The General's Wife Wants to Leave-Chapter 230: Quiet and strange

The rhythm of horses’ hooves clip-clopped along the road filled Joanna’s ears.

Occasionally, the sound of flipped paper would be interfered with.

When it was perceived in Joanna’s hearing sense, she would raise her eyes, removing her gaze from the page of the book that she was holding with one hand in front of her and covering the sight toward her face. Slightly lowering the book, she had her eyes fixed across from her.

That gesture alone had indicated that Joanna did not concentrate to read. If she did have ultimate focus on reading, as she usually did once the book was in her hands, most of the time she would not notice if there was a movement around her or she would notice, but it took some time before she realized that.

Hence, at the moment, if she was asked to give an honest answer over the question of what the story of the book she was reading was about, Joanna would shake her head before saying, ’I don’t know.’ According to the fact that the current book in her hands was a book that she had never read before.

Since the night she caught the man, who was now sitting across from her, visiting her in her room, Joanna felt like she was seeing a different man.

He was before her eyes, but it felt like he was nowhere to be seen. He was like being absent, like his absence in the days before his presence.

He was quiet. Most of the time he was like pondering over something in silence, as if there were a lot of things that spiraled, hard to disentangle in his mind. And Joanna first noticed that during their togetherness in the dining room.

After being absent for a few days, she was glad that she finally could have meals together with her father and her husband on the day before they left for Barasca. But the atmosphere that surrounded them felt different than the days before the incident happened.

Canillas had indeed discussed with her father the arrangement of their return to Barasca, and they indeed left one night after they met and had a brief conversation in her room. freeweɓnovel.cøm

Using one last day in the capital, she had also done what she could to discipline the idle employee of de Lara’s mansion in the capital. She had talked about that matter to her father as well, and he agreed with her idea to send one of trusted de Lara’s staff in Barasca to control over the capital’s mansion and gave a regular report to her father for a certain period of time.

A decisive step had also been taken for disobedient and idle workers that they would have to quit from their job if they refused to obey and be disciplined.

And this morning, after everything was well arranged and all were at the place, they left the capital together with all the entourage that escorted them toward the capital.

It had been a total of eight hours of journey now, including the short stop that they used for lunch, and they were predicted to arrive at the Greymore Inn within approximately two hours.

During that time as well, the man who rode the same carriage as her was quiet, making the quietness inside the carriage palpable, to the point she could hear her whispered breath if there were no other sounds seeping in through outside the carriage.

However, gladfully, during their togetherness with her father that happened when they had meals together, although he was quiet most of the time, when her father talked to him, he responded to him in a responsive way.

He conversed with her father with a lot of respect. But when her father was quiet, he would compete with him in the quietness.

It was not that her husband was a talkative person. Most of the time he was quiet if no one threw a bait to make him open his mouth to have conversation with them. But of course it did not apply to her, as he had been the one who made an initiation, not even doubting to poke her to talk to him over any subject he brought up for them to converse together.

But none of that applied for her as well this time. He was quiet, and the way he was quiet this time was undoubtedly different from his usual self. She could sense that, and it was not hard for her to know that.

During that time as well, he did not spare her any long looks. When their eyes met, he would offer her a tiny smile before averting his eyes away and not seeing her again.

It was like this time. He was busy reading the book that she lent him. As if he were immersed in the story that the book offered, becoming part of the characters written on the book, it could be counted with her fingers how many times he lifted his head to take a break from the book he was reading and stared outside the window for various seconds of silence.

He did not even once make any initiation to disturb her or poke her for amusement like he usually did.

Everything seemed calm, quiet, and strange.

Lowering her eyes back toward the book in front of her, Joanna put the book down on her lap and then lowered her head as she felt that there was nothing she could observe more from the strange man before her.

Was he her husband? Or her husband had gone somewhere, and the man who was now with her was his twin? Did he have a twin? Joanna questioned the absurd thoughts in her mind.

But the answer to that question was obtained by Joanna about an hour later.

The man that an hour ago sat in front of her was now sitting next to her. Not only that, she was now having her head laid on his shoulder, just like how it happened every time she fell asleep in the carriage during their journey to the capital more than a week ago.

"Awake?" She heard him ask her. The same question he asked her every time he noticed her stir when she had her head lay on his shoulder, implying that she might already wake up from the sleep that she did not realize when she surrendered to the slumber.

Pondering for a few seconds, Joanna gave a light single nod as a response to the low, deep voice that drifted into her ears, but she did not make a movement from her position. She kept her head laid on the sturdy shoulder while having her eyes fixed on her hand that intertwined with his large one and positioned on his lap.

Eventually, Joanna closed her eyes when a light pressure was applied to her head. It was he who pressed his head against hers in a gentle manner without exerting a total weight on her head, an intimate gesture for them to enjoy the moment of silence until they arrived at their destination.

Feeling the back of her hand gently stroked by the thumb of the hand that held hers, the masculine scent that had long gone flooded back in her senses.

Outside the carriage, one could see that the sunset blossomed upon the horizon, crowning over the earth where the breathing breathed.