4. Sebastian
Chapter 4
Sebastian
S he’s deliberately trying to drive me insane.
That has to be it. There’s no other explanation. Maybe it’s karma. I spent the first two days on this island seeking her out, watching her. And now?
Every time I turn a corner, she’s there—adjusting linen placement, nodding along with the florals team, rerouting vendors like she’s single-handedly running the show. She is, technically. But that’s not the point.
The point is I haven’t touched her in thirty-two hours, and I’m coming apart.
It shouldn’t be this hard. I’ve gone longer without sex. Much longer. I’ve never been ruled by it. I don’t need it the way some men do. I like control. Clean lines. Things that don’t get messy. And women, in my world, usually fall into two categories—temporary, or handled.
Genevieve doesn’t belong in either.
And now she’s everywhere.
Her voice on the earpiece. Her clipboard on the bar. Her citrusy vanilla scent in the corridor outside my suite. I can’t escape it.
I should be focused on the event. The networking. The feedback. The follow-up. The investors. Instead, I’m in my suite, drinking bourbon I don’t want and cataloging every breath I took the night I almost touched her the way I wanted to.
And then didn’t.
Because she’s a virgin.
And because I’m not just older. I’m decades older. I lost my virginity the year she was born. I was already making six figures before she finished middle school. She still blushes when she swears. And she wants me.
That’s the part I can’t make sense of.
I want her. God, do I. I still feel the shape of her under my hands. Still taste her when I close my eyes. I jerked off in the shower like a goddamn teenager just to try and stave off the hunger.
It didn’t help. Nothing helps. Because even when I shut the door, cut the lights, tell myself she’s just some girl I’ll soon forget, my mind goes right back to her. The way she trembled when I touched her. The soft, desperate sound she made when I kissed her. The look in her eyes—unguarded, open, like I wasn’t just the first man to touch her that way but the only one she wanted to.
Fuck.
And maybe that’s what’s undoing me now. Not just the want, but the weight of it. I’ve been desired before, of course. I’ve had women come apart under my hands, wrap themselves around me like they thought it would tether them to something real. But this feels different. Because she is different. She’s not trying to manipulate me or please me or prove anything. She’s just... wanting.
Me.
And I have no business taking her.
I’m older. Sharper. More ruthless than she even knows. She still thinks the world can be managed with color-coded spreadsheets and scented candles. She hasn’t been in the game long enough to learn what it takes to survive it. She’s not jaded. She’s not guarded. She’s not ready.
Which is why I stopped.
And why I’ve spent the last day and a half regretting it with every goddamn breath I take.
The knock comes just after midnight.
I ignore it at first. I tell myself it’s a staff issue. Or one of the assistants with another pointless update. Security with a guest complaint. It could be anything. I don’t care. I don’t want company.
But the knock comes again—quieter this time. Hesitant.
I set the glass down and cross the suite to answer the door. It could be anyone. But I already know who it is.
Genevieve.
She’s less put together than I’ve seen her to date. Her hair is down, her face completely bare. She’s wearing the same dress she had on earlier tonight, now wrinkled and slipping off one shoulder. She’s wringing her hands, but her eyes are steady.
She’s never looked more beautiful.
For a second, neither of us speaks.
Then she says, “I don’t want to be careful anymore.”
My pulse spikes. “Genevieve?—”
“I’m sorry,” she interrupts. “I know this isn’t appropriate. And I know I shouldn’t be here. But I—I can’t stop thinking about you.”
My throat tightens, but I say nothing.
She takes a shaky breath. “I’m tired of being told what I should want. Who I should be. How I should behave. I know this is reckless, and I know you probably think I’m naive, but I’m not. I want this. I want you. ”
She’s shaking. Not from fear—but from nerves, from the effort it’s taking to stand here and give me a choice.
And she is giving me one. That’s what makes it worse.
I could say no. I should. It would be the right thing to do. The decent thing. I am not a decent man, but I know how to fake it.
Instead, I step aside.
She walks in.
I close the door.
There’s a heartbeat of silence. Then another. She doesn’t wait for permission this time—just crosses the space between us and kisses me like she’s been thinking about it since the moment I walked away yesterday.
It starts soft. A repeat of what almost happened before. But when I pull her closer and slide my tongue against hers, she makes a sound— that sound—and the thread I’ve been holding onto finally snaps.
I back her toward the wall, one hand gripping her waist, the other tangled in her hair. She moans into my mouth, hips pressing against mine like she’s starving for contact. I don’t break the kiss. I keep tasting her, learning her.
Her skin is soft. Her breathing is shallow. Her body melts under my hands, pliant and eager. When I run my fingers down her skin and feel the arch of her back against my palm, I know I won’t stop this time. But I still give her the chance to walk away.
“Tell me to stop,” I breathe against her neck, but she just shakes her head and pulls me tighter.
That’s all I need.
I lift her effortlessly, carry her further into the suite, drop her to her feet just beside the bed.
I kiss down her throat, across her collarbone, down her stomach. She gasps when I peel her dress away. She doesn’t hide herself. Doesn’t shrink. She stands there—bare, waiting, trusting—and it almost undoes me. When I slide my fingers between her legs and find her soaked and trembling, she gasps again, and I nearly lose it.
“You want this,” I say, low, rough.
“Yes,” she whispers.
I groan as I push a finger inside, slow and steady. She’s so tight it borders on painful for her. She clenches around me like her body’s trying to hold me in.
She arches, jaw slack, eyes wide. “More.”
Jesus Christ.
I give her more.
I slide in another finger, and she takes it. Barely. The stretch has her shaking, but she doesn’t pull away. My thumb brushes her clit and she jerks, hands scrambling for something to hold on to. She moans again, deeper now, hips beginning to move in search of friction.
