silence, Achim gave his hand another impatient shake.
Martina’s face flushed in an instant. Not only was she being treated as the guilty party without question — but to be asked so brazenly, right in front of Dora, to return what she’d taken — a wave of humiliation crashed over her all at once.
It wasn’t only Martina who was thrown off. Even Dora stared at Achim with a blank, dazed expression. It was because a wave of emotions she couldn’t put into words had rolled in like a tide. Achim caught the look in Dora’s eyes — “Why aren’t you asking anything?” they seemed to say — and gave the small head a stroke.
The reason wasn’t complicated. It was simply that Achim felt certain someone as introverted and careful as Dora in everything she did would never suspect someone on mere assumption alone. Dora must have confirmed it with her own two eyes.
Achim gave his outstretched hand another shake.
“Quickly.”
At the short prompt, Martina — who had been stonewalling him — suddenly raised her right hand high. It happened in an instant. She brought it down hard across Dora’s left cheek. With a sharp crack, Dora’s face whipped to the other side.
“……!”
At the sight he could barely believe, Achim’s eyes flew open to their limit. He stepped forward in the same motion and seized Martina by the collar.
Her white blouse, without a single wrinkle before, crumpled under the rough grip with a sharp crush of fabric.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
Achim whispered low, eyes razor-sharp.
Martina’s face turned red in a way entirely different from before — not from embarrassment, but from her airway being constricted. Martina, caught by the collar, thrashed and wheezed out strangled sounds like a completely clogged drain.
Achim tightened his grip on her collar until his knuckles went white. To commit this kind of violence, out of nowhere and without any provocation. The fact that this type of person existed everywhere made his skin crawl.
He was furious — but he couldn’t very well swing a man’s fist at Martina either. And so Achim had no choice but to swallow his anger alone.
That was when it happened. Martina raised her right hand again — and this time brought it down hard across Achim’s cheek.
The crack rang out incomparably louder than before, yet astonishingly, Achim’s head didn’t turn even slightly. The force she’d put into it was enough to split the corner of his lip, blood beginning to seep out — but Achim didn’t so much as blink.
As the drop of blood seeped into his mouth, Achim seemed to register it at last, making a slow, smacking sound as if tasting it — then did nothing more than drag the back of his hand roughly across his lips.
Seeing that, Martina went white as a sheet, as though she’d seen a ghost.
“……Ah.”
Looking at the back of his hand now smeared with a streak of blood, Achim let one corner of his mouth curl up in something like appreciation. And understandably so — because the blood, the first he’d tasted in a long while, actually struck him as sweet.
That same familiar, electric rush he’d felt the other day when he’d gripped a Glock wrapped itself around his skin.
Achim had quite a high tolerance for hits. Slender as he was, he’d often held his own against men of much larger builds, and thanks to his natural talent for fighting, the times he’d drawn blood were few enough to count on one hand.
All of it from his days as a mercenary. Since wrapping up that life, he hadn’t even had the opportunity — eight years spent living like a monk in discipline — so tasting blood in what was, by his standards, a reasonably legitimate way, Achim couldn’t help but feel a thrill.
If the person in front of him had been an adult man instead of Martina.
Or if his current identity were mercenary, and the other party were an enemy.
He was in the middle of that exciting hypothetical filling his mind when footsteps became faintly audible somewhere nearby — and then steadily drew closer. Those approaching footsteps came to an abrupt stop, as if by coincidence, right near Achim.
Lost in thought, Achim missed the moment to turn around — and in the meantime, Martina’s eyes drifted slowly to the side. Simultaneously, they filled with water over those blue irises.
“Mi…… chael……”
……Michael?
Just as a startled Achim was about to turn to the side.
Martina let a tear drop with all the convincing grief of a lie.
Truly, it was a performance worthy of a best actress award. It was only natural that Achim’s face crumpled watching her — just like Martina’s blouse.
Come to think of it, it was more than enough of a situation to be misunderstood. And of all people, it had to be Michael, of all things. If it came to that, every effort he’d spent the past week trying to exist like a ghost would be completely for nothing.
Damn it. Achim bit down on the curse internally and loosened his grip.
“Ugh……— hack……!”
Finally able to breathe again, Martina bent forward and coughed out in small fits. The sight of her gulping down all the breath she’d been forcibly cut off from at once, tears streaming down her face in fat drops — she looked exactly like a tragic heroine from a third-rate film.
With a bad feeling settling over him, Achim dropped his head and turned it to the opposite side. Catching that, Martina quickly parted her lips.
“Michael——”
“You may go.”
But Michael had no intention of hearing her out. As he cut her off and gave the order in a gentle voice, Martina closed her mouth.
Michael curved his eyes beautifully. It was a soft smile anyone could fall for — yet for some reason the atmosphere was different from usual, and Martina didn’t dare say another word.
Achim glanced sideways at Michael. Michael was in his usual suit, wearing that same beautiful face as always today as well.
Could it be that the one he told to leave wasn’t actually Martina, but me. Achim was inwardly murmuring a desperate wish when he felt his skirt being tugged, and he slowly dropped his gaze.
It was Dora. Dora, clutching his skirt, had one cheek flushed a deep red and was on the verge of tears. At the sight of that face, what had happened only a few minutes ago came back to him and Achim’s brow creased.
Dora finally let her tears fall, without a sound. Achim quickly softened his expression and stroked the top of Dora’s head in a soothing motion. The orange hair ruffled messily under the clumsy touch.
“……Yes, Michael.”
Martina finally hesitated, then took her leave. In that opening, Achim was just about to quietly take Dora’s hand and slip away as well — when Michael reached out his long arm and seized Achim’s wrist in a firm grip.
Ugh — a moan slipped involuntarily through Achim’s teeth at the unexpectedly crushing grip.
This bastard——?
He almost turned on Michael in a flash of irritation, but the sound of the sudden moan startled Dora into looking at him — so Achim quickly wiped his expression clean.
“……Go on ahead.”
Dora looked reluctant. She couldn’t bring herself to leave easily, glancing back and forth between Michael and Achim several times.
But for Dora, who held Michael in something close to reverence, even adding a single word against him was close to an act of irreverence. In the end, after deliberating, Dora gave Achim’s hand one firm squeeze and then let go, taking slow, heavy steps away.
When Dora had gotten far enough, Achim turned to face him.
“Your hand——”
He would have wrenched it free without a second thought if he’d followed his temper. But the other party was Michael. Depending on what had just happened, his position here could be decided — so until the moment just before being thrown out, he had to play “Yvonne” perfectly.
And so even if the wrist he had grabbed right now were to snap, Achim had no choice but to endure it.
