Nora's eyes widened, her breath hitching in her throat as she gripped the steering wheel. "You... you actually know him?"
Evelyn didn't answer immediately. The muscle in her jaw pulsed with a rhythmic, aching intensity. Every instinct she had developed in the dark was screaming at her, misidentifying the predator in front of her. "Stay in the car," she commanded, her hand already white-knuckled on the door latch. "Don't let him see you. I'll handle this."
"Evelyn, wait—!"
But Evelyn was already gone. She crossed the street like a heat-seeking missile, her rage wrapped in a thin, lethal layer of icy control.
Inside the restaurant, the man by the window was ending a call with a clipped impatience that seemed to reorganize the air around him. Lucien Hale. He wasn't waiting for a romantic spark; he was enduring a business obligation that was late. "I'm giving you ten minutes," he said into the phone, his voice a cold scalpel cutting through the line. "If you're not here, I'm gone."
He set the phone down and looked up. A woman pulled out the chair across from him and sat with a terrifying, quiet confidence. Lucien's dark brows drew together. Evelyn Carter. Again.
"Can I help you?" he asked, his tone flat and uninviting.
Evelyn's mouth curved into a joyless sliver of a smile. "Now I get it. Lucas didn't become a world-class liar by accident. It runs in the family, doesn't it?"
Lucien's eyes cooled by several degrees. He adjusted his gold-rimmed glasses with a deliberate, terrifying patience. "Ms. Carter, if you're having an episode, I can refer you to a psychiatrist. A very discreet one. One who specializes in delusions."
Evelyn leaned back, her gaze drifting—deliberately, insultingly—down his torso. "Maybe you should get yourself checked first, Doctor. You spend enough time around blood to know that viruses don't care about your expensive white coat."
Lucien's jaw tightened. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"Oh, don't play the saint." Evelyn's voice sharpened, cutting through the low hum of the upscale dining room. "I've heard the stories. The brilliant doctor with no boundaries. The man who thinks a medical degree means 'no' is just a suggestion he can ignore."
The accusation didn't just target his character; it spat on his entire professional existence. Lucien's mouth flattened into a hard, dangerous line. For a second, it looked like he might stand up and end the conversation—or her—right there. But Evelyn kept going, her eyes burning with a primal rage that felt years old, as if he were simply the most convenient lightning rod for a life of being hunted.
"Do you use your position to do worse?" she pressed, her voice a venomous whisper. "Is that why you talk down to everyone? Because you've spent your life taking what isn't yours?"
Lucien didn't know her full history—not the blood-soaked details of the mountain or the switch. He'd only seen the scars and the kennel. But he recognized that tone. This wasn't righteous anger; it was panic wearing heavy armor. It was the voice of someone who had once begged for mercy and received a cage instead.
"You're wrong," he said flatly. "And you're being incredibly reckless."
"I thought you were just arrogant," she snapped, leaning forward until they were inches apart, her scent of cheap soap and expensive defiance filling his senses. "Turns out, you're dangerous. Stay away from Nora. If you keep harassing her, I'll put everything online. I won't be gentle, Lucien."
Suddenly, her phone buzzed in her pocket. Nora.
Evelyn answered without breaking eye contact with him. "What?"
"Evelyn—where are you?" Nora's voice was thin with pure dread. "He just called. He's threatening to call my dad because I'm late. Where are you?"
Evelyn blinked, a frown marring her forehead. "I'm sitting right in front of him, Nora."
There was a beat of static, agonizing silence.
"No—Evelyn," Nora whispered. "You're two tables off. Two seats forward. The guy I'm supposed to meet... that's Roy Lane. He's over there in the blue shirt. Who... who are you sitting with?"
The blood drained from Evelyn's face so fast her vision went sharp at the edges. She turned—slowly, agonizingly. She saw the other man. Same general silhouette. White shirt. Glasses. But he lacked the steel, the presence, the overwhelming, crushing weight of the man sitting across from her.
