SEQUEL: TWENTY-SIX

Madeline quietly let herself into the penthouse suite, expecting to find Alina right on the other side of the door with a scolding ready and was surprised to find the living room empty. A quick check of the main bedroom showed her that Alina was still fast asleep although it was well past 9 AM and the sun was streaming in through one of the open windows.
After she had been in a hurry to return too, it turned out that there was no need for her to rush back. She stared at Alina for the longest of times, wishing she could drive a knife through her skull and be done with this so she could make her move on Roman.
It was also a farfetched idea but everyone knew that she was Alina's best and only friend, there was a chance, she might be named the heir after Alina was gone. Alpha King Costin literally had no one else. But she wasn’t greedy, she was content with being the Luna Queen of Britain so she would take just that.
Sick of staring at Alina peacefully sleep without a care in the world, she decided to ring up room service. If Alina wasn’t awake, there was no way for her to tell just when Madeline had returned. She got comfortable in front of the big flat screen television, eating a lavish breakfast while watching a movie about royalty.
Halfway into her meal, she heard shuffling feet which made her lift her head up to see Alina rubbing her eyes as she walked into the living room. “Lina! You’re finally up,” She beamed, taking a sip of orange juice in a champagne glass.
“You’re back, Maddie,” She mumbled, pushing her tousled hair away from her sleepy face.
“Yeah, I‘ve been back for a while but you looked like you needed the sleep so I didn’t bother you… Want me to order breakfast for you?” Madeline offered lightly.
Alina heaved a sigh of relief, she had stayed up the night before overthinking. For some reason, she was convinced that Madeline was going to leave and never come back. Of course, she should have known how silly that thought was.
“Yeah thanks,” She smiled, “Just let me clean up real quick.”
Madeline’s smile dropped from her face the moment Alina turned around, she wasn’t tempted to poison her food but she didn’t give in. She already had a perfect plan, it would be stupid to let her impatience get in the way. She would also be killing off two birds with one stone literally by using Iyla as a scapegoat.
So a short while later, they were curled up on the couch picking at their tray of food while a different show from what Madeline had been watching earlier played in the background.
“So why did you go back home?” Alina asked curiously.
“Just some stupid promise I made to Peyton,” She said dismissively, vivid images of the argument they had before she left playing through her mind. She had no plans of telling Alina about it and she knew that her brothers knew better than to do that.
“Oh…” Alina mumbled, biting into an apple. She couldn’t place her finger on it but it felt like there was an ever growing distance between her and Madeline ever since they had a scuffle.
She didn’t want to bring it up or address it because she feared it being true. For the first time ever since she met Madeline in high school, she was faced with the possibility that Maddie might leave her, and she found that she didn’t like those prospects very much.
“Want to go shopping later today? Or we could just have a lazy day and stay in all day, your pick.” Madeline broke the tense silence.
Alina really wanted to stay in all day… Maybe she was the one with all the fault, recently she had lost all her flair and she just didn’t feel like doing the things they always did.
So she grinned instead of turning her down like she usually would if she didn’t want to do something, “Shopping of course!” She beamed with a strained smile.
Madeline had kept a neutral face because she didn’t want to influence Alina’s decision but she had been really hoping that she would agree to go shopping, it was paramount to her next attack. “Got any stores in particular that you want to visit?” She asked curiously, pulling out her phone.
Alina thought nothing of this, Madeline was more than often the one to plan for the places they went to. “What do you say to mall crawling?” She blurted out of the blue.
Madeline slowly glanced up from her phone, an inscrutable look on her face.
“I’m sorry, that was such a dumb idea,” Alina deflated quickly, “Why don’t you decide? I doubt there’s any worthwhile shop in Mistbourne that we haven’t gone to yet.” She said flippantly.
Madeline dropped her gaze back to her phone, relieved that Alina had changed her mind about mall crawling. It had caught her so off guard, that she had almost blurted out something she shouldn’t be saying. Alina was acting so odd, it unsettled Madeline because they had never gone on a mall crawl before, they were both too rich for that stress.
