Total pages in book: 171
Estimated words: 164705 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 824(@200wpm)___ 659(@250wpm)___ 549(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 164705 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 824(@200wpm)___ 659(@250wpm)___ 549(@300wpm)
“Which part is the worst?” I asked as he popped a U-turn, returning to the path we’d come from. “The fear of being seen or starting over?”
Plenty of actors came onto set burdened by shame of their bodies. Actors who’d lost a lot of weight that left them with excess skin. Actresses with large birthmarks, cellulite, and C-section scars. The truth was, no one’s body was perfect. Even my clients, the most gorgeous people on Planet Earth, still struggled with insecurities. But if I’d learned anything from my job worth learning, it was this – a diamond still shines with cracks.
“Shamefully, the former.” Seb sniffed behind his mask, and I knew he wanted to take it off, just as I knew he wouldn’t dare to. It didn’t matter that no one drove on this road at one in the morning. He didn’t even want the darkness to witness his scars. “Don’t get me wrong. Starting over would be exhausting. Going from complete solitude to peopling wouldn’t be fun, but I can handle it. What I can’t handle is the looks. The disgust. The pity.”
He quieted, cruising up Dark Prince Road.
Just when I thought he’d dropped the conversation, he added, “I spent the first half of my life looking like a demigod. The prospect of walking this earth looking like a monster terrifies me.”
Stop using that word.
It never failed to stab my heart.
“A monster?” I snorted. “You’re no monster, Sebastian. You survived something incredibly traumatic, though I still don’t know what it is. I hope one day you’ll tell me.”
“I hope one day I will, too.”
We spent the rest of the drive in silence.
Both of us in conversation with the real monsters.
The ones in our heads.
Chapter Fifty-Six
Oliver
Sebastian disappeared.
As soon as Briar left, I went to check on him. The shock at finding all his rooms empty had me reaching for my phone to dial 9-1-1. I stopped myself. Just barely.
Sure, panicking at a missing thirty-two-year-old man could be considered ridiculous. But he was also a thirty-two-year-old man who never left the fucking house.
I ripped through his shit, stalking the corridors like a demon, up and down, inside and out, trying to find him.
Nothing.
I kicked my guests out without bothering to conjure a reason, then stomped my way to the security room to check if he’d left. He had. In the Fiat the staff sometimes used to run errands.
I tried calling. Straight to voicemail.
When all else failed, I treated myself to an overdue mental breakdown, snatched up the rest of my whiskey, and ventured onto the porch to drown my sorrows in booze.
A total fucking cliché, I know. Boots on the wraparound railing, Macallan straight from the bottle. Just me and the night.
But I had never been a stranger to clichés. After all, I marketed myself as the empty-headed playboy to sail through life.
Trio and Geezer’s paws tapped the wooden deck beneath my seat, announcing their arrival.
“Yeah, that’s right.” I shot them a glance, lifting the bottle. “Daddy’s a fuck up. Hey, at least you’re rich and have money for therapy.”
I drank to drown my misery, hoping each sip would bring me closer to forgetting my reality, but it only served as a magnifying glass, thrusting me closer to the truth.
I ruined my brother’s life. I stole his chance at happiness.
Because of me, he was a dead man walking.
The only woman I’d ever loved humiliated me tonight, then proceeded to leave me, but not before making it clear how much she loathed me.
My friends went along with my bullshit story about undergoing a lobotomy because they had their own fucked-up shit going on at the time. They just accepted my personality change – as a complete and utter buffoon who only cared about chasing skirts and partying – in stride. Even as I tried to stitch together some semblance of a life, I refused to show them I possessed any redeeming qualities – that I worked, that I cared for my brother, that I cared, period – because it would make them try to fix me.
And I didn’t deserve happiness.
I deserved to atone for everything I’d done.
“You smell like Jim Beam came in your mouth.” Sebastian flung open the double doors and sauntered outside, plucking the bottle from between my fingers. “Easy there. If you fuck up your kidneys, you won’t be able to donate one to me.”
I didn’t answer.
To be honest, there was a high chance I’d hallucinated him.
“What do we have here?” Fake Seb descended the three steps down the backyard, emptying the rest of the bottle on the grass. “The royal fuckup, Duke von Bitch Ass, is drinking himself into oblivion? Don’t you think you’re a little old for this kind of shit?”
“I’m never too old to be a trainwreck.” My lips twisted around a question with a furious snarl. “Where have you been?”