The Duke's Daughter Is A Villainess (14)

Being so up close and personal to Lucas, Dahlia took the time to properly study his features. Light blue eyes, sandy brown hair, thick eyebrows. He looked the definition of a strong man, with the defined jaw and the eyebrows, yet at the same time he had delicate features and pretty eyes.

The characters in this novel were really quite dangerous.

"...Miss, are you alright?"

Dahlia sucked in a breath, eyes still a little wide, before she realised they were still in quite a compromising position and jerked into an upright position.

When Dahlia moved, Lucas did too, and he let go of her so that she could put some distance between them.

"Um, yes, I'm fine now. Thank you... for catching me." Dahlia spoke softly, her cheeks still tinged pink with embarrassment.

"It's no problem, Miss. You should be more careful next time."

Dahlia opened her mouth and was about to reply, but before she could, someone called her name. Dahlia turned around, surprised, only to see Stella running towards her.

There was no warning before Stella was suddenly jumping into her arms. Dahlia struggled to properly hold on to all the unexpected weight and stumbled backwards, somehow landing onto Lucas' chest once again.

His arms came around to settle over both Dahlia and Stella this time, but Stella didn't even notice.

"Dahlia!" Stella whined. "I missed you! The king took so long to drink his tea, they only let me leave just now."

It was at this moment that Alice walked out from inside the palace and onto the yard, spotting them easily from where she was standing. Dahlia pretended not to notice, but could see out of the corner of her eye the way Alice froze when upon seeing them together.

~Why does Alice's face look like that?

[Host.... did you forget that currently Alice is in love with Lucas?]

~Oh! That's right... I forgot.

[Host.... how could you forget this???]

~Well she ends up with Noah, doesn't she? It completely escaped my mind that she actually liked Lucas first.

[...She must be sad to see you so close to Lucas like this.]

~Really? Can't she tell that he just caught me from falling again?

[Host! Did you forget about Stella? Right now the three of you look like a small, happy family!]

~Oh.... right.

As if finally sensing that they weren't alone, Stella suddenly turned to look at Lucas.

"Oh...." Stella mumbled, as if having realised something. "Dahlia, is this your boyfriend??"

Alice, who had been walking towards them, caught the end of Stella's question and froze once again.

Dahlia, who was reminded that she was still in Lucas' arms, jumped forward to separate from his hold.

"He isn't my boyfriend, Stella... he's just a kind knight that helped me when I was about to fall."

Stella looked between Dahlia and Lucas, her eyes narrowed as if she didn't believe those words. "....Okay... if you say so..."

"No, really, I don't even know his name!" Dahlia insisted.

Stella looked stupefied. "You don't know his name? That's silly! If you're dating each other you should know each other's names." Then she turned to Lucas and asked, "What's your name?"

Dahlia could only gape at how straight forward Stella was being.

Lucas, who hadn't said a word until now, laughed, seemingly amused by Stella's antics. "My name is Lucas, and I'm sorry to say but I'm really not your sister's boyfriend."

"What? Why not? Is my sister not pretty? Why don't you-"

Dahlia slapped her hand over Stella's mouth before she could continue. She turned to Lucas apologetically. "I'm sorry about her.... we'll just be on our way now..."

Then she picked Stella up and practically ran all the way back to the Duke.

She ran past Alice, who was still frozen just a few steps away, but pretended she didn't notice her as she left.

~The 'Talent Stealer' really did its job!

[Of course, Host! Did you doubt the ability of my items?]

~No, no, of course not! I just didn't know that they would really be so effective. I mean, didn't I look totally natural back there?

[Yes! Host is doing great!]

~By the way, is there anything like a relationship bar or something that I could look at? Just so I know how close I am to getting the boys to fall in love with me.

[Yes! you can purchase the 'Love/Hate' sticker for 30 points and whoever you put the sticker on, whenever you see them you will see the percentage of how much they love or hate you over their heads. -100% means they hate you and +100% means they're in love with you.]

~Okay. I'd like two of those please!

[Purchase completed. 60 points have been deducted from your points collection, rendering the total amount of points you have to 170. Two 'Love/Hate' stickers can now be found in your dress pocket.]