CHAPTER 4 #2
Priya was engaged. My sister, who was five years younger than me and had, up until she met Ben, insisted she “didn’t believe in tying herself down to any one person,” was engaged.
The sourness sharpened into something more acrid.
“Are you okay?” Ayana asked. I looked up to find her and Sloane staring at me with concerned frowns. “You’re a little pale.”
“I’m fine.” I forced a smile. “Priya’s engaged.”
“Your sister? Oh my God! That’s amazing.” Ayana faltered, obviously picking up on my distress. “It is amazing. Right?”
“Of course it is.” I upped the wattage of my smile until my cheeks hurt. “I’m surprised, that’s all. I didn’t—we didn’t think it would happen so soon. They’ve only been dating for six months.”
I was happy for my sister. Truly.
But a secret, shameful part of me resented her for reaching that milestone before me. It wasn’t a competition, yet I felt like I’d fallen behind.
No one would let me forget it either. If my mom had been insufferable with her matchmaking before, Priya’s engagement would send her into overdrive. I dreaded finding out what she had in store for me now that I was her last single daughter left standing.
“Hey, Luna.” Xavier came up beside us, breaking the tension. He kissed Sloane on the cheek, and despite the cramp in my stomach, I couldn’t help but smile at the way her entire body softened at the sight of him.
With his smoldering dark looks and plethora of tattoos, Xavier looked like the ultimate bad boy until he smiled. Those dimples of his could melt even the iciest heart.
He bestowed those dimples on me a minute later. “So, I hear you need a proper date for your cousin’s wedding. Someone who’ll blow everyone else away.”
“I do, but I can find one on my own. You don’t need to… you know.” I gestured vaguely around us.
“Oh, it’s no problem.” Xavier’s grin widened. He appeared unusually thrilled about the situation. “I’d be delighted to set you up. I already have someone in mind.”
That was fast. “Who—”
“Who are you trying to set up now, Castillo?”
My smile vanished.
Sebastian joined our group, dressed down but irritatingly gorgeous in jeans and a black shirt. He greeted Ayana and Sloane warmly but didn’t acknowledge me.
I wanted to crawl under a rock when Xavier said, “We’re helping Maya find a date for her cousin’s wedding.”
Heat scorched my neck and chest. Sebastian was never going to let me live this down.
“Really?” His gaze flicked toward me for a split second. “Interesting.”
I braced myself for a taunt, a snarky comment, anything, but it never came.
I blinked, thrown by Sebastian’s uncharacteristic terseness. That was it? He wasn’t going to give me shit for needing help to find a date? What was wrong with him?
I almost reached over to check if he had a fever, but Xavier slung an arm around his shoulder and saved me from my own impulse. “We should pair her with Killian. He’s always down for a good party.”
“Killian Katrakis?” Ayana perked up. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of him. He’d be perfect!”
“He is really good-looking,” Sloane mused.
“Not as good-looking as you, of course,” she added when Xavier shot her a wounded look.
She patted him on the shoulder like he was a golden retriever instead of a six-foot-plus billionaire.
“But Killian could work. What do you think, Maya? You’re acquainted with him, right? ”
“Sure. We know each other,” I said with some wariness.
Killian Katrakis was the CEO of a major electronics conglomerate.
Gorgeous, single, and richer than God, he was one of the city’s most sought-after bachelors.
There was an ongoing bet amongst the single (and not-so-single) socialites in New York to see who could lock him down first. So far, no one had gotten even close.
“Great! We’ll give him a call.” Xavier’s dimples flashed again. “Right, Seb?”
A muscle feathered in Sebastian’s jaw. “We aren’t doing anything,” he said coolly. “I’ll leave the matchmaking to you. I’m not interested in doomed endeavors.”
“Fine.” Xavier appeared undeterred by the brushoff. In fact, he almost looked like he was trying not to laugh. “Don’t worry, Maya. I got you. Be back soon.” He grabbed a bemused Sloane and dragged her to another part of the club.
“I’ll be back too. Restroom,” Ayana elaborated. She winked at me and disappeared into the crowd.
And then there were two.
Sebastian and I eyed each other. His hair was more tousled than usual, and there was a bandage wrapped around his thumb. It hadn’t been there last week.
“Here I thought you’d be in the office,” he drawled. “Did you call me from the club earlier? That’s sad.”
