“The boss might have suggested you need to come back, but I can assure you, I’m not here on his orders. I want you back, Princess. Calli, Toby, even your fucking father want you back.”
I can’t help tensing at the mention of my dad. At everything Seb told me out in the living room not so long ago.
“You’ve spoken to him?”
“We’ve… uh… had words.”
I try to sit up so I can look at him, but he doesn’t release his hold on me.
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I’ve had a chance to settle a few grievances I had with your father,” he says cryptically.
I’ve spoken to him, so I know he’s alive, but…
“What have you done to him?”
He pauses, his body shifting as if he’s suddenly uncomfortable with this level of sharing.
“I might have hit him… a few times.”
“Seb,” I warn.
“What? He deserved it. Fucker’s been lying to you for your entire life, the result of which landed you in the fucking hospital.”
“So that’s how you kept him away from me,” I muse. “You put him in his own hospital bed, didn’t you?”
“Briefly. But that wasn’t why he didn’t come to you.”
“No?”
“He knew I was right, Princess. I might have said the words, but it was his guilt that kept him away.”
“This is such a fucking mess.”
He chuckles. “Welcome to the Family, Hellion.”
I sigh, feeling the weight of that press down on me.
There are so many questions spinning around in my head, yet as my lips part to ask the most pressing, all that comes out is a yawn.
“You need to rest,” he breathes, his hot breath tickling down my neck and making me shudder.
Despite my better judgement, my body gets heavier as I begin to lose my fight to the exhaustion.
I might pretend that all is well, that I’m healed. But the truth is, I’m not. I don’t need the ache in my belly from our activities to tell me that.
“Relax. I’ve got you.”
As I drift off, his weight lifts off me before his head disappears.
I want to complain, to demand he comes back, but I’m too far gone.
I do, however, sense when he returns and moves me so that he can clean me up.
The warmth of a washcloth seeps into my sensitive skin before sheets cover me.
“Seb,” I whisper, my hand reaching out.
“Princess,” he whispers back, crawling beside me and pulling me into his body. “I meant it. I missed you so fucking much, baby.”