Her Devilish Alpha - Chapter 196

“My goodness, looks like I’ll have to talk to Cornelia about this. I can’t believe she’s back to her old antics.”

“Old? As in, she’s done this more than once? And to other people?”

Rosalynn nodded, face filled with confusion. She thought Xavier would have told her.

“There was once a time even Xavier fell for it, thinking someone’s life was on the line because of Cornelia.”

Madeline opened and closed her mouth, but no words came out of it. The woman was too stunned to speak.

“Wait, seriously? Who did Cornelia threaten to–”

Rosalynn realised she had spoken out of line. So Xavier hadn’t told her yet, she had expected him to have told her by now. Perhaps he was too embarrassed, or perhaps he didn’t want to upset Madeline further.

“Forget I said anything,” Rosalynn said.

“Eh? Why?”

“Cornelia does this a lot, it’s not uncommon for people around her to be threatened. She thinks it’s funny.”

The girl looked flat-out horrified by what Rosalynn had told her.

Rose was beginning to think she also shouldn’t have told Cornelia found threatening people funny.

“You shouldn’t take things too seriously, Cornelia has a very eccentric way of doing things. Seems like being her daughter won’t exclude you from it either if she’d threaten to kill Xavier if you won’t attend dinner. Of course, she wouldn’t actually do it since she’s not heartless, but…”

The look on Madeline’s face said enough; Rose took the hint and stopped talking. That was enough talking about Cornelia for now.

“Eccentric. People call her eccentric,” Madeline muttered, unable to see how people could just accept things as is. Even Briar acted normal, like she hadn’t just been threatened.

Was it really as normal as they were making it out to be? Briar never met Cornelia before, so she wouldn’t know what it was like. Yet, she kept her cool. She made a small fuss about it at the beginning but that was it.

“She looked miserable that night, during dinner,” Rosalynn blurted out.

“What? How could Cornelia be miserable? She looked like she had the time of her life,” Madeline stated as if it was extremely obvious. Which it was, to her.

“Another thing Cornelia does often is put up facades. She may seem like she’s having the time of her life on one end but she may be suffering on the other.”

“Are you trying to say she was miserable because I was there?” Madeline asked, her voice shaky.

Rosalynn shook her head, “That’s not what I’m trying to say, dear. What I’m trying to say is she looked miserable because she knows what she did to you was wrong.”

Madeline folded her arms against her chest, narrowing her eyes.

“I’m not the only victim here.”

“Ah, right,” Rosalynn smiled apologetically at Madeline. She corrected, “Both you and Emilio. And Briar.”

“And yet she never explained why she did it. All she did was apologise, apologise and apologise,” Madeline pointed out flatly.

“You’re right. All Cornelia did the other night was just apologise, apologise and apologise. But just because she didn’t explain the situation to you also doesn’t mean she isn’t sorry, dear. You have to know that. Her job limits her from speaking about certain matters.”

“Even if those ‘certain matters’ are personal and important?’

“Especially if those certain matters are personal and important.”

Hurt shone in Madeline’s eyes, she couldn’t believe what Rosalynn was saying. She knew Rosalynn was trying to be there for her whilst also telling her about Cornelia’s perspective, but she felt hurt. By Cornelia, not Rosalynn.

“She abandoned me, and when she’s asked about why she can’t tell me why she chose to abandon me and not tell Emilio I exist, she says it has everything to do with her job. And then, when she doesn’t seem apologetic. Maybe there’s a hint of remorse on her face but I’ve been told she makes a great actress. And the look on your face isn’t exactly reassuring, heh.”

“That’s because what you said is true, and it would be wrong of me to deny it. But what I can’t deny and what I can say is that she is apologetic. She is miserable because she doesn’t get to say what she wants to say to you and because she has to look you in the face and remember what she did. If she didn’t care for you, she wouldn’t have checked up on you whilst you were growing up. She was there every step of the way, even if you didn’t see her,” Rosalynn said, nodding.

“That wasn’t a lie?”

“Nothing she said was a lie,” Rosalynn admitted, adding, “Except for what she said in that letter, that was a lie of course. I know her, and she wouldn’t have killed Xavier,” Rosalynn spoke, choosing to keep another thing from Madeline. She placed a hand on hers, “You should get some rest, it must have been a busy day for you.”

Madeline pressed her lips into a thin line, “Yeah, I probably should. Are you coming by tomorrow?”

Rosalynn nodded before the two ladies exchanged farewells, and she left, leaving Madeline alone.

She laid in bed, staring up at the ceiling, awake at night.

Madeline had chosen not to sleep in Xavier’s bedroom, thinking it was too soon for that and choosing to sleep in one of the guestrooms instead.

Just as she was about to sleep, she heard the sound of thunder booming.

‘When did it start to rain?’ Madeline wondered, her brows knitted. She had never noticed it had begun raining, she was too focused on her thoughts and ideas.

Covering herself with the comforter, she wished it would end. Madeline had always hated thunder, and storms ever since she was a little girl.

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Author’s Note: I would like to clarify that Xavier, Briar, Adrian and the others are away for a couple of days because it’s the full moon, and in Alaric, werewolves remain werewolves for a couple of days and not for only one night.