Chapter 6 #2
I couldn’t help but narrow my eyes at that.
Sebastian is a lot of things – cocky and arrogant and maybe a bit too smart for his own good – but he wasn’t a cheater.
He never had been. He’d rather be honest and get a punch to the face than hold his tongue and get away with something.
It was one of the first and most endearing things I learned about him .
“No offence to your friends,” I replied as I ducked my head, unable to stare at the wall anymore. “But that’s bullshit. Ignorant, judgemental bullshit.”
Her friendly smile slipped ever so slightly but she clawed it back so quickly I barely noticed. She leaned in, her ponytail slipping over her bare shoulder as she laid a daring hand on my knee.
“Of course, you’re right. I don’t think that way, not since I met Sebastian. He’s never cheated on me. Never even given me a reason to suspect he would.”
I nodded because that sounded right, sounded like the Sebastian I knew.
He wasn’t the type to get himself into a relationship if he didn’t want to be there.
He’d dated around casually before we’d gone on tour, and judging by the internet, had dated around just as casually after – but everyone knew where they stood.
There was no bitterness as far as I could tell.
So why did Myah look like she’d been sucking lemons all morning? There was a sourness in her gaze which belied the placid sweetness of her face and I couldn’t understand why. I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
“I don’t know why you want to talk to me about this,” I admitted, trying to suppress a sigh. “Until recently, I hadn’t spoken to Sebastian in five years.”
“I know,” she admitted, nodding. “I want to know what happened, back then. Because Sebastian doesn’t talk about what you were like, back then.
At all. He talks about that tour, and the crew, he has stories about Shep, Mira, Annabelle.
He even talks about how that was your band’s first tour with Kelly and how she got you all in line.
But he never mentions you. You’re not in any of his stories.
He only started mentioning you generally when you agreed to do this tour. Why is that, Max?”
My stomach sank to the balls of my feet as she went on.
If I hadn’t been wearing Dr. Martens, I’m pretty sure it would’ve broken out of the soles of my boots and down into the center of the Earth.
It shouldn’t have been a big surprise – of course Sebastian didn’t talk about me, or what had gone down between us on that tour.
I would’ve been a hypocrite to be upset about that because until recently, I hadn’t spoken about it either.
Thinly veiled barbs when his name came up, either in conversation or in an interview, had been all I’d been willing to offer when discussing that tour as well.
But I guess I am a bit of hypocrite, because hearing it from his new fiancée’s own mouth?
It hurt. I hadn’t talked about my time with Sebastian because I wasn’t sure I’d be able to pull myself back together afterwards.
Even when I’d been cluing Shep, Mira and Annabelle in on the situation, I’d kept my explanation brief.
I didn’t have the strength to go into it in any great detail and certainly not with the woman who was going to become Sebastian’s wife.
I could tell from the knowing way she pressed her lips together that my stricken expression had confirmed at least a few of her suspicions.
I didn’t need to look in the mirror to know that my hurt feelings were splashed across my face, clear as day.
Yeah, it hurt to know that Sebastian didn’t mention me in his old war stories – not even in passing – and now Myah knew that it hurt.
But I could only guess as to why Sebastian didn’t mention me when talking about that long gone summer.
I knew why I didn’t talk about him, but as always, his motives were a mystery to me.
He could’ve told her stories about me without telling her we’d been intimately involved.
We’d spent so much time together on that tour that there were plenty of anecdotes about what we’d gotten up to that didn’t involve sex.
“I don’t know,” I replied, trying for a casual shrug. “I guess I pissed him off, when I gave that interview after the tour. I didn’t mean…I was upset about something stupid and I shouldn’t have said it. ”
“So you think Sebastian just purged you from some of his fondest memories because you called him a spoiled brat?” She leaned back, barely concealing an eye roll. “I call him a brat all the time, Max. That’s not it.”
“Yeah but I called him names for all the internet to see,” I argued, sounding pretty weak even to my own ears. “I’d understand if he was…hurt by that.”
“I have no doubt that you hurt him,” Myah countered, her eyes glittering with something too close to victory when she met mine. “That you hurt each other. That’s why you both lashed out at the other.”
