Free Web NovelChapter 368: Chapter 368
Aria’s POV
Nathan and Collins’s scents lingered outside the door like a storm that refused to move on.
Inside, Amelia and I sat across from each other, planning our next move on how to dismantle the Darvin family and Clarence, ensuring their downfall.
“Why are you blocking the door?” Chloe’s sharp voice cut in. My wolf’s ears flicked toward the entrance.
“You do not talk to an Alpha in such a manner!”Collins snapped.
“Well, he is not my alpha! Last I checked, I have no obligation to him!” Chloe snarled viciously.
Amelia looked at me and I gave a small nod, not wanting the matter to escalate.
She opened the door and Chloe walked in, wearing a black lace and dark lipstick. Her eyes were already ready for war. She walked past Nathan and Collins, planting herself at the threshold like a guard wolf.
Only then did Nathan finally see me, standing behind Amelia.
His gaze was very heavy.
“Aria,” he said, his voice low. “I’m here to ask for your forgiveness.”
Ask. That word made my eyes lift, not in anger or love, just... recognition of how far things had fallen.
“Does Alpha Nathan need to ask?” I said lightly, a faint curve to my lips that didn’t reach my eyes.
Pain flickered across his face. My wolf noticed but it didn’t move.
“I sent the files to Amelia. I wanted to help you in the little way I could. I was too quick to judge you two years ago. Now you have proof to clear your name.” He paused, then added, “I’m willing to do anything to make amends.”
Anything.
My mind flashed back to the hardest days of my life, the days I spent in prison. I remembered the prison walls, cold floors, whispers behind my back, the loneliness of carrying a child in a cage.
“Anything” couldn’t buy back time.
Amelia stepped forward, placing herself slightly between us. She was calm, polished and dangerous in her own way.
“What I don’t understand,” she said gently, “is why this sounds like you’re helping Aria. This isn’t assistance. It’s accountability.”
Chloe folded her arms. “Exactly. She lost a year and six months of her life because of you.” fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓
My wolf felt their protectiveness like warmth at my back.
Collins looked uncomfortable. Nathan didn’t argue. He lowered his head in acknowledgment.
“My prejudice blinded me,” he said quietly. “I trusted the wrong people. I failed her.”
His eyes found me again, but now I stood behind Amelia and Chloe.
“There is no need,” I said softly, shaking my head.
Forgiveness wasn’t something he could request like a meeting and it wasn’t something I was carrying anymore.
Nathan’s POV
The air shifted around me, thick and cold, like the forest right before a storm breaks. My chest felt constricted. Every nerve in my body was alert. My wolf stirred, restless, tasting fear and loss on the wind.
Aria stood there, her eyes sharp, crystal-clear, and utterly unreachable. I tried to anchor myself on her gaze, tried to reach the part of her that had once loved me. “I want to make it up to you... for everything I owe,” I said, my voice hoarse and raw with need. “Please... forgive me, Aria...”
Her words, when they came, were ice against my heated chest. “After spending over a year in prison, I’m not the same person. Even if I forgave you... we can’t go back.”
I felt the wolf inside me cringe. The alpha’s pride, the human in me, both recoiling. I’d imagined this moment a thousand times, picturing her rushing into my arms, her anger melting at my feet. Instead, I stood frozen, an intruder in her world, with nothing but my own desperate scent to mark me.
I had underestimated how much she had changed. Her trust wasn’t mine to reclaim. She no longer looked at me as the man she’d once loved, she hasn’t done that since she came out of prison. She looked past me, and that sight cut deeper than claws.
I remembered the day I’d come home to Hemsworth Villa after her release only to find the house empty. She wasn’t there. My wolf had snarled at the silence, pacing, pacing, trying every tactic to pull her back. I’d thought I could fix this. Thought I could resume what we had. But her eyes...even when she returned for Lana, they were distant and sad.
Then came the divorce papers. My claws had dug into the desk, trembling, teeth bared in frustration. My mind was a chaos of memory and regret, every failed attempt to reach her replaying like a predator circling a vanishing prey.
When we eventually severed our mate bond, I hoped one day she would forgive me and take me back. I was actually hoping it would be today, considering I finally found proof to clear her name.
Aria glanced at me once before turning away. “Let’s pretend we never knew each other. You should go, Nathan.”
My wolf surged within me. My instincts screamed at the unfairness. I moved, arm out, gripping her wrist. “No!” I growled, the force behind it startled even me. “No...”
I felt my chest tighten, my heartbeat thundering. “Aria, you begged for our marriage. How can you just... discard it?”
Her surprise was palpable. My controlled alpha-self, calm and decisive, had vanished. Now there was only raw need, desperation bleeding into madness. My eyes glowed faintly red, my wolf speaking what my human voice could not.
“Nathan, let go!,” she snapped.
