Falling For My Alpha Stepsister (GL)

Two full weeks had officially passed since their six-month anniversary night.

During those fourteen days, the grandmothers had enthusiastically made it their main personal mission to plan the best, most extravagant wedding possible for Angel and April.

Meanwhile, April had been feeling unusually down and drained lately. The heavy stack of inventory books she carried around daily at work made her easily exhausted before the afternoon even hit.

At times during the day, she also randomly experienced unwanted, uncomfortable cramps deep in her stomach.

Today, Katie did not bring baby Angel to the shop with her because his Alpha parents were currently babysitting him at home, significantly reducing the daily workload and stress for the busy Omega mother.

Katie quickly noticed April resting her head flat on the counter surface.

”April, is everything really alright with you today?” Katie asked softly, dropping the small stack of books in her hands onto one of the display tables nearby.

April slowly raised her head back up, looking over at Katie with tired eyes.

”Yeah, I’m fine. Just a bit tired, honestly... working so hard all morning and still not a single customer walking through that door...” April looked outside through the front glass window at the empty road. She rested her forehead flat on the counter again, letting out a soft groan in sheer frustration.

”Well, we just have to keep having faith in ourselves, partner...” Katie said gently, trying her best to give her business partner some real hope. ”We are still very new around here, and if we keep actively distributing flyers around town every afternoon, people will eventually become fully aware of our little bookstore...”

But despite her encouraging words, she still genuinely wondered why April looked so visibly down and drained. She had been quietly noticing all the subtle changes in the girl’s slow movements over the past few days.

”Okay, I will definitely keep having faith, partner...” April murmured into the counter, then suddenly remembered something important. ”Katie...” April raised her head right back up.

”Huh...?”

”Have you heard anything from Abigail recently?”

”No, not at all. I actually tried calling her personal phone once last week, but she did not pick up at all, and it just went straight to voicemail. Even the twins mentioned earlier that she doesn’t respond to their private calls or even text back in our group chat anymore...”

”Same exact thing here... It’s honestly like she is intentionally avoiding all of us. Angel doesn’t bother calling her directly either because she really doesn’t want Abigail telling Madam anything about her current whereabouts...”

”Do you have any real idea why she is actively avoiding us like this? Because this whole thing feels so strange...”

”I have absolutely no idea...” April puffed out a small sigh, shaking her head.

For six long months since she had last seen Abigail on that ship, none of them had heard a single word from her.

It was almost like Abigail just wanted to live a completely low-key life now and simply didn’t want to mingle with her old friends anymore.

As the quiet day went on, Benny casually walked right into the bookstore, holding a borrowed book in her hand that she was returning.

”So which specific book do you want to get next?” April asked, taking the returned copy and placing it on the shelf.

”I want something with dark Mafia romance, you know, those heavy dark romance tropes...” Benny answered without missing a beat.

April was completely stunned by the request. The beta girl who always loved reading light sweet romance, cute love at first sight, and innocent sweet love stories was suddenly standing here asking for a dark Mafia romance.

”May I ask why you suddenly had this huge change of trope?” April asked, leaning over the counter with genuine curiosity.

”Well, I’m officially married to a literal Mafia wife now, and I just really want to change things up a bit. Maybe soft, innocent romance is just not for me anymore...”

”Still trying so hard to blend into this scary new life, huh? You know, I also don’t really like change whenever I finally find my own personal comfort zone, but sometimes change is actually a good thing when it’s with the right person...” April said, trying to make a soft point based on her own recent thoughts.

”Have you ever personally woken up in the morning with heavy gunshots as your alarm ringing tone or sat there and watched your own wife kill people in cold blood?” Benny asked, her face completely straight and serious.

”Nope. Definitely not.”

”Then you don’t truly understand what I’m dealing with...”

After spending a few minutes recommending some good Mafia romance books to Benny, the Beta girl looked around and realized just how dry and empty the entire store was.

”Still zero customers in here?” Benny asked, glancing down the empty aisles.

”Yes, Benny, absolutely no customers today. Apart from you coming in, it’s literally just been this one random farmer who entered earlier looking for a specific farming manual...” Katie explained with a heavy sigh as she helped Benny carefully pack the selected books into her bag.

”That is honestly because you guys opened up in the complete wrong location. You can’t actually force busy rural people to buy physical books and sit down in some quiet corner reading when they constantly have to look after their live sheep or make a scarecrow for their vegetable crops everyday...” Benny pointed out logically.

”I know that now. Even though I pretend not to care sometimes, I have always deeply dreamed of owning my very own successful bookstore...” April confessed softly, looking around the room.

”And I have always dreamed of writing my own real book one day...” Katie added, nodding her head in agreement.

”I’m strongly guessing you two should probably change your business location entirely. Try finding a completely different marketplace, or maybe a digital marketplace where physical location is not a problem at all, and you don’t even have to interact with random customers physically every single day...” Benny suggested, leaning against the counter.

”Are you implying that we should actually create an e-store online?” Katie asked, her eyes lighting up slightly at the idea.

”Yes, exactly, a digital e-store. I personally read a lot of digital books online on my tablet these days, and it’s honestly great... You two can easily try doing that. Who knows, you might actually end up running a really profitable e-store out of this place...”

After listening closely to Benny’s practical suggestion, both girls sat down and seriously thought about the grand idea together, immediately pulling out their notebooks to check their remaining capital and research all the basic requirements needed to own and launch a successful online store.