THE ALPHA WHO HATED ME - Chapter 34: Chapter 34

**Evangeline's POV**
Monday morning hits me like a truck loaded with exhaustion. Three days have passed since my encounter with Ronan in the woods, and I've barely slept. Every time I close my eyes, I see his face when I slapped him. The shock. The pain. The way he looked at me like I'd become someone he didn't recognize.
Maybe I have.
The charm Maeve gave me rests warm against my chest as I walk through the school doors. Students part around me like I'm carrying some invisible disease, but their whispers follow me down the hallway.
"Did you hear what happened Friday night?"
"She actually stood up to him."
"I heard she's different now."
Different. That word keeps following me everywhere. But different how? Different bad or different good? I can't tell anymore.
My wolf stirs restlessly under my skin, more awake than she's been in months. The binding stone that used to make her whimper and hide is losing its grip on us. Whatever Maeve did with this charm, it's working. I can feel my strength coming back, piece by piece.
But strength comes with a price. Now I notice things I never saw before. The way some students look at me with fear instead of pity. The way teachers avoid making eye contact. The way the air itself feels heavier, like a storm building in the distance.
I'm walking to my locker when the whispers suddenly stop. Complete silence falls over the hallway like someone pressed a mute button on the whole school. I look up to see what's happening, and my blood turns to ice.
Celeste Hartwell stands at the far end of the corridor.
She's been missing from school for three days. Three days of peace, of not having to watch my back, of not being the target of her carefully planned cruelty. I should have known it was too good to last.
But something's different about her today. She's not surrounded by her usual group of followers. She's not wearing her typical smug expression. Instead, she looks... nervous? Uncertain?
In her hands, she carries a small white box tied with pink ribbon, and beside it, a bag that smells like chocolate.
She starts walking down the hallway, and students press themselves against the lockers to get out of her way. But she's not looking at them. She's looking at me.
My heart pounds against my ribs like a caged bird trying to escape. What is she planning now? What new torture has she cooked up during her three-day absence?
I want to run. Every instinct I have screams at me to turn around and walk away. But I can't. Not anymore. I'm done running from her.
She stops about five feet away from me, close enough that I can see the careful makeup covering the dark circles under her eyes. Close enough to notice that her perfect blonde hair looks a little less perfect today.
"Evangeline," she says, and her voice is softer than I've ever heard it.
I don't respond. I just stare at her, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
She holds out the white box and the bag of chocolate. "I brought you something."
The entire hallway holds its breath. Students lean forward, straining to hear what's happening. Some pull out their phones, probably recording this for social media. Whatever Celeste is about to do, it's going to be witnessed by half the school.
"I don't want anything from you," I say quietly.
"Please." The word comes out cracked, like it physically hurts her to say it. "Just... please listen to me."
Listen to her? After months of torture? After the storage room? After everything she's put me through?
But there's something in her eyes that stops me from walking away. Something that looks almost like... desperation?
"I know I've been terrible to you," she continues, her voice barely above a whisper. "I know I've made your life miserable since the day you arrived here. And I know you have every right to hate me."
The understatement of the century. Hate doesn't even begin to cover what I feel for her.
"So why are you here?" I ask.
She takes a shaky breath. "Because I want to make peace with you."
The words hit me like a physical blow. Peace? Celeste Hartwell wants to make peace with me?
Laughter bubbles up in my throat, but it comes out bitter and sharp. "Peace?"
"I know how it sounds. I know you don't believe me. But I'm serious." She holds out the gifts again, and I notice her hands are trembling slightly. "I've been awful to you. No, not awful—cruel. I was cruel, and I don't even know why anymore."
She stumbles over the words, her carefully controlled mask slipping with each sentence.
"I don't want your cake," I say flatly.
"Please." There's that word again, spoken like a prayer. "I'm trying to apologize. I'm trying to make things right."
"You think cake and chocolate will make things right?" My voice rises, and I don't care who hears. "You think a few sweets will erase months of hell?"
Students around us gasp. Someone's phone camera is definitely recording this. By lunch, this conversation will be all over social media.
Celeste's face crumples a little, but she doesn't back down. "No. I know it won't erase anything. But I'm hoping it might be a start."
"A start to what?"
"To us not being enemies anymore." She takes a step closer, and I resist the urge to step back. "To us maybe even being... friends."
Friends. The word sounds so foreign coming from her mouth that I almost laugh again.
"You're insane if you think I'd ever be friends with you."
"I know." Tears gather in her eyes, and for a moment, she looks younger. Vulnerable. "I know I don't deserve your forgiveness. I know I've done terrible things. But I'm asking anyway."
This is a trick. It has to be. Celeste doesn't apologize. She doesn't show weakness. She doesn't beg for anything, especially not from someone like me.
"What's your angle?" I demand. "What are you really after?"
"Nothing. I just..." She trails off, looking around at all the faces watching us. When she speaks again, her voice is barely audible. "I just want the fighting to stop."
Want the fighting to stop? She's the one who started the fighting. She's the one who's been making my life miserable for sport.
"You could have stopped the fighting anytime you wanted," I point out. "All you had to do was leave me alone."
"I know. You're right. And I'm sorry." She wipes her eyes with the back of her hand, smearing her mascara. "I'm so sorry, Evangeline. For everything."
