InsaneJournal

Who: Sebastian & Nell
What: The truth about the last week comes out (Part 2 of 2)
Where: Their condo
When: This weekend
Warnings/Rating: Ultimate sads.

He was quiet until he was settled on the couch beside her, fingers laced with hers, thumb running over the back of her hand. His gaze was fixed downwards, and he tried to figure out where to even start. "Do you want the good news or the bad news first?" Sebastian finally asked, lifting his eyes to meet hers once more, and there was something in those blue eyes, something almost scared, and that wasn't an emotion that Sebastian often displayed, particularly to Nell. In fact, Sebastian could count on one hand out many times he had truly been scared in his life, and this was up towards the top of that list.

She almost went with the good news, but the look in his eyes stopped her short. Something was wrong, very wrong. He hadn't been like this since... well, since when he broke her heart all those years ago. Even the memory of that morning was enough to build a surge of panic in her chest, and Nell swallowed hard to push it away. She had to hear him out; it could be not so bad after all. "The bad news," she said, gripping his hand tightly, her mouth already dry. "Just pull off the band-aid."

He took a few breaths, steadying things, and he was glad that he hadn't taken another pain pill on the last leg of the flight, because there was no way he could have had this conversation doped up on heavy meds. Glancing down to her hand again, Sebastian took one more breath and released it, shoulders sinking down with the motion, and then he met her gaze as he started to explain. "I went back to Italy to do a job for the family," he started quietly. "Dad was having issues, and he needed to see if I could try and smooth things over with this other family he was doing a deal with. That maybe they would respond better to my youth, my negotiating skills. I wouldn't have agreed if I had thought there was a chance at it going poorly, but..." He trailed off, his own mouth gone cotton-dry as he spoke. It took several long, hard swallows before he could continue. "I didn't get an opportunity to do my own research on them, to do any sort of reconnaissance, and I had to go off of the notes that the family had. We were set up. It was going to go poorly no matter who went, and with me going, it was just an opportunity to take out the eldest son." He stopped there, his lips pressed into a thin line, fingers still squeezed tightly around her own.

It was a lot to digest, and Nell's mind was reeling too fast to take it all in. The rational half of her brain tried to piece together what he was describing over the loud denials of the other half, the half that refused to believe this was happening. "You what?" Nell sputtered and pulled her hands back, her brain finally focused on the most important part of his story. "You went back to do a job? For the mafia?" Her pitch rose slightly at the end and her breathing was starting to get more ragged, but she was still in control. For now.

As she pulled her hands back, Sebastian didn't chase after them, nor did he let his gaze drop from her face, even if it gave him a front row ticket to see how badly this, his decisions, were hurting her. "I went back to help my family," he repeated, his voice as measured and even as he could make it, though it hurt to try and give them any defense, because Nell didn't even know the whole story yet. She didn't know what happened after. "Because they were threatening to kill my father, Nell. I can't stand aside and not do anything! He is my father! And yes, yes, I know it was a bad decision, and I know I shouldn't have done it, but he wouldn't have asked me if he had seen any other solution to the situation he was in."

It was because of the harsh grip on her emotions she was maintaining that she was able to take in this new detail. He had gone back to save his father. Of course he had. As much as she tried not to, she understood that. Hadn't she just seen Anton in the hospital a little over a week ago? Wouldn't she have done anything to save him that pain?

This is different. They kill people. Nell sat and stared at Sebastian. For one of the few times in her life, she was at a complete loss for words.

The lack of response, the silence that greeted him in answer, it was worse, Sebastian thought, than if she had yelled at him. He didn't feel a need to go into what had happened there, the men who had died, the look on his own mother's face when they brought him in bleeding, the look on his father's face when he realised what it was he had sent his eldest son into. They wouldn't help the situation, not now, because when it came down to it, he had done what he had told Nell he wouldn't do again. He wouldn't go back to the family. He was through with it, right?

He reached up and wiped at his eyes, getting up to his feet moments later to move towards the suitcase that sat at the side of the couch. The paperwork was easy to find, tucked in the front zippered pocket, and he pulled that out, holding it out to her with his good hand. "The good news," he explained, his voice thick. The papers detailed, in great detail, the legal separation between himself and the Price family, including all assets and properties owned. It was, essentially, gone. He didn't offer any more explanation, didn't move to sit down again, and when she took the papers from him, his hand fell back to his side, limp, as though he didn't have the energy to do anything else.

Her hands took the papers automatically, but she was still too shocked to process what they meant. All she could think about was that he had gone back to the family business. After swearing to her up and down that he was pulling out, that he was going legit, he had still gone back and been a part of what they had done. Anton had been right. Sebastian was never going to be able to give up where he came from, just as she would never be able to let go of her need to fight crime.

