Chapter 24 Marfil
Sebastian had been married?
You can imagine my reaction. I took a few seconds to process, then I walked past him and got back in the car.
I felt angry and betrayed, even though Sebastian and I were nothing.
In my heart, however, Sebastian was all mine, it was that simple.
I couldn’t conceive the fact he’d ever belonged to someone else, that he had once vowed to spend the rest of his life with a woman whom he thought was the love of his life.
Although, given her attitude toward him, maybe she’d been the one to end things; maybe it was Sebastian who was still hopelessly in love with that pretty blonde.
This drama was honestly the last thing I needed right now.
I tried to rewind back to that moment of closeness we’d had at the hamburger place, his lips brushing my skin, his eyes promising something more.
But it was all eclipsed by a fact I’d been trying to deny since the moment I met him: Sebastian, whether I liked it or not, had a personal life outside of his job protecting me.
He seemed relieved that I was making good on my promise not to ask any questions.
For the first time since we’d met, I did what he wanted me to do: I kept quiet.
I only broke the silence as we entered the city, and I realized that, after everything that had happened—at my father’s house, with him, with Marcus, with his ex-wife—I didn’t want to be around him. I needed space.
“Take me to Liam’s, please,” I said without looking at him.
He turned to stare at me for a few seconds before fixing his gaze back on the road. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“I have a key to his apartment, just like he had a key to mine before you took it away from him. He’s my best friend, and I need to see him. I need… I’m sorry, but right now I need some space from you.” Danger be damned.
“Marfil, you can’t be aw—”
“I won’t leave his apartment,” I interrupted.
Sebastian pressed his fingers to his temples and threw me a defiant, calculated glance. His eyes rested for a few seconds longer than necessary on me, and then, sighing, he looked back at the cars ahead of him. “Give me the address.”
I told him, then immediately sent Liam a message letting him know I was on my way to his apartment and that I needed to spend the night. I had no idea whether he was alone, or if he was already asleep for the night, but I knew he would welcome me with open arms, and that was all I needed.
When we got to Liam’s building in the Financial District, a few blocks from Wall Street, Sebastian got out of the car and came to meet me as I stepped onto the curb.
I looked at him and once again heard the woman’s words of warning echoing through my head.
He’s dangerous. Was he? It was clear that he could be, but not with me, even after tonight…
Sebastian was the one who protected me from the bad guys… wasn’t he?
I was about to cross the street, but he held my arm. For a second, I thought he might open up to me, explain what had happened with his ex and that she was nothing to him now, confess that, against all his attempts to deny it, he felt the same way about me that I did about him.
But nothing like that came out of his mouth when he opened it to speak. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
I blinked. “Something stupid like falling for you?” I said without thinking.
“Marfil—”
“Don’t worry,” I cut him off, ready to walk away, wishing I could erase his expression of panic from my mind. “You’ve made it abundantly clear you’re only interested in one thing from me.”
I expected him to stop me, to tug again at my arm and tell me I was wrong. But he didn’t do either of those things, and I felt myself go pale.
I ran across the street to my best friend’s building and rushed through the front door. When I got into the elevator, I was starting to hyperventilate, and I used the few seconds it took to reach Liam’s floor to steady my breathing.
Liam’s apartment was dark upon entering, completely empty. I wandered down the long hall to his bedroom, then took off my clothes, grabbed one of his T-shirts, and got into his bed. It took me a while to get to sleep, but exhaustion eventually won out.
My nightmares weren’t the usual ones. They didn’t have anything to do with my mother or her death, but everything to do with a Sebastian who abandoned me, a Sebastian who turned his back on me.
No matter how many times I called out to him, he just kept walking away.
He walked and walked toward a tall, beautiful blond woman, took her hand, and led her into the darkness.
I awoke to the dazzling light of a new day. It took me a second to remember where I was. In Louisiana? My apartment? Where? Then Liam stepped into the room, shirtless in pajama bottoms, with a steaming cup of coffee in his hand.
“I have to admit, I love seeing you between my sheets,” he said, walking over to the bed, handsome as always, then sitting down next to me.
Why couldn’t I just fall in love with him? He was perfect for me, and I adored him.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asked, leaning against the headboard and staring at me with curiosity.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re thinking impossible thoughts.”
