Guidelines for the Perfect Goodbye - Chapter 251

As she wrote fluently in one go, Cecilia suddenly realized her tone was too casual.

‘Without even noticing…’

With Diana, she preferred to exchange notes in an intentionally ambiguous way, one that made it difficult for anyone to decipher their contents.

While the likelihood of this letter falling into someone else’s hands was slim, if Mary made a mistake, it was better to leave room for plausible deniability.

‘Subconsciously, I’ve grown this comfortable with her.’

However, Diana was ultimately just a business partner with a shared goal. If Diana realized Cecilia thought of her with genuine familiarity, she would probably find it unpleasant.

Cecilia’s gaze briefly clouded before regaining focus. She rewrote the letter, this time likening Caroline to a cyclamen flower, and burned the original draft.

After finishing the letter for Diana, Cecilia thought of Casey Heens. She recalled Casey offhandedly mentioning the tea company investment before.

Cecilia quickly penned a new letter.

[ Miss Casey, please forgive the urgency of my tone. I heard from Sir Nigel about the company you’ve invested in. If anyone you know has funds in that company, they should withdraw within the next month to avoid a loss. Please relay this to your father. ]

Cecilia stood to gain nothing from this letter. She simply wished to prevent Casey’s family from being entangled in the matter.

[ Tell your father it was your husband’s foresight. It might become an opportunity for reconciliation. ]

The next day, she handed the letters to Mary, who came to assist with her bath.

“You know what to do, right? Don’t give these directly to the postman coming to the estate. Take them outside yourself, find someone in need of money, and pay them to send the letters for you.”

“Yes, Milady.”

Mary couldn’t read the cursive on the envelopes. She mistakenly assumed Cecilia was sending love letters to Nigel.

‘The arrogance of nobles who want to keep their distance from commoners is surprisingly helpful at moments like these.’

With a bitter smile, Cecilia watched Mary leave and close the door before pulling out the pile of invitations she had gathered.

Invitations to parties she couldn’t attend.

But Caroline could.

While the invitations were unofficially targeted at her, the envelopes bore only the family name as the representative. That was their custom.

In other words, anyone from the Lasphilla family could use the invitations to attend the parties.

‘The Lope Viscounty’s party is in two weeks.’

The Lasphilla family would leave the capital earlier than usual because of her.

So, if Caroline didn’t take the opportunity to do something adventurous with these invitations, she would leave with Cecilia.

But if she chose to stay behind…

‘There’s only one reason Caroline would want to stay in the capital right now.’

To cling to Christian Pierce, that scoundrel.

Cecilia was more than willing to lay the groundwork for their reunion.

***

The next day, Cecilia instructed Mary to take all the invitations outside.

“All of them?”

Looking at the beautifully packaged invitations, decorated with dried flowers and gold leaf, Mary appeared downcast. Though it was her master who couldn’t attend, Mary seemed more disappointed about it.

“Yes. I can’t go outside anyway, so there’s no point in receiving these invitations.”

“If you’re not attending, wouldn’t it be better to send a formal reply?”

“With all the rumors circulating, sending letters myself would only add fuel to the fire. If I quietly decline, they’ll understand the situation and let it slide. It’s better for the Lasphilla family to appear strict in educating their children.”

“Understood. Should I burn them, then?”

“Burning or discarding invitations someone went out of their way to send isn’t polite. Let’s just pretend I never received them.”

“Then…”

Cecilia said,

“Place them on top of the hallway drawer where we store letters. When this house is vacated, a young servant will probably gather them and throw them out.”