Chapter 42 Madeline
Madeline
I should’ve taken the garden staircase. The thought hit the second I saw my mother standing dead center in the foyer, silk robe, lecturing a maid about the unforgivable crime of slightly-too-yellow roses.
“The brief was cream, not custard,” she snapped, gesturing at the vase.
My heels clicked on the last two steps. My mother’s head snapped toward me.
Her expression changed so fast it gave me whiplash.
“Oh. Madeline. Come here.”
Every cell in my body screamed no. I walked anyway.
“Morning, Mother.”
“Yes, yes, hello,” she shooed for me to be quiet, and gestured for me to hurry up. “Come closer. I can’t see you from there.”
We were five meters apart. I stepped forward. Her gaze swept over me with the sharpness of a scanner. Then her face dropped like she’d witnessed a crime.
“Oh my god.” Her hand went to her mouth. Her eyes widened. “Oh god,” she repeated again, her tone dropped in a way that scared me.
“What?”
“Closer.”
I obeyed out of habit more than choice.
She lowered her hand from her mouth, and reached for me. She turned my chin left, then right, like she was inspecting a product the dynasty courier had delivered damaged.
“That’s a line,” she whispered, clearly devastated.
“A… what?”
“A line, Madeline.” Her manicured nail hovered near the outer corner of my eye. “There.”
“Creasing maybe?”
“It’s age,” she squealed horrified. “Oh god. Oh no. A line. On my twenty-year-old daughter.”
“Mother—”
“Marco!” she barked, dropping my chin. “Get over here.”
My father appeared near the dining room archway, datapad in hand.
“What now?” he asked, already exhausted.
She grabbed my face again and angled it toward him. “Do you see this?”
He squinted. “See what?”
“The lines!”
He tilted his head. “Still not seeing them.”
She rolled her eyes. “You also can’t see without glasses.”
“Mother, I’m fine,”
“No, you’re exhausted,” she corrected, swatting at under my eye as if she could erase it. “This is what happens when Marco piles negotiations on you. Look at her, she looks late thirty.”
“Really?”
“You’re fine, Maddy.” My father stepped around her and touched my elbow, steering me toward the breakfast table. “Ignore your mother.”
“She’s ignoring the problem. You need a day off. Fresh air. Spa. Hydration therapy. Shopping. And proper clothing. That dress does nothing for your complexion.”
I glanced down at the pale blue wrap dress I’d put on because Vince liked the way it fell over my hips.
“I have meetings. The Hollis follow-up and—”
“No, you don’t,” she dismissed my schedule with a flick of her hand. “Cancel them.”
“I can’t just—”
“I said cancel them.”
“She actually can’t,” my father tried. “Madeline is handling the Hollis water rights merger.”
“And the Vance trade routes,” I added.
She waved that away like lower-tier gossip. “All of that can wait. You’re spending the day with me.”
“Mother—”
“Marco,” she said sweetly, turning just enough to wield him like ammunition, “are you saying you care more about trade meetings than the health of our daughter?”
He dropped like she’d punched him.
“That’s not…” He sighed. “Fine.”
I stared at both of them. My plans, my carefully-structured day, my fourteen-hundred slot, snipped away like a thread.
Mother smiled at me. “We’ll leave in an hour.”
She glided out of the foyer, already calling instructions to staff about cars and afternoon tea and which boutiques to open early. The house hummed around her commands.
I stayed frozen where she’d left me.
“Sorry, sweetheart. You know how she gets.”
Yes. I knew. I also knew I had one minute before she returned and confiscated my phone “to keep me present.” I pulled it out with shaking hands and opened my messages.
Me: My mother just hijacked my entire day.
His reply landed almost instantly.
Vince: Okay.
Just that. Four letters, full stop, nothing else. No baby, angel, or teasing. My stomach dropped.
Me: Are you mad?
Ten seconds.
Vince: No, baby. Why would you think that?
That baby helped. A little. Not enough.
Me: Just tell me if you are. I can stand reading it. Silence makes me feel sick.
The screen flashed.
Incoming call: VINCENT.
I ducked into the alcove beneath the staircase, and answered.
“Hi,”
“How’s my girl?”
“Are you mad at me?” It came out too fast.
“No, baby. I’m not mad.”
“I stood you up.” I pressed my forehead against the cool stone wall. “We had plans and I—”
“You have a life. I can’t control every second and element of it, sweetheart. I understand that.”
I closed my eyes. The words were reasonable. The tone was gentle. None of it touched the self-loathing already sliding under my skin.
“You aren’t punished because you’re going to spend time with your mom,”
“Okay,”
He was quiet for a beat. “Madeline.”