Nell closed her eyes and sat very still for a long moment. She wanted to scream and shout and cry and break something and cling to Sebastian all at once, and she needed to sort out which one was a priority. Finally, she opened her eyes and put the papers on the coffee table in front her, before forcing herself to look up at his face. "You lied to me." Her voice was flat and calm, stating a simple fact and brooking no argument.

Hearing it stated that way, the bluntest of truths laid out, there was no denying that yes, he had done precisely that. He had lied to her. "I did," he finally said, his voice quiet and lacking the calm that she had in her own. "But I'm done now. With the family. I know that doesn't make it better, but-" He broke off to swallow hard past the lump that had risen in his throat, his gaze steadied someplace past her until he could get his words together into something coherent. "I'm not a Price any longer. Because I can't live that sort of life, and I can't- I can't let myself be dragged into anything like that again." The words were trembling things, full of emotion, but he believed in them, believed in what he was saying.

"You lied to me."

His chest tightened at that, a physical pain that shot through him and had nothing to do with his injured arm. "And I'm sorry," Sebastian finally said, his voice cracking through the words.

"You're sorry?" she asked, in a half-hiccup, half-laugh, her voice laden with disbelief. She shook her head, blinking rapidly against the tears that were starting to find their way out. "This was the one thing that mattered. The only thing that matters." A hand roughly pushed away the hair that was falling in her face. "You swore to me that you would never do what they did. Never be a part of--" her voice fell away, and when it returned it was soft and young, with a quiet desperation she hadn't allowed herself in almost two years. "You promised, Sebastian." This time when she closed her eyes, tears fell.

"I went there to talk, Nell," Sebastian responded, and without saying anything else he dropped down in front of her to his knees, though he didn't give himself permission to touch, to hold, not now. He could see the tears on her cheeks, and he wished to all that was holy that he wasn't the cause of her sadness right then. "I was just supposed to negotiate with them. If I had thought for a second that it would turn out that way, I wouldn't have gone. Wouldn't have even thought about going." He did reach for her then, for her hand, desperate to touch, to twine his fingers with hers, for some sign that this could somehow work itself out. "I'm sorry, Nell. I am so sorry, Nell."

With the dam broken, there was nothing she could do to stop the flow of tears, so she ignored them. "You went there to help," she said, in little more than a sharp whisper. Pulling away reflexively when he reached out towards her, Nell wrapped her arms across her stomach. "Let me see it. What they did to-- I need to see it."

"I went there to try and keep it from turning violent," Sebastian said in his defense, but her words were, ultimately, the truth. When she pulled away, he didn't try again, his hand falling limply against the couch as he dragged his gaze away from her tear-stained face, not knowing what else to say. The situation was damned no matter what he did, what he said, and he had known that since the beginning. He had sealed his fate the moment he stepped on the plane to Italy, the moment he made the decision that this was what he was going to do. Until then, he could have turned away, changed his mind, apologised to his father, but there was no taking it back any longer.

Sebastian rocked back on his heels and started the process of stripping away the sling, then his shirt, leaving him bare-chested with just a peek of bruising spreading out from the heavy bandages that swathed his left bicep. He moved methodically, without emotion, unfastening the gauze and unwinding it, going slower as he got near to where the bandages were stained. It was, by all definitions, a flesh wound, but the furrow that had been dug through the meat of his muscle was impossible to ignore. It was stitched closed as best could be managed, and judging by the way the colour had washed from his face, it hurt. But he didn't say anything, not a word, as he twisted to show her, face tilted towards the ceiling, his eyes closed as he focused simply on breathing through a pain that was just as emotional as it was physical.

Nell showed no reaction to his words, instead watching closely to see what was under Sebastian's shirt. Nell had seen and received her fair share of battle wounds over the years, but none of it had prepared her for what she was about to see. The bandages, she could handle. The blood was shocking, but not unexpected. The stitches that bound together knotted muscle? That she couldn't handle.

Rising to her feet with a strangled cry, Nell backpedaled until she was against the wall. He'd been shot. He'd been shot. Someone tried to kill him. He had almost died. A few inches to the side, and he wouldn't have come back at all. The realization hit her with the force of ten thousand bricks, knocking the the air right out of her. Nell fell onto her knees, choking back bile and gasping for breath. Violence and destruction she had a lifetime of experience with, but almost losing someone she loved two times in as many weeks had left her unable to cope.

The moment she was in motion, the moment she got to her feet and all but ran away from it all, Sebastian was up on his own feet. The pain was ignored because she was the most important thing in his world, the one thing that separating from the Price family couldn't take from him. He didn't try to shush her, didn't try to offer words that would do nothing to alleviate the things she was feeling, but he did offer himself to her. He dropped to his knees in front of her, her emotions almost tangible in the expansive living room, sliding over him until he could almost feel them himself. But this wasn't about how he felt, not in the slightest, and not a bit of pain was noticed as he dragged both arms around her, feeling every shudder, every shake, and he knew that fear from the other direction. It was the same thing he had felt when gunfire had erupted in front of him, the searing pain, the hands that were on him before he could even process what was happening. He knew that fear, and it was nothing he wanted to feel again in his life.

