Sebastian shook his dark hair out as he angled his neck towards me. I could see the sigh escape his lungs.
“Hey.” He steadily breathed out, leaning over to brace his elbows on his knees. “Why aren’t you resting?”
I peeled my face from the doorframe to lift my shoulders. “I’ve been asleep for days.”
“Being unconscious and sleeping are not the same thing.” His attention was glued to me, his presence still stealing my breath despite the rage firing off inside of me.
I sauntered into the dimly lit room, pausing a few feet from where he lounged. “Were you able to sleep when you first learned of all this information?”
“No. Still can’t. Hence why I’m here and not in our room.”
Our room.I still didn’t know how I felt about that.
My elbows met my thighs, my head dropping into my cupped palms when I settled into the chair across from him. The lanterns flickered against the wall in a way that was uncannily reminiscent of the unsteady beat of my heart.
“I don’t know what to think about any of this,” I mumbled almost inaudibly into my hands, unsure why I even found myself confiding in him.
“It’s a lot.” The cushion of his chair released a quiet rustle as he adjusted his posture.
“That it is.” And the fact that my faith in him had been broken only added to that. Straightening my torso, I raised my face and narrowed my eyes upon him.
His chiseled jawline looked even more pronounced as he clenched it, waiting for me to say more. It looked like it was killing him to not approach me, but he remained static.
I picked at a loose thread on the armchair while ever growing tension and silence filled the room. It stretched across every square inch of the space until I forced it to break.
“Why did you do it?” I had to know.
“None of my reasons seem good enough now knowing what I may have lost.” He didn’t so much as hesitate, having known exactly what I referred to.
“Tell me anyway.”
His devastated, blue eyes latched to mine, and I had to fight myself to remember why I was so angry with him.
He had his response prepared, as if he had rehearsed this exact conversation. “I thought I was protecting you. Protectingallof you. And in all honesty, when I first met you, I had zero intentions of ever telling you. The journal was something between my mother and I. Something I felt like she left formeto find, and no one else.”
“But when you got to know me—when you fell for me—you didn’t think that the information in there was something I deserved to know?” I choked down my gulp. “Do you not trust me?”
His dark eyebrows cinched together as if my question caused him physical pain. “Of course I trust you. And yes, you did deserve to know, but so much time had passed and I didn’t want to lose you. I didn’t know how to approach the situation without pissing you off or hurting you.”
“Well, you managed to do both,” I scoffed, my words having an intentional bite to them. When he didn’t respond, I added, “I want to read it.”
Sebastian shook his head ever so slightly. “I don’t know that that's the best idea?—”
My spontaneous motion cut his words short. I rose, stepping towards him with my hand outstretched because I knew he had the damned book on him. “Let me correct myself. I amgoing toread it. If everyone else got to look at it, then so do I.”
“You’re not going to like what you read,” he cautioned.
“I already don’t like what I’ve been told, so what does it matter?”
His jaw ticked, but he shuffled forward to release the journal from the back pocket of his pants. Reluctantly, he passed me a book that was no larger than his palm.
I tucked it under my arm and began to turn away, but his calloused hand clasped around my wrist, drawing me back in.
“Maeve,” he said my name in that low, gravelly way that usually had me coming undone for him.
“Sebastian?” I retorted with a slight snarl.
“Did you really mean what you said? Do you hate me now?”
