Please Kill Me - Chapter 129
Perhaps she also feels the same way as he did.
Maybe they were both helplessly caught in a drizzle, gradually being washed away by each other’s incomprehensibility, blending into the same color.
‘If that’s the case…’
He can no longer deceive her. He also needs to understand what this feeling he has really is.
He felt it was time to stop the pretense and to have more conversations with Yekaterina—enough to cover all the time he didn’t know her.
‘How can I be thinking this?’
It’s surprising that it wasn’t so long ago that he deliberately closed his eyes because he didn’t want to know her.
Leonid gave a small, wry smile and turned his body.
“It’s been uncomfortable for a while, so let’s stop this…”
And he stopped abruptly.
A figure appeared at the entrance of the tent. Someone who shouldn’t have been there at this moment.
“Oh, Miss?”
“…Yekaterina.”
The two of them called out to her with startled voices, but no response came from Yekaterina. She only stared at them with a cold, unmoving expression.
Yekaterina looked at Leonid’s surprised face and his unbandaged hand in silence before speaking.
“…It was a lie from the start.”
Her words felt like sand being ground underfoot. She almost hoped they would deny it. But their inability to even offer an excuse made the meaning too clear.
Leonid hurriedly approached Yekaterina.
“Yekaterina, wait. Let’s talk. I didn’t intend for you to find out like this.”
“But this is how I found out. Unfortunately.”
Leonid squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them.
“Then should I have killed you, as you requested? I wanted to save you.”
“By deceiving me.”
Yekaterina’s frown deepened.
“Speak honestly. Was your intention to save me really for my sake? Not to use me?”
“…Yekaterina, there were circumstances. You know that.”
“Then shouldn’t you have said that what you wanted to save was not me, but His Highness Yuri?”
Leonid was at a loss for words. The reason he initially kept Yekaterina tied to Rostislav was indeed because of Yuri.
“I trusted you. But you only deceive me.”
Yekaterina’s sharp remark made Vasily step in, unable to stand by any longer.
“Miss, isn’t your accusation a bit harsh? How much has His Grace done for your convenience—”
“Should I then thank him?”
“…Miss.”
Vasily’s face grew rigid, but Yekaterina’s words didn’t stop.
“It was Leonid who kept me here when I wanted to leave. Am I supposed to express my gratitude for that?”
“Even so—”
“I appreciate your loyalty, but don’t dare to argue in front of me. You don’t have the right to.”
Yekaterina’s icy gaze pierced Vasily sharply, and he finally shut his mouth and left the tent.
Left alone in the tent, the silence lingered between Yekaterina and Leonid. Yekaterina, brushing her hair away with a weary gesture, spoke.
“I suppose it’s time to state my purpose. I came to express my gratitude. Thank you for not killing me back then. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have witnessed my father’s death. But now that he’s gone, I have no reason to stay here any longer.”
“…Yekaterina, are you—”
“I intend to leave now. Back to Offenbach.”
Yekaterina’s words made Leonid’s expressions stiffen.
“I was already thinking of leaving, but now that it’s come to this, I might as well leave cleanly.”
“…Yekaterina, are you serious?”
“By now, you should have realized that I don’t joke.”
Leonid’s face grew heavier with the cold, direct response.
Her words were true. Yekaterina was a person who might remain silent, but she would never lie. Therefore, what she was saying now was entirely sincere.
The strange elation he had felt moments before seemed to sink deeply. It felt as if he and the person who had been foolishly excited were not so different after all. Both were caught up in a peculiar fervor.
Leonid’s mouth twisted into a grimace. A grinding sound came from his clenched teeth.
“…You were planning to leave from the beginning. Since when exactly? Was it even when I suggested we return together?”
“Yes. Since I came here to die, if I can’t die, I should leave eventually.”
“Haha.”
A dry, twisted laugh escaped from his mouth.
“So that was the plan from the start. From the very beginning…”
Why had he believed that she would be by his side? Why did he trust her words, despite her claim that their conversations held no meaning, and believe in the faint smile that appeared when she looked at him?
If Yekaterina had been angry about being deceived, if she had said she couldn’t be with him because he had deceived her, he might have understood.
But knowing that she had intended to leave from the very beginning, even before discovering the truth, left him feeling bewildered.
