Chapter 21 The Mountain Cabin
TWENTY-ONE
THE MOUNTAIN CABIN
ANNALIESE
Idon’t want to return to the party. If I had my choice, I’d just go home.
Walk, Uber, drive… whatever it took, I’d be gone.
But this was my debut as Sebastien’s wife.
It was my fault that it didn’t occur to me that Eric would show up at Alexandre’s party.
In my brain, Eric was my past, Sebastien my present, and safety my future. They weren’t supposed to interact.
And, oh, did they…
I hate that Eric affected me the same way as always.
He made me feel like a silly little girl who was being scolded, and I…
I let him. I had no intention of leaving with him, but if Sebastien hadn’t rescued me when he did, Eric would probably still be doing his best to convince me to leave with him.
That’s how he won me in the first place.
Between wearing me down with the constant refrain that I couldn’t do any better than a powerful, wealthy lawyer, then pointing out how lucky I was that he chose me to be his…
and then slipping in some flattery that twenty-three-year-old Annaliese was helpless to fight back against…
in the end, going along with it was so much easier than fighting.
Falling in love with him was so much easier.
I don’t love him anymore. If I had any doubt about that, whether or not positive feelings lingered and that I would have regrets the next time I saw him…
yeah, no. I was already so pissed and frustrated that he would try to upset my sister.
But after the way he showed up at Alexandre’s party to confront me?
I might’ve quailed a bit under the weight of those icy blue eyes, falling back into the old habit where he talks at me and I just stand there and take it, but the whole time…
the whole time… all I kept thinking about is how I wanted him to just leave me the fuck alone.
And then Sebastien suddenly appeared. He saved me, and he threatened Eric, and he admitted that he went to the King and got a blood oath.
Loni told me about those. In the Order, it’s another level to a Claiming. If an Owed signs a blood oath, he’s swearing to take care of the woman he’s Claiming—to the death. If the King seals it, he’s giving the member permission to do whatever it takes to protect his wife.
Would Sebastien really do that for a fake wife?
Because if anything happened to me… if he fails in his duty…
the vicious Order says that the Owed will spill their blood again.
That’s how serious a blood oath is. Through Miranda, Deirdre confirmed it.
A blood oath says that my life is worth his.
If I lose my life because he failed to protect me, he forfeits his.
And if anyone hurts me, he can kill them.
It’s rare. Loni made me think it was common enough because she has one with her husband, but it only takes five minutes around Adrian and Loni Heller to pick up on just how obsessed that man is with his wife. No… devoted. That’s what Sebastien said. Adrian was devoted to Loni.
Is Sebastien devoted to me?
I don’t do fake…
He has a tattoo. As I reluctantly take the arm he offers me—covered with his leather jacket again, though the image of what’s underneath it is burned into my memory—to lead us both back into the venue, I keep thinking about the word inked on his skin.
Love. He got a tattoo the morning after our wedding. He got it for me.
Who does that if they plan on walking away after the year they agreed to?
I don’t know, but the same question beats a constant refrain against my skull as we rejoin the party.
Eric is gone. I’m not all that surprised. Deep down, he’s a coward. He can bully me all he wants because, well, he always has. But once Sebastien interfered? Once my husband threatened him? Of course he fled.
Does that mean that I think this is over?
That he’d take the hint and finally give up on me, moving on?
Maybe. I’m not sure. I’d love to think so, but I don’t have the mental capacity to to think about it at this moment.
Not when Sebastien has switched his hold on me so that I’m tucked under his arm, wheeled around the party as we make our ‘goodbye’s to the guests two hours before the scheduled end of the party.
We drove over to the venue together in Sebastien’s Porsche. I allow him to lead me out to the car, but once I’m sitting in the passenger seat and he’s sliding next to me, I turn to him.
“He knows we’re married now.”
Sebastien’s expression is flat. That’s not usual. No matter, there’s always a hint of charm. It’s his own shield against the world. I realize how much I’ve gotten to know him in the last two months or so because whenever that easy smile is gone… I know that the real Sebastien is peeking through.
Only now? I have no idea what he’s thinking. And when he says, “Is that a problem?” in a carefully controlled voice, I can tell it’s not good.
“What? Of course not. It was only a matter of time. But Eric…” I shake my head, trying to hide my fear, instead showing my husband my disgust. “He’s dangerous.”
