Chapter 116
Evelyn's POV
"I expect you to trust me!" Julian's voice rose to match mine. "I expect you to let me help you instead of shutting me out and doing something that could get you killed or arrested or—"
He ran a hand through his hair, frustration rolling off him in waves. "Do you have any idea what it was like, sitting in your apartment waiting for you, and slowly realizing where you'd gone? What you were doing?"
"Then you shouldn't have come back early," I shot back. "You should have stayed in Singapore like you were supposed to."
"Like I was supposed to?" He stared at me like I'd slapped him. "Jesus Christ, Evelyn. Do you even hear yourself? You're angry at me for wanting to surprise you? For missing you enough to cut my trip short?"
The truth of it hit like a physical blow. He'd come back early because he missed me. Because he wanted to spend time with me. And I was punishing him for it, pushing him away because it was easier than admitting I'd broken my promise.
"I didn't ask you to miss me," I said, and watched something crack in his expression. "I didn't ask you to care about what I do with my nights."
"No, you didn't." His voice had gone quiet now, deadly calm in a way that scared me more than his anger. "But I do care. I care that you're throwing your life away for revenge. I care that you're turning yourself into exactly what Kholod wants you to be. And I care that you're so terrified of letting me in that you'd rather destroy us than admit you need help."
"There is no us," I said, and the lie tasted like ash on my tongue. "There's you, trying to save someone who doesn't want to be saved. And there's me, doing what I have to do to survive."
"That's not surviving." He closed the distance between us, his hands gripping my shoulders. "That's dying slowly. And I'll be damned if I stand by and watch you do it."
I could feel my control slipping, the carefully constructed walls I'd built around my heart starting to crumble. He was too close, too real, too everything I couldn't afford to want. And the worst part was that he was right. About all of it.
But admitting that meant admitting I was weak. That I needed him. That I couldn't do this alone.
And I'd learned a long time ago that needing people only got them killed.
"Let go of me," I said, my voice cold and clinical—the voice I used when I was about to pull the trigger.
"No." His hands tightened on my shoulders. "Not until you stop running. Not until you look me in the eye and tell me you don't want this. Don't want us."
"I don't—" The words stuck in my throat, refusing to come. Because it would be a lie, and we both knew it.
"Say it," he demanded, his eyes searching mine. "Tell me you don't care about me. That these past weeks meant nothing. That you'd rather be alone than let me stand beside you."
I opened my mouth, ready to deliver the killing blow that would drive him away for good. Ready to prove that I was exactly the monster Kholod had created, incapable of love or trust or anything resembling human connection.
But what came out instead was: "You don't understand what you're asking."
"Then explain it to me." His voice gentled, some of the anger draining away. "Help me understand why you'd rather push me away than let me carry some of this weight with you."
And that was the problem, wasn't it? He wanted to help. He wanted to fix me, to save me from myself. But I was beyond saving. The things I'd done, the person I'd become—there was no redemption for that. No amount of caring could erase the blood on my hands.
"Because you're not my anything," I said finally, reaching for the one weapon I knew would hurt him most. "You're not my boyfriend. You're just someone I've been sleeping with while I figure out my next move."
The words landed like bullets, and I watched them hit. Watched the way his expression shifted from hurt to something harder, colder. Watched the light in his eyes dim as he processed what I'd just said.
"Is that really what you think?" His voice was flat, emotionless. "After everything—the nights we've spent together, the yacht, the way you reach for me in your sleep—you think this is just sex?"
"What else would it be?" I forced myself to meet his eyes, to not look away from the pain I was causing. "We both know what we are, Julian. We're two broken people using each other to feel less alone. Don't try to make it into something it's not."
For a long moment, he just stared at me. Then he released my shoulders and stepped back, and the loss of contact felt like losing something vital.
"You're right," he said quietly. "I tried to make it into something it wasn't. My mistake."
He moved toward the door with mechanical precision, pausing only to scoop my weapons off the coffee table. "I'll have Webb drop these off tomorrow," he said without looking at me. "Along with anything else I left here."
"Julian—" I started, but he was already opening the door.
"Don't." He finally turned to face me, and the emptiness in his expression was worse than any anger could have been. "Don't say my name like that. Don't pretend you care. Just..." He exhaled sharply. "Just let me go, Evelyn. It's what you're good at, right? Pushing people away before they can get too close?"
The door closed behind him with a soft click that somehow sounded louder than any slam could have been. And I stood there in the sudden silence of my apartment, surrounded by the ghost of his presence, and felt something inside me shatter.
I stared at the door Julian had just walked through, and realized with crystalline clarity what I'd just done. I'd chosen revenge over the one person who'd ever seen the worst parts of me and stayed anyway. I'd chosen the darkness Kholod had cultivated over the light Julian had offered.
I'd chosen to be Wraith instead of Evelyn.
My legs gave out, and I sank to the floor with my back against the couch, pulling my knees to my chest. And for the first time since Vorkuta, I let myself cry—not the silent tears I'd shed in Julian's arms, but ugly, gasping sobs that tore through me like physical pain.
Because I'd finally gotten what I thought I wanted. I was alone again. Free to finish my revenge without anyone to hold me back or make me question my choices.
And it felt like dying.