Chapter 116

Emily’s POV

The walk back from the restaurant felt endless.

Every step was heavy with Jace’s words, echoing in my head like a song I couldn’t turn off.

“I wouldn’t make you doubt yourself.”

“You don’t have to keep bleeding for someone just because you loved him first.”

“Love should be simple.”

God.

He was right. On some level, I knew he was.

Being with Jace would be easy. He’d never once made me feel like I was too much, or not enough, or anything in between. He saw me, he really saw me and wanted me, even when I was at my lowest.

And yet…

When I closed my eyes, it wasn’t Jace’s voice I heard. It wasn’t his arms I remembered wrapping around me last night. It wasn’t his whisper that had pulled me out of the darkness I’d been drowning in for months.

It was Alex.

“I love you.”

The words he’d finally spoken, the ones I’d waited for, clung to me like a second skin, and no matter how hard I tried to shake