It Seems Like The Infamous Trash Can is Right Here! - Chapter 136
He spread his arms without hesitation, embracing me tightly.
“My spring-blossom baby. My love, my everything, my princess.”
He whispered in the same aching voice I remembered from what once was my whole world.
Then he rained kisses over my forehead and hair, as if he could no longer hold back.
Back when I lived at Father’s estate, I never imagined I would ever be loved so fiercely again in my life.
That’s how much Father and Vaikal had poured their love into me.
Even though I’d known, deep down, that I’d see my family again one day. Now that the moment had come so quickly, I couldn’t hide the joy overflowing in my heart.
The warmth of his embrace, the familiar scent of Father brought me to tears.
I’d thought I’d cried enough when I reunited with Vaikal yesterday, but now the tears came again.
“I missed you.”
As I choked out the words in a trembling voice, Father gently stroked my head with his large, warm hand.
“ Daddy missed you too, my princess. Every day without you was like hell.”
And in his voice, I heard the sincerity. They were not just words. He had truly suffered.
Even more than I had.
“There will never be a parting again. I’ll stay by your side for the rest of my life.”
‘Huh?’
Even as tears streamed down my face, born of joy at our reunion and sorrow over the years spent alone, I instinctively lifted my head.
“Daddy, you can’t do that.”
I was happy to see him, of course. But what wasn’t right was still not right.
“I have to live with my husband now.”
“…What?”
My father looked at me, stunned.
“Of course, if Lionel agrees, maybe we can all live together…”
I quickly pulled out a handkerchief, dabbed away the tears, and offered a bashful smile.
“Dad, I’m engaged. I’m about to become the Duchess of Luanax. Isn’t that wonderful?”
For daughters born into noble families, wasn’t marrying a worthy partner the greatest act of filial piety?
Vaikal might have his issues with Lionel, some misunderstanding from their academy days, perhaps, but not Father. As the head of the Solen family, a man with exceptional insight into the political and economic tides of the continent, there’s no way he’d oppose it.
Surely Vaikal had already explained how Lionel came to take me from the Cloren Kingdom’s monastery.
‘…Wait. Did Vaikal not mention Lionel at all? Why does he look so shocked?’
I glanced up at Father’s eyes, still trembling with disbelief, and gave a little tug on the hem of his sleeve.
“Daddy…?”
In the next moment, he dropped his head, burying his face in my shoulder as he embraced me tightly.
“To think something so soft… ended up in the hands of a beast like…”
His voice broke into muttered fragments. I could hear the faint grind of his clenched teeth.
‘He must not be ready to let me go yet, either.’
Of course, he’d parted from me before I’d even come of age. To him, I must still seem like a child.
“Daddy, I’ve grown up. I’m old enough to marry now.”
Even as I said it, I understood his feelings. I gently patted his broad back.
Only after quite some time did he finally let go. His expression was still dark, but unlike Vaikal yesterday, he didn’t flare up in outright rejection.
The expressions of the men who had unintentionally witnessed this reunion between father and daughter were all different.
Sirren looked oddly moved. Vaikal, as grim as Father. Halid wore a more conflicted expression.
And Lionel…
“I always thought your shifting behavior was strange… Now I understand.”
With the look of someone waking from a long sleep, he stared fixedly at my father.
“You both remembered everything, Count Solen and Young Count Solen.”
