Page 23 of Forbidden Sins

“So, Estella,” he says, taking a sip of his beer.

He’s sitting just a bit too close to me for comfort, and I try to squirm away, but Marilee is sitting very close on my other side, tipsy and cuddled into me like she hasn’t seen me in months.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Sebastian sitting up a little straighter, setting his beer down.

“Marilee said your dad’s in tech, or something like that,” he continues. “I did an internship at Apple. I’m working on my own app, and I’m looking for investors. You know anything about what he might be interested in?”

I force a smile. “I don’t really pay much attention to the family business,” I manage. “I was an art history major. It’s not really my thing, honestly.”

“Well, maybe you could put in a good word for me.” His hand rises, resting against my bare shoulder—a light touch, but impossible to miss. “We could even get together and talk about it sometime.”

From the corner of my eye, I see Sebastian’s demeanor shift.

In an instant, he goes from slightly tense to something alert and predatory, his gaze watching Tyler’s every move.

I know that look—I’ve seen it before, when guys would try to approach me on campus.

One guy wouldn’t fuck off after I told him I wasn’t interested multiple times, and Sebastian appeared out of nowhere, pinning the guy’s arm behind his back.

He’d have broken it if the guy hadn’t promised to never speak to me again.

“I really think that’s not my area of expertise,” I manage. “My boyfriend, Sebastian, knows a thing or two about it, though. Marilee introduced you earlier, right?”

The word hangs in the air between us, and I see Sebastian’s gaze flick to mine. There’s something dark in his eyes as he looks at me, a glimpse of something possessive and hungry, and my chest tightens. For a heartbeat, I wish he’d never stop looking at me like that.

He already protects me like I’m his. For that brief moment, I can’t help wishing that I really was.

“Sure,” Tyler says, and Sebastian extends a hand across the table.

“Maybe you forgot,” he says, his voice taut. “Sebastian. Your name was?—”

I see irritation flash in Tyler’s eyes. He’s not the kind of guy who likes to think that he’s forgettable. “Tyler Burnham,” he says, taking Sebastian’s hand to shake it.

“Nice to meet you.” Sebastian shakes his hand, his grip visibly tightening until Tyler winces.

“Yeah, sure.” Tyler snatches his hand back, flexing his fingers as Sebastian releases his hand. “I’m, uh—gonna go get another beer. Anyone else need anything?”

“Grab me one?” Cora’s boyfriend asks, and the tension dissipates as another round is ordered. Marilee grimaces as Tyler retreats, taking Rachel’s boyfriend with him.

“Sorry,” she mutters, glancing after him as he goes. “I didn’t even want him to come tonight, but he’s friends with Nick, and I didn’t want to say no. He’s a little much when he’s drinking.”

“It’s fine,” I assure her, although the dark look in Sebastian’s eyes suggests that he doesn’t think it’s fine at all.

The night passes far too quickly. Tyler keeps to himself after the handshake, and I sip at the beer, getting a slight buzz as we bowl round after round, and I watch Sebastian crack jokes and chat with my friends and their boyfriends.

It’s so much fun that it hurts, because I know I’m never going to have fun like this again.

After tonight, I’m going to be shut back up in my gilded cage until my father gives someone else the key.

This isn’t real life for me, but I suddenly, desperately wish that it was.

It’s just before one in the morning when Sebastian taps me on the shoulder. “We need to go,” he says regretfully. “We’ve got to get back before Brick changes shifts, don’t forget.”

I bite my lip, but I nod. “Okay,” I whisper, going to say goodbye to Marilee and the others and wish her a happy birthday again.

Reality comes crashing back in, and when Marilee makes me promise that we’ll do this again soon, I say yes—but I know that’s never going to happen.

Soon, I’m going to be engaged to someone I hardly know.

Soon , I’m going to become a mob wife, someone else’s key to the Gallo fortune.

There’s a hush to the air as Sebastian and I walk back out to the parking lot. We pause at the motorcycle as he hands me the helmet, and I pause as I reach out to take it from him, my fingers brushing his.

It feels like now or never. Like when I go back home, back to the mansion, the doors will close behind me and I’ll never get out again.

It feels like this might be the last time I could ask Sebastian a question like this, even though I know it isn’t true.

“If things were different—” I whisper, the words hanging between us in the warm night air as I speak, my gaze locked on his. “If I wasn’t who I am—if I were someone else, if you—” I swallow hard. “Would you?—”

“Don’t, Estella.” His voice is rough, sharp, cutting me off as he says my name with a sudden harshness that I’ve never heard before. “Don’t ask me questions I can’t answer.”

A tingling awareness rushes through me as I see the look in his eyes—possessiveness and pain and desire all wrapped up together, and I know the truth, the answer to the question I’ve been wondering for longer than I’ve wanted to admit.

Sebastian wants me, too. He cares for me, more than he should.

But it doesn’t matter, because nothing can ever come of it. And he won’t step over the line, any more than I should let him.

