AllFreeNovel
Share Us
It wouldn’t work.
He stepped to his left, ready to get around her.
“Hey, I think you do need to sit down for a minute, buddy.” Eric moved to his side. “You went a little pale there.”
Javier was in his way. “Man, I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. Why would you let everyone believe you did that? Did you not fight the rumors at all?”
Not once his mother had believed Alicia. And Ramona. His sister, the one who’d cried at his bedside and promised to do everything she could to help him, had turned her back on him, too. No. He hadn’t tried to sway the town to his side. He’d called Macon and left. He’d rolled into Ian Taggart’s office, broken down and alone in the world.
What do you want to do now? Big Tag had asked him.
He hadn’t said what he’d wanted to say. Die. He wanted to go back to that moment when the world had exploded around him and not get up again.
I want to be useful.
He wasn’t going to be useful to Tiffany. He would be a burden to her. He’d been a complete idiot to think this could work. Perhaps it could work with a woman who expected less of him, but the irony was Tiffany’s sweet side, her giving soul was exactly what made him love her.
He couldn’t love her. He couldn’t be near her.
“Move out of my way.” He tried to push past Eric.
“Hey,” Eric said. “Calm down. I think something’s wrong.”
Everything was wrong. Every fucking thing in the world. He reached to shove Eric out of the way. That was the moment Tiffany stepped up and he caught her instead.
He shoved her, sending her back and making her hit the wall.
Horror rushed through him. He’d hit her. He’d hit Tiffany. “I’m so sorry, baby.”
She brushed herself off and shook her head. “I’m fine, Sebastian.”
He needed to get his hands on her, to make sure he hadn’t hurt her. God, he didn’t want to hurt her. No matter what he did, he hurt her.
He reached out to haul her up, but Eric got in the way. Sebastian lost his balance and his left leg banged against the prep table. His vision blurred, pain jarring through him, and he felt his leg give.
He crashed against the prep table, trying desperately to catch himself, but it was far too late. He managed to bang his elbow, another spark of pure agony shooting up his arm.
He heard Tiffany call out for him. Eric and Javier moved in, looming over him.
He could feel something wet. He managed to look down. Blood. It soaked his slacks.
Shit. He’d reopened the wound, likely made it much worse. He was going to need stitches, going to have to stay off it, and that meant crutches or worse.
Tiffany knelt at his side. “Baby, are you all right?”
There it was. There was the look he’d been trying to avoid. A sickening sympathy came into her eyes. She wasn’t looking at him like a Dom anymore. She was seeing who he really was—a propped up man who could fall apart at any moment.
“Get out.”
Her eyes widened. “What? Sebastian, you’re hurt. We need to get that bleeding stopped.”
“Get out. I want you out of the apartment. Stay with Javier. I don’t care, but I don’t want you there when I come home.” He didn’t have a choice. He couldn’t move out on his own and he wasn’t asking anyone for help. He turned away from her, unable to stand the way she was looking at him.
“Sebastian, stop this right now,” she demanded. “Lie down and I’ll call an ambulance.”
She was so not doing that. “Don’t you dare. Eric, give me a hand. I can drive myself. Better yet, do you have a needle and thread around here?”
He could sew the fucker up himself and not have to take the inevitable lecture. He could call some movers and leave her the apartment.
