Free Web NovelChapter 251: Chapter 251
The hour had long since slipped past midnight, and the manor sunk into a calm silence.
Quiet pressed in from every corner, broken only by the rhythmic sound of guards patrolling the outer corridors.
Even that sound felt muted, as though the night itself conspired to keep Ragnar alone with his thoughts.
In his study, lamplight pooled warmly over the broad oak desk, casting long shadows across the walls and illuminating stacks of ledgers spread open like dissected secrets. The scent of old paper and lamp oil hung in the air.
He had lost track of how many pages he had turned.
The books his guards had procured from Jireh lay before him, records salvaged from the estate of the imprisoned dignitary. Their leather bindings were worn smooth with age, ink faded in places, margins crowded with careful, almost frantic notations. These were not merely about household accounts or estate expenses. They stretched back years, decades even, into the era of the man’s late father.
Ragnar read them with a growing sense of unease.
Large sums vanished at irregular intervals.
Not stolen but funneled elsewhere.
He leaned forward, forearms braced against the desk, shoulders tense as his eyes traced the figures again. Transfers disguised as charitable donations. Loans extended and never reclaimed. Properties sold quietly, the proceeds redirected and then erased from later records as though they had never existed at all.
It was almost impressive that the family had managed to fall into destitution at all.
Ragnar exhaled slowly through his nose, the breath leaving him in a controlled line.
"Where did you send it?" he murmured to the empty room. freeωebnovēl.c૦m
One name surfaced again and again in his thoughts, coiling there like a familiar serpent.
Narfor.
If the dignitary’s family had been indebted to him then the steady hemorrhaging of wealth made sense.
From what Ragnar knew, Narfor was not a man who forgave unpaid debts. He collected them in any way he could, even by forcing those that owed him into servitude. If this family had been trying to buy time, to keep him at bay with gold, then these ledgers were more proof of corruption.
Ragnar’s fingers drummed once against the desk before stilling, his thoughts churning too quickly to settle. Connections formed and tangled in his mind, each more troubling than the last.
This was a thread, one that led deeper into Narfor’s web.
And Ragnar intended to pull it.
A knock sounded at the door.
The first was tentative, almost hesitant. Ragnar did not look up. The second one that followed a moment later was firmer.
He leaned back in his chair at last, muscles protesting faintly after hours of rigid stillness.
"Enter," he said.
The door creaked open.
Circe slipped inside and closed it quietly behind her, the soft click of the lock echoing in the otherwise silent room. She did not speak at first, and Ragnar’s gaze lifted of its own accord, drawn by her presence even before he truly saw her.
Her hair was unbound, spilling freely over her shoulders in dark, silken waves that caught the lamplight as she moved. She wore one of the nightgowns he had bought her months ago. It was thin, the pale fabric clinging softly to her form and a robe draped loosely over it, as though added as an afterthought against the night’s chill. It did little to conceal her and nothing at all to dull the slow, instinctive heat that stirred in him at the sight.
For a heartbeat, the ledgers ceased to exist.
His eyes traced her movement, a slow, deliberate perusal that felt intimate enough to be a touch. Circe met his gaze without blinking, her expression soft but knowing, lips curved faintly as she crossed the room toward him.
Her steps were light, and unhurried, as though she had nowhere else she needed to be.
When she reached the desk, Ragnar shifted his chair back just enough to make space. He lifted a hand and patted his lap, the silent invitation for her to sit.
A small smile touched her mouth.
She stepped between his spread thighs and perched on his lap, the warmth of her seeping through layers of fabric. His hands settled at her waist instinctively, steadying her.
"It’s late," he said quietly, his voice roughened by fatigue and something deeper. "Why aren’t you asleep?"
"I should be asking you that," Circe replied.
She lifted her hand and traced his cheek, fingers gliding along the sharp line of his jaw in a tender caress. The simple touch sent a ripple of sensation down his spine, cutting cleanly through the haze of numbers and schemes he had been drowning in for hours.
The truth lingered unspoken between them. She had waited for him. Waited until sleep had claimed her briefly, and she came here when she realized he still had returned to their room.
"You work too much," she added softly. "It can’t be good for you." frёewebηovel.cѳm
Ragnar watched her through half-lidded eyes, the lamplight catching in their depths and turning them molten. "Are you worried about me, princess?" he asked, the pet name rolling off his tongue affectionately.
Instead of answering, Circe leaned closer until their faces were a breath apart, close enough that he felt the warmth of her skin, the faint brush of her exhale against his lips.
"Come back to bed," she whispered. "Surely this can wait until tomorrow."
Her gaze flicked briefly to the ledgers strewn across the desk, then returned to him, steady and intent.
Ragnar lifted a hand and brushed a loose lock of hair back from her face, his thumb lingering at her temple. In her eyes, he saw his own desire reflected back at him.
Whatever resolve he had left unraveled swiftly after that.
He kissed her.
His mouth claimed hers hungrily, as though he had been denying himself this very thing all night. She melted into him at once, lips parting instinctively as he devoured her like she was something rare and precious.
His arm slid around her waist, drawing her flush against him. The heat of his body seeped through the layers between them.
His grip tightened slightly, as though afraid she might slip away if he loosened his hold for even a heartbeat. She responded without thinking, fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt, anchoring herself to him just as firmly.
The world beyond the study fell away.
The ledgers strewn across the desk, the whispered conspiracies inked into their pages, Narfor’s ever-present shadow, all of it dissolved beneath the warmth of her body and the familiar cadence of her breath against his lips.
