Chapter 341: No Price Too Steep!
Whispers had gone quiet regarding the upcoming marriage between Erwin and Alya... After the Count who challenged Christoph went missing, word quickly got around of what had happened. Everybody knew what Christoph had done, but nobody had any evidence to report him to the proper authorities.
And because of this, even quietly among friends, few if any of the higher nobility dared to utter their thoughts regarding the upstart who was marrying off his son to some lowborn Russian girl. Word eventually reached Heidi’s ears, and because of this she invited Christoph and his wife out for tea.
Gone were days where Heidi would silently dispose of people behind her husband’s back. If a threat reared its ugly head, she would leave such dirty and blood business to the men in her life. Bruno was one of them, but he was about as subtle as a fragmentation grenade being tossed into a living room.
But Bruno had men at his behest who were quite skilled in covert operations. Still, she had not expected Christoph to be one of them. And frankly speaking, Christoph was a man who had heard rumors of the things Heidi had done behind the scenes in the past years.
There was never a shred of evidence left behind for him to confirm them, but if rumors were to be true, even to some degree, the woman had buried more men than she had saved. A saint who wielded a dagger in one hand and a syringe full of penicillin in the other.
And if he was being honest, he had seldom had a reason to speak alone with Heidi in the past, nor would he want scandalous rumors to appear should people witness them together in public without their spouses. Out of both fear of potential violence, as well as the stain such baseless rumors could have on their family’s reputation, Christoph brought his wife as he met with Heidi.
Interestingly enough, Heidi also did not appear alone. She had her son Erwin with her. The boy was home for the summer, which had just arrived and thus acted as his mother’s companion in this exchange.
Erwin, though young, had the ferocity in his sky-blue eyes that was shared with his father. But unlike his father who was the alpha of a wolf pack who had been through scraps and scrapes with the likes of coyotes, bobcats, cougars, and bears, he was like a young pup that while eager to prove himself, was as green as grass.
Still, Christoph could not help but smile at the fortitude in his nephew’s eyes as he addressed the boy first before his mother.
"Erwin, you have grown much since our last encounter. I must say, you look very much like your father did when he was your age. Though you have a hint of your mother’s grace, which I suppose is fitting, as Bruno inherited much the same from our own mother.