“Yes.”
“Is everything okay?”
“Do you… think I’m looking old?”
He went silent in a way that wasn’t dangerous, just stunned. “…What?”
“Or that I’ve put on weight.” I stared at the pattern in the marble. “You can be honest.”
“What has prompted this,”
“Just thought I saw… lines in the mirror. And those pictures I sent. I looked… heavy.”
The pause stretched.
“Baby, if anything, you’re too small. There aren’t any lines. If there were, I’d kiss every single one and then threaten whatever gave them to you.”
My throat squeezed. My eyes burned.
“I have to go,” I whispered. “She’ll be back.”
“Message me,” he said. “Updates. Where you are. How your head is. That’s not optional anymore.”
“Okay.”
I ended the call, already hating the day that awaited for me.
The rest of the morning was a blur of boutiques. Four, maybe five. Hard to track when everything smelled like perfume and money and quiet cruelty.
My mother moved through them with the precision of a handler selecting weapons.
She rejected every dress I liked.
“That colour washes you out.”
“That cut makes your hips look wide.”
“That neckline is vulgar.”
“That silhouette makes you look… sturdy.”
I turned again, pretending the wool-rough fabric wasn’t scratching my skin. She studied my reflection with her arms folded.
“The shoulders are wrong.”
The tailor, hovering behind us, frowned. “We can take them in, madam—”
“It’s her shoulders,” my mother clarified. “Not the dress. Forget it. Her body isn’t in the right shape for a tailored fit.”
Heat crept up my neck.
We did this for three hours. Stand still. Turn. Step closer. Step back. Be quiet. Answer when prompted. Take the pin prick without flinching.
Unfortunately for me, that horror ended only to be escorted to the next one.
The dynasty daughter luncheon was held at an airy hotel terrace overlooking the city; glass walls, pale marble, crystal chandeliers hung to look effortless. Everything about it screamed casual wealth. We arrived fifteen minutes late — on purpose. My mother liked making an entrance.
“Fix your straps,” she said as the hostess greeted us. “And stand up straight. You’re already short; don’t make it worse.”
I straightened, lifting my chin.
Inside, the room was a pastel nightmare. Blush, cream, soft gold, every table a picture of curated femininity.
“Remember,” my mother murmured, looping her arm through mine like we were friends. “Smile. Don’t volunteer information. No one needs to hear about your little deals. Leave the heavy talk to the men.”
“My ‘little deals’ pay for half this room,” I said under my breath.
She squeezed my arm hard enough to bruise. “Don’t be vulgar, Madeline.”
We hadn’t even reached the first cluster of women before someone called my name.
My mother flourished here, playing the role of elegant saboteur with frightening ease.
When someone praised my intelligence, she leaned in with, “She’s too hard on herself. She gets so emotional about outcomes.”
When a woman mentioned seeing me at a negotiation, she said, “She’s bright, but she’s still green. If she weren’t so sensitive, she’d be perfect.”
When one of the wives remarked that I seemed composed under pressure, my mother laughed. “Oh, that’s all training. She collapses later. My poor girl isn’t built for pressure.”
Each comment a thread. Sharp enough that the people listening absorbed it and filed it under true.
I felt myself shrinking with every polite laugh.
“Your daughter is very impressive at the table,” one matriarch said later.
I felt like I was watching myself from the ceiling.
“Yes, well,” my mother said, tightening her grip on my shoulder, “she also lost the Ventnor agreement last week. Nobody talks about that part.”
My chest punched inward.
“That was not her fault,” the woman said gently. “Ventnor’s heir refused any compromise.”
“Still,” my mother insisted, swirling champagne, “Madeline oversold her proposal. Five successes don’t erase one very embarrassing loss. A dynasty daughter can’t crumble at one ‘no.’”
“I didn’t crumble,” I said quietly.
She smiled at the table, the expression not reaching her eyes. “Of course you didn’t, darling.”
After the third round of being introduced with a list of my flaws disguised as affectionate concern, I stopped trying to correct the record.
When we finally returned home, I felt half dead.
I changed into one of the dresses my mother had approved. I spent too long staring at my reflection, trying to see what she did.
I walked into the dining hall. My father sat at the head of the table, reading a report on his datapad. He looked up when I sat beside him, his expression softening.
“How was your day, sweetheart?”
My throat tightened. It would’ve been easier to say fine.
“Mother hates me,”
He sighed. “She doesn’t hate you, Maddy.”
“She hates everything about me,” I said quietly. “How I look, how I talk, how I work.”
