“Things have been so good between us,” she said, fighting back tears. “Don’t do this. Don’t hurt me. I’ll do better. I’ll be better. I promise…just please…”
“I’m not interested in your promises, Taylor. Only the results. I will
find a punishment you don’t enjoy and, eventually, you will learn to stop baiting me. Now strip.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Just listen to me for one minute, Sebby, please,” she begged, holding out a staying hand.
“I don’t negotiate, Taylor. Stop crying. You brought this on yourself.”
“I know,” she choked, blindly dashing the tears away. “Just give it a little more time. You're not the man who loves me right now. I won’t be able to take this. This…emotionless. If you punish me now, you’ll destroy us both. You’re not you. Don't hurt me just so you can feel.”
He stood over her for a long moment. When he finally spoke, his voice came in a strained rasp. “Is that what you think?” he asked. “You think hurting you makes me feel better?”
The honesty was difficult, but she forced herself to nod and meet his eyes. The hurt and bafflement warring with the anger on his face didn’t make it any easier. “I think it gives you a release—a way to vent all the rage and hopelessness SKALS makes you feel, but I’m not a target, Sebastian. I’m the woman who loves you,” she whispered, hanging her head.
The silence that followed broke her heart. Each second that ticked by shattered it a little more.
“What do you want from me?” he asked. “What is it that you want me to be, Taylor?”
The exasperation in his voice caught her off guard. She swung her tear-filled gaze back up to his and struggled to push the words past the agonizing lump in her throat. “I’m not asking for the world. I just want you to be you. I know you’re still in there somewhere, Sebby. I can feel it. I just don’t know what to say—what to do. How do I get you to come back to me?”
Cocking his head, he spread his palms. “I’m right here.”
“No,” Taylor whispered with a sad shake of her head. “You’re not. You’re still stuck inside SKALS headquarters somewhere. When you’re you, we’re so good together. Everything feels real and right. You’re my perfect fit. I know this is hard. I know this isn’t what they trained you to be, but I need you. Not some hollow shell. Not this cruel replacement. You. I need you to stay with me, Sebby. Please. Come home. Try to remember what we had. I know you love me, but right now when I look in your eyes, all I see is hate.”
His lethal stare narrowed even more. The muscles along his jaw corded and clenched, as did his fists. Ice rolled through Taylor’s veins, certain she’d just provoked a much more terrifying alternative to his belt. Those hands were large, powerful, and trained to kill. Without a word, he snatched her up from the floor in a forceful yank. Certain he was about to murder her, she splayed her palms against his chest.
Seizing both her wrists in one hand, Sebastian jerked away from her touch as if burned. That was the last straw. It was pointless. If he wouldn’t even let her touch him now, he was never coming back. There was no way to reason with him or plead. All fight fled her and Taylor blinked against the tears. Maybe it would be kinder for him to end it than to subject her to a lifetime of living like this—an existence full of torment and fear. When it came to SKALS, she couldn’t compete. It wasn’t fair to either of them for her to try.
Lifting her chin, she peered back at him in wounded resignation. “It’s okay,” she whispered. “I understand. Do what you have to.”
Sebastian’s lean form trembled with fury. Closing her eyes, Taylor hung her head and braced herself for the worst. It scared her to know she would have no idea what was coming, but it was easier than seeing him like this.
She stumbled as he used his hold to jerk her across the room. A forceful shove sent her reeling. Before she could regain her balance, she tumbled onto the end of their bed in an awkward sprawl. Seconds ticked by as she shivered and held her breath, waiting. The stillness ended with a forceful slam of the doors that shook the entire house and threatened to stop her heart dead.
Something deep inside her broke in the silence that followed. The shattered fragments of her heart fell without sound. She’d spent a lifetime yearning for love only to catch fleeting glimpses of what it could offer. It was an elusive phantom, a ghostly specter haunting the hollow corridors of hope, constantly twisting out of reach at every turn. She’d found passion with Sebastian, but their love was a razorblade dipped in poison—a dream held hostage at the edge of SKALS knife. She bit back a sob knowing, if left to Marx’s mercy, it would never survive.
Sebastian gave his Disaronno another disheartened swirl. It was a strange and eerie feeling to know he was at a crossroads. One from which there was no turning back. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been sitting outside, but dusk was already starting to settle across the grounds. The house behind him remained quiet and still. The grounds were vacant as well. Rupert and the rest of the security team had taken one look in his direction and wisely decided to give him some much needed space.
