The Villain’s Aide Has Run Away - Chapter 46.1
Leslun, lost in stray thoughts, found that while trying to pour the wine he had, without realizing it, drawn close to Kailos.
A distance where their arms might touch. It was only at the moment their breaths brushed that he became aware of the space between them.
“You drifted into other thoughts just now.”
“My apologies.”
Startled, Leslun pulled back, and Kailos looked at him with eyes full of displeasure.
“Come here.”
Kailos beckoned kindly with his hand. Yet Leslun still did not move as he wished.
Should he say he couldn’t? Or that he didn’t want to?
When Leslun hesitated, Kailos’s brow arched briefly, then lowered again.
Suppressing his annoyance, he arranged his expression and sent Leslun another gentle gaze—like a hunter smiling as he draws closer so that the prey caught in his trap will not be startled.
“I won’t eat you. I only want to speak with you.”
Had Robin been present, he would have said that all of Kailos’s scarlet intentions were plain as day.
“Before you enter the Academy, shouldn’t you at least learn how to drink?”
But it wasn’t Robin he was coaxing, it was the naïve Leslun. And of course Leslun could not openly refuse.
His plan was to snatch Leslun into his arms the moment he pretended to give in and draw closer.
“Your Highness, are you perhaps unwell?”
“Do I look unwell to you?”
“This part seems to be trembling.”
Leslun tapped the corner of his own mouth. He seemed to have discerned Kailos’s true intent.
“Is that so? I don’t notice it myself.”
“Here, at the right corner of your lips.”
“And where exactly is my right side? Would you come closer and tell me?”
Feigning ignorance, Kailos ran his tongue over the left corner of his upper lip. A red tongue gliding over red lips beneath red curtains. In that world of nothing but red, Leslun’s eyes blurred.
The dizzying sight made it feel as though reason itself was slipping away. Enchanted, he leaned forward.
Kailos’s eyes gleamed as he watched Leslun slowly close the distance. How troublesome and vexing it had been that Robin, whom he always thought an ally, had turned adversary.
Robin had locked Leslun in the office and would not even let a single hair of him be seen. Whenever Kailos tried to approach, Robin somehow noticed and blocked the doorway.
‘But I know Robin well, too.’
A man must sleep, and with his peculiar obsession against sharing a bed, he would never sleep with Leslun at his side. So Kailos had chosen a time when Robin was absent to summon Leslun.
He had been waiting for an opening beyond Robin’s watchfulness, and since it was dawn, the mood was all the better for it. He had even gone so far as to redecorate the bedchamber in haste.
“Set the bottle down there for a moment.”
“Yes…”
Drawn by Kailos’s captivating gaze, Leslun set one knee upon the bed. And when he placed his other leg up as well, the mattress was so soft that his upper body pitched forward.
Startled, Leslun tried to brace himself with both hands against the bed, but Kailos tugged at his wrist, and in an instant he was pulled into his embrace.
With both hands caught above him, Leslun’s body collapsed forward, crashing against Kailos’s. It was not a blow that hurt but rather one that could stir a subtle thrill.
As if enjoying the weight pressing down on him, Kailos curved his lips into a faint smile.
“How does it feel?”
With Blue absent, this was at last the chance to truly discover what lay in Leslun’s heart.
At the insinuating look in Kailos’s eyes, Leslun faltered, his gaze unsteady. But then his pupils, which had slackened, gradually grew firm again.
Kailos, watching the process unfold before his eyes, cupped the man’s face gently in both hands.
He tilted his head as though to press a kiss. When Kailos’s face drew close enough for their breaths to mingle, Leslun spoke:
“You are not trembling now.”
“……”
Kailos saw the flutter of Leslun’s eyelashes.
“It seems you are fine, so please release me. Otherwise, I will go at once and summon a physician.”
At Leslun’s calm reply, Kailos let go of his cheek as though the air had gone out of him.
A strangely heavy silence enfolded the space between them.
Leslun averted his gaze slightly, while Kailos pressed his lips together with an unreadable expression.
No words were exchanged, yet the awkward warmth of his breath and body heat still lingered in the room.
This time it had not been an illusion. Their lips might truly have met. But that would not have been the right choice.
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