Calhoun’s pov~
I almost didn’t recognize the place at first, here was a small rooftop bistro tucked behind the new glass towers of the neighboring Pack’s business district. It had been chosen for its quietness: modern steel and greenery, a place people could disappear into without running into anyone they knew. That was probably the point.
I stepped through the door and my world narrowed to the one figure in the corner. Elodie. She sat with her back to the low city noise, a plain sweater, her hair pulled up into the loose knot she used whenever she wanted to be invisible. It should have been a relief to see her safe; instead it felt like walking into a room that had been emptied of air. One month apart and the ache felt like punishnt I hadn’t earned.
She looked different, softer sohow, not the prim woman who sat at my desk. There was no crisp blouse, no neat office hair. There, was the Elodie I used to catch glancing at during etings, the one who’d tucked things into my bag without saying why. For a second, I wanted nothing more than to cross the room and press her to , to fix whatever I had broken.
I forced my smile into place and walked over like a man doing what he knew would be judged later. “Elodie,” I said. “It’s been a while.” My heart raced.
Her eyes didn’t lift right away. When they did, there was no welco in them, only the flatness of soone who’d rehearsed goodbyes. “Let’s not waste ti,” she said. Her voice was small, the way small things can still be sharp. “I only agreed to et because I needed to close this.”
There it was, a soft blade. I couldn’t keep myself from stumbling forward. “I know,” I said before I could stop myself. “I know I destroyed things. I let Carla tear everything apart. I...I didn’t see what I wanted until it was gone. I love you, Elodie. I always—” The rest of it tumbled out: how blind I’d been, how I’d let the wrongness seem easier than the truth. How I’d been a coward.
I pictured the scene that would save : her standing, throwing herself into , forgiveness falling easy like rain. Instead she watched like soone watching a play they hated but felt obliged to finish.
“Too late,” she said, and the words landed harder than anything anyone had ever thrown at . “Your apology doesn’t change the month I spent waking up without you. It doesn’t change the things I tolerated because I believed they were temporary. I don’t love you anymore, Calhoun.”
Her hand slipped from the coffee cup as if it burned; she stood and began to gather herself with the calm of soone who had rehearsed every movent. It should have been a small thing, an exit but it felt like the floor beneath dropped away.
“No,” I said. I grabbed her wrist before she reached the door. The panic in was not dignified. “Don’t say that. We can fix it. I can fix it. I’ve dealt with her. I’ll leave everything behind. Na it, anything, I’ll give it to you. Five years. We had five years of sothing real. Don’t throw it away for one month of rage.”
She pulled free with a strange strength I hadn’t expected. Her voice was quiet but it carried so much weight. “That month was exactly what I needed. I had to see you clearly, without excuses, without the shadow of soone else on every plan. I don’t love you anymore, Calhoun. I’m not your return ticket.”
Those words... I felt them as if a hand had reached inside my ribs and twisted. I wanted to scream that she didn’t an it, that she couldn’t just switch off her feelings like a light. I wanted to tell her that everything about had changed in the last sleepless nights, that I had finally seen what I’d been killing. I wanted to beg, to bargain, to do anything that might bring her back.
Instead my voice ca out thin and raw. “Please. We can try. I’ll do anything.”
She looked at with sothing like pity and contempt and then she surprised with a truth that cut deeper than all her quietness. “You always did what was easiest. You kept as sothing convenient: at night, in private, unannounced in public. That was your choice. You chose to let things be because it was simpler than being brave. I’m done being the easier choice.”
She picked up her bag with the calm of soone who’d decided her life was no longer negotiable. I felt sothing inside loosen and fall not just pain but a cold understanding of my own failure. I clutched at her hand one last ti, ridiculous and pleading, my pride bleeding away.
“Please,” I said like I was praying. “Don’t make this the end.”
Her hand slid from mine with the finality of a slamd door. Her face was unreadable as she stepped back.
I never begged anyone in my life. Not once. Not as a boy, not as an Alpha, not as a man who’d broken bones with his bare hands. But here I was, on my knees in every way that mattered, staring at the only woman who’d ever owned , watching her slip away like water through my fingers.
“Elodie, please,” I rasped, my throat burning. “I know I fucked everything up. If you forgive , just once, we can leave tonight. We’ll go ho, we’ll get married tomorrow. No more secrets, no more hiding what we are. Work, don’t work, I don’t care. Everything I have is yours. Every part of is yours. No one else matters. Not Carla, not anyone. I’ll never hurt you again. Just give one more chance. Please. Don’t throw away what we built.”
My voice cracked. God, I hated how desperate it sounded. But it was the truth. Nine years. Nine years of us burned to the ground because I’d been too blind, too damn arrogant to hold on the way I should have.
Her eyes didn’t soften. Once, those words would have undone her. I’d seen her lt under less. But now... her face was stone. Her heart was gone, calcified, buried.
She pulled her hand out of mine like it was nothing. “Listen to , Calhoun. We’re finished. I’m giving you exactly what you always wanted.”
The words sliced through like knives dipped in ice.
She kept going. “Do you rember our deal? You said when the one you truly loved ca back, I’d step aside. And when Carla returned, I hoped, God help , I actually hoped, you might choose . But you didn’t. You showed exactly where I stand. And I won’t forget it.”
My vision blurred. My chest felt like it had been split open with claws. I shook my head so hard I thought it might roll off. “No. No, Elodie, don’t say that. Don’t walk away from .” My voice broke. “I made a mistake, a terrible mistake. Just give one chance to fix it. One. I’ll burn the world down for you. Please, Elodie—”
Her silence was worse than a slap. She stood there, watching crumble, then turned with her shoulders straight, like she was carrying the last coffin nail of what we had.
And she left.
She didn’t look back.
Not once.
The door closed behind her and with it, every scrap of light I had left. My chest caved in. It was more than heartbreak, it was murder in slow motion. She killed without touching , and I knew she’d keep walking as if I was nothing but dust in her rearview.
I wanted to howl. To rip through that bistro with claws and teeth until nothing but wreckage remained. To drag her back, to make her see that I was hers and she was mine.
But I sat there instead, trembling like so broken animal, my palms slick with sweat, my face wet for the first ti since I was a child.
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