Taking another long draw of the sweet amaretto whiskey, he sighed. No matter how hard he tried to shake them, Taylor’s words still haunted him. He would never forget the emptiness and resignation in her eyes as she gave up. Not just on herself, but him.
Tucking the bottle between his knees, he scrubbed his hands over his face and let his troubled gaze wander to the sky. Maybe it was better this way. Marx was growing increasingly unhappy with his relationship and performance. A fact he had made painstakingly clear over the past ten days. It had been much worse than usual. This time, the commander had made his point with intensive rounds of shock therapy and water boarding. There were times when he’d doubted he would ever get out of that room alive.
Sebastian shuddered with the memories, his body coiling with helplessness and rage.
It was too damn hard to keep bouncing back and forth. He’d been riding the fine line between the man he wanted to be and the one SKALS demanded for too long. The constant shifting and conflict was starting to take its toll. He couldn’t keep going on this way. As strong as he was, he didn’t know how much more fight he had left to give.
His thoughts returned to Taylor and he tipped the bottle with a grimace. He’d never intended to fall in love with her, but that was exactly what had happened. Her laughter and innocence had wormed its way beneath his skin. They helped keep the darkness and venom at bay and, somehow, she had managed to remind him how good it felt to laugh—to feel, to live again. Part of him resented her for it. For giving him a glimpse of what life was supposed to be. The other wanted to cling to her tightly and never let those experiences go.
Everything he’d been through—the training, the operations, the reconditioning—made it easier to work, easier to function and do what he needed to do. Sebastian took another disheartened swill. He wasn’t stupid. He could see enough to know Marx wasn’t just ripping away the last shreds of his humanity. He was ripping away his life. It would be so easy to give in. So easy to surrender. Another round or two in a reconditioning cell at that man’s hands and there would be nothing left. Nothing. It was already too damn hard to find the broken little pieces, but he was fighting it. Fighting with everything he had for one reason and one reason alone…he wanted to be worthy of Taylor.
Shaking his head, he took another long pull off the bottle. It didn’t matter what he did. That would never happen. She was too good for someone like him. She didn’t deserve this life, let alone some of the things he had done. He knew it, and she knew it, and still she stood by him, hoping and praying that things would change. She could have shut down and just offered her body when she realized there was no way out, but she still put her heart on the line. At least until tonight.
Sighing, Sebastian dragged a weary hand across his face as one lone question came to mind. He wanted to, but could he give her that life? Was he capable of making that change and being the kind of man she deserved? As hard as he’d been trying lately, he still failed. The past always loomed, serving as a constant reminder. One tiny misstep and Marx would snuff her light for good. He didn’t know if he could live with that. A dry snort broke the silence. It didn’t matter what he could handle. It was too late to turn b
ack now. Marx would never let her walk away. She knew too much. Taylor was as trapped in all of this as he was and, if today was any indication, he’d already done a damn good job of killing her either way.
He pried himself out of his seat and made his way back inside. Somehow, he had the feeling he would find Taylor still waiting upstairs. His heart ached when he pushed open the bedroom doors to find her still hugging her knees to her chest in the middle of their bed. She looked so fragile and broken as she tracked his movements, her eyes empty and drained of life. Gone was the sparkle of vitality and hope he’d come to love.
Setting the bottle on the dresser, Sebastian faced her with a grim shake of his head.
“I am going to be completely honest with you, Taylor. I’ve spent the last few hours thinking about everything you had to say.” He trailed a slow finger along the dresser’s smooth, glossy surface. “What you fail to understand is my position. You were just supposed to be a means to an end for me. Nothing more. Just a beautiful body to use for my pleasure. Someone to do my cooking and cleaning...but love was never supposed to be a part of that deal. Men like me aren’t supposed to have families. We go to work and we rip those institutions away.”
“But some of you manage…” she whispered, “if you try.”
“Do we?” he asked with a dry laugh. “Take a good look around you, Taylor. My sister is a widow, and the rest of my family is dead. Those of us that have tried to build a life outside of work have failed or met an untimely grave. Where is the success in that?”
She said nothing. A miserable tremble ran through her as she lowered her gaze and hugged her knees tighter.
“I have given this a great amount of consideration over the past few hours, and I realized things can’t go on like this. Things have to change.”
She nodded and he watched, tilting his head, as she worked to tug the band on her finger free.
“Whatever you are doing, stop it right now. So help me God, Taylor, I will beat you senseless if you take off that ring.”