Ruined (Barnes Brothers #4)(46)

He wondered if she could feel how fast his heart was racing.

“Let me go, Sebastien. I’m fine. I’m just . . . I’m tired. I didn’t eat much today and I haven’t been drinking enough water, either. I’m fine.” Her brilliant blue eyes glared up at him and once more, she shoved against his chest.

“That not eating thing is pretty common,” he responded, setting his jaw. “But the passing out? Not so much. If you don’t want me to take you, I’ll get Dash.”

“Why . . .” She stopped and blew out a breath between her teeth. “I’m fine, Sebastien.”

Slowly, he let her go. She certainly seemed fine, color once more returning to her cheeks. She was also looking at him. Straight at him, instead of away or through him. Unless they were working, she didn’t do a lot of that anymore.

Nodding, he let her go and stood up, offering her a steadying hand, which, to his shock, she accepted.

A few murmurs moved through the crowd, but he was too busy staring at her to care about what anybody else was doing or staying.

Once she was upright—and steady—she tried to tug her hand free, but he held on. “If you don’t want to go to the hospital, fine. But if Dash isn’t around, let me drive you back to the hotel. We can tag Dash on the way, call the set medic, have him come take a look at you. Once Dash gets there, I’ll leave you alone.”





Chapter Thirteen




If he said Dash’s name one more time . . .

Dash was gone—he had a date.

She didn’t want to point that out to him, though. Sebastien still had it in his head that Dash was the baby’s father.

Marin hadn’t been able to disabuse him of the notion. When she tried to talk to him, he went out of his way to either invite others into the conversation or he just suddenly had somewhere else to be.

He wasn’t staying at the hotel, so she couldn’t even ambush him there.

With every passing day, it was getting harder to figure out how to do anything about the craziness that now stretched between them. Staring at him, painfully aware of others staring at them, she closed one hand into a fist.

“Dash had to leave already,” she said, keeping her voice calm. If she didn’t say something, Sebastien was likely to push the issue. “I’ll give him a call once I’m on my way back to the hotel. You don’t need to drive me. There are still cars going to the hotel. I’ll catch one of them.”

“Maybe you should let Sebastien drive you,” Sojo suggested. Before Marin could even sputter out a response, Sojo took a step forward. Voice low, she added, “People are going to get curious if you keep this up, Marin. Just take the f*cking ride already.”

She gave both of them a silencing look, and then turned back to the others. “I heard there was going to be pizza and beer tonight. Is there a reason I wasn’t invited?”

Marin looked over at Sebastien and huffed out a breath. “Fine.”

She’d better go, otherwise tomorrow, Sojo would never let her live it down. The other woman never went out with the crew. It wasn’t that she didn’t like to hang out with the others, but she wasn’t much on socializing on a large scale. If she was doing it, it was to draw attention away from Marin.

Sebastien gave her a look that told her he knew exactly why she’d given in, but he was courteous enough—today—not to call on her on it.

When he laid a hand at her back, she had to fight not to jump away.

Not because she didn’t like his touch—she did.

Oh, did she like it.

The feel of his fingers, the warmth of his palm was something she wanted to just sink back against. Part of her wanted to turn to him and just melt against him. The other part of her wanted to smack him, because why in the hell couldn’t he see what was obvious?

Sojo had already figured it out.

She’d bluntly asked Marin, “Why is Sebastien always pushing you toward Dash? He’s the daddy, isn’t he?”

Dash hadn’t made that connection yet, but he would.

And if she wasn’t careful about things like . . . oh, say passing out in front half the crew, others would put two and two together and realize she was pregnant, then others would start making stabs in the dark. Sooner or later, one of them would hit the target.

The rumor mill would spin nonetheless and by the time she got home, the tabloids would be spouting off shit like maybe a Martian had impregnated her.

“Maybe they’ll be decent and at least make it Matt Damon,” she grumbled as she trailed along next to Sebastien.

“What?”

She could have kicked herself. The problem with being an only child is that sometimes you just talk to yourself. It was a habit she’d developed in childhood and when she was tired or stressed, she lapsed back into it. Tonight, she was tired and stressed and now she was irritated to boot.

Feeling his eyes on her, she managed a shrug. “The way things are going, people are going to figure out what’s going on and when the news hits the tabloids, I’ll be lucky if they don’t have a Martian pegged as the father.”

“Ah . . . and you’re hoping they go with Matt Damon.” He crooked a grin at her. “Well, he’s better than the Looney Toons version. Although, you and Marvin would have made an interesting couple.”