CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

S ebastian

Luke Hawthorne is kissing me. Luke Hawthorne’s arms are around me. Luke Hawthorne’s lips are tangling with my own, while his fingers play in my hair.

This is—God.

Did something happen? Some asteroid hit the earth? And I’m in heaven? Has carbon monoxide filled the air of the Montreal Grand Hotel, and I am unconscious, my final thoughts on earth about a fantasy that can never happen?

Because this can’t be real.

This shouldn’t be real.

This—oh, God.

The man is on medication. He was literally hit on the head. He was staring at snowflakes in wonder, scooping one up from the heavens and giving it to me, beaming as if he’d pulled down the moon.

He’s not himself.

I close my lips. Luke whines against me, as if he instantly misses me, as if the fact that me not kissing him causes him pain, when of course, the fact can only be ridiculous.

Because if I know one thing in the world it’s that I’m not supposed to be kissing a Hawthorne.

I squeeze my eyes. He doesn’t know who I am. He would never kiss me if he knew.

I pull away. His grip remains on my waist.

“Luke,” I say, my tone firm.

He drops his hands at once.

“God, I’m sorry. I-I accosted you. I-I thought—” Red spreads over his face, dipping toward his torso, and anguish sits in his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.”

“You’re in this room to take care of me, not to—”

He doesn’t finish the rest of the sentence. I’m grateful. There’s already too much awkwardness in the room without adding actual words.

He steps away, and I hate the pocket of air between us. I hate that there’s coolness, where there was warmth. I hate that there’s pain where there was pleasure. I hate everything.

My body trembles, as if desperate to reach him, desperate to run my fingers over his muscular planes, to smooth away the pain and shaking, to tell him I didn’t mean to stop, didn’t mean to separate us.

But all the reasons why we should not kiss pile up between us instead, and from the sorrow on Luke’s face, he sees them too, as clearly as if they were composed of actual letters and the flashing red signs found on the dangerous sections of some highways, when a wrong move might flatten a crew of construction workers.

“If circumstances were different...”

Hope shines in his eyes, and his face is brighter than before.

“What would happen if circumstances were different?” He asks, narrowing the distance between us. He moves slowly, eyes on me, like I’m a deer that might leap from reach at any moment.

But the thing is, there’s nowhere else I’d rather than be than in his arms. He is no predator. He is Luke Hawthorne, handsome and kind, talented and strong. He belonged to the same town I did. And he pulled himself up with the same grit I did.

He is amazing.

“There are things I haven’t told you,” I say.

“Oh.” His eyes soften. “Secrets you mean?”

I tense, and my eyes lower to the ground, guilt swirling and strengthening, moving from dangerous hurricane category to more dangerous hurricane category to even more dangerous hurricane category.

I give a miserable nod. I should confess them all, but I’m not ready. I’m not ready for disappointment and confusion to line his face, where there was tenderness.

My organs tighten and twist because I know I need to tell him. I should have told him long ago.

“I’m not who you think I am,” I say finally.

His eyes soften further, the tenderness so sweet it makes my heart leap. “Baby, I know exactly who you are.”

I shake my head frantically, ignoring the pet name, because this will all make it worse. “No, I’m...”

My fingers tremble, and he narrows the distance between us at once.

He clasps hold of my shaking fingers, then presses a kiss to them. He keeps his gaze on me. “You’re Seth Archer from Ashcove.”

I stiffen. “You know.”

“I’ve always known.”

I blink.

“You mean, when I came to speak to your agent? You knew me then? That’s why you changed your mind about going on the show?” My voice wobbles, but I get it. I really get it.

He shakes his head.

“In the coffee shop?” My voice squeaks, and I remember him leaving, and chasing after him in the snow and the ice, of him turning and catching me...

“I’ve always known,” he repeats his voice firm.

He frowns, then sits on the bed, then pulls me into his arms. I’ve never been held like this before. I’ve always gone for skinny guys like me who don’t remind me of jocks. Who don’t scare me.

But I realize there’s nothing scary about Sebastian, and all I feel is safety and warmth.

“I’ve watched every episode of Seeking Mr. Right,” Luke says.

Whatever I expected him to say, I didn’t expect him to say that. “What?”

He nods and wraps his arms more tightly around me. “Multiple times, most of them. I, um, heard you tell Ella you didn’t want me to be Mr. Right.”

I close my eyes. “You heard that? I’m so sorry.”