“Can’t, or won’t?” I ask softly, and he shakes his head.

“Does it matter?” he murmurs, and I swallow hard, looking away.

“I guess not.” There’s a trace of bitterness in my voice, and I know he hears it.

He reaches out, touching my shoulder where Tyler touched me earlier, as if to wipe it away, to brand the spot with his touch instead.

I feel it, hot and searing against my skin, and I want to keep his hand there forever.

“I hated seeing him touch you,” Sebastian murmurs, a raw admission that I hadn’t expected. I look sharply up at him, feeling a crack run through my heart at the look on his face.

“You’re going to have to see it again,” I whisper. “Not him, but…someone else.”

He presses his lips together tightly. “I know, princess,” he says finally.

The silence hangs in the air between us for a long moment. Sebastian holds out the helmet, and I can feel the warm night pressing in around us, the remainder of it slipping away faster than I can grasp at it to stop.

“We have to go,” he says quietly, and I nod, taking the helmet from him with fingers that feel as if they’ve gone numb.

I feel cold on the ride home, even the memory of what happened on the ride to the bowling alley is not enough to warm me.

Brick lets us back in, and we go in through the back, slipping easily through the quiet, silent house and back up to my bedroom.

Sebastian walks side by side with me, not touching, but still close enough that I can feel the warmth of his body.

We pause outside my bedroom door when we reach it, and Sebastian looks down at me, shadowed in the darkness of the hallway.

“Good night,” I say softly. “And—thank you. For helping me. It was fun, and…you were right. I needed it.”

“Of course.” Sebastian sounds oddly formal as he says it, and I see him swallow hard, his throat working as he shoves his hands into his pockets—almost as if he’s trying not to touch me. The thought makes my heart leap a little, and I bite my lip, looking up at him.

Slowly, as if in a dream, I see his hand slide out of his pocket, lifting toward my face.

His thumb brushes against my lower lip, ever so slightly, tugging it free of my teeth.

Even in the shadowed hall, I can see the pain in his eyes, the longing, and my chest squeezes as an aching warmth floods me.

“Estella…” His voice is a low, hushed rasp in the darkness. “Whatever happens, I promise you—I’ll protect you. No matter what.”

There’s a fierce determination in his eyes, behind the pain and longing, that makes my breath catch. “I know,” I whisper.

“Do you?” He searches my face. “I mean it, Estella. Through all of this—everything your father has planned, everything that comes next, I’ll stay by your side. I’ll never leave you. Do you understand me?”

His touch burns against my lip, like a brand, like the kiss that I wish he’d give me. Like everything I’ve imagined and can’t have. I can feel the weight of his words—an oath, a promise of a knight to his princess. My champion.

My Sebastian.

A vow, sworn in the shadowed hallway, for only our ears to hear.

“I understand,” I whisper, and I feel that fissure in my heart widen, because I do . I understand everything he’s not saying—that he won’t leave me, no matter what, that even if my father or my future husband wants him gone, he’ll find a way to come back to me. To protect me, however he can.

That he’s making this promise because it’s the only one he can ever make me, even if he might want to make one that would be so much more.

He nods, and I feel his thumb brush against my lip, the briefest, faintest of touches before he steps back.

I can feel that something’s shifted between us, some barrier that’s fallen tonight, and as Sebastian turns and vanishes into the shadows that lead down the stairs, I can’t help but feel that nothing is going to be the same again.

In the darkness of my bedroom, under the covers as the moonlight streams in and illuminates the chair where Sebastian spent night after night sleeping near me, I replay what he said in the hall.

I replay everything tonight—his smiles, his laughter, the touch of his fingers against mine.

I feel the ache of desire sweep through me, and I let my hand drift down between my thighs, settling over the slick, hot flesh there as I close my eyes and imagine everything that I wish he could give me.

I imagine that it’s his mouth on my lips, instead of his fingers, his hand where mine is.

I imagine that he’s my first, instead of a stranger that I don’t know and don’t want.

I imagine a world where duty can be replaced with desire, and where I’m not Estella Gallo, but just Estella…

a woman that Sebastian could want. A woman that he could love.

I imagine him moving over me in the dark, teaching me every secret I’ve ever wanted to uncover about my body and his.

I imagine his mouth on me, my hands drifting over the lines of his body in the darkness, and I let my other hand drift down, circling my entrance as I imagine him there, pushing into me for the first time.

I feel the pleasure ripple through me, tightening my muscles, arching my back, and my mouth makes the soundless shape of his name as I come, shuddering with pleasure as I feel my arousal, hot and slick against my fingers.

For a moment, I think I hear the sound of footsteps outside my door, and I wonder if Sebastian is out there, making his rounds, hovering just outside of my room as torn by desire as I am.

I imagine, for the briefest moment, him opening the door and coming into the room, seeing me flushed and breathless, my fingers still wet from my orgasm—and I banish the thought as quickly as it enters my mind, closing my eyes as I roll over.

Some things are too dangerous to imagine, even alone in the dark.