Chapter 20
It took Ehlian three days to convince Willian not to report Sandar’s visit to the authorities.
Ehlian wouldn’t usually call himself a coward, but even he knew which lines not to cross, and which people you simply didn’t mess with.
Sandar Cartivair was one of them. Not to mention, Sandar hadn’t even managed to breach his mental shield and get into his mind, so he had no real case, just a half-hearted attempt.
And good luck proving that. A man who openly admitted to bribing prison guards for information wouldn’t blink at persuading anyone to sweep such a trivial case under the rug.
The sky had already darkened by the time he reached Willian’s apartment building after a long walk. It didn’t feel as relaxing as it used to. He couldn’t shake the sense that Sandar’s men were following him everywhere.
He glanced up at the clouded sky, wondering—
No. He didn’t want to go back there. Didn’t want to think about possibilities. Deceits, lies… the truth.
He was over it. Over him.
He pushed through the door with two bags of food, fully determined to focus on nothing else except making dinner.
“I’m back,” Ehlian called from the hallway as he headed to the living room, raising the bags with a triumphant energy. “I bought food for an army. What do you want to—”
His words cut off. The bags slipped from his hands and hit the floor, containers rolling across the tiles.
Hayce’s figure seemed to fill the entire room, dressed in a dark suit, silver buttons catching the light. Self-assured. Composed.
Someone was saying something, but the words didn’t register. The edges of the room blurred.
A heartbeat later, the room came back into focus. Hayce wasn’t here. He was just a hologram, projected from the HoloTV.
Then the image shifted. Hayce vanished, replaced by another alpha. Sandar Cartivair.
“…the alleged Apex telepath remains at large alongside Sandar Cartivair,” the presenter said.
“Their whereabouts are unknown. Leaked messages between the pair reportedly outline a plot to murder his father and coordinate the cover-up. If apprehended, Cartivair could face charges including solicitation of murder, bribery, and facilitating core-signature falsification.”
“I thought you were over him,” Willian said, eyeing the bags on the floor.
“Yeah, sorry.” Ehlian crouched down, gathering the scattered food in a bit of a daze, then headed into the kitchen.
Willian followed him a moment later. “Ehlian?”
“What do you want to eat?” Ehlian asked, pulling out a chopping board and a pan. “Pasta? We haven’t had it in a while after I burned it last time. You really shouldn’t let me in the kitchen, actually.”
“I think you need to sit down for a bit.” Willian tried to steer him toward a chair.
“I’m fine.” Ehlian shrugged him off, his hands shaking slightly as he tried to open a bag of pasta. “But I’m starving, and starving for pasta, so I’m going to do it again even if I burn down this kitchen, which will probably piss you off—”
“Ehlian.” Willian’s voice hardened, almost leaning into an alpha’s command. He took the bag out of Ehlian’s trembling hands. “You need to sit down.”
“I’m fine!” Ehlian raised his voice a little too loud, gesturing toward the living room. “Why are you acting like that means anything to me? It doesn’t. I’m over him.”
“Okay, alright,” Willian said, pulling the chair closer. “You’re over him, fine. Just sit down.”
Ehlian sank into the chair, his weak legs grateful for not having to carry his weight and all the heavy, choking emotions battling inside him.
“Good,” Willian said. “We don’t have to talk about it, but I’ll do the pasta because I value my kitchen and won’t let you burn it down.”
Ehlian smiled faintly, watching his friend busy himself in the kitchen for a moment before he finally spoke. “How was Sandar found out?”
“His sister.”
Ehlian’s brows drew together. “His sister?”
“Yeah. That secret visitor was closer to home than Sandar ever imagined,” Willian said. “She spent the last two years gathering incriminating evidence against him.”
“Calia?” Ehlian asked, shocked. “That sister?”
“Do they have another sister? Yes. Her.” Willian let out a small laugh, then added. “I have to give it to her. That was a brave move. Exposing one brother to free the other… it couldn’t have been easy.”
“There’s no guarantee Hayce ever walks free if they never track down Sandar.”
“You never know. The evidence his sister gathered might be enough to prove his innocence.” Willian shook his head in disbelief.
“For an Apex telepath, that alpha seems pretty dumb to have everything spelled out in those messages. I guess power doesn’t come with intelligence.
Same goes to Sandar.” He muttered under his breath that he couldn’t believe Apex telepaths still existed, then added, “But it could be enough for Hayce to be released early.”
“Well then.” Ehlian swallowed. “Good for him.”
Willian cast him a careful look. “It seems he told you the truth… and a few lies as well.”
“He told me nothing, Willian,” Ehlian said.
“And it’s pretty obvious why,” Willian said pointedly. “Sandar wasn’t exactly discreet when he nearly split your mind open.”
“Hayce was only looking out for himself, not me, or anyone else,” Ehlian said through a tight jaw.
“Only himself and his plan to get out. He made it pretty fucking clear I meant nothing to him. He won’t come to see me.
” His voice caught, a lump rising in his throat.
“And he’d better not come see me, or I swear, Willian, I swear… ”
“Okay,” Willian said gently, pulling a chair for himself and sitting down in front of Ehlian. “You know him better than I do, so… I’m here. On your side.”
Without Willian’s steady presence, Ehlian knew he wouldn’t have made it this far. “I wish I could fall in love with you.”
“Oh, please don’t,” Willian replied with mock horror. “Your outbursts are atrocious. And you make terrible pasta.”
Ehlian let out a laugh. “Can’t deny that.”
