shattered promises

chapter 8

The First Kiss

Darkness swallowed the apartment whole.

For one terrifying second, nobody moved.

Nobody breathed.

Then chaos exploded again.

“Down!” Sebastian’s voice cut sharply through the dark as another gunshot echoed somewhere behind us.

Instinctively, I dropped.

Sebastian’s arm wrapped around me immediately, pulling me against his chest as bullets tore through the hallway wall.

My pulse thundered painfully.

Everything felt unreal.

The darkness.

The screams.

The smell of gunpowder filling the air.

And somehow, in the middle of all of it…

Sebastian remained terrifyingly calm.

“Stay close to me,” he whispered near my ear.

I nodded quickly even though he probably couldn’t see it.

A flashlight beam suddenly flashed across the hallway.

One of the attackers.

Sebastian reacted instantly.

A loud crash echoed as he shoved me behind a corner just before another shot rang out.

I gasped sharply.

Then Sebastian fired back.

The attacker dropped.

Silence followed for half a second.

Then more footsteps approached.

Too many.

“We need another exit,” one of Sebastian’s guards hissed urgently.

“There isn’t time,” Sebastian replied coldly.

Another loud bang shook the apartment.

My breathing became uneven again.

“They’re everywhere,” I whispered.

Sebastian turned toward me briefly, his expression unreadable in the darkness.

“No,” he said quietly.

“They’re desperate.”

That somehow scared me more.

Because desperate people were dangerous.

Sebastian grabbed my hand tightly.

“Come on.”

We moved quickly through the dark hallway while the sounds of fighting echoed behind us.

Every shadow felt alive.

Every noise made my heart jump.

At one point, Sebastian pulled me sharply against the wall just as another masked man appeared around the corner.

The attacker raised his weapon—

But Sebastian was faster.

The fight happened so quickly I barely processed it.

A punch.

A struggle.

Then the man hit the floor unconscious.

My chest tightened as I stared at Sebastian.

Not because I was afraid of him.

Because I was starting to understand him.

This world.

This violence.

This constant danger.

He lived in it every day.

And somehow…

He still protected me first.

“You okay?” he asked quietly.

I nodded shakily.

“You?”

A faint humorless smile crossed his lips.

“I’ve had worse nights.”

“That’s not comforting.”

“It wasn’t supposed to be.”

Another gunshot echoed from somewhere downstairs.

We both froze briefly.

Then Sebastian cursed softly under his breath.

“They’re blocking the exits.”

Fear crawled up my spine.

“What do we do?”

His eyes locked onto mine.

“We survive.”

The way he said it sent something strange through my chest.

Not panic.

Trust.

And maybe that was the most dangerous thing of all.

Sebastian led me into a small storage room near the back of the apartment.

The moment the door shut behind us, the outside noise became slightly muffled.

Not gone.

Just distant enough to breathe again.

Barely.

The room was dark except for faint city light slipping through a narrow window.

I leaned against the wall, trying desperately to steady my heartbeat.

Sebastian stood near the door, listening carefully for movement outside.

Focused.

Alert.

Beautifully dangerous.

“You do this too easily,” I whispered before thinking.

His eyes shifted toward me.

“Do what?”

“Handle violence like it’s normal.”

Silence.

Then—

“In my world, it is.”

The honesty in his voice hurt more than I expected.

I looked down briefly.

“This isn’t the life I imagined.”

“No,” he said quietly.

“It’s not.”

For a second, neither of us spoke.

Then suddenly, exhaustion hit me all at once.

Emotional.

Physical.

Mental.

Everything crashed together painfully.

I slid down slightly against the wall, pressing trembling fingers against my forehead.

“I can’t do this anymore.”

The words came out broken.

Weak.

And I hated that.

Sebastian moved instantly.

He crouched in front of me, his expression sharper now.

“Yes, you can.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do.”

“How?” My voice cracked slightly. “Because right now I feel like I’m losing my mind.”

His gaze held mine steadily.

“Because you’re still standing.”

Something about those words nearly broke me.