I sucked in a breath, knowing she was circling the truth.
I glanced around the cabin, hoping to recalibrate my thoughts or come up with an escape plan, whatever.
But there were no bright ideas forthcoming.
All I could do is sit there, staring at my hands, wondering what the hell she wanted me to say.
“I don’t know what you want me to say, really,” I replied with a sigh. “Isn’t this a conversation you should be having with Sebastian? He’d be able to tell you why he doesn’t talk about me when he’s looking back on those days. I don’t know him well enough to get inside his head. I never have. ”
“I don’t believe that for a second. I know the two of you were fucking around. Probably for the whole tour.”
There it was, the crux of her reason for visiting.
She knew, somehow, that Sebastian and I had been more than friends, more than tour mates.
Judging by the glare on her face, the fact that it had been five years ago apparently did little to soothe her.
I couldn’t deny it, not straight up like that – wasn’t going to make myself a liar for Sebastian. Not again.
“So?” I shrugged again to hide the viciousness bubbling away in my stomach.
I didn’t owe her anything, didn’t owe Sebastian anything either.
“I don’t see why it has anything to do with you, to be honest. That was a long time ago, years before he even met you.
I don’t date much these days so I’m not sure how it works, but did you really expect him to tell you every single time he hooked up with someone? ”
I could tell by the way her eyes widened that she didn’t expect me to brush it off so easily. The incredulous look on her face would’ve been funny, if I wasn’t so pissed off at her for thinking she could come to me as a complete stranger and try to dredge up my past.
“If you two had just been hooking up, I wouldn’t give a shit. Sebastian is a world famous, touring musician, I’ve made my peace with knowing that he fucked around before we got together,” she said, still sounding way calmer than I felt. She even waved a dismissive hand in my direction.
“But,” she continued. “I don’t think you were just a casual hook up, Max.
You never were. And now just as we’re starting to make plans to get married, my future husband inserts himself back into your life when you’ve made it perfectly clear you wanted nothing to do with him.
I’m just supposed to accept that you’re going to be traveling the world together, gone for weeks at a time? ”
I mean, she wasn’t wrong. When she laid it out like that, Sebastian’s timing did seem a bit off. It was Sebastian who asked for Reliant to support Burning Bright on the tour, he’d admitted it pretty openly.
“Yeah, you just have to accept it,” I nodded, running my hands through my hair in an attempt to get them to stop shaking. “If you trust him, you have to accept it.”
“Do you?”
“Do I what?”
“Trust Sebastian?”
I blinked at her, once again caught off guard by the direction our conversation had taken. Thankfully, the ringing of my phone gave me an out. I silently thanked the heavens as I pulled it out of my pocket – Abbey was facetiming me.
“I have to take this,” I told Myah. “Thanks for stopping by.”
It was a bit heavy handed, as far as conversation enders go, but I’m not exactly known for my social skills. I felt like she’d sliced me open and gone rummaging through my guts, I was pretty sure that I could let my polite facade drop.
She got up, nodded once in my direction, and let herself out. I let out one long, shaking breath before I answered Abbey’s call.
◆◆◆
I was still sitting in our little cabin, bouncing my legs to try and work out some of the restless energy that my unwelcome meeting with Myah had left me with, when there was another knock on the door.
I glared in the door’s general direction, deciding against just going over and opening it. I’d already been burned once. But it wasn’t like the cabin door had a peep hole, so I settled for yelling.
“Who is it?”
“Sebastian!”
My heart leapt into my throat, entirely without my permission, just at the sound of his voice. There was a tremble in my hands as I pushed myself to my feet. I couldn’t tell if it was from rage or nerves, but either way, it wasn’t a good sign.
I let him in, though, because there was no way I was going to just…ignore him. I’d never been able to ignore him and it seemed unlikely I was going to be able to start any time soon. Even after my little spat with Sebastian’s fiancée, I still wanted to see his stupid gorgeous face.
“Hey, you alright?” He asked, his steely blue gaze tripping from my face down to my hands then back again. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I wish I had,” I muttered as I stepped away from the door to let him in. “Would’ve been easier to process.”