I couldn’t help but smile. He knew me so well.
“Why are you in my bed?”
I pulled the covers up to my chin. “I wanted a bit of normalcy.”
“In your life?” Liam laughed. “Babe, that word has never come close to defining you.”
I sighed.
“Can I ask you why your bodyguard is parked across the street, sleeping in his car in the freezing cold?”
I sat up quickly. “What are you talking about?”
“I saw him early this morning when I came home from the party.”
I stood up and went to the window, where I could see the entrance to the building. It was true—Sebastian’s car was still parked there, with him inside, I supposed. I was instantly flooded with guilt and quickly searched for my clothes to get dressed.
“Where are you going?”
“Home. I had no idea… It doesn’t matter. You’re right, my life is shit.”
Liam laughed loudly. “I said that?”
I ignored him, angrily hopping into my pants to pull them up, then buttoning them.
“Hey,” he said, standing up and stepping toward me, “I can go down there and tell that asshole to get lost. You could skip class, we could order in some pizza and watch a movie. You decide.”
I shook my head. “Another time. Right now, I’d better go home and face the consequences of…” I fell silent, realizing that I’d said too much.
“Consequences of what?”
I avoided his blue eyes, fixing my gaze on the window.
Liam sighed deeply. My silence must’ve given me away.
“Marfil… are you seriously in love with that idiot?”
Was it that obvious?
I picked up my bag. “Don’t make a big deal over it, okay?” I answered, annoyed.
Liam shook his head. “I always knew this moment would come.”
I spun around to look at him. “What?”
“I knew you would end up falling in love with the first guy who rejected you, a guy your father would never approve of, and that you’d fall hard. I knew it as soon as I saw the way you look at him.”
“And how do I look at him, if you don’t mind telling me?”
Liam leaned against the dresser and crossed his arms. “You look at him like you expect him to rescue you from the life you were born into.”
I stood in silence, processing what he’d just said to me.
“I don’t need anyone to save me. When are you guys going to get that through your heads?”
I left without waiting for his response.
When I stepped out of the building, Sebastian opened the car door and got out.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I said.
He didn’t bat an eye. “It concerns me that you haven’t realized by now that I’m not going to leave you unprotected.”
He looked annoyingly handsome, even in his disheveled state and the fact that he’d surely slept like shit. I wanted, I needed, to touch him, feeling that longing more intensely than ever.
“You said you would wait for me at my apartment.”
“I said no such thing.”
His self-control was unnerving as fuck.
I huffed angrily and got in the car.
Sebastian got in after me and gave me a look that made me think he had something more to say, but then he seemed to think better of it, starting the car.
When we got back to the Upper East Side and entered my building, there was a giant bouquet of flowers on the front desk beside Norman, who looked at Sebastian somberly.
“Miss Marfil, these flowers arrived for you,” he said, then looked to Sebastian. “Mr. Moore, I haven’t touched them or brought them up, just as you instructed me to do with anything that comes for Miss Cortés.”
“Very good, Norman. Thank you,” he said as I moved over to the flowers and, with shaky hands, picked up the card inside.
I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Have dinner with me.
Marcus
Before I could tear the card into a thousand pieces, Sebastian pulled it out of my hand and read it without my permission. He didn’t say anything, just stuck the note in his pocket.
“Get rid of them, Norman,” he said, then followed me into the elevator.
He stood behind me, so I couldn’t see his expression, but I supposed it was as dark as mine. That asshole Marcus had just ruined my day, and it was only ten o’clock in the morning.
My intention had been to lock myself in my room as soon as we entered the apartment, but Sebastian stopped me with his deep, baritone voice. “Marfil, wait a second.”
I turned slowly toward him.
“It was unfair to make you promise not to ask any questions about Samara,” he said, taking me totally by surprise, “but there are just things in my past that I prefer to leave there. Do you understand?”
The way in which he said her name, with such familiarity, such intimacy, left me unsettled.
“Do you love her?”
“Yes.”
My heart stopped beating.
“But I’m not in love with her.”
That phrase, that clarification on his part, could mean so many things.
“What happened between the two of you?”
Sebastian stepped closer. “I can’t tell you,” he said, looking at me sadly, as if he wished to tell me so many things but couldn’t.