Because he said them like they mattered.

Like I mattered.

“I was supposed to marry Liam,” I whispered shakily. “I was supposed to have a normal life.”

Pain flashed briefly through Sebastian’s eyes at Liam’s name.

Gone almost immediately.

“You still miss him.”

I laughed bitterly.

“I miss who I thought he was.”

Silence settled heavily between us.

Then I looked at Sebastian carefully.

“And I don’t even know who you are.”

His jaw tightened slightly.

“You don’t want the answer to that.”

“Stop deciding things for me.”

The frustration in my voice surprised both of us.

Sebastian stared at me for a long moment.

Then finally—

“My father built Blackwood Holdings through fear,” he said quietly.

I blinked slightly.

He never talked about himself.

Never.

“When I took over,” he continued, “I tried to clean parts of it up.”

“Parts?”

A bitter smile touched his lips.

“You don’t erase decades of corruption overnight.”

I swallowed hard.

“So Liam discovered something inside the company.”

“Yes.”

“And someone killed him for it.”

Sebastian’s silence answered for him.

My chest tightened painfully.

“Do you know who ordered it?”

His eyes darkened instantly.

“No.”

“But when I find out…”

He didn’t finish the sentence.

He didn’t need to.

The cold promise in his voice said enough.

The tension between us shifted again.

Not fear this time.

Something deeper.

More emotional.

More dangerous.

“You cared about him,” I said softly.

Sebastian looked away briefly.

“He saved my life once.”

That surprised me.

“When?”

“A long time ago.”

His voice became distant.

“Before power changed him.”

The sadness hidden beneath the words caught me off guard.

Because suddenly…

Sebastian didn’t look cold anymore.

He looked tired.

Lonely.

Human.

Without thinking, I stepped closer.

His eyes lifted slowly to mine.

And just like that…

The air changed again.

“You hide everything behind control,” I whispered.

His jaw tightened.

“It keeps people alive.”

“No,” I said softly.

“It keeps people away.”

The words hit something inside him.

I saw it happen.

The walls.

The control.

The distance.

For one brief moment—

It cracked.

“Olivia…”

The way he said my name nearly destroyed my ability to think clearly.

Low.

Careful.

Like he was already fighting himself.

My heartbeat became painfully uneven.

Because I should’ve stepped back.

I should’ve remembered Liam.

Remembered the danger.

Remembered that Sebastian Blackwood was the last man I should trust.

But instead…

I stayed.

A loud noise echoed faintly outside the room.

Neither of us moved.

Neither of us cared.

Because suddenly, the danger outside felt less terrifying than whatever was happening between us.

Sebastian stepped closer slowly.

Close enough that I could feel his breath now.

Close enough that one more step would erase the space between us completely.

“You should stay away from me,” he said quietly.

The warning came too late.

Because I already knew I wouldn’t.

“Why?” I whispered.

His eyes searched mine carefully.

“Because once I care about something…”

His voice lowered dangerously.

“I stop being rational.”

My breath caught instantly.

And that was it.

The final c***k in the distance between us.

I don’t know who moved first.

Maybe both of us.

Maybe neither.

All I knew was suddenly Sebastian’s hand was against my face, and his mouth crashed against mine with years of restraint breaking underneath it.

The kiss wasn’t soft.

It wasn’t gentle.

It was desperate.

Intense.

Full of everything we had both tried to ignore.

Fear.

Tension.

Anger.

Need.

My fingers gripped his shirt instantly as he pulled me closer.

And for one terrifying moment…

Everything else disappeared.

The danger.

The gunshots.

The grief.

All of it vanished beneath the way he kissed me like he had been trying not to for far too long.

Then reality slammed back violently.

A gunshot exploded somewhere nearby.

We broke apart instantly.

Both breathing hard.

Both staring at each other like we had just crossed a line we could never uncross.

Sebastian stepped back first.

The control returned immediately.

Cold.

Sharp.

Protective.

But his eyes betrayed him.

Because the way he looked at me now…

Was nothing like before.

And deep down—

I knew mine didn’t either.