The apology hangs in the air between us like a foreign language neither of us knows how to speak. Students around us murmur in shock. Someone drops their books, and the sound echoes like a gunshot in the tense silence.
"I don't believe you," I say finally.
"I know you don't. But maybe this will help." She opens the white box, revealing a perfect slice of chocolate cake with strawberry frosting. Then she opens the bag and pulls out an expensive-looking chocolate bar.
But instead of handing them to me, she does something that makes my jaw drop.
She takes a bite of the cake.
Then a piece of the chocolate.
"There," she says, chocolate still on her lips. "It's not poisoned. I promise."
The crowd around us gasps again. Someone actually says "Holy shit" loud enough for everyone to hear.
Celeste Hartwell just ate food meant for me to prove it wasn't poisoned. The same girl who wouldn't share her lunch with her own friends is standing in front of half the school, showing me that my safety matters more than her pride.
I don't know what to say. Don't know what to think. This goes against everything I know about her, everything I've experienced from her.
"Why?" The question slips out before I can stop it.
"Because I hurt you. Because I was cruel and petty and jealous, and I took it out on someone who didn't deserve it." Her voice breaks on the last words. "Because I want to be better than I was."
Jealous? What could Celeste Hartwell possibly be jealous of when it comes to me?
But before I can ask, she's talking again.
"I know you won't forgive me today. Maybe you'll never forgive me. But I had to try." She wipes her eyes again, leaving dark streaks on her cheeks. "I had to at least try to make things right."
She holds out the cake and chocolate one more time. "Please. Take them. Not because you forgive me, but because everyone deserves cake and chocolate."
I stare at the offerings in her hands. Part of me wants to knock them to the floor, to reject her gesture as violently as she's rejected me. But another part of me, the part that's tired of being angry all the time, considers taking them.
Not because I forgive her. But because maybe I'm tired of carrying so much hate.
"I don't want your food," I say quietly.
Her face falls, but she nods like she expected this. "I understand."
"But..." I take a deep breath, feeling like I'm about to jump off a cliff. "If you really want to make peace, you can start by staying away from me. No more games. No more tricks. No more making my life hell."
"Done." She says it so quickly, so earnestly, that I almost believe her.
"And your friends. Tell them to back off too."
"Already did." She sniffles, trying to clean up her ruined makeup. "Madison, Sarah, and Emma won't bother you anymore. I made sure of that."
The certainty in her voice surprises me. How did she make sure? What kind of power does she have over them?
"There's one more thing," she says, pulling something out of her jacket pocket. It's a cream-colored envelope with elegant writing on the front. "I'm having a party this Saturday. A small gathering. I... I'd like you to come."
A party. She's inviting me to a party. Celeste Hartwell, who's spent months making sure I'm excluded from everything, is now inviting me to her house.
"You're kidding."
"I'm not. I know it sounds crazy, but I mean it. I want you there." She holds out the invitation, and I notice her hands have stopped shaking. "You don't have to answer now. Just... think about it?"
I take the envelope without thinking, and the moment my fingers touch the paper, something strange happens. The charm around my neck hums softly, but not in warning. Almost like... approval?
There's something about this invitation. Something that feels strange. Like a door opening I didn't know was there.
But before I can examine the feeling more closely, Celeste is smiling at me. Not her usual cruel, triumphant smile. This one is softer. Sadder.
"Thank you," she says. "For listening. For not throwing the invitation back in my face."
Then she turns and walks away, leaving the cake and chocolate on the floor between us.
The hallway explodes into whispers and shocked exclamations. Students surge forward, trying to get closer, trying to understand what just happened.
"Did Celeste Hartwell just apologize?"
"Is this real life?"
"Someone pinch me."
I stand frozen in the middle of it all, holding the invitation and feeling like the ground has shifted beneath my feet. Everything I thought I knew about Celeste, about how this year would go, about my place in this school's hierarchy, has just been turned upside down.
My wolf lifts her head—not in fear, not in warning. Just alert. Curious. Like she's sensing change in the air.
I look down at the invitation in my hands. The writing is beautiful, the paper expensive. It's warm from Celeste's touch. Cream-colored, elegant, with my name written in gold ink and a party date for Saturday night.
No hidden meaning. Just possibility.
Behind the swirl of emotions—confusion, disbelief, wariness—one feeling pushes through the noise: relief.
Maybe the war is finally over.
The question is: am I brave enough to accept this olive branch? Or am I too hurt to believe in second chances?
As students continue to buzz around me, asking questions I can't answer, I catch sight of a familiar figure at the far end of the hallway.
Ronan.
He's standing by his locker, staring at me with an expression I can't read. He saw everything. Heard everything. And from the way his jaw is clenched and his hands are fisted at his sides, he doesn't know what to make of this any more than I do.
Our eyes meet across the crowded hallway, and for a moment, the rest of the world fades away. It's just him and me and all the complicated, painful history between us.
Then he turns and walks away, leaving me standing there with more questions than answers and an invitation that represents something I never thought possible.
Hope.
For the first time in a long time, I'm not afraid of what comes next. Maybe this is the start of something new. Or maybe it's just one night. But for the first time in months, I feel... seen.
Like maybe, just maybe, things are about to change.