Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Those words.

He had said those words loud and clear so that everyone could hear. Dillon was furious. Not because she had been publicly dumped—though of course, that in itself was worth getting furious over—but because Emily hadn’t even turned fifteen at the time. What kind of person would outright admit to liking his fiancée’s pubescent sister when he himself was over twenty years old?

“I’m not saying I’m going to try to do something with Emily,” continued Miles, whose brain had clearly rotted through. “I just wanted to tell you the truth. It pained me to deceive you. I couldn’t take it anymore.” With that, Miles had left the Langton family’s land. Relations with the house of Whitewood had understandably ended soon afterward.

In the novel, that was when Dillon had started hating Emily, which obviously wasn’t the case for the current Dillon, who could see that Emily had been the unwitting victim of a shameless pervert. Even now, the two of them would use the man’s name as an insult—really, the entire Langton family did. For example, “the weather is absolutely Miles” meant the weather was horrid.

In any case, Novel Dillon finally ended up with the first man who deigned to marry her, became Baroness Samuelson, and never stopped lusting after Cedric and despising her sister. How could she have stayed in her right mind when she saw Adeline, who closely resembled Emily, standing by Cedric’s side? Of course, she had totally lost it.

Novel Dillon had eventually banded together with Cedric’s aunt, Sabrina, in an embarrassing display of her unbecoming desire to stay close to Cedric no matter what. Before meeting Sabrina, Baroness Samuelson (Dillon didn’t even want to think of her by her own name) had carried out a variety of immature schemes that ranged from calling Adeline unrefined and making fun of her family origins to spilling drinks on her every time Cedric brought her to a party.

Despite it all, the two leads continued to grow closer, which only drove Baroness Samuelson even crazier. And no wonder. At one point in the novel, Cedric had given Adeline a revealing dress and told her to play the role of a proper mistress, which of course hurt Adeline. His reasoning, however, was that Adeline had stubbornly continued to insist, “I’m nothing but a mere mistress. Please don’t expect anything more from me.”

Novel Cedric had been unable to stand all the other men ogling Adeline and, in a fit of jealousy, wanted to make it known to the entire world that she belonged to him. Oh, and Dillon had also gone out of her way to amplify Adeline’s worries that she was just a replacement for Cedric’s dead wife. Dillon had lied, saying Cedric still loved his former wife, and Adeline had believed it wholeheartedly because as Emily’s older sister, wouldn’t Dillon know better than anyone?

That was why Adeline had continued to push Cedric away, insisting that she was nothing more than a mistress. Cedric, meanwhile, had only fallen deeper in love with Adeline. Novel Dillon’s pathetic efforts to tear the two leads apart had only made their bond stronger.

Baroness Samuelson didn’t realize that her schemes had failed and continued to see Adeline as a persistent little leech that wouldn’t leave Cedric alone. Enter the novel’s main villains, Cedric’s uncle and his wife, Sabrina Hayworth, who would gain all the assets and authority of the dukedom if they could get Cedric out of the way.

They knew that Cedric was crazy about Adeline, so they tried to make Adeline into a spy, but Adeline... Well, she had already fallen in love with Cedric and couldn’t be swayed. So instead, the two villains had taken advantage of Dillon’s inferiority complex and manipulated her into antagonizing Adeline by convincing her that if Adeline was gone, she would have a chance with Cedric. That was how Sabrina had used Dillon’s obsession with Cedric to recruit her as a minion. She had ceaselessly agitated Dillon, filling her head with nonsense.

How did the current Dillon come to know about all of this? Considering everything that’s been mentioned so far, Baroness Samuelson isn’t even an important villain in the novel, more an irritating gnat than anything else. Normally, minor characters like her aren’t involved in a story for long.

Dillon, however, was mentioned throughout the entire novel, especially in important scenes, so the current Dillon remembered that version of herself. Specifically, she remembered when Novel Dillon had tried to kill off the female lead.

Usually, right before a villain tries to end the main character’s life, they have the opportunity to explain the thoughts behind their action. Taking advantage of that chance, Baroness Samuelson had told the whole humiliating tale. Then, half-delirious, she lunged toward the female lead with a knife. While trying to dodge her, Adeline tripped and fell down the stairs, losing consciousness.

Of course, Baroness Samuelson had been caught immediately. It wasn’t like she had even tried to carry out her assassination attempt secretly—she had gone straight to Adeline’s home and caused a scene, so there was no doubt she’d be caught.