The urge to ask about his bandage disappeared beneath a comfortingly familiar avalanche of annoyance. “I called you from happy hour, and that’s because I needed the alcohol to make talking to you bearable.”
His lips curved. “I’d find that more believable if we hadn’t had many conversations sober, Sal.”
I hated that he was right.
A specific memory rose, unbidden, like an old ghost emerging from a long sleep.
Boarding school. The hushed silence of the library. The faint, distinctive smell of old books, like dry wood mixed with sweet vanilla.
And Sebastian and I, cooped up there so late during finals that we were the only ones left.
We were wired from too much caffeine and delirious from too little sleep, and we would stay there long after midnight, our conversations meandering from the function of cells to debates about art, literature, and philosophy. We’d fall asleep arguing, and…
I blinked away the memory before it sank its claws into me.
That was then; this is now.
“Many conversations, yes. Many conversations I’ve enjoyed? Not so much,” I said, recovering.
A smirk played around the corners of his mouth. “Stock’s up day over day this past week,” he said, abruptly changing subjects. “Good job.”
“Are you so obsessed that you’re stalking my company’s performance?”
His expression flickered before it smoothed again. “It’s the first rule of business, Sal. Always keep a close eye on your competition.”
“We operate in completely different fields.” They were both food-focused, sure, but there was a vast difference between frozen foods and gourmet restaurants.
“I’m not talking about our companies.”
My eyes flew to his.
There it was.
We’d never said it out loud, but we’d both known from the start that it’d never been about work, or school, or who got the last word in a student debate.
It was about him and me. Always had been, always would be.
The half-dozen drinks I’d consumed earlier hit me all at once.
I set my glass on the counter, my stomach queasy. Ayana hadn’t returned from the restroom, and Sloane and Xavier were nowhere in sight.
I was forced to stand there like a bug under a microscope and participate in this endless back-and-forth we’d had going on for decades.
On a normal day, I’d relish the opportunity to try to take Sebastian down. But between the stress of the past week, the news of my sister’s engagement, and that stupid smirk on his face, I was suddenly, completely over it.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” I said. Fire licked against my ribcage and burned away any filters I might’ve had.
“There is no competition between us. You’re smart, I’ll give you that.
And sometimes you win over me. But I will always work harder than you, and care more than you, and feel more than you.
You can collect as many accolades as you want, Sebastian, but they’re as empty as everything else in your life.
You want those wins so you can say you have them, but you don’t actually give a shit about them.
I can’t be in competition with someone whose heart isn’t in the race.
So tell me, who’s the real winner here?”
I wasn’t conscious of what I was saying; I didn’t even know where the words came from. But they were out there, and I couldn’t take them back.
My heart pounded as Sebastian’s eyes pierced mine. He hadn’t so much as twitched during my rant, and his gaze was eerily calm.
“Is that what you think?” he said, so softly I shouldn’t have heard it over the synchronized pounding of my heart and the music.
But I did. Every word. They snuck inside me and twisted something deep in my chest.
I swallowed past the sudden tightness in my throat. “It’s what I know.”
Those cool amber eyes darkened. The air pulsed with subtle danger, and the something in my chest scrabbled for a foothold.
“Disappointing.” Sebastian stepped back, his face wiped of emotion. “I expected more from you.”
Before I could ask what he meant, he turned and walked away. “Check your email.”
I was left standing alone at the bar, my pulse thundering. The queasiness in my stomach coiled into a tight knot.
I hated that this had happened twice in one week—him walking off and leaving me at a loss for words.
I especially hated the prickle of guilt inside me.
I’d told the truth. Other people were too afraid or too in awe of Sebastian to be honest, but that had never been a problem for us. We held up a mirror to each other’s faults.
So he shouldn’t be hurt by what I’d said, and I shouldn’t care how he felt about it.
Still, I couldn’t shake the sense that I’d crossed some sort of invisible line as I opened my email. His message sat at the top of my inbox, and the knot in my stomach cinched painfully tight when I read through it.
It was a response to the product launch ideas I’d sent earlier. He’d marked them up with his own notes and observations. They were witty, insightful, and dammit, they made my proposals stronger. A lot stronger.
I’d emailed him at the Tipsy Goat, which meant it’d taken him less than an hour to read and edit all eight pages.
The prickle of guilt hardened into splintering shame.
I shoved my phone into my bag and searched the crowd for a head of tousled dark hair, but he was nowhere to be seen.