Chapter 29
Persy
Unfortunately, Sebastian had not only made me care for him, he’d made me like him.
Enough that after over an hour of seeing just the top of his head from across the room and engaging in conversations with good friends and passing acquaintances, I’d faltered on my decision to stay away from him and went in search of him.
Lia Vulcan had told me something about her girlfriend, and he simply had to know.
I was weaving through the crowd when I finally spotted the distinct slope of Sebastian’s shoulders, but when I realized who he was speaking to, I froze.
Sebastian was hunched over, jaw hard as he listened to his aunt spew something that was surely no better than disgusting hate in his ear.
For anyone staring at his back, they might assume he was simply focused in on what he was hearing.
But I could see him. I always saw him.
I could see the way his hands were clasped together, the whites of his knuckles showing as he gripped them together. I could see the hang of his head, his eyes on the floor in defeat. I could see the set of his shoulders, tense and drawn up towards his ears.
That was enough.
I didn’t even care if this revealed too much, my heart already felt flayed open tonight.
Before I could even consciously decide to do it, my feet were moving towards them.
When I was several feet away, Sebastian’s head snapped up like he could sense me coming. His eyes immediately went panicked, his eyebrows drawing together.
Without caring whether his aunt was in the way, he took a long stride towards me. I held my hand up, silently telling him not to get in the way.
After a moment of confusion, her eyes blinking when she realized Sebastian wasn’t in front of her, his aunt looked at me. Her eyes widened in recognition.
Before either her or Sebastian could stop me, I got in between them. “What did you just say to him?” I snapped, my voice tense around the words.
“Persy,” Sebastian said at my back, but I ignored him.
“What did you say?” I asked again, when his aunt simply looked at me like she couldn’t recall her own name. It was Ariana, in case she needed the reminder.
She sputtered over a few words before wisely respecting the fury surely burning in my eyes and standing straighter. She looked over my shoulder at Sebastian for a moment, then back to me. “I simply reminded him of some family values.”
Either she thought me uninformed about those very values or she was bold. Too bold. I took a slow step towards her. “I’m well aware what your family values. And none of it belongs anywhere near Sebastian.” My words were a touch too possessive, but I was too angry to care.
His aunt’s eyes narrowed, raking over my form slowly in a move clearly meant to make me uncomfortable. It did no such thing. “You must not know my nephew very well, then.”
She was crafty, I’d give her that. She’d implied that Sebastian was lying to me and baiting me to refute her claim about our closeness in one fell swoop.
“I know him perfectly well,” I snapped back, not caring whether or not she found that suggestive of a deeper relationship or not. “But that doesn’t matter. You have no right to talk to him. Not after what you—”
She stepped toward me, a smiling blooming on her face. “After I what? Helped his parents? Facilitated his rise to power?” I stood my ground, even though I knew I’d spoken too much. “All things that are quite natural for us to talk about.”
Before I could say anything more, Sebastian’s hands came down on my shoulders, spinning me around so that he stood in between me and his aunt.
He bent down, forcing my chin up with his hand. Even though it wasn’t the first time he’d touched me there, it felt like it was. Goodness, it burned. I wanted that sensation everywhere.
“I let you go on long enough. Regardless of how,” Sebastian swallowed thickly, losing whatever he was going to say in his throat. “How much I enjoyed that,” he settled on. “You need to stay behind me.”
I was seconds away from jumping over his shoulder, but there was no breaking away from the way his hands were cemented on my body. It was the exact same way he’d protected me from his parents when I’d invaded his dream.
“Ariana,” Sebastian said, his voice thick with rage. “You are nothing without my help. I have zero intention of ever restarting that horrid plan, and you will get nothing from me for as long as I live. You’d do well to listen before I tell someone else, Persy’s brother perhaps, to watch every move you make.”
Ariana’s face paled, draining of blood, but there was still a great deal of rage in her eyes. “I see your parents had their worst fears realized. You were nothing they hoped you’d be.”
“That’s a good thing,” I bit out, wrenching my wrists out of Sebastian’s hands. Before I could step around him, he cut me off with his massive form again.
“Go away, Ariana,” he all but growled. “For good.”
With a haughty sniffle, Ariana stepped to the side. For a second, I thought she’d simply walk away, but she stopped next to me, leaning close. “I’m pleased to have met you,” she said, with false joy in her voice. “How illuminating this conversation has been.”
“Ariana,” Sebastian snapped.
With a smile, she held her hands up and walked away, leaving me heaving and angry. Now I really needed to leave.
Sebastian placed a hand on my shoulder, making my gaze snap up to his. If I was angry, he looked livid. He opened his mouth, surely to tell me I’d crossed a line, but just then, someone said, “Lord Apollo, I had to tell you what a wonderful night this has been.”
Sebastian looked seconds away from snapping fuck off. Rather than doing so, he graciously turned to the person who’d spoken and said, “Thank you.”
While he did, I took the opportunity to step away from him, making his hand drop from my shoulder. He was trapped in this conversation, unable to leave without appearing unduly rude to a kind patron.
It was the opening I needed to flee. With a smile at the patron, I walked away, seeking a dark corner as quickly as possible.
I gathered a portal the second I was alone, dropping right into my studio. I didn’t even bother going to the house to change, walking immediately to the piano in the middle of the room.
I needed to be alone, and this was the only place I could have it.
I needed a distraction, and this was the only way I could get it.
My fingers settled on the keys, finding a song that sounded as painful as the hurt in my chest. The second my body was busy, my mind took off.
Sebastian was leaving.
I was staying here, in my corner of the world, while he went out there and shone like the sun.
This was what I was supposed to want. It was what everyone else wanted. For me to fix him and for him to return to his pinnacle of power, showering in everyone’s love and adoration.
I bet he even—
I had to shake my head to force the thought out. Thank goodness I didn’t attend many events or read the news. If I had to see first hand how he interacted with women out in public, I would … well, the only thing that sounded appealing after an image like that would be to punch something, then cry.
I could feel my fingers pressing harder into the keys, trying desperately to distract my mind.
Sebastian would leave and never look back. He’d said it himself countless times, he couldn’t imagine staying this far away from the sun.
That’s what he focused on. The lack of it. No mattered how hard I wished for him to view it the other way, to fixate on the extra minutes of sunlight we’d been getting every day. Even if it was probably explained away by some fluke of the seasons or nature—though Prometheus was affected by neither in any normal way—I wanted to shake him and make him stay.
He never would. And I could never ask. Not when this was half-imagined in my head.
That was deeply insane. Imagining asking a man who you haven’t even kissed, who probably views you as nothing more than his jailer, to voluntarily give up a piece of his power because you’re pretty sure you’ve accidentally fallen in love with him.
The music stopped abruptly, almost out of my own control as my head fell into my hands to catch my tears. A violent sob wracked my body, sending a horrible clang of notes through the room.
Ugh, he made me so angry. It was like my body wasn’t big enough to contain any emotion I felt towards him.
At the end of this, he was just going to leave me to deal with all of it by myself.
It was cruel.
And yet it wasn’t. Not really, because true cruelty required someone to want to hurt you. He didn’t have to apologize for not loving me or for wanting to run for the hills the second these six months were over.
I could do nothing but bow under the weight of it, trying not to go insane from the force. I let myself cry, allowed myself that much, before I tried to put on a brave face. I needed to let it out somehow.
Or else I was scared I’d do something I’d regret.