He knew what it meant. That it wasn’t just about desire. Not with Maddie.
She wasn’t a game. She wasn’t a woman to ruin, or tempt, or steal a moment from. She was… everything he’d stopped believing he was worthy of.
And that terrified him more than Paisley ever could.
Because Paisley would offer for her. With her mother’s blessing.With an estate and a title and a smile that never quite reached his eyes. Sebastian had no illusions about it—he was the more dangerous choice. The unknown one. The one with quirks.
And yet, Maddie had looked at him like she didn’t care. Or maybe she did care and still wanted him anyway.
That was the part that undid him.
He didn’t want to take her innocence. He didn’t even want to steal her first kiss. He wanted to earn it. Every inch of it. The trust. The surrender. The way she might one day reach for him—not because she was caught in the moment, but because she knew him and chose him still.
But to have that… He’d have to become the kind of man she could choose. Not the kind who sat in the shadows of his family name, letting bitterness dictate his choices. Not the man who made women laugh at dinner and then left before morning. Not the man who ran from feeling anything real because it was easier to pretend nothing mattered.
He rubbed at his chest.
She mattered.
More than he’d expected. More than he might be able to handle.
Thomas frowned. “He saw you two? How much has he seen?”
“Enough.”
Sebastian leaned forward, elbows braced on the table, the firelight catching the angle of his jaw. He looked like a man trying not to feel too much and failing.
“He wants her,” he said. “Everyone knows it. He’s even arrogant enough to say it out loud without letting her know first.”
“And what do you want?”
Sebastian’s throat worked. He didn’t answer.
Thomas let the silence hang. When he finally spoke again, itwas quieter.
“You’re in deep.”
Sebastian looked up sharply. “It’s not just that she’s beautiful. Or kind. Or clever. She makes me feel like—”
He broke off, then pushed back from the table, rising to pace across the room.
“She makes me forget everything I hate about myself. And everything I’ve spent my whole life running from.”
Thomas watched him. “Your mother?”
Sebastian laughed, but it was hollow. “She’d adore Maddie. She’s exactly what my mother’s always hoped for. Polished, poised, unscandalized. Sweet. Good. Too good for me.”
“So what’s the problem?”
Sebastian turned, his eyes dark. “I never wanted to be the son she could be proud of.”
“But now you want Maddie.”
“Yes,” he said hoarsely. “And she’s the one woman I can’t have without becoming exactly the man I never meant to be.”
The words settled in the air between them, thick and unspoken.
Thomas stood and walked over slowly. “Sebastian.”
