Chapter 181

Ella

I couldn’t believe the mess I had gotten myself into. I felt like a fraud, a manipulator, no better than Marina herself.

But I needed to keep my little sister safe. Her life was the most precious thing to me, and I would be damned if I let anything happen to her.

However, despite my turmoil, time had to go on. I didn’t hear anything from Logan involving Miles in days, not since I had given him the photographs. And I was too afraid to ask, so I just decided to throw myself into my work as a distraction.

And yet, every day that Logan’s case glared at me from my desk, I felt a heavier and heavier weight on my chest. I had been ignoring it for days now, but it couldn’t be ignored any longer. I had an appointment with Logan to discuss the first details.

Little did he know that I had already begun making plans for his downfall.

The knock on my office door interrupted my train of thought. I glanced up from my desk and called out, “Come in.”

Logan entered, and I couldn’t help but feel a pang of guilt as I watched him come in. Here was a man I cared about, seeking my help, while I was secretly building a case against him. I pushed those thoughts aside and greeted him with a forced smile, although my heart was pounding relentlessly in my chest.

“Hey,” I said, motioning for him to take a seat across from my desk. “It’s been a while.”

He nodded as he sat. He looked tired. Really tired.

“Yeah, it has,” he said, his voice a bit gravelly. “Everything going okay?”

I nodded in response even though that couldn’t have been further from the truth. It had been a week since I last saw him, and although we had barely spoken, I still felt Marina’s claws at all times. She contacted me almost every day to make sure I was keeping in line, and it was getting harder and harder to focus.

And yet, as he settled into the chair across from me, I couldn’t help but notice the exhaustion in his face, too. I wanted to ask how everything had gone with Miles, but I just couldn’t bring myself to say it. I was too afraid of what I might find out.

“So, um…” I cleared my throat. “Let’s get started, then.”

“Yes. Lets,” Logan said.

“Okay,” I said, picking up my pen and a notepad. “First things first, Logan. Do you have an alibi for the night of the fire?”

Logan furrowed his brow, his gaze distant as he thought back. After a long pause, he finally spoke. “I can’t remember exactly where I was that night. Most likely, I was out driving around.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Are you certain that’s what you were doing?”

Logan sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I’m pretty sure. I sometimes go for long drives to clear my head when things get tough. But I can’t say for sure. All I know is that I wasn’t around other people, that’s for sure.”

I set my pen down with a heavy sigh, even though my mind was racing with the knowledge that there was yet another detail to add to my secret dossier against him.

“An alibi like that won’t hold much weight in court, Logan,” I said. “Without some form of confirmation from another person or documented evidence, it’ll be challenging to use it in your defense.”

Logan’s shoulders slumped, and he cursed under his breath. I felt awful, but I also knew that it would help in my battle to follow Marina’s hellish orders.

“I’m sorry,” I said softly. “We’ll try to work out some other details to make up for it. But I want you to be prepared.”

He nodded, his expression betraying very little. “It’s fine. Let’s move on.”

For the next hour, we delved into the details of Logan’s case. I asked questions about his relationship with the businessman accusing him of arson, probing for any potential motives or conflicts.

At one point, Logan hesitated before admitting, “A few years back, we had a disagreement that got pretty heated. I, uh, threw something during the argument. Not at anyone, just... out of frustration.”

I jotted down the information, trying to hide my surprise. “That should be fine,” I said. “It happened years ago, and you can testify that you haven’t had any violent outbursts since then.”

Logan nodded, but I could sense a shadow of unease in his expression. Little did he know that I was saving this tidbit, along with the vague ‘alibi,’ to add to my case against him.

And yet, as our meeting continued, I couldn’t shake my guilt completely. I felt like I was betraying someone who really cared about me; hell, I had already betrayed him.

And that hurt more than anything.

…

A couple of weeks passed, and I continued to secretly collect and manipulate information, crafting a secondary narrative that placed Logan near the scene of the crime.

It was a painstaking process, one that could result in disaster if I wasn’t careful. One wrong step could mean my plan being discovered, Logan finding out, and possibly even losing my license to practice law.

The only relief—to a certain extent—was that Logan wasn’t spending the nights with me anymore. Ever since the incident with Miles, he hadn’t even offered to come over. I was glad for it, because I could hardly look him in the eye.

I was sitting on my couch one night with a bottle of wine open in front of me, working on the details of my secret dossier, my wolf growled inside of me, a constant reminder of my betrayal. She was furious with me, and rightfully so. Hell, I was furious with myself.

“This isn’t right,” she said, growing frustrated. “Logan trusts you.”

“I can’t help it, and you know that, Ema,” I replied as I typed on my laptop late one night, sitting cross-legged on my couch. “Daisy’s safety is at risk.”

She sighed. “I know. It just makes me so…”

“Look, I’m angry too,” I replied. “But there’s nothing I can do about it. My hands are tied.”

Suddenly, as I was sitting there, my phone buzzed on the coffee table. I groaned audibly, figuring that it was Marina calling again to ‘check in’ on me, and went to pick up the phone. But when I saw the name on the caller ID, it wasn’t her.

It was Logan.

“Hello?” I answered.

“It’s me,” Logan said. “Are you busy?”

I paused for a moment, glancing back and forth between the bottle of wine and my laptop screen. Finally, realizing I was taking too long to answer, I replied. “No. Not really.”

“Good,” he replied. “Listen, I’m heading to the race track for some practice. Will you come with me? I need my lucky charm.”

My blood ran cold, and I felt a knot tighten in my stomach. It wasn’t just that I hadn’t heard Logan utter those words in weeks; it was that the racetrack possibly meant Miles.

Miles, who I had thrown under the bus for the sake of Marina’s orders.

Could I really bear to witness the wreckage of the storm I had created?