Chapter 3
TAYLOR
My mouth fell open, and I stared at Sebastian, waiting for him to correct this asshole.
When several seconds passed and he didn’t, I turned to the man. “You’ve got it completely wrong. Sebastian’s the one who disappeared on me. Cut me out of his life completely.”
Like we’d never even happened.
Ten years. Ten long fucking years since he’d changed his number and blocked me everywhere.
And I’d never understood why.
Sebastian’s face crumpled for a brief second before he fixed his expression into something bored and disinterested-looking. “It was a long time ago,” he said, pivoting toward his companions. “Let’s go.”
As he guided them off the dance floor, the only thing I knew was that I absolutely could not let him walk away.
Not after a decade of wondering. Not after hearing that he believed I broke his heart.
What the actual fuck?
I darted after him, catching up at the edge of the room and grabbing his arm, my fingers tightening around solid muscle. For a heartbeat, everything else—the music, the crowd, Wyatt and the woman—ceased to exist.
His whole body went rigid, and his gaze dropped to where I had a hold of him. “Get your hands off me,” he seethed.
I let go immediately, my face heating with shame and embarrassment.
“Sebastian, please,” I begged. “We need to talk.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Wyatt and the woman exchange a smug look.
My fists instinctively opened and closed at my sides. “Something you want to say, asshole?” I spat, my lip curled in a sneer.
He glanced down at my fists, and his face blanched.
Fuck.
This wasn’t the ice. I couldn’t just drop my gloves and handle it. I unclenched my hands and shook out tingling fingers.
Sebastian sighed, a deep, tired sound. “Go away, Taylor. There’s nothing to say.”
His dismissal rocked through me. For a second, it felt like I couldn’t pull in air. I stood there, my chest feeling hollow as I stared at the only person I’d ever loved.
Dismissed.
Again.
I dropped my chin and attempted to save face. I was a lot of things, but a glutton for punishment wasn’t one of them.
“Message received. I’ll leave you to it.” I hooked my thumb over my shoulder, gesturing somewhere toward the exit. “Um. Have a good life, I guess.”
All at once, my eyes began to sting, and everything in front of me went blurry.
Before I could further embarrass myself by actually crying in front of these assholes, I turned and shoved through the crowd—past women in sparkling dresses and drunk guys with their drinks sloshing over the rims.
Away from the one person who’d ever had the power to destroy me—and just had.
Nothing felt right. The shower was too hot. Then too cold. The silk pajama bottoms Johnny’s shopper had picked out for me felt scratchy against my skin. I yanked them off and threw them in the corner, climbing into bed naked. The sheets were worse, like sleeping on sand.
I tossed and turned for several uncomfortable minutes, Sebastian’s dismissive voice echoing loudly in my head. How could he think we had nothing to say to each other after all this time? After the way he’d left things?
When twenty more minutes passed, during which I’d stared at the ceiling and punched the pillow to try to get it the way I liked, and I still couldn’t get comfortable, I grabbed my phone and pulled up Google. My hands shook as I typed Sebastian’s name into the search bar.
The first hit was for his consulting firm, a sleek website featuring a photo of Sebastian in a suit that probably cost more than my first car. I clicked around, looking for clues about the kind of work he did.
It turned out he focused on getting progressive candidates elected up and down the ticket, including a very familiar face from downstairs: Senator Wyatt Hastings, pictured with his fiancée, Celine Whitcomb, a philanthropist heiress.
I scrolled through more photos of Sebastian with Wyatt at campaign events and fundraisers, and then candid shots at what looked like private dinners. It was clear they were a unit. A team. Though I still didn’t understand the weird sexual dynamic I’d witnessed between the three of them downstairs.
I read for a few more minutes, begrudgingly impressed by everything he’d achieved, and hating that I was impressed.
I clicked away from his website and kept searching, wanting something personal.
That was when things got really fucking weird.
A society magazine article about a gala to raise money for the arts included a photo of Sebastian dressed in a tuxedo, standing between a South Carolina senator I recognized immediately—one who’d spent a decade fighting against same-sex marriage—and a blonde woman in a frilly pastel dress, her arm curved around Sebastian’s waist with a smile that said mine.