The ringing in Evelyn's ears grew deafening. Across the table, Lucien watched the realization hit her like a physical blow.
Then, the universe added a final touch of cruelty. A man strode into the restaurant and spotted them. "Lucien!" he called out, dropping into the spare chair—then freezing as he saw Evelyn. "Wait... do you two know each other?"
Evelyn stood so fast her chair screeched across the hardwood floor, a sound like a dying animal. She wasn't running, but she was finished.
"Ms. Carter," Lucien's voice followed her, cool and edged with a dark, predatory amusement.
Evelyn stopped, her shoulders squared, her mask sliding back into place despite the roar of humiliation in her veins. "What. Do you. Want?"
Lucien leaned back, his eyes tracking every line of her face. "You're just going to walk away after that performance?"
Evelyn's chin lifted. "What do you want, exactly? Blood?"
"An apology," Lucien said. "A real one."
"Fine." Evelyn spat the words out like a bitter pill. "I'm sorry."
Lucien didn't blink. "No."
"Excuse me?"
"That apology had no weight," he said calmly, as if discussing a heart rate. "You just accused a high-ranking surgeon of sexual misconduct in a public space. You did it loudly. And you were catastrophically wrong."
His friend shifted, looking uncomfortable. "Lucien, come on. Let it go."
Lucien didn't look at him. He looked at Evelyn like she was a surgical site—and he intended to debride it. "Ninety degrees," Lucien said, his voice steady and inescapable. "Loud enough for the entire room to hear."
Evelyn didn't move. The silence in the restaurant was deafening now. People were pretending not to look, but everyone was listening. Heat crawled up Evelyn's neck. The familiar, jagged edge of humiliation tightened around her throat. She could have walked away. She could have thrown a glass at him.
Instead, she swallowed hard and turned the blade inward. She bowed. Deep. Clean. Exactly ninety degrees. In a voice that rang clear as a bell through the silent dining room, she said: "Dr. Hale. I am sorry. I was wrong."
Lucien's expression didn't soften, but something flickered in the depths of his eyes—a spark of dark satisfaction. He had broken her pride in public, and he liked the way it looked on her. He nodded once. "Good."
Nora burst through the door a moment later, grabbing Evelyn's arm as if pulling her from a wreckage. "I am so sorry!" she blurted toward Lucien. "It was a misunderstanding. We—"
"I asked for an apology. She gave it," Lucien said, his gaze never leaving Evelyn's face. "That's enough."
Outside, the man Nora was actually supposed to meet, Roy Lane, surged after them, his face twisted with entitlement. "Hey! Nora! What the hell was that? You bring a friend to insult people and then you run?"
Nora's hands were shaking, but she did something that surprised even Evelyn. She lifted her chin, her voice trembling but clear. "I don't like you, Roy. I never have. Looking at you makes my skin crawl. I'm not marrying you. Ever."
Roy turned purple. "You stupid b*tch—I'll call your father—"
"Go ahead," Nora snapped. "Tell him. I'm done being owned by either of you." She turned and marched toward the car, leaving the stunned man on the sidewalk.
Inside the restaurant, Lucien's friend whistled low. "I've never seen you get that petty, Lucien. Making her bow? You sure you're not interested?"
Lucien stared out the window for a long moment, watching the dark sedan pull away into the city traffic. "Say that again," Lucien said, his voice deadpan, "and I'll remove your tongue."
"Okay, okay. But still... you didn't have to humiliate her like that. You know what people are saying? That her family keeps her in a kennel."
Lucien's jaw tightened. "She isn't sick."
"Then why do they treat her like a leper?"
"Ask her family," Lucien snapped, his irritation returning. "And stop looking at me like I'm supposed to carry her tragedy. I'm a surgeon, not a savior."
But as he turned back to his drink, he knew one thing for certain: Evelyn Carter was no longer just a patient. She was a ghost that had just moved into his head, and she wasn't planning on leaving.