Her gaze wandered across the living room until it settled on a framed photograph hanging beside the television.
It had been taken on their second anniversary.
Nathan had laughed while hanging it on the wall, insisting that one day they would show it to their children and tell them how young and carefree they used to be.
The memory tightened painfully around her heart.
She remembered rainy afternoons spent cooking together, movie nights that ended with the two of them asleep on the couch, playful arguments over whose turn it was to wash the dishes, and the tiny succulent she had bought because Nathan always forgot to water plants.
She had even begun quietly setting aside money to help him buy the wedding ring she believed he would one day choose for her.
Every memory returned with painful clarity—not because she wanted to remember them, but because she suddenly realized they had all become memories.
“So… that’s it?” she asked softly.
Nathan frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“Our story.” She looked at him with eyes that had cried so much they could scarcely hold another tear.
“Three years together… and this is how it ends?”
“It doesn’t have to.” The words escaped Nathan before he had time to think.
“We’ll figure something out.
I promise you, we will definitely find a solution.”
Lena stared at him in disbelief.
“Figure it out?” A faint, disbelieving laugh escaped her lips as she slowly shook her head.
“How, Nathan?” She spread her hands helplessly.
“Am I supposed to stay while you belong to someone else?”
His expression crumbled.
“No.”
“Then should I wait until that compatibility score disappears?
Or am I expected to wait until the score compatibility comes down to zero?”
Only silence answered her because, that wouldn’t occur even with miracles.
She looked into his eyes and the three of them knew the truth.
“You deep down know it won’t,” she whispered.
Nathan lowered his eyes as he couldn’t deny it.
This was the truth of the compatibility score.
“So tell me,” Lena continued, her voice trembling despite every effort to remain composed.
“What future are you asking me to believe in?
What is in there for the future?
As a second wife?”
Nathan searched desperately for an answer, but none came.
There wasn’t one.
For the first time in his life, love wasn’t enough—not because it lacked sincerity, but because the world they lived in had decided that biology mattered more than choice.
And could he make her the second wife?
He could but what about Lena?
He knew her dignity couldn’t allow her to.
And what kind of a future did that give her?
A mistress?
Lena slowly stepped backward until her fingers found the doorknob.
Each step felt heavier than the last and Nathan instinctively followed her.
She turned away from the bedroom as she wiped her tears away.
“Lena… please.”
She paused but didn’t turn around immediately.
After a long silence, she spoke so lowly that he almost didn’t hear her.
“Do you know what hurts the most?”
He couldn’t answer.
“I could have forgiven a mistake.” Her fingers tightened around the handle.
“I could have forgiven a lie.” Another tear slipped silently down her cheek.
“I might even have forgiven betrayal.” Only then did she look back at him.
“But I don’t know how to compete with fate.
I don’t know how to compete with a wolf mate.”
If it were a human partner, probably they could have maneuvered, she could have believed she had a chance, but a wolf?
Nathan felt the words drain every ounce of strength from his body.
“Lena…”
A sad smile touched her lips, though it never reached her eyes.
“It turns out I was never fighting another woman.” Her gaze shifted briefly toward the glowing bracelet still hovering in the room.
“I was fighting an entire system.” She slowly opened the door.
“And this time…” Her voice was barely more than a whisper.
“…the system won.”
Without waiting for a response, she stepped into the hallway leaving Nathan standing there all frozen for a heartbeat before rushing after her.
“Lena!”
“Lena wait….”
The elevator doors were already sliding shut.
For the briefest moment their eyes met through the narrowing gap and then the doors closed between them.
Nathan reached the elevator just as the display changed to Ground Floor and his fist struck the metal doors with a dull thud.
“Lena!” He called out, but only silence answered him.
For the first time in three years, he truly understood what it meant to lose someone he loved—and there was nothing he could do to bring her back.