From the living room, the HoloTV cycled back to the same news segment. Through the open doorway, Hayce stood there again, nothing more than pixels and illusion. For a brief, traitorous moment, Ehlian’s gaze met the hologram’s eyes before he tore it away, filtering out every noise and words.
*
Hayce was released from prison two months later.
And then he was everywhere.
Everywhere Ehlian turned, everywhere he looked, everywhere he went. His tall frame filled the flashing screens on buildings; Ehlian passed his hologram on the street as shops projected the news; he caught his name in passing conversations.
Everywhere, all the fucking time.
Yet it almost felt like they were reporting on a phantom.
Hayce seemed to have vanished from the face of Arox.
He was probably sick of seeing himself everywhere and stayed in privacy.
Well, he wasn’t the only one. Ehlian was fucking sick of it too: of seeing him, of hearing about him, of passing through his body on the street without feeling him, without feeling his touch.
He just wanted it to be over, wanted the vicious news cycle to let the story die and move the fuck on.
Wishful thinking. They would suck the story dry until people started to lose interest, and stupid people just didn’t want to lose interest.
Ehlian suspected that behind closed doors, Hayce was working tirelessly to save the Cartivair empire from crumbling.
His release and the unprecedented revelation of his innocence had driven sales up, but public sentiment was still split.
Sandar’s guilt had left a mark on the company’s name too.
It was the second devastating scandal the company had endured in four years.
It would probably take some time before Hayce regained control and began untangling the mess his brother had left behind, or at the very least, until he had the empire’s board firmly behind him.
Now he was the rightful heir, the head of the empire.
But until Sandar was captured, uncertainty would loom.
To this day, no one knew where Sandar had found refuge.
Two months later, Hayce finally made his first public appearance.
It wasn’t on a news channel surrounded by presenters, or in some private interview.
Oh no. It was at a lavish ball, Hayce fitting seamlessly into high society.
He was one of them, after all. Prison hadn’t stripped that away from him for even a second.
Flawless, graceful, beautiful omegas circled around him, angling for his attention…
never quite touching but ready to pounce.
Hayce was easing back into his old life, rebuilding connections as if prison had only been a detour and everyone tied to it nothing more than an inconvenience.
Hayce would want to sever that part of his life completely. Cut it out. Forget it ever existed.
The longer Ehlian stared at the pictures, the smaller he felt. Someone pale and insignificant. A nobody. Hayce’s status was nearly that of royalty. He was no less unreachable.
Did he really think Hayce would settle for someone like him?
Where even was Hayce now? Nowhere near Ehlian.
Because Ehlian was the last thing Hayce needed.
What Hayce needed were powerful allies. An omega who could be a perfect, strategic match to strengthen the empire in status. It hit him just how vastly different their worlds were. It had already been apparent in that lavish prison cell, but here on Arox it intensified tenfold.
Ehlian would bleed out in Hayce’s circles. Judged, scrutinised, picked apart. The very thought of one of those snobbish omegas, or even alphas, side-eyeing him sent a cold shiver down his spine.
For weeks the photos kept pouring in: Hayce drifting from one private ball to the next, surrounded by omegas.
Touches, smiles, laughter… bared necks, subtle but bared.
How many had he fucked? Every single one of them, probably.
He didn’t need to control himself anymore. He was free to take whoever offered—
“That’s enough for today, Ehlian.” Willian plucked the holopad from his hands.
Ehlian tsked. “I was just checking.”
“Checking what?” Willian’s voice spiked with frustration, then softened after a breath.
“I get it, okay? You shared a cell with him and he offered you protection, but he’s been out of prison for months.
If he really wanted to see you again, he’d have come already.
Take that from an alpha.” Willian’s eyes shifted to the still-projected images on the holopad.
“He clearly has more than enough time on his hands.”
Ehlian cast one last glance at Hayce dancing with an omega before Willian shut it down.
“I know,” Ehlian said.
In the end, Hayce was just like Geald. He didn’t want to be associated with an omega criminal. Hayce might have proven his innocence, but Ehlian never could. He would always be a criminal. A nobody. Without a title. Without wealth.
Did he really think that just because Hayce had told him the truth about his brother, suddenly everything else wasn’t a lie? That the breakup wasn’t real?
What had he even been waiting for? One last fuck before Hayce went back to his fancy mansion and married his fancy omega? Had he actually lost his mind?
Willian sat down next to him on the sofa. “I might have been a bit too harsh.”
“No, you’re right.” Ehlian rubbed at his face, a sharp laugh breaking out. “Gods, I’m such a colossal idiot.”
“He is the colossal idiot,” Willian corrected him. “So really, it shouldn’t be hard to find someone better than him. But please, avoid the likes of Geald this time.”
“By a mile,” Ehlian reassured with a half-smile.
Maybe that was exactly what he needed: to focus on what mattered and regain control over his life. The thought of moving back to his own flat still made him uneasy, but he had to take that step, however small and daunting it was.
“You know,” Willian said carefully. “There’s this alpha… a customer of mine. I got to know him over the years. Actually, you met him the other week. He came in to pick up his holowatch. Dark hair, brown eyes… he wore a dark green suit.”
“I don’t remember him.”
“That’s a shame. He’s kind of fond of you.”
Ehlian shook his head. “I don’t think I’m ready for that yet.”
“I know,” Willian said. “But why not give it a shot? I’m not saying you should settle down or anything. Just ease back into it—have dinner, maybe a drink somewhere.”
“Give me his details.” Ehlian gave in, and a few seconds later his holowatch buzzed as Willian transferred the information. “I might never contact him, but I’ll consider it.”
He’d erase Hayce from his life, just as Hayce had so easily erased him from his.
He would move on.
For good.