Ruined (Barnes Brothers #4)(55)

He went to interrupt. “Oh, I’m not done, honey,” she said, slashing a hand through the air.

Sebastien clamped his mouth shut and lifted his chin.

“Then, while my head is still spinning, trying to figure out how to explain . . .” She sighed and the weight of everything crashed down on her. The sleeplessness from the previous night caught up with her, her fear over how he was going to react . . . all of it. Pressing her fingertips to her eyes, she leaned back against the counter.

She sniffed and irritation exploded when she realized how watery it sounded. Damn it, she was not crying again.

“Ah . . . Marin? Hell, you’re not crying, are you?” He looked at her uneasily and when he shot a look toward the door, she thought she might grab something heavy and hit him.

Bad enough that every time she’d tried to tell him, he’d just avoided her—or he’d been letting Evie give him a good look at her tits. Now he was looking panicky because she was getting a little upset?

“Guess what, Sebastien? I’m pregnant!” She shouted it loud enough that he winced. She realized she probably needed to get her temper under control and it was entirely likely that her secret wasn’t so secret now—these trailers weren’t exactly made with shouting in mind. But just then she didn’t care.

That one rational part of her mind sighed and flung up her hands. You will . . .

“Marin, come on, now . . .” He took a step toward. He shot a look toward the window and offered her the same charming smile he’d used to get himself out of trouble a hundred times.

It wasn’t working. She pointed a finger at him. “Bite me. You insisted on coming with me. You wanted me to explain, guess what? That’s what I’m going to do and if I start crying, it’s your fault.”

“I’m not trying to make you cry!” Sebastien said. He jammed his hands into his pockets, looking put out.

“You can’t tell by me! Avoiding me all the time, letting Evie rub her tits all over you—pushing me toward Dash all the time.”

“He—” Sebastien clamped his jaw shut just before he could finish.

“Smart man,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. She wanted the damn robe off. It was annoying her, but they were shooting—or supposed to be shooting one of the scenes where somebody broke in on her while she was changing and Sebastien’s character rode in to save the day. She was wearing only a bra and panties for it, up until he grabbed clothes for her to put on, right before hauling her out of the house. Under the robe, all she wore were the bra and panties. Sojo had announced, privately, that they would get any scene that involved her scantily clad out of the way early on. Since the robe was supposed to protect the lingerie and she needed the lingerie for today’s work, she was stuck. She wasn’t about to have this argument—discussion—whatever—with Sebastien while she was in her panties.

Sebastien finally spoke and this time it was through clenched teeth. “How about you explain to me how you didn’t tell me he was the dad, because I distinctly remember . . .”

His voice trailed off and Marin cocked a brow. Propping her hands on her hips, she started to tap her foot. “Yes? You distinctly remember . . . ?”

It was almost cute, how he glared at her for a minute and then spun away. Stalking over to the window, he stared outside, although she doubted he was seeing anything out there.

“Let me refresh your memory. You decided that congratulations were in order—for both of us. Even though we both tried to cut you off, you just kept going and before I could correct you, you just climbed on your high horse and rode on out of there. I even chased after you, trying to catch up with you on the porch and you didn’t want to wait—not even for two minutes.”

“I was f*cking jealous!” he shouted, spinning around to glare at her. “I’ve had a thing for you for as long as I can remember and there you were—” He stopped, sucking a breath and blowing it out so hard, his entire body worked with the movement. “I was jealous, okay? So maybe I assumed it was Dash’s. You were dating him and . . .”

“One or two dates doesn’t exactly paint us as any sort of fixture, Sebastien. I haven’t even slept with him if you must know.” Her heart was twisting in her throat now. The look in his eyes wasn’t that much different than if somebody had knocked him across the head, but she was too busy processing what he had said. “What . . . you . . . just what does that mean that you had a thing for me? You were . . .”

She huffed out a breath and crossed her arms over her chest. “You’ve been all shut down over the past year because of Monica. You were going to ask her to marry you.”

For a moment, Sebastien said nothing. He looked like he was still taking in everything that had been said in the past few minutes. Finally, he sighed. “Hell, Marin.”

As she watched, he moved over to the couch and dropped down, scraping short nails down his jaw and drawing attention the fact that he, like Dash, was expected to be scruffy-looking for much of this movie. Dash, whether he had five o’clock—or even ten o’clock shadow—still managed to look pretty. A year ago, she might have been able to say the same about Sebastien.

Now he looked dangerous. Heart-stopping. Breath-stealing. The scar stretched from his left eye down his cheek, almost to his mouth, paler against his tanned skin and that imperfection somehow just drew more attention to the surreal beauty of his face. He was still beautiful. She knew he didn’t see it, but he was still so beautiful. His eyes came up to hers and the hard sigh that left him seemed to come from the very bottom of his soul. “I did love Monica. But I was a kid when we hooked up and what I was looking for . . . Shit, it wasn’t what you need to make it last. I get that now. I know the difference. I . . .” He looked away, then. “We don’t need to do this. Look, I care about you. Maybe a little too much and it was rubbing me wrong thinking that Dash and you were . . . well . . . Top that off with the fact that the hound dog can’t keep it in his pants and that’s why I was going nuclear. I’m sorry. I’ll apologize to him and I’ll . . . I’ll get my head straight. I thought I was getting better at that, but guess not.”