“Your mother is… difficult,” he said in that careful tone people use when they’ve run out of excuses. “But she loves you.”
“She didn’t act like it.”
He opened his mouth to respond, but the doors swung open.
My mother entered like a woman walking onto a stage.
“Oh, Marco,” she sighed as she sat, napkin unfolding into her lap. “What a day.”
“So I hear,”
“And Madeline did so well socializing. Hard to believe her only friends are fictional.” she added.
The maid pouring wine inhaled sharply.
My father frowned. “Darling—”
“What?” she asked. “She watches television all day. That’s not a personality. That’s avoidance.”
“You didn’t need to say that,” I murmured.
“Oh, darling,” she cooed, “you’re so sensitive.”
The maid set down the basket of dinner rolls between us and fled as politely as possible.
I reached for one, because I hadn’t eaten since the luncheon and I was shaking.
My mother’s hand snapped out, fingers closing around my wrist.
“Maddy,” she hissed. “Bread?”
I froze.
“I put broth on the menu for you. I told you, your dresses were tight. Do you want to be poured into them?”
Shame burned hot under my skin.
“I didn’t—”
“Carbs bloat. You hold everything in your face.”
My father looked pained. “Let her eat.”
She sighed. “Well, we don’t want her ballooning, do we? After all the effort I put into crafting her image.”
My fingers loosened. The roll fell back into the basket.
“And the things I gave up to have you,” she snapped, “I lost my uterus. For what, exactly?” She gestured down the table. “For this?”
My father stared at her. “That’s enough.”
“She doesn’t appreciate me. I risked everything and got one child out of it. One. I could have had more—children who listened, who showed gratitude—but no. I get sarcasm and biotech insults.”
“You got your ‘timeless face’ early,” Something inside me snapped. “You should thank me. Losing your uterus meant you could start biotech treatments sooner.”
My father’s head turned slowly toward me. “Madeline.”
My heart pounded against my ribs.
My mother went very still. Then she rose from her chair with a hand to her chest, eyes filling with tears on cue.
“I gave up everything to be your mother,” she choked out. “Everything. And this is how you speak to me? The child I almost died having?”
Guilt hit my stomach. “I didn’t mean—”
My father pushed back his chair. “Darling—”
“She hates me, Marco,” my mother insisted, tears falling perfectly. “My own daughter hates me.”
“I don’t—” I started.
My father turned to me instead of her, and for a horrible moment he looked… disappointed.
“You know better than to say something like that,” he said quietly. “You know how she is. Why would you deliberately provoke her? Now she’s going to be impossible.”
My throat closed.
“I wasn’t trying to—”
“You could have just sat there and said nothing. You know that, Maddy. You know what she’s like.” He stood and followed my mother out as she sobbed her way dramatically through the doors.
The dining hall doors closed behind them. I was sure the next few weeks would be hell.
I stared at the place my mother had been sitting, at the wine glass still half full, at the roll I wasn’t allowed to eat. My skin buzzed like I’d been slapped. Maybe I had been, in a way. Just not where anyone could see.
I’d said one wrong thing. One. And somehow, by the end of it, I’d become the ungrateful daughter who ruined everything.
Maybe that was the truth.
Maybe that was all I was here.
Too soft for dynasty deals. Too emotional for real pressure. Too heavy for dresses. Too thin-skinned for comments. Too sarcastic. Too sensitive. Too… disappointing.
But deep down I worried…what if she is right. What if this was the best version of me anyone was ever going to get. And I wasn’t enough for anyone.
My phone buzzed against the table.
I looked down like it was a lifeline.
Baby, I got this weekend free. Please tell me you can spend it with me?
The word baby blurred. I blinked hard to see the message clearly again. I typed, I’m free.
His reply came in fast, like he’d been waiting. Naturally flirting followed.
I stared at the screen, at his name, at the way he talked to me like I wasn’t a mistake someone regretted having.
What I didn’t tell Vince was how much I needed that.
Needed him and two days where no one grabbed my wrist when I reached for bread. Or listed every flaw I had. Where I wasn’t a project or a burden someone almost died for.
With him, I could almost believe I was wanted on purpose.
I typed, then deleted, I had a bad day. Typed and deleted, She hates me. Typed and deleted, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.
Instead I sent a smiley I didn’t feel and a joke about needing coffee before I could survive a whole weekend with him.
Unwanted mistakes didn’t have someone rearranging their entire weekend just to be with them.
I set the phone face down on the table, pulse still racing, and clung to the only solid thing I had left.
I might be nothing here, too much and not enough at the sam emit, but in forty-eight hours, I’d be with someone who looked at me like I wasn’t a waste.