Fucking pussy.
I should have known better. I should have known myself better than to allow me to talk myself into rebound sex with a perfect stranger less than forty-eight hours after the second-worst day of my life. And I should have known better than to expect more than one fuck from a player like Sebastian, especially when it started feeling like something real, something more than fucking. So much more.
Because it had been, hadn’t it?
I’d felt a connection.
Real, powerful, potent, and undeniable. And completely unlike anything I’d ever felt before, with anyone.
I peeled Sebastian’s T-shirt off, because I couldn’t handle his scent any longer.
Except his scent wasn’t just on the T-shirt, it was on me. On my skin. In my hair. I spread my legs and pulled the skin of my thighs apart to look at the stark black love bites he’d left on either side of my pussy. He’d marked me. Claimed me. For a few handfuls of minutes, I’d felt so utterly perfect, beautiful, powerful, desired, needed.
And then he’d just slammed a wall down, and that was that.
So much for never letting me leave his bed.
I had to get his scent off me so I jumped in the shower and rinsed off, scrubbed my skin a little too angrily, and then got out, dried off, and dressed all over again in the other change of clothes. Outside, the rain had slackened off a bit, it seemed, so if I was going to get out of this bar and away from Sebastian, now was the time.
I ignored Zane completely as I left the room and rushed down the stairs, purse in hand. Ridiculous, that all I had was a white clutch purse meant to match my wedding dress, but whatever. It had my wallet and phone in it, which was all I really needed.
There was a series of coat hooks at the bottom of the stairs, just inside the stairwell, and hanging from one hook was drab green raincoat with a deep hood. I slipped it on, zipped it up over my purse, and left the bar.
I was tempted to go back to Sebastian’s sailboat, but I wasn’t ready to be found yet—assuming he would even go looking for me.
So…I just walked.
And tried desperately to talk myself out of feeling hurt and rejected by Sebastian. It didn’t work, of course, but I had to try. It was better than just wallowing in it, right?
I was so fucking stupid.
It was true, and I knew it. There wasn’t even any point in arguing with myself over my own stupidity. Stupider yet, I’d known going in that this would happen.
Double dumb.
10
Sebastian
I heard the apartment door open and close, and knew Dru had left. Whether for good or just to think, I wasn’t sure, and tried to tell myself I didn’t care.
I pulled on a pair of jeans commando and left my room, found Zane lounging on the couch with a beer, watching some action flick on cable TV.
There was half a bottle of Jack in the cabinet above the fridge, and despite the hour, I needed it. Not even noon and I was already a mess over that woman. I dug out the bottle, a block of cheese from the fridge and a knife from the block, and sat down beside Zane on the couch, cutting myself a thick slice of Colby Jack and shoving it into my mouth.
Zane watched me twist the top off the Jack, just sort of staring at me oddly. I got the bottle to my lips, tipped it back, and then his hand flashed out and snatched the bottle from me, spilling whiskey all over my bare chest.
“What the fuck, dude?” I demanded.
He snatched the cap from me before I could react, twisted it back on, and tossed the bottle across the room. “The fuck are you doing, dumbass?”
“Drinking? Because I’m an adult and I can?” I pushed up off the couch, but Zane’s fist slammed into my chest and knocked me back onto the couch.
“No, you’re not. You’re a fucking dumbass. The dumbest dumbass I’ve ever met, and that includes the first-day washouts at SEAL training. You let that girl walk out the door and don’t go after her, you might as well cut off your teeny-weeny little boy balls, because you sure as fuck don’t deserve ’em.” He indicated the bottle of Jack with an angry wave of his hand. “And instead of manning the fuck up, you’re gonna hide in the bottom of a bottle like some wet behind the ear yellow-belly pussy? You’re a pussy. Fuck you, pussy-boy.”
I stood up, rage rising inside me. Who the fuck did he think he was?
I stomped across the room, snatched the bottle, and moved toward the kitchen. I’d planned to put it away, but Zane must’ve interpreted my action as intent to drink anyway.
He was across the room and in my face in a flash. “I can kick your ass, Bast, and you’d better not fucking forget it.” He took the bottle from me and set it far too gently on the counter, then returned to stand an inch in front of my face, his voice deadly quiet. “Thought Dad raised us better than to pussy out of the hard shit, especially by drinking.”