14. ~Sebastian~

I rubbed my throat as I made my way down the corridor toward the stairwell, the red-raw ring there from Sky’s attempt to choke me out.

With her thighs, of all things.

Under other circumstances, that would’ve been hot beyond belief. To be honest, it had made me hard. Rough sex had been our thing, so it was probably some residual thing from that.

But the intent there had been bitter to say the least.

She was closing herself off to us.

After all this time, this was how she’d come back to us.

I fucking hated it.

In the few times I’d allowed myself to think about her, about what it would be like if we ever crossed paths again, none of it had played out like the brutal reality that had slapped me in the face last night.

The conflict warring within both of us.

It had fucked with me so much that I’d walked in there wanting to hate her and unload all of it that I’d been bottling up all this time. Yet, the moment I’d laid eyes on her and she’d looked out at me with those emerald-green pools our connection had flooded over me, drowning all the rest out. All the distance. All the heartache. All the disappointment, betrayal, anger, and grief. All I’d wanted was to reach out and touch her, make sure she was real, that she was really here.

But she’d had such a wall up, I hadn’t been able to get much from her. The longer I’d been locked in that room with her, the more the need had grown to connect with her again, to sink back into what used to be between us.

All I’d managed to get was something physical, but that had even been a muted version of what it had been when we’d come together before and unleashed like wild things all over one another. Because the passion hadn’t been there—she’d had it locked down and I was gun-shy, holding back in my own way.

I didn’t fucking know what to do with any of it.

I didn’t know what I wanted.

For so long, I hadn’t allowed myself to properly consider the notion of ever being able to have her back with us. So now it had happened, it was one hell of a major mind-fuck.

The fact that she was closing herself off really didn’t help either. It was just making things all the more complicated because I couldn’t see her properly, couldn’t feel her. I couldn’t see who she was now.

A very powerful part of me didn’t want her to leave again. But the other? The other worried that what she’d said was true, about having her back in my life twisting me up again and sending me down a bad track.

“I’m fucking ready for you now, for everything that comes with you, with the four of us being together.”

That was what I’d wanted to scream back at her.

Because that powerful part of me believed it.

But the other part held the doubt and worry that I might not be.

The fact that I was thinking all of this and it was churning me up meant that I wanted it, that the need to have her transcended all that hate.

What you wanted wasn’t always what you needed, though.

“Fuck,” I muttered under my breath.

None of it could even begin to be resolved while she was like this—shutdown and on a rage-filled mission of vengeance and punishment against Jett Bane.

Hewas all she was seeing right now. And it was clouding everything for her.

Jesus Christ. She was in a real fucking state.

Voices reached me as I made it downstairs to the first floor.

Just the distraction and refocusing I needed right now.

I couldn’t help smiling in spite of everything as I heard Caleb’s coming through.

He was here in the house, back with us.

Well, at least physically.

The rest… that would come with time.

There was a lot to work through.

Judging by the agitation and disapproval in Caspian’s tone, he was struggling with that.

I made it to the living room and peered around the corner, taking in Caleb lounging back in one of the armchairs in a pair of gray sweats and a white tee, while Cas stood a few feet away leaning against the wall and sipping at his espresso clad in one of his Hugo Boss suits.

“Why are you reading that?” he grunted at Caleb.

I peered closer to see the title of the book in Caleb’s hands. Great Expectations.

Yeah, that was weird for him.

“I can’t read from your collection now?”

“You’re not known for it.”

“I started another copy a few days ago and I didn’t get to finish it.”

“Don’t bother. You won’t like it.”

“Why not?”

“You only like happy endings. Pure, unambiguous happy endings.”

“And this doesn’t have one? After everything Pip has been through?”

I smiled as I saw Caspian’s lips twitch as the sweet and innocent side of Cal came to the surface with his whole happy endings thing.

He cleared his throat and responded stoically, though, “This is the version with the original ending, so no.”

“Oh.” He tossed the book down on the coffee table. “Well, shit.”

Cas rolled his eyes, then put the espresso cup down beside it and took a seat on the edge, looking Cal over.

“How are you feeling?”

