Chapter 28 Sebastian
SEBASTIAN
Istand frozen for a moment, trying to make sense of the scene in front of me.
Harper’s shirt is streaked with blood, the rag wrapped around her palm already saturated through, and her eyes, normally sharp, stubborn, painfully alive, look unfocused, as if someone has pulled her too close to a flame and she hasn’t realized she’s burning yet.
Ares lounges against the windowsill like he owns the room, the night wind at his back, watching me approach her with a look that twists my stomach into knots of hatred.
I move to her in three long strides. The second I reach her, her hand lifts toward mine, instinctual, like she needs the contact as badly as I need the reassurance that she’s still breathing.
Her fingers curl around my wrist, warm despite the blood drying on her skin.
I let the touch anchor me, even as my eyes lock onto Ares’s gaze with a fury I haven’t felt in years, feral, black around the edges, consuming.
“Seb, let me explain-” she murmurs, brushing her palm against the side of my face as if she knows exactly where to touch to keep me from unraveling.
But when she moves, the light catches something that punches air out of my lungs, blood on Ares’s forearm.
Her blood. A smeared trail across his skin, shaped like the curve of her fingertips.
My chest tightens, rage coiling inside me like a beast clawing for release.
He touched her. He held her. He restrained her.
“Did he hurt you?” My voice comes out low, deadly quiet as my hand slides to the back of her head, guiding her closer while I look over every inch of her, hunting for bruises I already know I’ll find.
Ares laughs under his breath, sharp and dismissive.
“You must take me for something much worse than I am, Harwood. Last time I checked, she can defend herself. She doesn’t need a guard dog.”
The words slice through my temper like a blade.
I move Harper behind me in one smooth motion, my body a barrier between her and him before I’ve even thought about it.
His expression shifts, subtle but unmistakable, interest sharpening, attention narrowing.
He drags his leg back through the window, stepping fully inside the classroom, posture straightening with almost predatory amusement.
His blue eyes lock on me with glacial stillness, cold enough to make every instinct I have bristle.
“I leave her alone for two seconds,” I say through clenched teeth, “and she’s bloody and hurt because of you.”
He scoffs again, infuriatingly casual.
“She could have said no to our deal, and I would have left it at that. But she, I, and even you know Andrew cannot be reasoned with. The only way to stop him is by harnessing a power she has.”
He folds his arms across his chest as if lecturing a group of students rather than standing in front of the man who wants him dead.
“She’s not going to make any deals with you.” The words come out before I can stop them, possessive and instinctive. Wrong or right, it doesn’t matter. He is not touching her again. He is not standing this close again.
But Harper’s hand trembles as it reaches for my forearm. The tug is small almost apologetic. I turn to her, and the world narrows to her eyes, haunted and conflicted.
Her palm rises.
Ares’s does too.
A scar marks both.
My stomach drops.
“We made a blood oath,” she whispers, and everything in me goes still. “It’s customary in my house… I can’t jeopardize your safety. I will do whatever it takes to stop my father. Even working with someone like him.”
Shame curls cold in my chest. Fear follows. Not fear of Ares, but fear of losing her again, of watching her slip into danger because she thinks she must, because she thinks she’s alone in this fight.
Ares only watches her with something darker than amusement now, something sharp and hollow that might almost resemble disappointment, if he were human enough to feel it.
“To think,” he mutters, tossing his hands up in a mock display of heartbreak, “I thought you were finally warming up to me.”
My jaw sets. My fingers curl. And every instinct I have screams that this, this exact moment, is where everything begins to unravel.
The moment Harper’s words settle, the confirmation of the blood oath binding her to him, something snaps loose inside me.
Ares doesn’t flinch when I surge forward.
He barely even shifts. My hand slams into his collarbone and I drive him back into the wall hard enough to rattle the glass vials on the shelves.
The impact echoes through the classroom.
For a heartbeat, satisfaction spikes, finally, a dent in that smug composure. ..but his smile only widens.
A slow, deliberate curl of his mouth, like he’s been waiting for this.
“Careful, Harwood.” His voice is low, almost appreciative. “You’ll start giving me the impression you care.”
My forearm presses harder against his chest. Magic pulses in my grip, instinct begging to be unleashed. He doesn’t resist. Doesn’t tense. Doesn’t defend himself. Instead, Ares tilts his head just enough to meet my eyes with a confidence that borders on taunting.
“As entertaining as this is,” he murmurs, “your anger isn’t the blade that will kill her father.”
The words turn my stomach. Harper moves behind me, quiet, breath trembling, and though I don’t look back, the awareness of her presence roots me to the floor.
Ares’s eyes flick toward her, sharp and hungry with interest. “And she’s already made her choice.”
That does it.
My grip tightens, magic rising hot beneath my skin, but Ares only laughs under his breath, a low, amused sound that grates like sand through my veins.
“You truly don’t listen,” he says, unconcerned as he touches two fingers lightly to the inside of my wrist. Not to pry me off. Not to defend himself. Just a reminder that he could, if he wished, but he doesn’t need to.
Blue eyes gleam like struck metal.
Then he shifts his gaze to Harper.
Something in him softens, not kindly, not warmly, but with a dark fascination that feels far too familiar.
“It has been my pleasure, Harper.”
Her name leaves his tongue like a promise and a warning woven together.
Before I can throw another punch, shadows coil around his boots. The air bends. A ripple of distortion climbs his frame like a living tide. He steps back, not into the room, but out of it, vanishing into a dissipation so smooth it barely disturbs the air he leaves behind.
Silence drops heavy in the aftermath.
Only then do I realize my hands are shaking.
Harper stands a few feet away, her ragged palm pressed over the binding wound, her chest rising with shallow breaths. The room feels smaller than it did moments before, the space between us crackling with a tension neither of us knows how to name.
“Harper…” My voice comes out too rough, too close to breaking.
She doesn’t look up.
Her fingers tighten around the blood-soaked cloth. Violet light flickers faintly under her skin, rage, grief, power, but her expression is painfully calm.
“There’s no sense getting angry,” she says, almost softly. “No sense trying to protect me from a deal I already made.”
Her throat works as she swallows, the words dragging themselves out of a place carved deep.
“I am a Whitlock,” she whispers. “There are never happy endings for us.”
The room seems to exhale with her, trembling beneath the truth she’s carried alone for far too long.
And for the first time since finding her again, I don’t know how to pull her away from the cliff she’s standing on