SEQUEL: THIRTY

Madeline just walked over to her and wiped her boot on her face, “Something I should have done a long time ago.” She said cruelly.
Madeline could have had Alina shot while she was unconscious but she wanted to savor her win, she wanted Alina to know that she was losing her crown to her.
“What… what are you talking about?” Alina asked in that feather soft voice, hoping that she was truly in the hospital under heavy medication and hallucinating something terrible.
Madeline scoffed, starting to get irritated with the slow and stupid soon to be ex princess. “Don’t fucking act stupid, I’m killing you and taking your place.” She said trying to keep her calm and failing.
Alina started to laugh and then stopped, frowning painfully. She wasn’t acting stupid, her brain was genuinely refusing to process the scene in front of her. She couldn’t take the last person she had in her life betraying her.
“Y-You want to mate Roman?” She asked slowly, hoping to Fate and back that that was the reason Madeline was throwing away nearly a decade of trust. She might be able to understand and forgive it if it were for love.
“I don’t give a shit about that cold bastard, I just want what he can offer me.” She said spitefully, pissed off about Alina’s question so she kicked her in the face.
Alina’s head whipped to the side from the force of the kick but she didn’t feel it, she had gone numb, she immediately turned over to face Madeline again. “That’s a lie, Maddie, please tell me it’s a lie,” She begged, tears brimming in her eyes.
“Shut up.” Madeline bit out, kicking her again. “You wouldn’t be in this pitiful situation if you had just gotten with one of my brothers, I have nothing against you personally, you’re just in the way of what I want.” She huffed.
Alina fell silent, the cold hard reality of what was happening finally sinking in. Maddie had never cared for her, she had only cared that she was a princess. She had been lonely in high school because the other students were either too scared of her or were jealous of her, Madeline had been the only exception, or so she thought.
Madeline paced for a bit, getting angry all over again, “Why do you get to be a fucking princess and I don’t? What’s so fucking special about you? You’re such a fucking loser.”
Alina didn’t respond, it felt like she had fallen into a coma but she was wide awake. Her father that was supposed to love her unconditionally her abandoned her and threw her into a world that would never really love her all because of who he was.
She didn’t bother fighting, maybe this was how she was meant to go, maybe she would be able to reunite with her mother, the only person that ever wanted her. She closed her eyes slowly to Madeline’s ranting, the pain in her head returning, only that it wasn’t just in her head. It was all in her heart and it was quickly spreading, consuming her.
Alina wondered what Madeline was waiting for, she had already arranged all this, hadn’t she? She might as well just get on with it and blow her brains out. Or was this some kind of power trip for her? Wasn’t it enough that she had fooled her for almost seven straight years? Wasn’t it enough that she had ripped out her heart spat on it and handed it back to her?
“Fucking do it then!” She suddenly exploded after keeping quiet for so long, “Fucking shoot me! There’s nothing more to take from me but my beating heat, so fucking take that too!”
Madeline slowly walked over and kicked her in the side twice as hard, wishing that she wore her steel toed boots that night. “Don’t fucking yell at me,” She said in a quiet but dangerous voice. “I’m not going to kill you myself, I told you that I’ve never killed a person before, haven’t I? Because a princess doesn’t soil her hands and that’s why you’re a failed princess.”
Alina didn’t give a fuck about whatever Madeline was going on about, she just wanted to be out of there and if death was the only way to do that then she would take it. “Then have one of the humans you hired to do it,” She said in a tired voice.
She had been so tired recently, yes, that was the feeling she had been feeling. Exhaustion…
“Fine,” Madeline agreed, “If that’s what you want, I’ll give it to you. We’ll call it your dying wish.” She said coyly, signaling Pedro who walked over and pulled out his gun.
“Finish her off,” She ordered, walking away from Alina.
Pedro had a sad expression on his face, he didn’t like stories of betrayal, they always made him feel so conflicted but he was ruled by the God of money so he didn’t hesitate to pull the trigger.
Alina closed her eyes and waited for the stinging pain of the bullet and the blissful silence of death but it never came. A shot did ring out but she never felt the impact of the bullet, her eyes flying open at the sound of a second gunshot.
What had happened was that as Pedro pulled back the trigger, Roman had shot his whole wrist clean off and before the henchman could recover from seeing only a bloody stump where his wrist used to be, another shot rang out and he dropped to the ground.
It wouldn’t be right to say chaos broke out because there was simply no time for that to happen, it was a one sided massacre, highly trained werewolves against unsuspecting humans, there was only one way for it to turn out.
Roman had already silently cleared out the men stationed outside the warehouse to keep watched before the men that Lou arranged for him arrived. They all silently took up positions to be able to take out as many men as possible before the other group could reconvene and return fire.
It had turned out far better than he expected, the human thugs Madeline had hired dropping like flies. He didn’t drop his gun as he strode in, Alina somehow looking more shocked that he showed up than Madeline.
Madeline stood frozen in disbelief, uncaring that the men she hired were all possibly dead. “Roman?” She said his name without stuttering for the very first time.
Roman didn’t even bat an eyelid in her direction, the other men knew to surround her after making sure that there were no enemies left so he wasn’t worried about her stabbing him in the bad.
“You always end up in the worst situations, Your Highness,” He said calmly, dropping down to one knee to untie her.
“What are you doing here?” Alina asked in a cold voice to mask how vulnerable she actually was.
“Because someone kept ignoring my calls,” He said, inwardly wincing at how petty he sounded.
His reason sounded perfectly logical or it would if he wasn’t currently rescuing Alina from a life threatening situation, that would make anything sound silly in comparison.
“I didn’t see your calls,” Alina deadpanned, able to sit up when her arms were free.
Roman paused before he cut her ankles free, “Don’t play games with me.”
“I lost my phone but even if I had seen them, I would have ignored them anyway,” She snarked.
Roman rose to his feet without freeing her of the rope around her ankles, “Why did I even bother coming here at all?” He muttered to himself on a sigh.
“I should be asking you the same, I was handling things just fine by myself.” She huffed, putting her nose in the air.
Roman glanced at her, taking in her bruised and bloody face, and her tear clumped lashes, wondering how she still managed to be so aggravating when she was near death. “Sure you were.”
“You don’t even like each other,” Madeline blurted out, the only hope that she kept desperately holding onto that Roman would choose her.
Roman turned to look at her, “You’re not better than a dead person Madeline, you shouldn’t be speaking,” He drawled, returning his attention back to Alina.
“You either ask me to help you or I fully intend to leave you here,” Roman stated.
Alina shot him a look of disdain, “Then you better start leaving because I’m never doing that.”