“I slept in, hydrated, and took those painkillers you left for me, so I’m all good.”

“I’m glad to hear it. But I’m not just talking about in the physical sense.”

Caleb stared at him for a moment, a haunted look in his eyes.

But then he blinked it away and said in a forced upbeat tone, “One night back and you’re already saving my ass, huh?”

“Less than one night if we’re getting technical.”

“Yeah, well.”

“You fucking went to him, Caleb! As if it wasn’t bad enough that you fucked around with that twisted shit, Asher Monroe.”

“Damn, you’re jealous.”

“What?”

“You’re insanely jealous. You even called Ash your replacement.”

“Don’t use his name around me.”

“You were the one who brought him up.”

“I don’t want to hear it spilling from your lips.”

“Why is that? Does it get your imagination going, thinking about me moaning his name, maybe screaming it, as we fucked like a couple of goddamn animals?”

A snarl sounded and then Cas was in his space, looming over Caleb in the armchair and caging him in. “I don’t care about the fucking.”

Cas was right up in his face, his rage barely checked. It was more pain than rage, but he was clearly still processing that, unable—or unwilling at current—to recognize its true nature.

Caleb glared back at him steadily. He was the only one who could take Caspian King’s fury like that.

“The hell you don’t,” he told him.

His reaction, no worry there, had Cas flinching, his rage tapering off a little. Probably a lot of it was the shock of having that again in Cal after it being taken from him for two years.

“We both know your cock is a whore. Not to mention, your ass too. What bothers me is you connecting with him, wanting him for much more than sexual gratification.”

“You weren’t there!”

Cas frowned, pulling back a little. “What?”

“You weren’t there with me! I had no one! I was alone in the dark for a fuck of a long time, and then he came along, all right? But he’s not your replacement, nobody ever could be. Nobody! And that’s the fucking problem! I thought I could break the hold you, Bastian, and Skylar had on me with distance and time, that I could spare you my depravities, how toxic things had become with you having to meet me on my level when you’d grown to detest it. But I couldn’t! I couldn’t shake you all. It always came back to you! And now I’m back here, it’s more consuming than ever before! Fuck!”

Cas pushed off the chair and staggered back.

Long moments of intense silence elapsed between them.

And then Caleb shifted on the chair and muttered, “Happy now?”

Cas pinched the bridge of his nose. “You made yourself vulnerable by drinking like that at Haywire. If I hadn’t shown up—”

“He’d already agreed to stop.”

“Excuse me?”

“Damien had already agreed to shut it down just before you barged on in there.”

“So, he had a change of heart? So fucking what? He still plied you with liquor, brought you back to his place, settled you into a false sense of security, then stripped you naked and had his hands and God knows what else all over you.”

What. The. Fuck?

“Stop it.”

“It was sexual assault, Caleb.”

“No!” he yelled fiercely, pain breaking through. “Just leave it be. I had it handled. He was just lonely and he needed a connection.”

“Jesus Christ. That’s some impressive spin.”

“It’s the truth. Don’t retaliate, all right? It’ll just make everything worse—for all of us. Especially Bastian.”

“If you think that fucker is safe from me, you—”

“It’s a favor.”

“What?”

“Consider it me asking you for a favor.”

“In exchange for what?”

“That’s where we’re at, is it? Tit for tat? Making deals? You can’t just do it because it’s me asking?”

“No.”

“Not as things currently stand between us, huh?”

“Correct.”

“Fine. What do you want?”

“Stay away from Damien going forward.”

“I second that,” I spoke, finally making my presence known and stepping across the threshold into the living room.

Caleb swung his head my way and his eyes lit up. “Bastian,” he breathed.

He went to move out of the chair to come to me, but he pulled up short, unsure and studying me, trying to gauge where my head was at when it came to him, if I was gonna bring a shitload of animosity and anger toward him like Cas had been doing.

And just like with my interaction with Sky, I’d figured that was how I would respond if I ever saw him again, if he ever deigned to waltz back into our lives. He’d left us.

But looking at him now, seeing the pain all over him, and knowing he’d been so upset and twisted up inside with coming back here that he’d actually gone to my brother… I couldn’t take it there. I couldn’t attack. I couldn’t condemn. I couldn’t do anything but be fucking elated that he was back here with us after all this time.