“Greedy little thing,” I murmur against her throat. “You like being stretched, don’t you?”
I want to take my time with her. I want to hear every sound she makes. I want to memorize every place she shudders, every place that makes her hips jerk. But, she’s an impatient little thing. She rides my fingers, her whole body straining toward release, so eager for it.
“I want to hear you.” I curl my fingers just right, watching her eyes flutter. “Don’t hold back. Give me everything. ”
Her breath starts coming in broken gasps, her whole body straining toward the edge. I keep her there, right there, dragging it out because I can. Because she’s so damn responsive I can read every shift in her hips, every stutter in her breath.
“Come for me,” I order quietly. “Now.”
She does. She breaks apart with my name on her lips, thighs trembling, chest heaving, her pussy pulsing around my fingers.
I drag my hand from her slowly, savoring every last twitch. Her eyes are half-lidded, dazed. She’s never looked more undone. God, she’s fucking beautiful.
I raise my fingers to her mouth. “Taste.”
Without hesitation, she parts her lips and flicks her tongue over the mess I’ve made of her. My control fractures.
I grab her by the hips and lift her before she can come back to earth. I lay her down on the bed, pin her beneath me, and kiss her again.
“You’re sure?” I ask, kneeling between her thighs.
She nods too fast.
“Use your words, sweetheart.”
“Yes,” she breathes. “I want you.”
I drag my hands down her thighs, spreading her wider. Her pussy’s still glistening, flushed and slick, open for me. I roll a condom on quickly, desperate to be inside of her.
“I’m going to give you exactly what you want,” I say, my voice low, even. “But you’re going to take every inch. No running. No whining. You’ll take it, and you’ll thank me for it. Understood?”
She swallows hard. “Yes.”
I line up, the head of my cock brushing her entrance. She shudders.
I ease in—slow, deeper with each roll of my hips. She’s so tight I have to grit my teeth to hold back. Hot. Wet. And perfect.
Halfway in, I pause. “Tell me to stop, Genevieve, and I will.”
A strangled moan escapes her throat. Her legs wrap around my waist, trying to pull me closer.
“Patience, Ms. St. Claire.”
I thrust the rest of the way in with one slow, brutal stroke. She cries out—half shock, half pleasure—but doesn’t tell me to stop.
“Good girl,” I murmur, dragging my mouth down her neck, letting her feel the full weight of me. “You’re taking it so fucking well.”
I stay there a moment, buried deep, grinding my hips until she’s squirming again. She trembles beneath me, but I don’t move yet. I give her time. Let her feel how deep I am. Let her understand that once I start, I won’t stop until I ruin her for anyone that comes after me.
She’s mine .
Her pussy is still fluttering from the aftershocks of her orgasm. I grind my hips slowly, just enough to remind her who’s inside her. She twitches beneath me, already oversensitive, and I drag my mouth down her throat to where her pulse pounds wildly.
“Feel that?” I murmur flexing my cock inside her, lips brushing her collarbone. “That’s how deep I am. You’re going to remember this every time you sit down for the next three days.”
She whimpers. Her fingers grab the sheets, spine bowing toward me like her body wants more, even if her brain hasn’t caught up yet. I pull back slowly, almost all the way, and drive in hard. She gasps. Her legs tighten around my waist, hips rising instinctively to meet the next thrust. She’s catching on quickly. Fast learner. Good.
I shift my angle, hitting the spot that makes her cry out. She jerks beneath me, teeth sinking into her lower lip to keep herself quiet. I don’t want quiet. I want every sound. Every breath. Every raw, unfiltered reaction I can draw from her body. I thrust harder, watching her face, the way it contorts when I don’t give her time to recover. She takes it. All of it.
She’s so damn responsive it borders on addictive.
“You’re doing so well,” I growl against her ear. “So damn tight, and still trying to take every inch. You want to be ruined, don’t you?”
She nods, unable to speak, lips parted with another moan. Her skin is flushed, her eyes glassy. I can feel her getting close again, the tension winding through her limbs, coiling low in her stomach.
I pull back, thrust in again. Her hands scramble for my shoulders, her nails digging in as I slam into her from above. Her head tips back, throat exposed, mouth open as she chokes on another moan.
“That’s it,” I bite out. “Let me hear you. You’re going to come again, and when you do, I want you screaming my name.”
Her eyes roll back. She arches off the bed. The sound that tears from her chest is wrecked and raw, and it shatters whatever thread of control I had left. I don’t slow down. I don’t stop. I fuck her through the second orgasm, driving into her like she’s mine to keep forever. Her body clutches me like it believes that, too.
I reach for her jaw, force her to look at me. “You’ll never forget this,” I say, voice rough. “No one will ever fuck you the way I do. You hear me?”
She nods, dazed, wrecked, completely gone beneath me—and then she comes again, harder this time. Her entire body seizes, muscles locking around me as she screams my name just like I told her to.
It undoes me.
I come with a low, guttural sound, hips locked to hers, spilling deep. It’s not clean. Not restrained. It’s full-bodied and bone-deep and far too much for someone who was supposed to keep this casual.
And when it’s over, I don’t move.
Her chest rises and falls beneath mine, damp skin flushed and trembling. I press a kiss to her shoulder, the back of her neck, her temple. I don’t know why I do it. It’s not part of the routine.
I can already feel her going soft beneath me, drifting toward sleep with her limbs tangled in mine. I should leave the bed, start cleaning up, say something to push the distance back between us. But I stay.
I stare at the ceiling, one arm wrapped around the woman I should’ve said no to, and know without a doubt that I crossed a line I can’t uncross.
It’s only later—when she’s asleep, curled against me, her breath warm on my chest—that the shift hits me.
Not lust. Not satisfaction.
Guilt.
But not enough to keep me away from her. No, now that I’ve had her? There is no going back.