Chapter 35 Sebastian
Sebastian
Luke and I stayed out for about an hour, but unsurprisingly, I wasn’t feeling up for a night on the town. Before we left, he got a text from Scarlett saying that she was heading home after a girls’ night at Claire’s house.
“Was Lydia there? Ask her if Lydia was there,” I said.
“Of course Lydia was there. Where else would she be,” Luke huffed but asked the question anyway. A second later, he smirked down at his phone, typing a message back.
“What the hell, man. What did she say?”
“Yes, Lydia was there. She’s fine.”
Fuck. She was doing just fine while I was over here pining and missing her like crazy.
It was too soon to throw in the towel. I needed to figure out some way to prove to Lydia that we belonged together, without being pushy or demanding.
“You’ll be alright,” Luke said. “Love is a powerful beast. It can make you feel like your insides are being ripped out and stomped on, but that’s just part of the deal. You fall in love, and that’s the risk you take.”
“That’s less helpful than you think,” I deadpanned. Cold beer slid down my throat as I swallowed the last of the drink that I had been nursing since we got here.
“I’m going to head out. You should do the same,” he said.
“Yeah. I’m not staying here,” I told him. “Thanks for meeting me for a drink.”
We settled up with Ronnie and walked out together. The warm night air was still sticky with humidity. The cloud covered sky promised some much-needed rain that would hopefully take the humidity with it when it rolled out.
I pulled up to my house in a daze. It wasn’t due to the one drink I’d had with Luke but rather from images of Lydia, smiling and laughing at a girls’ night, perfectly fine without me.
I pushed my key into the lock, never even registering the fact that the handle twisted in my hand before I engaged the key.
The house was illuminated from the light of the television.
I didn’t remember leaving the TV on though.
As a matter of fact, I hadn’t even been home since this morning, and I hadn’t turned the TV on at all that day.
I nearly screamed when a head popped up from the couch as I closed the door behind me.
I stilled. “Lydia.” Her name on my tongue fed my soul.
My heartbeat started an Olympic sprint in my chest. She was so damn beautiful.
Her silvery-purple hair was loose, hanging past her shoulders.
One of Reid’s large T-shirts dwarfed her much smaller frame, and a peek of pink shorts with delicate lace around the bottom hem looked like nothing she would have picked out herself.
“Hey. Can we talk?” She stood from the couch and started toward me, studying me, a nervous energy emanating from her.
“I’m sorry, Lydia. I shouldn’t have said those things to you.
If I could take them back, I would.” I took a step closer to her, and when she didn’t take a step back, I tried another one.
“I don’t care what you post or share on my accounts.
I don’t care if the entire world thinks I’m a terrible business owner or bad with money.
I don’t care if SD Ink flourishes or flounders.
I never should have called you crazy or said that I would deny the reality of what you post. That was a dick thing to say, and I know that.
I’m so sorry.” I was only a foot away from her.
I wanted to reach out and touch her, but I didn’t.
“I know. I think you panicked, then I panicked.” She shrugged, her eyes soft.
She looked down at the floor for a beat before lifting her gaze to me again.
“What I said that night, about you and… him… being alike. It wasn’t fair and it isn’t true.
You are nothing like him, Sebastian. You couldn’t be more different in all the world. I’m sorry too.”
A tear hung from her lash before gravity pulled it to her cheek. I couldn’t stand it anymore. I swiped the tear away, my thumb lightly caressing her soft, smooth cheek. She looked up at me, a question in her gaze.
“You don’t have to apologize.” With my hand around the back of her neck, I pulled her to me, wrapping my other arm around her in a tight embrace.
She rested her head against my chest, clinging to me like a lifeline.
“I won’t make that mistake again, little wild, I promise you.
I can’t promise I won’t make any mistakes, but I never want to make you question yourself. I love you.”
“I love you.” She lifted her head and placed a kiss to my jaw. “I’m going to be honest.” Another kiss peppered my jaw. “I missed you a stupid amount.” She kissed right below my ear. “In just two days.” She sucked my lobe into her mouth, taking it between her teeth.
I growled, capturing her lips in mine. Lydia tried to take control, but I tilted her head to just where I wanted her and deepened the kiss.
My tongue slid across hers, filing the Lydia-sized hole in my heart with love.
She wrapped her arms around my shoulders and hopped up, circling her legs around my waist. I caught her midair, one arm holding her weight while the other was threaded into her silky hair.
“Lydia,” I groaned. My cock pulsed in my pants.
Having Lydia in my arms, her warm body flush against mine, was enough for me to nearly lose control.
I slid her down and back up, dragging her thin shorts over my bulging erection.
The urge to sink into her tight channel was overwhelming.
Sweat beaded at my temple as I continued to stoke our flames through our clothes.
“Seb.” Lydia’s grip tightened. Her head fell back, and I took the opportunity to kiss, lick, and bite a trail up the side of her neck.
She turned her face to mine, heat blazing in her eyes.
“Make me come. Make me come just like this and then again on your tongue. And then again when you’re fucking me bare.
” She rode me hard, her beautiful face contorting as she raced closer and closer to her climax.
“I dare you, Seb. I dare you to make me come all night long.”
This minx was going to be the death of me. Her thighs squeezed my waist, and I had to fight to stay in control. She screamed my name. I crashed my mouth into hers, swallowing her moans of pleasure.
“A dare, Lydia? Really?” My voice was husky and low. “You know how serious I take a dare.” I carried her to the bedroom, the light from the still on TV lighting the way.
“That was kind of the point,” she sassed, sucking on my neck as her hands pulled at the collar of my shirt. I lifted it up and off, Lydia still clinging to my waist.
She slid down my body as I put her on her feet. “Promise me.” I kissed her, pouring every emotion I’d felt over the past two days into her. “Promise me, if I say something stupid or hurtful that you’ll tell me.”
