Page 76 of The Sun & Her Burn

And there was no room for me with them.

I did not fit in Adam’s world, his male lover, and I wasn’t sure I could love Linnea with half my heart when the other was mired in the past.

Mired induchessa mia.

I stared up at Savannah, her blue eyes pale but intent on mine. Her gaze scorched me, hot and sharp instead of comforting, as if she was trying to burn away the layers of my skin to see through to my heart.

If Adam had once been my moon, had Savannah been my sun?

How could she have been when the image conjured only violet eyes and caramelized skin, the wide smile of a girl whocould never sit still or leave well enough alone? Who tipped her head to the sky to bathe in the warmth spilling from the burning planet we orbited around as if each golden ray was a gift.

“Sebastian,” Savannah rasped.

And I knew then, in those three syllables, what her decision would be because she had already made it all those years ago when I stood in a hotel room begging her to leave her first husband for me, too.

No.

“I wish I could,” she finished on a weak exhale, hands trembling as one rested on my shoulder and the other pushed through my hair. “If things were different, if I had made different decisions as a young woman, but now… I am sorry. I can’t just run away with you.”

Was it running away if it was meant to be coming home?

“D’accordo,” I murmured, rocking back to my feet to stand and step away as quickly as I could. “Naturalmente.Quando mai sono stato abbastanza?”

Of course, when have I ever been enough?

I moved to the leather messenger bag I had dropped beside my chair and fished out the stapled pages of the script before I dropped them on the table in front of her. They clattered against the china, the teacup upending from the saucer and spilling brown water across the immaculate white marble.

“I wrote a script,” I said woodenly, ignoring her little gasp. “I made you a promise that you could be the first to read it, but you should know, I won’t make this movie with you and Tate.”

“Seb—”

“You should know,” I repeated, the words whipping from my tongue to lash across the space between us so hard she flinched. “We were never just friends, Savannah, and now? Now, you have chosen for us to be nothing.”

I walked away then, believing until the very last moment I got into my car and pulled away from the house that she would come after me.

Of course, she didn’t.

17

LINNEA

Ihadn’t seen Adam or Sebastian in five days.

Not too long, in the grand scheme of things, especially considering that before a month ago, I hadn’t seen either of them in a decade.

But five days felt like a lifetime, now.

Sebastian had practically disappeared. Only a single text two days ago informed me that he had been in his writing cave. I tried not to take it personally that, in the wake of our kiss, he was essentially ghosting me, but it was hard not to. Especially when I couldn’t exactly talk to anyone about it.

What would I say?

The man I’ve loved from afar for years finally kissed me, but I’m contractually obligated to date his ex-lover?

Yeah. No.

To add even more confusion to the mix, I also missed Adam.

After our date in Malibu had been cut short, we returned to his place on Carbon Beach for a debrief with his entire team: Chaucer, Rachel Hoffman, Mi Cha Lee, and his lawyer, Boone Decker. They decided that ignoring “the outrageous claims of adisgruntled employee” was still the best overall tactic, though an “anonymous source” close to Adam would offer a reputable publication a quote along those lines.