He kisses the skin beside my eyes, the move tender, and my heart aches from the sweetness.

Luke isn’t a guy I met at a Hollywood party who marches me out while explaining all the wonderful things about him, who either slithers out before breakfast, or who clings to my arm at events with passion, as I wonder why there are more photographers than before, and I see our names splattered together on newspapers and his job description going from “aspiring actor” to “actor of” until he no longer calls me and answers my texts and I next see him on social media holding the arm of someone more successful than myself.

I never minded the coldness of my relationships. Never allowed myself to care. But then none of those people were Luke.

He has the ability to break me as surely as if he personally flings me from the window, hauling me into his strong, muscular arms, and dropping me four stories down.

I sink against his skin, his torso hot, and he wraps his arms around me, tangling his hands with mine and pressing them against my heart.

I want to tell him he is amazing, but shame moves through me too. He’s Bryce’s brother. He heard what Bryce said to me in hallways, and though Bryce never laid a hand on me, because I guess I didn’t grow up in the 1970s, his words pierced me.

It was fine.

I’m fine.

But I hate that Bryce was right. I like my life, but I hate that he knew back then, before even I knew, what I wanted. I hate that the sex acts he described me having, craving, using vulgar language to make people laugh, are sex acts I have, sex acts I crave.

I’m all the things Bryce said I was.

And Luke heard it. Did Bryce talk about me at home? What did he say about me when I was not around? Was he quiet then, or was my name still mentioned, a substitute for everything ridiculous and crude and wrong and ugly? A substitute for everything he despised.

My heartbeat quickens despite myself, and I don’t think it’s because I’m being held by a beautiful man, the man who is literally the archetype of romantic perfection in this entire country, and with the countries Falcon Productions secured distribution deals for. People now are translating Luke’s words to gorgeous women into other languages, concentrating on fitting their own work into Luke’s mouth, filling their words with emotion, so hearts in France and Latin America and Japan will flutter with the same force as the hearts here.

It’s not that.

It’s that Luke knows everything.

“It’s okay, baby,” Luke says, stroking my hair, and I suddenly remember the only reason I’m alone with Luke now is because I’m supposed to be taking care of him.

“You have a concussion,” I say. “I’m supposed to take care of you.”

He grins. “Well, you did help me out of my clothes.”

“And I didn’t get you pajamas!” I scramble from his lap and fling my arms up. I hasten to his suitcase, find the luggage rack and drag his suitcase up.

He starts to rise, but I gesture for him to sit with an impatient wave of my hand. “I can do that.”

“You were carrying me!” I exclaim. “You were supposed to not physically exert yourself. It says so on the paper your team doctor gave me. I’m supposed to ask you regular questions so you make sure you know your name!”

“I know my name.” His eyes dance. “And I know your name! And your old name!”

“Now is not the time to joke about that,” I huff.

I turn and focus on unzipping his bag.

Luke sighs. “You don’t need—”

I wave my palm at him again, and he stops and smiles. I fling open the lid of his suitcase, and it hits the wall with a bang. “Oops.”

He chuckles, the sound warm. It seems to wrap around me, even though he’s ten feet away, even though the sound of laughter isn’t supposed to feel as soothing as a hug, even though sounds in general aren’t supposed to do that.

But it’s his sound.

His laugh.

And my body longs for it.

I fix my gaze on the contents of his suitcase.

“No dildo, unfortunately,” Luke says.

I frown and toss a t-shirt at him. It sails through the air, and he catches it with all his NHL grace.

“Shit. I threw something at you.”

“Cotton isn’t harmful, Sebastian.”

“But you’re injured. You’re concussed.”

“A slight concussion,” he says.

‘They didn’t put you on the team plane!”

“For precautionary measures. Altitude issues.” He shrugs nonchalantly, but my heart still beats way too fast, guilt as effective as any pedal.

I focus on his clothes.

I only see some sweatpants and t-shirts.

“Which ones are your pajamas?”

“Any of them.”

I jerk my head toward them.

“I mean, they’re all soft, right?”

I blink. “Seriously? You don’t have any in particular?”

“They all function the same.”

I frown. My forehead crinkles. Maybe the puck hit me instead. “But what do you wear in the day?”

“Any of them.”

“Oh.” I look at his clothes again, then select a t-shirt and sweatpants. “Well, you were wearing this in New Hampshire.”

He grins. “You remember what I was wearing in New Hampshire.”

“Of course. I remember everything.”