Page 3 of Meadowsweet and Marigold (EverAfter CozyXverse #1)

THE ULTIMATE BETRAYAL

~ M ARIGOLD~

"They're saying horrible things," her understudy whispered, appearing in the doorway. "About you and Rowan. And Magnolia?—"

In her dressing room, Marigold methodically removed her stage makeup, watching her professional mask dissolve along with the foundation and rouge. The face that emerged in the mirror was a stranger's — pale, wounded, and somehow older.

"Close the door," Marigold said, not looking away from her reflection. When they were alone, she continued removing her costume, each pin and hook unfastening something deeper within her.

"Will you fight back?" the younger dancer asked. "Make a statement?"

For what?

Who would even give a damn about an Omega’s opinion in our judgemental world of showbiz and the “golden” spotlight?

Marigold slipped into a simple black dress.

"There's nothing to fight for here."

"But your career—your reputation?—"

None of it matters.

If it did, none of this would have happened. None of this would be such a trajectory if it couldn’t be shattered and stolen from my grasp simply because my dreams were just as important as my Alphas’ happiness.

I thought we shared the same hopes, and after years of commitment an tailoring to their needs and desires, I expected being encouraged to follow my own dreams after all the self-sacrifice would have been worth it.

Obviously not…

"Were never truly mine."

She gathered her few personal belongings, leaving the rest — gifts from Rowan, photos with Magnolia, the accumulated treasures of a life built on lies.

"I was just borrowing them until the truth came out."

Her phone buzzed incessantly with notifications, but she silenced it without looking.

She’d rid of it. She’d have no choice because it wasn’t something she bought. It was gifted by her Alphas who emphasized the importance of her safety and being able to communicate with them and those of importance to her.

Now it was buzzing with all the tabloids and articles probably being plastered on social media and would be on the front page of the daily newspapers tomorrow.

All mockery…

"Where will you go?" the understudy repeated the question from earlier.

Marigold paused at the door, her hand resting on the knob.

"Somewhere I can remember who I was before all this. Before them."

Willowbend.

The name came to her suddenly — her grandmother's cottage, empty since her passing three years ago. The small countryside town where Marigold had spent childhood summers before the ballet academy consumed her life.

Before she met the Alphas she thought would be her forever.

"They'll follow you," the understudy warned. "The press, the gossip?—"

"Not where I'm going."

For the first time since Rowan had uttered those devastating words on stage, Marigold felt something other than pain — a flicker of determination, small but inextinguishable.

"Nobody follows fallen stars for long. They'll find something new to talk about."

She slipped out the back entrance, dodging the flashbulbs and questions. The night air hit her face with cleansing coldness, washing away the stifling heat of humiliation.

"I can start again," she whispered to herself as she hailed a taxi. "I will start again." The city lights blurred past the window, but Marigold didn't look back.

"I am Marigold Everhart," she whispered fiercely, her voice growing stronger with each word. "And I will not be broken."

In her mind, she was already gone — already picturing the overgrown garden at the cottage, the silence broken only by birdsong instead of applause, the solitude that had once seemed like a punishment but now felt like salvation.

"Willowbend," she told the driver, her voice gaining strength with each syllable. "As fast as you can."

~MAGNOLIA~

"Run, little Marigold," she murmured, her voice dripping with false sympathy. "Run and hide, like the coward you are."

From her private box overlooking the theater's rear exit, Magnolia Everhart observed the unfolding of her masterpiece.

The emerald tones in her hair caught the dim lighting as she leaned forward, lips curved into a satisfied smile. Her sunset-gold eyes tracked Marigold's hunched figure through the glass of her opera binoculars.

"She's actually leaving," Magnolia murmured in anticipated glee, lowering the binoculars to take a delicate sip of champagne. "How perfectly predictable."

Her companion, the theater's financial director, shifted uncomfortably.

"Was all this truly necessary, Miss Everhart?"

Magnolia's smile hardened.

"Necessary? My dear man, it was inevitable." She traced a manicured finger around the rim of her glass. "Prima ballerinas don't just step aside. They must be...displaced."

Below, Marigold climbed into a taxi, her once-impeccable posture now a study in defeat. Something flickered across Magnolia's face — perhaps the ghost of sisterly connection — before vanishing beneath triumph.

"You've been planning this for years," the director observed.

"Since we were children," Magnolia replied, her voice softening with remembrance.

"Always Marigold in the spotlight while I stood in the wings.

'The talented twin,' they called her." A flash of bitterness sharpened her features.

"No one ever saw that I worked twice as hard for half the recognition. "

She rose, moving to the window with feline grace.

The taxi disappeared around a corner, carrying her sister away from everything she'd ever loved.

"Did you see her face?" Magnolia whispered, pressing her palm against the cool glass. "When she realized I orchestrated this grand scheme of utter embarrassment with her fiancé of all people. When she understood it was all orchestrated? I bet she’s realizing if Rowan boldly rejected her, so did the rest of her pack. She’d be a fool to try and return home.

" A quiet, satisfied laugh escaped her. "Worth every moment of waiting in her shadow. "

Her reflection stared back at her from the darkened glass — so like Marigold's, yet fundamentally different. Where one twin's eyes had filled with heartbreak, the other's now shone with triumph.

"The company will announce my promotion to principal dancer tomorrow," she said, turning back to her companion. "After a respectful interval, of course. We mustn't appear opportunistic."

The freckles across her cheeks seemed to darken as she smiled, already imagining tomorrow's headlines, the flowers that would soon flood her dressing room— Marigold's dressing room.

"She'll recover," the director offered weakly.

"Oh, I'm counting on it," Magnolia replied, draining her champagne. "Marigold always was annoyingly resilient. But by the time she does..." She gestured around the opulent box, to the stage beyond, to the world she had coveted for so long. "All of this will be mine."

She closed her eyes briefly, savoring the moment when everything had changed— when she'd finally stepped out of her sister's shadow and into the spotlight that had always been meant for her.

The future was hers for the taking, and she would let nothing, and no one, stand in her way.

"To transformation," she whispered to the empty space where Marigold had been. "Yours...and mine."