I Faked a Pregnancy, but My Husband Returned - Chapter 102

Melanie’s maid clearly said she had confirmed the child in Judith’s womb ‘at Judith’s request.’

Normally, Judith—who had to hide the fact she wasn’t pregnant—would never have made such a request. No, if anything, even if someone offered to check on the child’s condition, she should have refused.

But if she was the one who asked, that meant she wanted to know too… and, according to the dates…

Pieces that hadn’t made sense before were starting to fall into place.

No one could understand why Judith had recklessly left the ducal residence despite Ron’s threats, why she had urgently demanded a divorce, why she had gone into hiding so completely that not a single strand of hair could be found—until now.

If she was pregnant?

The child would be born in nine months. She couldn’t wait in the ducal residence indefinitely.

“That’s impossible.”

Isabella shook her head firmly.

“Something must be wrong. I mean, whose child is she supposedly pregnant with inside the ducal residence?”

Then Alteion cautiously spoke up, “Is there any chance she got involved with the attending physician or a servant? Perhaps Hud Soden…”

“Judith isn’t that kind of girl.”

Isabella denied it with a fierce glare in her eyes.

“Even if that were true, who’s the father, then? What kind of trash leaves a pregnant woman all alone? Hud would never behave like that.”

“I think so too. Something’s definitely off.”

Ben stepped forward as if he wouldn’t be outdone.

“Ekian, don’t you think so too?”

Ekian was silent, dazed for a moment. Only after Ben nudged his side did he mutter with a grave expression.

“I… I think… the pregnancy… might be real…”

“What? Whose child is it? Do you have any suspect in mind?”

“…M-my… child…”

“What?”

Isabella jumped up and started hitting Ekian’s back furiously. Her face, already wild-eyed, blazed with fury.

“You lunatic! Just how trashy were you that Judith lost it and ran off demanding a divorce first? Huh?”

No one could stop that one-sided outburst and violence. Not even Ekian.

Ekian staggered back to his room.

***

“Find her. She’s carrying my child. You must find her. No matter what.”

After fleeing from Isabella’s beating, he had returned from barking out bloodshot orders to his subordinates. But even he wasn’t confident. The imperial family had already done its best and failed to find her.

Still, he couldn’t give up.

“You should rest for today. You’ve come a long way.”

Alteion said as he patted Ekian’s shoulder.

“And starting tomorrow, let’s try a different method. It’s not like Judith ran away because she was afraid of you…”

There was only one clear ‘different method.’

Judith had run from the Emperor, not from Mayus. So if they let her know the threat was gone, and she heard it wherever she was in seclusion, she might come out on her own.

It wasn’t about finding the hidden one, but about making her come out herself.

For that, it was time to reveal the truth.

“I’ll announce that you are the missing prince. Then, go to Arten, which has been in disarray without a lord, and restore the estate. Once you uncover that the lord of Arten and the Emperor have died, you’ll naturally be granted Arten as a Grand Duchy.”

In truth, Ekian being in the capital wasn’t particularly helpful in the search for Judith. On the contrary, it would be more strategic if Ekian became known elsewhere, so Judith—wherever she was hiding—might hear about it.

And if word got out gradually that he was the master of the Grey Information Guild too…

It was the truth he most wanted to tell her. But if he could see her again, there was no reason not to let the whole world know. Ekian sat in his room, pressing a hand to his forehead.

Even so, none of it was satisfying.

The lordship of Arten, the title of Grand Duke as the Crown Prince’s brother… all the rewards he had been promised felt meaningless without Judith. So even when Alteion told him to depart for Arten the very next day, he was indifferent.

“Right now, Arten is in utter chaos. It needs someone to restore order. I’ll officially send you, so depart tomorrow. That’ll raise your reputation, and if Miss Judith happens to pass by, she might hear your name.”

The barbarians who had attacked Arten had already been bought by Alteion, so they had quickly scattered and sought asylum under his faction. Meanwhile, Arten, having suddenly become a lordless estate, was in disarray.

“It’d be troublesome if other barbarian groups attacked the empty castle in the meantime. Of course, if you fend off such attacks, it’ll be even easier for you to settle in Arten… Well, in any case, let’s think about that tomorrow. You don’t seem in any shape to talk further right now.”

People kept pushing him, saying he should at least sleep, but he simply couldn’t. He hadn’t slept in days already, and it seemed he would continue suffering from insomnia until Judith was found.

Sitting quietly in his room, memories with Judith flooded in.

The bed they lay on together, the table they sat at, the countless conversations they shared…

More than the glamorous days they spent as Ekian Mayus, the nights spent sneaking in through the secret passage and talking about all sorts of things remained vivid. That warmth Judith had longed for—surely, it was those things. But what he had prepared for her was the position of Grand Duchess of Arten. The gap between them pained him anew.

“And being alone during the whole pregnancy without her husband… that’s truly unsettling and heartbreaking.”

What Melanie had said, which he had once brushed off, now pierced his heart. Judith had gone through her pregnancy alone, while he had left behind just one letter asking her to trust him. Then, what the servant at the ducal residence told him gnawed at his mind again.

“Before the divorce, the lady only left the residence twice. The first was to visit Lord Soden’s annex, and the second… she said she wanted to go to the Grey Information Guild. Of course, the place was closed, so she had to return immediately.”

She must have gone after learning she was pregnant, wanting to inform the master. Even knowing he had left, she had tried to reach out somehow.

Because she couldn’t even bring herself to ask him for anything, a woman who wanted to accept and give up everything couldn’t simply sit around waiting for him.

“She just… kept staring at the store where the Grey Information Guild used to be. Her expression was so blank that even I felt bad. I remember how desperately she asked the real estate agent when the guild had been cleared out—it wasn’t like her at all.”

Standing alone in front of the closed Grey Information Guild without knowing, how devastated she must have felt.

It must have been the feeling of confirming she was truly alone. Imagining her in the returning carriage, thinking she had to shoulder all of this on her own, made his heart ache. In such a state, there was no way he could sleep or eat.

Did Judith really… did she truly have to leave all on her own? Without leaving him any message, completely on her own…

It was then.

Something flashed across Ekian’s mind.

There was no way Judith hadn’t left some kind of message for the father of her child. If she had even gone to the Grey Information Guild herself, she must have left a clue about her whereabouts somehow. Even while staying in this room all that time.

But where?

Somewhere Ekian Mayus didn’t know, but the master did…

‘No way!’

Ekian shot up to his feet.