𝐅𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐓𝐫𝐮𝐭𝐡

𝐟 𝐨 𝐫 𝐭 𝐲 - 𝐭 𝐡 𝐫 𝐞 𝐞

"Yesterday night, at the annual winter ball hosted by the royal family, a well-known drug criminal who goes by the alias, Felon, took control of the castle. He and his men killed a total of sixty-seven security guards, severely injured seventy-two of them and killed a woman who attended the ball. He gathered all the reports who were at the winter ball to record a message he said. The police arrived at the scene a few minutes later after some channels broadcasted the video in which he took off the mask he was wearing, revealing himself to be prince Ricardo's twin brother. He then later shot king Eduardo twice in his abdomen area, and was rushed to the hospital for surgery. Sources have said that his condition remains uncertain after the surgery and the next few hours will be very crucial. The citizens of Spain each have their own opinions on the video that surfaced last night. However, the majority of the posts on social media say that king Eduardo should be jailed if he makes it through the surgery and all of his descendants should be dethroned and stripped away of their royal titles. Now, let's look at what's going on outside of the royal palace of Madrid."

And the screen changed to a male reporter who from the background is right outside the gates of the palace. "Steven Lopez here. I'm currently living outside of the royal palace of Madrid and as you can see behind me, there's about two hundred people protesting with signs and chanting. Some of them are holding up sign which has 'go to hell' and-"

I turned off the television and stuffed the remaining omelette in my mouth. I turned my head to look at the clock, it's one in the afternoon and I had just finished my brunch. After texting Nicandro yesterday, there's no way I could sleep peacefully and needed to think about something else so I was on the phone with Breton until almost four in the morning discussing sorting out admin matters of my year two enrolment into Eunoia Junior College in Singapore. We decided that I'll only join the school in the second term in March as Breton thinks it would be best to hire a private tutor for three months first to catch me up on the things I've missed out on for four years.

I talked to Efren on the phone in the morning and he seemed alright, he said he'll be discharged in a few days and will get two weeks medical leave off work. He also mentioned that everyone working in the kitchen yesterday was not harmed at all, including his sister.

I also got two phone calls from the hotel phone, one from Perez and another from Olivia, both of them just checking in to how I was doing. I don't even want to know how they knew which hotel and which room I was staying in, good thing I'll be leaving today,

The uncle of the guy you like killed your biological parents.

Nicandro will be coming here soon. If I don't distract myself, I'll literally have a whole speech ready in my head of what to say to him later. Therefore, I went to pack my luggage to try to get my mind off worrying about the conversation later.

Don't push him away, Alveanea.

He's just a guy you met two weeks ago.

Who you kissed and have romantic feelings for. You haven't had romantic feelings for anyone since Walter, which was five years ago.

He's the prince of Spain, idiot. You've no future with him!

He is the one that kissed you yesterday. You're his first 'real' kiss!

Who the hell cares if you're his first kiss, only his last one matters.

That's when the sound of the door knock interrupted the two opposite voices in my head. I slowly dragged my feet towards the door, thinking about the inevitable that is coming. His green eyes met my medium brown eyes.

He spoke first. "Hi."

"Hey." I opened the door further for him to come in.

"Do you want some tea?" I asked, completely freaking out about starting the difficult conversation.

"Uh, sure." He went to sit on the couch as I took the two teacups which I had prepared on the dining table.

Just as I sat the teacups on the table, Nicandro spoke up, "My grandfather passed away an hour ago."

"I'm..."

Nicandro cut me off, "It's alright if you don't feel sorry, I don't feel sorry either."

I waited for him to continue speaking as I'm afraid I would say the wrong thing if I opened my mouth, so I waited for him to continue, "I know he's not the kindest man, but he always had his affairs in order as king. I'm still trying to wrap my head around him having done such an inhumane thing."

"If he didn't abandon his own child, you wouldn't have grown up as an orphan." He looked at me with guilt, clearly seen in his green eyes.

"It-it's not your fault, Nicandro," I put my hand on his arm, "Plus, it's not all bad. If I weren't an orphan, I wouldn't have met Nikita, Zari ...and you."

"So you don't regret meeting me? The nephew of the man who killed your parents?"

"Of course not, you're the most kind-hearted person I've ever met." I brushed his black hair lightly with my fingers.

"That's good, because I don't think I'll be able to live with myself if you simply see me the nephew of the man who killed your parents and a notorious drug lord."

He gently put his hand on my waist and pulled me close to him, my head leaning on his shoulder and we sat on the couch in silence.

"You're leaving for Singapore today, right?" He broke the silence.

I sighed, guess this conversation is happening now.

"Yeah."

"What time is your flight?" I could feel his breath on my forehead when he said that.

"Six," I replied weakly, the thought about leaving him hurts me.

He turned his head to the clock, which showed that it's ten minutes to four. I should be heading to the airport now.

"Alright then, I can't let you miss your flight," he sat up straight and I moved my body away from him, "Text me when you've landed."

Guess I'm doing this then.

"I'll not be doing that," I swallowed, bracing for what's to come.

Nicandro furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, "What?"

"I'll not be texting you when I land."

He put his hand on my knee, making this ten times harder, "Okay, you can text me whenever, you've-"

"No, I mean we shouldn't text each other anymore."

I can see his green eyes turning into a darker shade of hurt. An hour ago his grandfather died, and now I'm leaving him.

I take his silence as my queue to continue talking, "I don't think it would be best for the both of us to stay in contact. Right now, we need to go on our own path, we need to move on from this. My priority will be my education and hopefully getting into a good university in the future. Your priority will be to allow the people of Spain to see that you'll be a great king someday."

His head was facing the ground now as he slowly nodded his head, "Yeah, you've got a point there."

"The next time we'll be seeing each other won't be for a long time, but know that I'll forever cherish the short amount of time we spent together," I can feel the tears threatening to spill.

Nicandro then faced me, tears at the brim of his eyes, "I've never connected with anyone the way I did with you."

I pulled him into a hug and did something I've never done before- I kissed him on the cheek.

"I'll miss you a lot, Alveanea," he whispered into my ear.

"Me too."