Sebastien reaches out, laying his hand possessively on my thigh. “So am I, love.”
I suck in a breath. “Sebastien…”
He rubs my knee. “Not to you. I hope you understand that. Never to you. I’m a dick, Annaliese, but I’m your dick. You don’t have to be afraid of me.”
I have never been afraid of Sebastien Reynolds. I don’t think there’s anything he could ever do that would cause him to inspire fear in me. “I know,” I tell him. “And I’m not. Afraid for you, maybe—”
“Ward doesn’t scare me.”
He should. He has fifteen years on Sebastien, and while my husband has purposely avoided the Order as much as he can, Eric is firmly enmeshed in it.
I’d like to think that Sebastien’s close friendship with the King will help him, but if Eric starts targeting Sebastein now because of me… I’ll never forgive myself.
I choose my words carefully. “He has connections and no morals. You’re a good guy, Sebastien—”
He snorts.
I continue anyway. “You are. He’s… not. He told me if I ever chose another guy, he would…” At the last minute, I change what I was going to say. “...it would be bad. And he didn’t just threaten to demote me. He threatened to take Miranda’s future away from her. I can’t let him do that.”
“So we don’t,” is Sebastien’s easy answer.
I wish it was that easy. “He wields his influence in the Order like a weapon.”
I need Sebastien to understand that. Because of his high rank…
because he’s purposely made it so that he doesn’t care…
he has the privilege to flip off the Order and not let it affect him.
But for someone like? I’d have to leave Harmony Heights, start over, escape if the Order turned on me—and that’s assuming that I could. That they would let me.
And that’s when he lifts his hand cupping my jaw, turning my face so that I’m not looking at the floor of the car, but him instead. “So? Know what? The Order rules my life. It rules yours. Why do we let it? I say we stop.”
I blink over at him. I would’ve thought that the Order didn’t touch him at all… but maybe I was wrong. Remembering his dream of being a mechanic, of owning his own garage… yeah. I was way wrong.
“Okay,” I say breathlessly.
It’s not his usual easy grin. Nope. When his lips quirk upward, it’s an honest smile that makes his face even more beautiful.
“Let’s leave,” he says slowly, rubbing his thumb along the edge of my jaw. “Just get out of town for a few days.”
What? “Leave?”
“Yeah. You finished Alexandre’s event. And I guarantee your phone is going to explode with other Order families begging for your services after this.
” He lowers his hand, wrapping his palm around the side of my throat as he leans in.
“You deserve a break. And I want some time alone with my wife now that this job is done.”
The word ‘wife’ sends a shiver up my spine.
“What do you think, love? We can go home, pack a few bags, leave tonight… just you and me?”
What do I think?
I lay my hand over his and nod. “Let’s go.”
It’s so hard to believe it, but less than two hours later, Sebastien is pulling up in front of a large cabin, with an attached garage, that’s hidden in the spring-green mountains.
During the day, sunlight would pour over the valley like spilled gold.
At ten o’clock at night, it’s dark yet still beautiful, the moon shining down on it instead.
The path is rocky. Just like the waterfall, tucked away on these same mountains, the Reynolds family cabin is hidden from passersby.
You have to maneuver your vehicle through closely grown trees, down a barely-there path, and if you don’t know exactly where you’re going, you could either get lost or end up way too close to the mountain’s edge.
Sebastien, of course, knows the way intimately. On our drive up, he explains that, while this is technically his family’s mountain home, he’s taken it over himself. This is where he goes when he needs to get out of Harmony Heights.
This is where he goes when he needs to get away.
I find out why almost right after we park outside.
He told me to dress comfortably before we left the house.
Because I have this need to wear his clothes as my pajamas lately, I traded the dress I wore to the party for one of his long-sleeved dress shirts and some leggings.
He’s dressed the same, but the way he moves lightly on his feet as he hurries to open my side of the car, he already seems to be in a much better mood.
Grabbing the two duffel bags that we packed for our few days’s stay, he jerks his head at the second building, attached to the cabin.
It’s smaller than the main structure, and I get the idea that it’s similar to the attached garage on Sebastien’s house, until he says with a touch of pride, “That’s my workshop. ”
I give him a questioning look.