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I look around immediately, curious about this space that he kept away from the mansion. It’s fairly nondescript—the kind of simple layout that I imagine a lot of apartments have. There’s a tiny kitchen with a half-breakfast bar separating it from an equally small living room, and a short hallway that leads to two separate doors—the bathroom and bedroom, I imagine. It’s minimally furnished and decorated, more of a crash pad than a home, I think.

That jealousy flares through me again, as I imagine him bringing a woman here. My teeth sink into my lip, and I suddenly don’t want to touch anything. I wrap my arms around myself, and Sebastian gives me a quizzical look.

“I need to clean up and change. You should too,” he adds, glancing down at my dirty and torn dress. “I have some clothes that might fit you?—”

“From someone who stayed over?” I blurt it out before I can stop myself, and Sebastian pauses, turning to face me.

“No,” he says gently, reaching up to brush his fingers against the edge of my jaw. “I don’t have any souvenirs of anyone who ever stayed here. No one ever stayed the night, honestly.”

“But you brought women here.” I don’t know why I’m picking this fight right now, but just the thought makes my chest hurt, my eyes pricking with tears. I hate the thought of any other woman touching him, of him wanting anyone else. I hate how close we came to the reality of my being trapped with Vitoforever, while Sebastian went on to have a life full of any other women he might ever desire.

Sebastian’s expression smooths, turning to something cautious. “I’m not going to lie to you and pretend that I’ve lived like a priest my whole life, Estella,” he murmurs. “But I can promise you this. Standing here right now, looking at you, I can’t remember a single one of them. I can’t think of any woman I’ve ever passed a night with who wasn’t you. And none of them mattered. No one else has ever or will ever matter who isn’t you. And in the last three years—” He draws in a breath, cupping the side of my face as he takes a step closer to me, the hard, muscled front of his body nearly brushing mine. I can smell his smoky cologne, the warm scent of his skin, the lingering freshness of the outside air clinging to his clothes. The musk of sweat and the tang of the gunfight. Heat blooms through me, and I sway toward him, needing everything that he has to offer me—needinghim.

“In the last three years,” he repeats softly, “Any woman I’ve ever touched was only because I couldn’t have the one woman I really wanted.You.”

He breathes the last word, his gaze flicking down to my lips, hunger so evident in his eyes that I start to rise up on my tiptoes. That need burns through both of us for a moment before Sebastian takes a quick step back, regret flickering in his expression.

“We don’t have time for this right now,” he murmurs, brushing his thumb over my lower lip before stepping back a little more, as if he’s having to physically tug himself away from me. “We need to get out of here.”

He turns to head down the hall, but as he does, I notice that he’s favoring his right side. “Sebastian, you’re hurt.”

He glances back at me, wincing slightly as he tries to force a smile. “I’m just sore. I’m not entirely healed up from?—”

When he takes another step and winces, I move toward him quickly, reaching to grab his arm. “Sebastian, let me help.”

“We don’t have time for this—” He tries to shake me off, but I’m not going to go so easily.

“Let me see,” I insist, as we make our way down the hall to the small bathroom. My arm accidentally brushes against his side, and he flinches. “Sebastian, please.”

For a moment, I think he'll refuse, but then he sighs and begins unbuttoning his shirt. It’s hard not to notice the taut skin and tanned muscle that every button reveals, but marring all of that are the bruises and cuts that still haven’t fully healed from the beating my father gave him.

I try not to stare at all of it as he shrugs off the shirt, sinking heavily down onto the edge of the tub. “There’s a first-aid kit under the sink,” he says wearily, and I can hear the tiredness in his voice, exhaustion that even I know we don’t have time for. “If you can grab it.”

I immediately go to the sink, quickly finding the kit that he’s talking about. I retrieve it, coming to sit next to him as I open it up and glance at the cuts that reopened during the run for the car, now weeping blood.

My hands shake slightly as I tear open an alcohol pad, knowing how much this is going to hurt him all over again. It tears me apart.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, as I reach out to run the pad over one of the cuts. The muscle around it twitches, and his skin shudders, his body recoiling from the pain. “This is all my fault.”

“No.” Sebastian reaches out, tipping up my chin so that I’m forced to look at him. “None of this is your fault, Estella. You didn’t choose to be forced into this marriage. You didn’t choose to marry a man as vile as Vito Bianchi.”

“I chose to keep pushing, out there in the gardens, when you kissed me for the first time.” I swipe the alcohol pad overhis cut again before reaching for a bandage, wishing more than anything that I could take the pain for him instead.

“And I could have walked away.” Sebastian’s thumb brushes over my lip. “I would endure a hundred beatings, little dove, to get to kiss you even once. I’d risk everything for you, princess. Pain, death, none of that matters if it means keeping you safe. If it means having any part of you that you’ll give me, for as long as I can have it. A minute, a second, an hour, a day…” He breathes in slowly as I reach to clean another open cut. “I’m afraid it’s too much to think of what price I’d have to pay for a lifetime.”

My heart leaps in my chest at that, and I look up at him sharply, startled. “Would you want that?” I whisper, and Sebastian gives me a soft, sad smile.

“Let’s try to live through tomorrow, and then we’ll think about it.”

His gaze, as it holds mine, is intense. I bite my lip, reaching for another bandage. “I don’t want to stay here tonight,” I admit. “Not where there’s been other?—”

“We’re not going to,” Sebastian promises. “We need to get out of here sooner rather than later, actually. They’ll check my known addresses. Go see what you can find in the bedroom to wear. We need to move.”

I nod, swallowing hard as a mixture of fear and anticipation ripples through me. I’m terrified of what comes next, of what my father and Vito will do—but at the same time, a part of my mind is entirely fixated on the fact that Sebastian and I will be alone together tonight. That we might spend more than one night together, depending on how long we can manage to run for.

In the back of my head, I can’t help but feel that us getting caught is an inevitability. That we won’t be able to run forever, and we’ll have to face the consequences eventually. But for tonight…

I go to his room as instructed, trying not to stare at the bed as I hurry over to a plain wooden dresser along one wall, a TV resting on top of it. I find a pair of sweatpants and a plain black T-shirt, as well as a hoodie that I grab despite the fact that it’s summer, in case I need to try to hide my face. It’s all too big, but I roll up the ankles of the sweatpants, shoving my feet into a pair of slides that I find. I leave the ruined dress draped over a chair, a souvenir of a night that I want to forget—at least the first part of it.