Thankfully, Adeline had survived, so it was only attempted murder. Because Dillon was from a noble family and she had not directly pushed Adeline down the stairs, as well as the fact that Cedric was still close with Viscount Langton, her sentence had been negotiated down to indefinite imprisonment in a psychiatric ward. And that was her final appearance in the novel.

It was easy to imagine what might have happened to her afterward: Head shaved, she would have spent the rest of her life in a straitjacket while occasionally receiving beatings in the name of psychiatric treatment before eventually dying in obscurity. But that didn’t mean that Dillon’s evil deeds had served no purpose whatsoever because she had been crucial to the development of the novel’s plot: After Adeline fell down the stairs, it was discovered that she was pregnant!

“Thankfully, the baby is safe,” the doctor had announced, inadvertently alerting Adeline herself to the pregnancy, at which point Adeline had run away from Cedric. She didn’t want to raise her child in the world of the dukedom, and she didn’t want to be told to get rid of it!

That’s right. The pregnancy trope. Yet another cliché. Predictably, Cedric had found out about the pregnancy from the doctor, and after searching for months, had finally been able to locate Adeline. From there, it had been a clash between “Did you hate the thought of bearing my child that much?” and “I don’t want you to keep me around just because of the baby!”

This was a conflict that would soon vanish from memory when the main villain kidnapped the female lead, but that wasn’t important. What was important was that Dillon had fallen for Cedric and was nothing but a tool in the end no matter how hard she tried. In the novel, Cedric had felt nothing but hatred for Dillon. That’s why this proposal, now, was unbelievable. It shouldn’t be possible. So why was it happening?

How did trying to stop Cedric from proposing to Emily end up like this? Dillon lamented.

Ten seconds had passed. In that time, while Dillon had been lost in her own thoughts, the silence that permeated the room had been broken.

“Why isn’t she responding?” one person asked.

“Hurry and accept it,” another insisted.

“You’re supposed to say yes!”

“Is she not saying anything because she’s too stubborn?”

Either Dillon had suddenly learned how to read minds, or the people around her were goading her out loud. It really was a proposal that no woman could refuse, but she didn’t want it. This Dillon was not the Dillon from the novel, so she didn’t want to accept this proposal. If only to avoid paths that could lead to her own destruction, she didn’t want to marry Cedric.

After all, she might not like him now, but it was possible that she could fall for him later, and if that happened, the end result would be the same as in the novel. Adeline was bound to show up soon. If Dillon were to fall for Cedric, it would only be a matter of time before he cut her loose and she became jealous of Adeline. And even if she didn’t fall for him, she would still become a hindrance to him.

At most, there were only two years left before the two leads would meet. Dillon didn’t want to get in their way, she didn’t want to turn their relationship into an affair, and above all, she didn’t want to die while giving birth to a stillborn child.

How on earth is the female lead supposed to meet Cedric now that I’m in this situation? She looked down at Cedric, who was still kneeling. Unable to read his expression, Dillon sighed heavily. If he really held even a mere hint of affection for her, he wouldn’t look at her with such an expressionless face.

All things considered, it was a proposal that she could turn down.

However:

“Say yes.”

“Say yes.”

“Hurry and say yes!”

The pressure from the crowd was overwhelming, and of course, that crowd included Viscount Langton. The Southerwick dukedom was not only the target of widespread envy and respect, but it was also the perfect candidate to help the Langton family out of its difficult financial situation.

If Dillon refused, it would cause an uproar. Viscount Langton’s daughter publicly rejecting Cedric Hayworth’s proposal and humiliating him? It wouldn’t stop with rumors. It would be all over the tabloids, and the Langtons would be labeled a shameless bunch who didn’t know or appreciate their place in society.

Naturally, that would harm Dillon’s family. It would be a stain on their honor. Even Emily would be the target of whispered insults, all because she was also Viscount Langton’s daughter. That was the weight of significance that Cedric Hayworth’s proposal carried.

The longer Dillon stayed quiet, the more intense the surrounding whispers would grow, along with Dillon’s agony. Her mouth had gone dry.

Reject it. I need to reject him.

“Say yes!”

I need to—

“Hurry!”

reject him—

“Goodness,” someone said, breaking the tension in the room. “I understand you’re nervous, but please don’t keep us waiting any longer, my lady.”

It was the soft voice of an elderly man. The crowd, which had been watching Cedric and Dillon intently, slowly turned its gaze toward the ballroom’s newest arrival. He was old, but he was tall and had a commanding presence. Cedric turned his head toward the strange voice and spoke: “Grandfather.”