Evaline:
Oscar.
I stared at him like I was seeing a ghost... except ghosts didn’t breathe heavy in the moonlight. They didn’t hold your gaze with dark green eyes full of wild tension. They didn’t smell like fire and pine and something dangerous that lived in the back of your throat and heart.
But he did.
He was real.
And he was naked.
I instinctively took a step back. My heart was slamming so hard that it hurt. The weight of the mate bond flared up between us like it had just remembered its purpose. A golden string pulled tight in my chest, vibrating, burning.
He didn’t move at first. His gaze was locked on mine, unreadable.
He was the same man who kept telling me to stay away. Who hadn’t even looked at me since our last meeting when my world tilted and my heart betrayed me by accepting him despite everything.
He had rejected that bond. Rejected me. Even if not directly, his words that day were enough for me to know that he didn’t want the bond, or me.
But his wolf?
His wolf had done the exact opposite.
"I didn’t know," I said, my voice barely above a whisper. "I didn’t know it was you."
His jaw twitched. Still, he didn’t speak.
The tension thickened between us. It was like a pressure that was pushing against my skin like the heat before a storm. I should have left. I should have turned and walked straight to the door. But I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
Because something in his eyes had changed.
There was no cold dismissal there. No contempt. Just intensity. Heat. Hunger. And something far more terrifying... need.
"I told you to stay away." His voice was low and raw, breaking the silence. "So why are you here?"
My lips parted in disbelief. "You think I followed you? It’s the other way around for your kind information."
He took one slow step toward me and the air shifted.
"You are in the library. Alone. On a full moon night."
"It’s my Academy, too!" I shot back, feeling slightly frustrated. "And if anyone’s to blame for this situation, it’s your wolf, not me!"
His expression faltered.
Just for a second.
And that second was all I needed.
"Your wolf came here," I said, quieter now, almost breathless. "He found me. He waited for me. He didn’t hurt me. He didn’t leave."
His hands clenched at his sides. "He’s... not me."
"Yes, he is," I whispered. "He’s the part of you that you try to bury. The part that doesn’t lie."
I saw it in his eyes then - that war. That push and pull inside him. The Alpha and the man. The wolf and the stubborn fool who didn’t want this bond.
But tonight?
Tonight, he wasn’t the one making decisions.
I stepped back, slowly, until I reached one of the lounge chairs by the window. I didn’t sit. I couldn’t. My legs were trembling too much. My heart was caught between fear and something dangerously close to longing.
"Are you going to tell me to stay away again?" I asked softly. "Even now?"
He didn’t answer.
Instead, he crossed the space between us in three big strides.
He didn’t touch me.
But Goddess, he almost did.
His presence towered over mine. The heat rolling off his body was wild and electric. The bond between us was screaming louder now, coiling around my ribs like vines with thorns.
"I shouldn’t be here," he muttered, more to himself than to me.
"But you are."
I looked up into his face. His lips were parted and his breath was uneven. The edge of his control was so thin I could feel it cracking. The full moon had done something to him. Not just to his wolf. But to him.
"I fought this," he said suddenly in a harsh voice. "From the moment I scented you, I fought it. Because I didn’t want this - you - to destroy what’s left of my brothers."
"I never asked to be your mate," I shot back and lifted my chin. "You think this bond doesn’t terrify me, too? That I want to be tied to someone who looks at me like I’m poison?"
His face twisted, but I didn’t back down.
"I hate this," I admitted with a shaking breath. "I hate how it feels when you look at me. How my chest aches when you ignore me. How your wolf shows up and makes me feel like I matter, and then you disappear like I don’t."
His hand moved.
Just a flicker of movement, like he was about to reach for me... and then stopped.
But it was enough.
My resolve cracked. And before I could think it through, before my fear could remind me how wrong this was... I stepped forward.
The bond between us flared at the closeness.
I was standing so close now, causing our breaths to mingle. I stared at his lips. At the sharp line of his jaw. At the brokenness he tried to hide but couldn’t anymore.
"I don’t know what you want from me," I whispered.
But he didn’t reply. Instead, he did the last thing I was expecting.
He leaned down... slowly, so carefully... and rested his forehead against mine.
The touch was light. Barely there. But it felt like being struck by lightning.
"You drive me insane," he murmured in a hoarse voice. "I hate how you make me feel. How he..." he thumped his chest, "... how he won’t stop wanting you."
"Then don’t fight him." The words escaped before I could stop them, and his breath hitched.
"Don’t tempt me," he growled.
But I already had.
And I didn’t pull away.
Not even when he gently, almost reluctantly, pressed his palm to my waist. Not even when his nose brushed along my jaw in the softest, most reverent way, like he was scenting me.
Because some twisted, desperate part of me wanted it.
Wanted him.
Even after everything.
"I can’t give you what you want, Evaline," he said, his voice breaking. "But tonight... I just need to stay close."
I nodded, chest burning. "Then stay."