Her mossy green eyes locked on mine. “I will,” she said.
“That’s not a promise.”
She rolled her eyes, a smile pulling at her lips. “I promise. And I promise to give us a chance to fight it out instead of leaving. I promise to always remember that you are not my past.”
“I’m not,” I agreed. But I would be her future, her forever, if she let me.
I snaked my hands up her shirt, lifting it over her head. We undressed each other slowly, deliberately, enjoying the intimacy of two people being in this moment together just as much as the physical act it was leading up to.
“You are my world, Lydia,” I told her, backing her up until her knees hit the side of the bed and she sat.
“I don’t want to put that on you as some sort of pressure to live up to.
But I need you to know.” I leaned into her, tasting her soft lips while I gently pushed her to her back.
“And I’ll give you anything you want,” I said, falling to my knees in front of her, spreading her thighs.
Arousal glistened, shimmering in the moonlit room. “Starting with this.”
My tongue swiped through her center, and the sounds she made drove me wild.
I licked her clean from the last round, ready to make her scream my name again.
If she wanted to do this all night, that was fine with me.
I fucked her with my tongue until she was writhing beneath me.
My hand held her down on her lower abdomen, pinning her in place while I worked over her clit in quick, firm flicks.
She was getting close, her muscles tensed, her breathing labored and erratic.
I pulled back from her clit to spear her pussy with my tongue.
“Seb,” she cried. “I need to come. Please.”
I had every intention of making her wait for it, but that word.
Begging for me to bring her the relief she sought so badly.
I moved back to her clit, sucking hard on the little bundle of nerves and inserting two fingers deep into her pussy.
I pulsed my fingers in time with my mouth until her walls tightened around me.
She screamed my name as her juices flooded my hand.
I worked her through her tremors until she was boneless and spent.
“You taste so fucking good,” I said, moving to my feet and licking my fingers clean. “That’s two. And it’s only been thirty minutes. We have all night. I hope you’re ready to handle what you started.”
She sat up with a gleam in her eyes. Taking her bottom lip between her teeth, she looked me up and down. “Oh, I can handle it. Can you?” She ran her tongue around the tip of my painfully swollen dick before sealing her lips around me.
The warm, wet sensation that was her mouth nearly brought me right back to my knees. Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I would survive this, but if she was my undoing, I would gladly pay that price.
* * *
Soft footsteps padded down the hall. I knew the smell of bacon and fresh coffee would get her out of bed. I looked over my shoulder, and my pulse still quickened at the sight of her.
My Lydia.
Or at least I hoped so.
The day after Lydia and I made up, I called Luke.
He, Wyatt, and I went around from jewelry store to jewelry store until I found the perfect ring.
The white-gold band held a purple stone in the center with a crown of small diamonds along the top.
It was a little nontraditional as far as engagement rings went, but Lydia wasn’t the traditional type.
That was almost a week ago, and I had been holding on to it ever since.
“Morning, beautiful.” I smiled.
“That smells delicious, but do you have to make it so early?”
She had been up all night last night working on her current PR campaign.
After the local businesses had seen the results of her work for SD Ink, Lydia started getting calls to find out if she was taking on more clients.
Her newest client, Jeannie Roston, owned Calla Bay Candies.
The bright swirls of color were completely opposite to the aesthetic of SD Ink, but Lydia rocked it, like she always did.
“It’s the same time I start breakfast every morning.” I grinned at her surliness.
I made us both a plate while Lydia poured herself a cup of coffee.
“Want me to do something that might make you smile?” I asked.
“Yes, always. But can you give me ten minutes? Bacon doesn’t taste as good cold.” She winked.
I pulled the small black box from the back of the cabinet and dropped to one knee in front of her.
“Seb. Oh my God.” She covered her mouth with shaking hands, her gaze shining through misty eyes.
I took one hand in mine, needing a piece of her to hold on to.
“Lydia. I’ve told you before that you’re my world.
My everything. My forever. I wasn’t kidding.
I love you like I never thought possible.
You are the strongest woman I know. You’ve lived through a lot of shitty things, more than you ever should have.
But I want to be something that makes your future brighter, because that’s what you do for me.
You make every day better. I waited eleven years to have you in my life again, and now that I do, I can’t imagine a day without you. Will you marry me?”
She was nodding her head before I got halfway through my speech.
“Yes. Yes, of course I will.” She pulled me to my feet, and I lifted her out of the chair. My hands came to the sides of her head, and I froze, just staring into her eyes. Mine. She was really going to be my wife.
Lydia crashed her lips into mine. I could feel the moisture from her tears on my cheeks.
“All the bad things in my life, Seb, you made them better. You make my life better. I love you.”
I knew from the moment we kissed in her childhood bedroom all those years ago that there was something different about Lydia. Through all my escapades—one-night stands, drunken hookups, and a revolving door of meaningless flings—no one made me feel even a fraction of the way I felt that night.
The shit that we had to go through and get through to be here, in this moment, seemed endless. But I wouldn’t change a thing. Every tragedy, heartbreak, and bad decision brought us together again, and this time, I wasn’t going to let her slip through my fingers.
I was just about to walk my fiancée back to the bedroom when I heard my phone buzz. And then another. And another.
“Do you need to get that?” Lydia asked, her lips brushing against mine.
I knew without even looking who it was. The guys’ group text was popping off because they knew that I was planning to propose today. They were either wishing me luck or seeing how it went. Either way, they could wait.
“No,” I said. “I have something much more important to attend to.”
“Well, time’s a-ticking. Are you going to take me to bed or not?” she sassed, her eyes gleaming with amusement.
I slapped her on the ass, eliciting the perfect squeal.
Always so damn sassy. Just the way I liked it.