Nell fought to breathe normally, the push-pull of her heart, her brain, and her body having left her in tatters. Strong, familiar arms pulled her forward from where she had landed, and she clutched at them blindly, pressing herself into the embrace. Through the tears and the sobbing and the hyperventilation, she could pay little mind to his injured shoulder. Reason had been overwhelmed entirely, and now Nell was operating purely on instinct, digging her deceptively strong hands into the bare muscles of his back as she fought to regain control over her faculties.

Pain furrowed lines on his forehead as she clutched at him, but the discomfort of that was disregarded because this? Her? She was far more important than anything else at the moment. He didn't try to shush her or anything, instead letting her ride the emotions out to whatever conclusion she could find, but never did he release his own grip upon her. Arms were curled tight around her, an anchor in the storm that threatened to sweep them both away, and he just held, ran a hand up and down her back, his own heart beating a furious rhythm in his chest, fast enough that he could hear the blood roaring in his ears. He loved this woman, loved her more than he loved himself, than his family, than anyone, and it boggled him that he could have ever thought he could live a life without her. The risk had been too great, and even now, he couldn't see the end. He could still lose her. He could still lose her after all of this.

They stayed locked into that position for a long time; long enough for the panic subsided. Consciousness of her surroundings seeped back in as the pressure on Nell's chest lifted and allowed her to breathe again. She slowly released her death grip on Sebastian's back, certain that her archer's fingers would leave deep bruises were they were. Sliding off his lap and back onto the carpet, Nell looked at him wordlessly, afraid of what would have to be said next.

When she slid from his lap back to the carpet, the sense of loss he felt was more than he had anticipated. It felt like such a large separation, even if there was no sign, yet, that it would be permanent. He swallowed hard, meeting her gaze, his left arm weeping blood where some stitches had torn, but he was ignorant of what was going on there. "I love you, Nell," Sebastian finally said, and there was a rawness to his voice, a roughness to the words that belied just how deeply the man was feeling right then. "I want to do right by you, to give you a life where you never have to worry if I'll come back alive. For you, I'd give up the entire world. None of that matters if I can't have you in my life." His eyes never left hers as he spoke, the words rough and full of truth.

She didn't know if it was the sight of the ruptured stitches or the rawness of her voice that did her in, but the tears were back, and this time they weren't as quiet. "I love you too, Sebastian." Her voice hitched but she pushed on, unwilling to let the quaking in her chest slow her down. It would be so easy to fall back into his arms and let this go, to go back to living in that world of willful blindness again. But that was precisely why she couldn't. She had fought too long and hard to convince both the world and herself that he had left it all behind to turn a blind eye to the fact that he hadn't. Twice before she had survived heartbreak at the hands of men she trusted implicitly, and she couldn't, just couldn't let herself go through that again. It didn't matter that she loved Sebastian to the very center of her being. Or that the words at the tip of her tongue had her sobbing before she could even verbalize them.

"But I can't trust you."

There were a lot of things that she could have said that would have hurt, but those five words, spoken with the tears in her voice, speared through him, drove the coldness through him and in its wake, it burned. He didn't try to argue with her, to fight over her words, that she could trust him, that he would show her she could trust him, but he had done something he had told her he would never do. So he swallowed hard, his eyes burning with unshed tears as he bowed his head to the floor, and then in a gesture that would have been smooth and easy weeks prior, he rolled up to his feet. "I wouldn't trust me either after that," he said softly, his voice wooden as he stooped, picked up the shirt he had tossed moments earlier to pull over his head, blood immediately soaking the short sleeve through. It was hard to breath, hard to think more than a single step ahead. "I'll go. I'm-" He shook his head, reaching up to wipe the tears that had fallen away, his jaw a line of tightness that had the tendons in his neck standing out. "I'm sorry, Nell. I'm so sorry."

Every instinct in her body wanted her to stop him, to say that he didn't have to leave, and that they would be okay. But those instincts were met by something that had been drilled into her over years of therapy -- that sometimes her instincts were wrong. She forced herself to stay where she was as he got to his feet, but she even if her vision hadn't been blurred, she couldn't have made herself watch. She wanted to tell him to go to the hospital, to take care of himself, to call a cab and not risk driving, but she knew she couldn't. Their own history told her that even one step in that direction would have them sliding back. The only thing Nell could do in that moment was hug her knees and wait, and keep together what vestiges of composure she had left until she could lose it altogether.

He didn't say another word as he found his suitcase by the couch where he had left it, a moment spared to zip the front pocket of the thing. Moments later, the front door was closing behind him, and it was all he could do not to completely lose it on elevator ride down to the main floor, the elevator where not so long ago he had been holding the woman he loved. That was all gone now, along with his name, his family, everything that he felt made him him. There was nothing left. He had lost it all.