I couldn’t do anything but miss him.

The next thing I knew, I was striding across the room toward him.

He rose to his feet just before I reached him, and then I was throwing my arms around him, pulling him into me, and breathing him in.

It took him a moment in his startled state at my positive reaction, and he froze for a few seconds, before he then returned my affection and wrapped his arm around me, his other hand coming up and cupping the back of my head, holding me to him so fucking tightly I was surprised either of us could draw in a steady breath.

“Missed you, B,” he choked out. “So fucking much.”

“Missed you too, Cal.”

When we finally pulled apart, Cas walked to me and gently traced his fingers over the raw skin of my throat. “How are you feeling, sweetheart?”

“Throat’s a little sore, but I’ll be fine.”

“Having a pair of sexy thighs wrapped around your face, especially hers, should’ve made for a hell of a good time. Under different circumstances anyway.”

“Caleb,” Cas ground out.

Cal winked at me. “Got you hard still, didn’t it?”

Cas pulled from me and muttered, “That was a given anyway, he’d just fucked her.”

All humor from Cal vanished. “You did what?”

I scrubbed my hand over my face. “Seeing her again… having all those walls up from her… it got away from me… it was the only way open to connect with her.”

“You shouldn’t have done that while she’s like this,” Cal told me. “Trust me, in that state, poisoned by the dark, there’s just emptiness. And it would’ve messed with her head too, it could make her delve deeper and be more determined to remain shut down.”

Shit. “Well, it’s too fucking late now, isn’t it?”

“Is that what you want, Bastian?” Cas asked me. “To connect with her again?”

I blew out a breath. “While she’s like this, it doesn’t matter either way.”

“Agreed,” Caleb said, before Cas could push me for an answer I didn’t have yet. “Everything is dialed to rage and vengeance for her right now.” He looked at me. “It’s like an addiction, B. All the rest is background noise to her, her mission to destroy Jett Bane taking all her focus and energy.”

“But you can help her, right?” It was why Cas had called him back here. Well, his excuse for doing it, at least.

“I’ve got a good shot. But I need you both to work with me, to accommodate my recommendations.” He eyed Cas. “The first being, no more sedation or putting her out. Release her from those binds too. The more you treat her like an out-of-control animal, the more it’s going to reinforce for her that she is one.”

“Bastian released her from the ankle cuffs last night and he sustained damage. She tried to choke him out.”

“Like I said, the more you treat her like an animal, Cas.”

He gritted his teeth. He didn’t like the idea of us being in danger in any way whatsoever. Even during our nights conducting Jackals activities, he would micromanage to an intense degree and strategize every op down to the most minute detail to ensure our safety.

But he’d asked Caleb to come in for his expertise, so he knew he had to be willing to defer to him in these matters. He acknowledged that after a few moments of resistance, telling Caleb, “Fine. But King Manor will move into lockdown for her safety as well as ours.”

Caleb smiled. “Don’t want to let her go again, huh?”

Cas glared at him. “Just prep whatever you need to for when she wakes up.” He eyed his Rolex. “I need to get to work.” He looked out at me. “And Bastian needs to get to Luxe.”

“I’ll reacquaint myself with the mansion while you’re gone then.”

Cas gave a nod, then he went to walk out so he could head off to King Tower.

“Hold up,” I told him.

He eyed me over his shoulder.

“I lied to Sky, told her that you’d already figured out where she was getting her leads on Jett from. When do you think your tech team will really determine that?”

“A few days.”

“All right, good. Not too long then. What about Wheeler?”

“His still in the wind. He learned from the best in Frank Bennett. We’re still searching. And the same with Frank, himself.”

“Frank’s your backup, because you think I’m gonna fail,” Caleb called to him.

“I always have a Plan B,” Cas told him simply with no small amount of terseness, before he glared at him, then headed on out of the room.

I sighed as I followed him out.

Things were a fucking mess.

Having Caleb and Sky back like this and right up close just drove home how fractured things were between the four of us.

There really was a thin line between love and hate right now.