CHAPTER 28
Sebastian
MID-MARCH IN NEW YORK WAS brUTAL. ICY GUSTS OF wind howled through the streets, kicking up dirt and other things I’d rather not name. The skies were painted a dull, unrelenting gray, and everyone seemed surlier than usual as they trudged from home to work and back again.
It suited my mood perfectly.
I took the stairs down to my chosen bar for the night. I shook off a light dusting of snow before handing my coat to the hostess, who greeted me with a flirtatious smile that I didn’t reciprocate.
Her confidence visibly wavered—she didn’t look like the type who was used to rejection—but she recovered and led me to the back, where Xavier and Killian were already seated in a burgundy leather booth.
“I took the liberty of ordering you a drink.” Xavier pushed a glass of Scotch toward me. “You look like you need it.”
I took it without a word and downed it in one pull. After I was done, I signaled to our server for another glass.
My alcohol ban had exceptions, and the past two weeks had been one giant red exception.
Killian let out a low whistle. “What happened? Did someone piss in your food or something?”
“That’s disgusting, and no.” Although I would’ve preferred if someone had—not because I liked bodily fluids in my food, but because that was an easier problem to solve than the gaping hole in my chest.
I’d left India two weeks ago. Since then, time had crawled by with agonizing slowness. I’d ignored Maya’s texts and calls, but I didn’t delete them. They sat in my phone, waiting, taunting, daring me to call her back.
Knowing her, she was trying to make amends for how we’d left things, but I had nothing else to give. I’d laid my soul bare for the second time, and she’d stomped all over it, also for the second time. I was persistent, but I wasn’t a masochist.
I was done.
Our server brought over more Scotch and a selection of Cuban cigars, which I’d requested in advance since it was a designated smoking lounge. Killian and I plucked one each from the humidor, but Xavier passed.
“Sloane will kill me if I come home tasting like cigars.” He eyed me with curiosity. “I haven’t seen you smoke in ages.”
“Felt like it tonight,” I said tersely. I took a puff of my cigar, but the cloud of heady smoke didn’t do much to chase Maya’s specter out of my mind. Neither did the alcohol.
She was always there, haunting me. A persistent ghost I couldn’t exorcise.
I downed my second glass of Macallan, my jaw grinding.
Xavier and Killian watched me with varying degrees of concern.
“Okay, this shit is getting weird,” Xavier said. “You want to tell us what’s really going on, or would you rather brood like an emo asshole all night?”
“Second option.”
I wasn’t in the mood for psychobabble bullshit. I wanted to eat, drink, and maybe fuck. The bar was filled with beautiful women. I could take any of them home tonight.
But when I looked at them, I felt absolutely nothing. No lust, no attraction, not even a flicker of interest.
Unless it was Maya, I didn’t care.
It was yet another thing she’d ruined for me.
“Fine by me.” Killian reached into his pocket and slapped a deck of cards on the table. “I’d rather play for money while Laurent broods than listen to him wallow in self-pity.”
I flipped him off, but I accepted his poker challenge even though I hadn’t played in years.
Here was the thing about bad habits: they were hard to break and easy to fall back into.
For the next few hours, I indulged in every vice I’d sworn off in the past. I drank. I smoked. I ate a fuck ton of artery-clogging food. I gambled thousands and lost thousands. Of course I did; the universe delighted in kicking me when I was down.
That didn’t stop me from putting down more money or ordering another drink. The toxic indulgences were cathartic in a way, like I was purging myself in preparation for a fresh start. One last hoorah before the real work began.
Either that, or I was royally fucked.
I could tell Xavier was leaning toward the latter camp, but he waited until Killian left to use the restroom before he swooped in.
“That’s it.” He took my drink from me, his tone firm. “I’m cutting you off.”
“Fuck off.” My words slurred. My tongue felt thick in my mouth, but my head swam with pleasant detachment.
It was nice.
“Sebastian.” Xavier fixed me with a hard stare. “What the fuck is going on?”
“Nothing.” I reached for the last cigar, but the bastard took that from me, too. “Since when did you become such a buzzkill?”
“I’m not trying to be a buzzkill. I’m trying to keep you from killing yourself.”
“It’s a little smoke and alcohol, Castillo. I’m not going to die.”
“You drank almost an entire bottle of scotch by yourself tonight.”
“Good thing I don’t make a habit of doing that.” I made a half-hearted swipe for my drink. My limbs felt heavy and clumsy, and I missed by a mile.
“Stop it.” Xavier’s eyes flashed. “You’ve had enough. I came to hang out, not watch you self-destruct.”
“Stop it,” I repeated. “Or what?” A nasty edge slid into my voice. “Just because your ball and chain has you on a leash, it doesn’t mean the rest of us can’t have fun.”
