Bride Behind the Mask novel Chapter 624

In the stillness of the night, Frederick's mind snapped into harsh clarity.

Marguerite's probing question had sent him spiraling into a labyrinth of self-reflection and doubt.

Had his fervent kisses and possessive embrace been acts of love or spiteful revenge?

His thoughts, a tangled web of unrest, spurred him to dress with hurried motions, a desperate urge to flee not just the room but also Marguerite's unsettling inquiry.

Yet as he tugged at the stubborn door handle, which refused to yield, he was faced with the stark reality that there was no escape.

Resigned, Frederick returned to the room without approaching Marguerite. He drew back the curtains and stood on the balcony to smoke, his silhouette bathed in the lunar glow, majestic yet tinged with an air of melancholy.

Marguerite's heart ached more deeply than the sorrowful scene before her. Watching him smoke, one cigarette after another, she felt an overwhelming sense of loss.

Was it so hard for him to distinguish love from hate?

All she wanted was an answer, but even that seemed a luxury beyond her reach.

Time passed, and at last, Frederick finished his final cigarette and turned back to the dimly lit bedroom. His eyes were inscrutable pools of shadow, and Marguerite could not discern the emotions they concealed.

"I'll be in the living room. You should get some rest," he said, his voice void of the passion that had just consumed them. It was as if their intense encounter had been nothing but a figment of Marguerite's imagination.

Yet that figment felt so palpably real to her, the emotions and sensations still vivid in her memory.

He went to the living room, where he dozed off on the couch, never uttering another word or stepping foot back into the bedroom.

Marguerite turned off the lamp, surrendering her body and her tumultuous feelings to the enveloping darkness, as tears silently fell once more.

Meanwhile, at the Winston Mansion.