Chapter 22

( Evelyn's POV)

I can feel him, and so does everyone else. The air shifts—heavy, thick with an energy that makes my skin tingle. There’s no mistaking it.

It’s the wolf. His presence fills the room, stirs the air, and every instinct in me screams to run.

But it’s too late. He’s already there, closing the distance between us.

“Evelyn.” His voice is low, dark, and filled with something I can't quite place. I feel the tension in every muscle, my heart racing faster than it should.

I try to push him away, but he’s too close.

The heat of his body radiates against mine, and it takes everything I have not to shudder. I catch the flicker of his wolf’s emotions. It’s agitation, frustration, and desire that surge through the bond between us like a live wire.

“Mate,” his wolf growls, and for a brief, fleeting moment, I can almost hear it. Feel it. It’s a primal call that shakes me to my core.

No. No, no, no. I can't listen to this. I can’t give in to the past. Not again.

I snap out of it just as Chris’s voice cuts through the thick tension.

He’s arguing with Logan—his voice low but firm, Alpha authority pressing into Logan’s chest. “She’s not yours,” Chris growls, and I know, without looking, that he’s using his pack presence to hold Logan back.

“You don’t get to decide that,” Logan snarls, the veins in his neck pulsating. His eyes flash dangerously—his wolf is sat on the surface, a telltale amber bleeding into his irises. “I am the Alpha who claimed her!”

“You have claimed nothing,” Chris spits back. You follow that unstable half-mad Emma around like a lost puppy,” he scoffs. I know it, and so does everyone watching. Chris is walking a dangerously thin line.

I shove Logan away, hard, feeling my heart thud in my chest, panic setting in.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I demand, my voice shaking despite my attempt to sound strong. My breath comes in shallow gasps. “We’re done, Logan. It’s over. You need to sign the damn papers.”

His gaze hardens, a familiar sneer curling at the corner of his lips. “Sign it so you can be with the prince? Dream on.”

I feel a sting in my chest, like a knife twisting in my ribcage. His words…the accusation…make my stomach churn.

It’s as if the weight of everything we were and everything we’re not presses down on me in one suffocating breath.

He steps closer, too close, and I can’t breathe.

His presence fills the space between us, and everything in me flares with an overpowering urge to pull away, to escape. But I’m trapped. Trapped in the past, in the memory of what we had—or at least, what I thought we had.

“Logan, stop,” I say, my voice a broken whisper. But I know it won’t be enough.

Not for him. Not for us.

His hand reaches for me, fingers brushing against my arm. And in that single touch, I feel everything we’ve lost.

I flinch, pulling away from him, the panic rising in my chest. The alcohol from the night, loose, dizzying, makes me weak. I’m not strong enough to fight him, not like this.

“Let me go,” I whisper, my throat tight with something I can’t name.

But Logan’s grip doesn’t loosen.

His eyes are full of something darker now—something deep, something that belongs to him and him alone. I can’t decipher it, but I feel it in my bones. “You’re mine, Evelyn,” he growls, his voice rough with emotion.

I feel the fire of his words burn through me, searing the space between us. The words echo in my mind like a threat, like a command. And I hate that it still affects me.

It shouldn’t.

It shouldn’t.

“No.” I finally push him, more forcefully this time, but my strength is fleeting. “You don’t get to decide this anymore.”

I see his face and his eyes darken with frustration. I’m not sure if it’s anger or something else, but it’s enough to set my nerves alight.

“Enough, Logan,” I say again, more firmly this time. “I’m not your possession. I’m not your mate. Not anymore. Find Emma, she’s the one you adore so much!”

I stand my ground. I will not bend. Not now. Not after everything.

Just as I think I’ve gotten through to him, I hear the sound of footsteps behind me.

I turn, just as Emma enters the restaurant.

Right one time.

She looks almost fragile, her eyes wide, filled with unshed tears. She’s standing at the doorway, her gaze darting between Logan and me.

Logan freezes.

For a moment, the tension between us breaks, and my breath catches.

Something about her presence, about the way she stands there, makes everything feel off-balance.

“What are you doing here?” Logan asks, his voice softer now, the edge of his anger replaced with something else—something I don’t know how to place.

Emma’s eyes flicker to me, then back to him. “I couldn’t leave you, Logan. I—” She pauses, glancing down, her lips trembling. “I couldn’t stay away.”

Then, before I can react, she steps forward, standing on tiptoe. And just like that, she kisses him.

I freeze.

My heart drops into my stomach.

It feels like a punch, a blow to the chest.

I can’t breathe.

I can’t think.

It’s like the world tilts on its axis, and I’m falling.

Logan doesn’t pull away. He doesn’t even hesitate. His hands slide to her waist, and he lets her kiss him, lets her claim him in front of me, in front of us all.

And Emma—her eyes gleam with something smug, satisfied, like she knows exactly what she’s doing.

I see the flash of triumph in her eyes, and it cuts me open.

It’s not the kiss that breaks me—it’s the way she looks at me afterward, as if she’s won some invisible battle.

As if she’s taken something I didn’t even know I still wanted.

Logan finally pulls back, his hand still on Emma’s shoulder.

He looks at her, murmurs something under his breath that I can’t hear. Emma smiles, a soft, knowing smile, before she turns and walks out of the room, leaving me there, feeling cold and empty, like a hollow shell.

The seconds stretch.

My pulse thrums in my ears, and the air is thick with everything unsaid. Everything I’ve been holding in.

Logan looks back at me, but I can’t meet his gaze. Not now. Not after that.

“I’ll take you home,” he says, his voice softer now, but there’s no warmth in it. No gentleness. Just the same old dominance, the same old command.

“I don’t need you to take me home,” I snap, my voice sharp as glass. “I’m fine on my own.”

Logan’s brow furrows. “Why are you being so stubborn?” he demands. “What does he give you that I can’t? What has the prince done for you, Evelyn?”

I feel the anger rise in me again—sharp, hot. It burns through the hurt, the confusion. “He didn’t give me anything. Nothing that matters. He didn’t want me to treat his ex-wife.”

In that moment, all the joy was sucked out of me.

I needed to go home, to cry, until there was nothing left.