I stared at the screen, my stomach curdling. I clicked on the image to enlarge it, as if getting a closer look would somehow make it make sense.
The screen blurred for a second before I blinked and refocused.
I clicked on the next hit. And the next.
Page after page of photos showed Sebastian with his parents. Sebastian with their friends. Sebastian at fundraisers for right-wing candidates that his father bankrolled.
I dropped the phone and pressed the heels of my palms into my eye sockets.
The Sebastian I’d known ten years ago had once told me he’d rather lose his trust fund than pretend to be someone he wasn’t. Unless, of course, that trust fund had proved too much of a temptation.
One of the Sebastians I’d uncovered was a lie.
I just didn’t know which one.
The hotel bar was dimly lit, jazz drowning out the sound of hushed conversations. A waitress in a black dress started toward me with a smile. I waved her off and headed for the bar.
Then froze.
Sebastian sat at the far end, tossing back the last of his drink like he was trying to drown something.
I almost turned to leave, but stopped short. Fuck that. I pulled my shoulders back. I had just as much right to be here as he did. If I wanted a goddamn beer, I was getting a goddamn beer.
I strode to the bar, scraped the heavy stool back, and dropped down onto it.
Sebastian sat up quickly, his shoulders going tight, and turned to face me fully.
“Seriously?” He lifted his right eyebrow, instantly transporting me back to our suite ten years earlier.
Back then, that bold, knowing lift was all it took to get me naked and panting for him like Pavlov’s horny dog.
I stifled a groan as my dick responded without my permission. I shifted in my seat, trying to adjust myself as inconspicuously as possible.
“I’m not stalking you,” I told him as I hailed the bartender and asked for whatever IPA he had on tap.
“I didn’t say you were.”
He didn’t have to; his pinched, slightly panicked expression said it for him. It might have been ten years since we last saw each other, but some things never changed, and Sebastian’s haughty expressions were one of them.
“You forget, I know you,” I said. “Your feelings are written all over your face.”
His mouth flattened into a hard line. “You don’t know a goddamn thing about me.”
I set my beer down, my hands shaking.
“I know you’re a gay man who cozies up to the very people trying to strip away our rights.”
I was so worked up, I didn’t even realize I’d said “our” when talking about the community. A community I hadn’t told anyone but my sister, my therapist, and my agent that I was a part of.
Sebastian’s face turned red, and a vein popped in his forehead. “Fuck you, Taylor.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
His eyes darkened, and he leaned close enough that I could feel his breath on my face.
His head swiveled to survey our surroundings—a quick check of the bartender polishing glasses ten feet away, the couple at the table behind us.
When he seemed satisfied that no one was watching us, his hand shot out and landed on my knee, his thumb pressing down and then sweeping higher.
“Is that you offering?” he asked, moving close enough that I could see that his pupils had crowded out the amber of his irises.
I glanced down at his lap. He was hard—unmistakable so.
My mouth watered.
I might not like Sebastian Carruthers, but I wanted him. Probably always would.
His grip on my knee loosened as the waitress set another glass of bourbon at his elbow. He picked it up and drank half of it in one long pull, his eyes never leaving mine. I noticed his hand wasn’t steady.
“You still suck cock like a champ?” he asked casually, his free hand finding my thigh again, his thumb sweeping slow, lazy circles just below the outline of my erection.
I wanted to lie, make him think those months together hadn’t been the best damn sex of my life.
But I couldn’t.
“Not since you,” I admitted, my eyes moving over his face. “Only for you.”
Something that might have been surprise flickered across his face, but it was gone before I could be sure.
His thumb pressed harder, and I shivered.
“I hate you,” he said, his focus dipping to where his hand moved against me, his breath coming faster.
“I hate you too,” I whispered in return, the words feeling wrong on my lips.
A few more strokes of his thumb, and I let out a low moan. It was entirely possible I was going to come in my pants like a horny twelve-year-old if he kept this up.
“I have a room.”
“So do I.”
It overlooked the parking lot and a bunch of dumpsters, while he was probably staying in a fancy-ass suite with a view. Though I didn’t think either of us cared too much about that right now. Not when the best view would be him naked and panting for me.
“One last time?” he asked, settling the full weight of his palm over me and squeezing.
I swallowed and nodded feebly. “For old time’s sake.”