Chapter 275
Elowen's POV
I saw it in Casper's eyes the moment they opened—that dangerous crimson glow that meant his hellhound was close to taking control. The air around him seemed to shimmer with barely contained violence, and several people in the crowd took involuntary steps backward.
But I kept walking.
"My mate," Leo's voice rumbled through the bond, raw and desperate. It wasn't Casper's smooth baritone—this was rougher, more primal. The sound of it sent shivers down my spine.
"We're not your mate anymore," Juno snarled back, her fury bleeding into my thoughts. "You chose Sarah, remember?"
The bond between us flared hot and aching. Through it, I felt Leo's confusion, his pain, his absolute certainty that we belonged to him. It made my eyes burn with unshed tears.
"No," I whispered, more to myself than anyone else. "Just still in love with him."
Juno's growl echoed in my skull. "Are you really that stupid?"
I stopped three feet from where Casper lay, close enough to see the way his chest hitched with each breath, to smell the familiar scent of pine and smoke beneath the copper tang of blood. Close enough to feel the pull of him like gravity.
His eyes—Leo's eyes—locked onto mine. The red glow intensified, and I watched his lips form words I felt more than heard through our fractured bond: "It was all a game, cutie. All tricks... please."
My hand moved of its own accord, settling protectively over the swell of my abdomen where our twins grew. "A game?" The word came out strangled.
"Yes. A stupid game." Leo's voice cracked with something that sounded like hope, like desperation. "Please, cutie. Please believe me."
"Don't listen to him," Juno warned, but her voice lacked its usual conviction. She felt it too—the sincerity bleeding through the bond, the raw anguish that wasn't an act.
Around us, the crowd held its collective breath. I was dimly aware of Alaric behind me, tense and ready to intervene. Of the injured wolves watching with a mixture of fear and morbid curiosity. Of the way several people had their phones out, no doubt recording this moment for posterity.
But all of that faded to background noise as I stared into Leo's crimson eyes and felt the weight of his plea settle over my shoulders like a physical thing.
The anger came then—hot and sharp and all-consuming. It burned through my chest, stealing my breath, making my hands shake. "A game," I repeated, and this time my voice was steady. Cold. "You call what you did to me a game?"
Through the bond, I felt Leo recoil from the ice in my tone. Felt Casper stirring beneath the surface, drawn by my distress. The red in his eyes flickered, wavered.
"No!" Leo's anguish was palpable. "Not that. Never that. The game was—" His body twisted on the floor, every muscle going rigid. "The choice. Sarah. All of it was fake. Had to make you safe. Had to—"
"Stop." The command came out sharper than I intended, powered by six months of accumulated hurt and confusion. "Just stop talking."
But even as I said it, something in my chest loosened. Because beneath the anger and betrayal, beneath the bone-deep exhaustion of carrying twins while nursing a shattered heart, I felt it—the truth of his words resonating through the bond like a tuning fork.
Juno felt it too. "He's not lying," she said quietly. "I hate that he's not lying."
"You broke me," I whispered. "Do you understand that? You and Cassian, you broke something in me that I don't know how to fix."
The crimson in his eyes guttered like a dying flame, and for a moment, I saw Casper—just Casper—staring back at me with devastation written across every feature. "I know," he breathed. "God, Elowen, I know. And I would do it again if it meant keeping you and our babies safe."
Our babies. The words hit me like a physical blow, and my hand pressed harder against my stomach, feeling the flutter of movement beneath my palm. They were real. Alive. Growing. And their father was lying broken on a bar room floor, begging me to understand choices I couldn't begin to comprehend.
"Why?" It was all I could manage. One word, laden with six months of questions I'd been too afraid to ask.
Through the bond, I felt Casper gathering himself, fighting past Leo's protective instincts to surface fully. His eyes slowly faded from crimson to their natural amber, though they remained fever-bright with emotion. "Because Selene gave us an impossible choice," he said hoarsely. "Lose you and the twins, or make you hate us enough to leave. We chose your life. We'll always choose your life."
The truth of it rang through the bond like a bell, clear and undeniable. And with it came a flood of memories—not mine, but his. Shared through the mate connection in fragmented images: Raven's smirking face. A deal struck in desperation. Cassian's cold calculation. Casper's screaming refusal that slowly, agonizingly, turned to acceptance.
All of it to save me. To save our children.
"You're an idiot," I told him, my voice breaking on the words. "You're both complete idiots."
A sound that might have been a laugh or a sob escaped him. "I know that too."
I became aware of Alaric moving closer, his presence a steady warmth at my back. Of the crowd's whispers rising in volume as they processed this very public revelation. Of the way Leo's presence had receded but not vanished, watching from behind Casper's eyes with wary hope.
"Can you stand?" I asked finally.
Casper tried. Made it about six inches off the ground before his ribs protested and he collapsed back with a pained grunt. "Give me... a minute."