He stilled. “First of all, never call Sloane that again,” he said, his voice dangerously quiet.
“Second of all, I’m cutting you off because I’m your friend.
I’ve seen other people spiral like this, and it never ends well.
You’ve had your fun. Now you need to deal with whatever is bothering you in a healthier way. ”
My teeth ground together. I felt a twinge of regret for lashing out at him when he was only trying to help, but it was quickly smothered by his next question.
“Does your shitty mood have anything to do with why you left Radhika’s wedding early last month?” he asked.
How the fuck did he know about that?
New tension seeped into my muscles. If I could erase everything about that wedding from my mind, I would. “You left before I did.”
“I wasn’t invited to the close friends and family day. You were.” Xavier’s knowing gaze bored into my skin. “Trouble with Maya?”
“Don’t say her name.” The viciousness of my reply shocked even me.
Bitterness crawled into my throat, and a dull ache radiated up my arm. It was only then that I realized I was clenching my hands so hard, my knuckles throbbed.
I forced myself to loosen my them, but the ache remained.
Xavier’s face softened as understanding dawned. “So it is about her.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” I was desperate for another smoke or drink. My lovely high was slipping away, every mention of her chipping away at my shield until I was in danger of being exposed again.
Bile sloshed in my stomach.
“What happened?” Xavier persisted. He was like a fucking dog with a bone.
I wished I’d only invited Killian tonight.
Pre-relationship Xavier wouldn’t have cared what happened as long as we were having a good time, but now that he was happily in love, he seemed to think he was some sort of relationship expert. “Did you—”
“Xavier.” I clipped out his name with cold, steely precision. “Drop it, or this friendship is over.”
A long, fraught second ticked by before Xavier averted his gaze. He muttered something that sounded suspiciously like you idiots, but he didn’t press the issue any further.
Killian returned a minute later, his cheek smudged with a lipstick print that hadn’t been there earlier.
He retook his seat, seemingly oblivious to the tension. “What’d I miss?”
I didn’t stay for much longer at guys’ night. My conversation with Xavier had put a damper on the evening, which wasn’t doing what I’d needed it to do anyway.
I thought hanging out with my friends and drinking the night away would make me feel better, but it only made me feel worse. Once the brunt of the alcohol wore off, I was left feeling nauseous and hollow.
I’d slapped a temporary Band-Aid on a wound that was too deep to heal, and I had nothing except a nasty impending hangover to show for it.
I stumbled out of my Uber and up the stairs to my house. I jammed my key into the front door after several tries. The world swung sideways, and I knew there was no way I’d make it upstairs in my current condition.
I somehow made it into the kitchen and chugged a glass of water instead. Once I was done, I leaned forward and propped my forearms on the marble island. I bowed my head, trying to breathe through the vise strangling my lungs.
The brownstone’s silence made it easy for her to invade my thoughts again.
She was in the same city. If I took a cab, I could be at her place in half an hour. I could call her and hear her voice. I could—
Stop.
I squeezed my eyes shut and took a long, measured breath through my nose. I told myself I was done, and I meant it.
Maya had made her feelings clear years ago. I was the idiot who’d refused to give up hope, but no more. It was time to let go.
The haze in my head gradually cleared. The room no longer spun every time I moved, and I was able to straighten without a vicious hammer slamming against my skull.
But that hole in my chest? It was still there, and I had a sinking feeling it’d stay there for as long as Maya held a piece of my heart.
The doorbell rang. The sudden noise made me flinch, but I stayed put. It was probably a needy neighbor or a kid playing a prank. I wasn’t in the mood or condition to deal with either.
But whoever was at the door refused to go away. They alternated between knocking and ringing the bell until they wore me down with sheer annoyance.
I bit out a string of French curses as I stormed into the living room. I yanked open the front door, ready to give the asshole a piece of my mind, but my words died a swift death when I saw who was standing on the front step.
Maya’s hand was poised for another knock. She lowered it when I opened the door, and we stared at each other, our breaths forming small white puffs in the icy air. Her eyes were glossy in the moonlight, almost like she’d been crying.
A sliver of awareness knifed through my numb stupor.
Maya was here. At my house. On a Friday night.
Why?
I soaked her in hungrily despite myself. I hadn’t seen her in weeks, and her appearance hit me like a bolt of lightning.
Her hair was loose, her face makeup-free. She was wearing jeans and the sweatshirt I’d given her in Vermont. Her gold birthday locket gleamed around her neck, but my attention snagged on the envelope in her hands.
My stomach plummeted. It can’t be.
The paper was worn with time, but I’d recognize that handwriting anywhere.
It was mine.
And inside that envelope was my biggest regret, the one thing I wished I could take back—the letter I wrote to her in boarding school.