Portrait of An Arrogant Master - Chapter 54
However, in the middle of the night, Morgan whispered that Eren had come to the cabin, so she hurried back.
She covered her eyes with a cloth and went into the bedroom. Eren usually left in the morning after a night of treatment, but he came out shortly after entering.
There had been no further news since. Macy needed to check what was going on, but she couldn’t even remember Morgan telling her about Eren.
By then, she had been so drunk that her mind was completely foggy.
‘I must have made a mistake that day. If not, why would Eren leave suddenly and not come back until now?’
Though Eren sometimes took irregularly long breaks, the fact that he left shortly after arriving troubled her. The thought of what might have caused him to leave came to mind almost instantly, filling her with anxiety.
‘Could it be that I confessed something serious to Eren in my drunken state?!’
There had been a similar situation recently when he had tried to get out of bed…
Now, what could Macy do? There was nothing she could do. She had no choice but to wait endlessly at the cabin, painting and living her daily life. Her anxiety was driving her to the brink.
“Madam Pomantder really liked your painting.”
Kieran’s words pulled her out of her troubled thoughts.
“Oh… that’s good to hear.”
“Madam Pomantder is well-known in social circles and has many acquaintances. If you do well, she might introduce you to others.”
“Actually, I haven’t even finished the painting yet, but she’s already introduced me to two people.”
“Really? She must have really liked it then.”
Thanks to this, Macy was having a hectic day. Though she could refuse if her schedule was too tight, she didn’t. She wanted to paint as many pictures as possible, even if it meant pushing herself, not knowing when such an opportunity might come again.
“Am I going to lose all my clients like this?”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’m just starting out.”
“I knew you’d do well. You’ll do even better in the future, Macy.”
Kieran, joking around, smiled brightly. Seeing that expression, Macy was suddenly curious.
“Why are you so nice to me?”
It was something she had wanted to ask for a while, but she had hesitated to speak up. The occasional glint in his eyes seemed to hint at an answer.
“Didn’t I tell you? You’re like a dream to me.”
It was the same look he had when he first mentioned wanting to be like Yannick. Macy, trying to gauge his reaction, asked cautiously.
“…When did you find out?”
“Is it strange not to know? I’ve studied your paintings a lot.”
She felt an odd sensation. No one had ever recognized Yannick’s ghost painter through her paintings before. At first, she had wondered if anyone might know, but no one did.
Macy had never stolen anything, but people labeled her as a copycat and criticized her for trying to stand out as a woman.
Hearing that, Macy deeply regretted painting in Yannick’s style. She fell into self-loathing, feeling she should never have done it. She wanted to erase all that time.
But if she hadn’t painted from a young age, would she be where she is now? If she hadn’t painted so intensely, Kieran might not have become her fan.
‘Maybe I haven’t been doing something pointless after all…’
It almost made her want to cry. It felt as though her difficult past was being acknowledged. It felt like a reward. There was someone who recognized her even if her name wasn’t on the painting.
“Hey, are you crying?”
“No…”
“You are crying.”
“I’m not crying. Don’t look at me.”
At some point, she began to think that perhaps she hadn’t been completely abandoned by fate. Maybe it was coming late, but she was receiving good fortune. Otherwise, it wouldn’t make sense.
The way kind people kept moving her deeply…
Despite everything not being resolved, Macy felt happiness lately. She was grateful and thankful for meeting Anna, Hils, Kieran, and Eren.
“This is just so childish. It’s a bit shocking, seeing such a kid act like this.”
“Coming from someone smaller than me…”
“I’m not!”
Seeing Kieran’s angry reaction made Macy smile again.
* * *
Through the window, a sparrow landed softly on a branch, fluttering its wings before settling down. It pecked at something on the branch.
Rubens watched quietly, lost in thought.
‘I used to think it was trivial and fragile, something easily managed.’
Just like the sparrow that could be coaxed into a nest if he wanted, or driven away with a shake of the branch if he didn’t.
Yet recently, Rubens found himself increasingly troubled.
What he had thought of as just a pretty sparrow now seemed to take on a more significant, even tempting, allure. In fact, thinking about her made his lower abdomen ache with desire at all hours, to his discomfort.
“Will you leave it as it is?”
At that moment, someone nudged Rubens with an elbow and whispered. It was Nicholas Shearton, the head of Baron Shearton family.