But that wasn’t even the reason why she thought Alina’s response was odd, the fact that a mall would be too crowded for her to pull any kind of attack was what had chilled her to the bone. It almost felt like Alina could read her mind, and she didn’t like how that jarred her.
It was why she didn’t address the suggestion at all, moving on quickly like Alina hadn’t said it at all, “Sure, I’ll just pick a couple of stores that we’ve been to before.”
Alina’s phone dinged at this point, interrupting their conversation. She reached for it with relief, hoping that there was something that could distract her from the blunder she just made.
Her expression shuttered when she saw who had sent her a message, shooting to her feet abruptly. “I’ll be on the balcony, I need to do something really quick.” She said in a rush, hurrying off.
Madeline didn’t even pay any attention to her, trying to get over her earlier scare while trying to figure out the best shop to pull an attack in. Who knew so much work went into killing a person and successfully hiding your tracks?
Alina on the other hand was standing on the balcony staring wide-eyed at the text message on her phone from Roman that said they needed to talk. For a moment she was befuddled, trying to figure out just what they needed to talk about but she knew well that it was definitely something to do with that blasted contract.
She had quickly left Madeline because she knew that Roman was a very sensitive topic between her and her best friend, and she didn’t want another argument to sprout from that.
Alina settled on the aesthetic bench on the balcony and crossed her legs, ringing up Roman. She scowled when the call rang several times without him picking up, immediately lashing out at him when he did pick up. “You say we need to talk then refuse to pick my call.”
Roman fell silent for a few seconds on the other side of the call before responding, “The contract has been drawn, I sent it to Anton to have a lawyer look at it and I could send you a copy if you want i-”
“Why did you send it to my dad?” She cut him off, her dark eyes narrowing.
“Because he was the one that proposed it,” He said shortly, uninterested in humoring her. “If everything goes right, it should be signed in about a week.” He ended his sentence as well as the call.
“Fucking bastard,” Alina sneered at her beeping phone. “He hung up on me.”
She shot to her feet and tried to bring her emotions under control, glancing at her phone once more when another notification brightened the screen. It was a copy of the contract as Roman had said and she didn’t bother looking at it because she already knew what was in it.
She really wished that she could talk to Madeline about this because it had her in a tense knot and she needed to get it out but there was no one to talk to. Madeline would take out look at the clauses of the contract and storm out again, she didn’t want that. Even if they couldn’t talk about it, Madeline’s presence was really all that buoying her at the moment.
Alina made her way back to the living room to find Madeline fast asleep on the couch, her phone by her side opened to ‘Maps’ and she shook her head fondly. Maybe she couldn’t talk about some things to Maddie but her best friend always had her good interests at heart and always tried her best at what she was good at, she should try to appreciate that more.
“‘Hey, Maddie,” She spoke softly while gently nudging her, “You should sleep in the bedroom, it’s more comfortable there.”
Madeline squinted her eyes open, looking confused for a few seconds, “Shit, did I fall asleep?”
“It’s fine, we can always go shopping in the afternoon, go take a nap.” She urged her, helping her to her feet.
Madeline must have stayed up late the night before to attend to whatever she had to do and the fact that she was already at the penthouse before Alina woke up meant that she had started out early just to get back as quickly as possible.
“Sure,” She yawned, picking up her phone before trudging to the bedroom.
Alina just shook her head fondly, watching her until the door clicked shut. She was left all alone in the living room with their leftover breakfast which wasn’t difficult to clear up, all she had to do was ring up room service.
Alina had no intention of bothering Madeline until her best friend woke up whenever she was ready to, which was exactly what Madeline wanted. She needed enough time to make preparations and she couldn’t do that while Alina was right beside her asking questions.
She sat up on the bed, leaning against the headboard with pillows behind her for support. She got back to anonymously hiring thugs to get rid of Alina while pretending to be fast asleep.