THE CEOS’ SECRET BABY.

THE ILLUSION OF FREEDOM

LEO STERLING POV

“Let’s go, buddy,” I grunted as I helped Matthew up, throwing his heavy arm over my shoulder to stabilize his weight.

He was such a complete light head!!

Four glasses of cheap whiskey at the casino and he was already completely out of it, his words slurring into incoherent mess while feet dragged against the floor. Honestly, it was pathetic, but right now, his intoxication was the only thing working in my favor. It kept him from seeing what his precious new billionaire boss had just done to his wife against a locked door.

With clumsy steps, we made out of the casino room and into the grand lobby of the hotel, making sure to nod at the uniform bellboy to open the doors at the entrance for us.

Making it outside, harsh, cold evening wind welcomed us, lashing against our faces and causing Matthew to shudder, gaining a tiny bit of his senses back from the sudden drop in temperature.

“I think... I think I saw Ava,” Matthew muttered, his head lolling to the side as I practically hauled him down the concrete steps to my car. “She was wearing... man, she looked so beautiful, Leo. Like a red angel...”

“You’re hallucinating, Mat,” I lied, feeling bitter taste of bile rising in the back of my throat as the memory of Ava pinned beneath my brother flashed in my mind.

I unlocked my black sedan once we made it. “Ava is at home, probably asleep. You’ve just had way too much to drink. Let's get you home too man.”

I shoved him into the car, slamming the door shut before jogging around to the driver's side and sliding behind the wheel.

Inside the vehicle felt stuffed with the heavy smell of liquor sipping off Matthew. I wiggled my nose a little, adjusting to the smell before roaring the engine to life.

My mind was in chaos, Serge and Ava. The handcuffs? Really? Yet they were a few feet away from her husband.

The look of ruin on her face. I needed to blot it out. I needed a distraction before my own sanity cracked right down the middle.

Reaching into the glove compartment, I pulled out a half empty bottle bourbon. I needed to loosen up a little.

“Here,” I muttered, tossing the bottle into Matthew’s lap as I shifted the car into drive sped out of the hotel’s driveway.

“Drink up, buddy. Let’s finish the night right.”

Matthew let out a slurred, enthusiastic cheer before unscrewing the cap and taking a massive gulp. “To Mr. Sterling!” he shouted along with a sharp hiccup in the process. “To the best f*****g boss in New York!, He’s gonna save my house, Leo! He’s gonna help with our mortgage!”

A bitter laugh escaped my lips as I steered onto the dark highway leading out of Manhattan.

He isn't saving your house, Matthew, He’s buying f*****g your wife.

Grinding my teeth in anger, I snatched the bottle from his hand, tipping it back and letting the liquid burn down my throat, my foot pressing down harder on the gas pedal.

The speedometer climbed. SixtySeventy….Eight miles per hour. The headlights cut through the pitch black stretch of the highway, the shadows of the trees blurring past us like a distorted timeline.

I felt free. Like nothing in this world f*****g mattered. Because nothing did.

“ Yeah!!!…” I yell, pressing at a button and rolling down both our windows before yelling some more into the passing darkness.

“Turn the music up!” Matthew screamed,his hand fumbling blindly with the dashboard controls until a loud, vibrant rock song exploded through the car's speakers.

For the next minutes or hours we chose to be delusional. Singing at the top of our lungs, screaming the lyrics into the dark cold night while passing the bourbon bottle back and forth until the liquor blurred the edges of reality.

Matthew was laughing, throwing his hands in the air, completely blind to the execution order his life had just been handed. And I was drinking just to forget that I was his accomplice by keeping my mouth shut. The adrenaline was pumping through my veins with a dangerous intoxicating high that made the car feel like it was flying through the midnight air.

THUMP.

Within seconds, a sickening impact rattled the front bumper of the sedan. The steering wheel jerking aggressively under my grip as the tires screeched against the asphalt as a horrific sound echoed from the floorboards. It was dense, almost Raw.

“What the f**k was that?!” Matthew screamed, the sudden shock cutting through his drunken state as his body jolted forward against the seatbelt.

My breath died in my throat. The car skidded across the center lane before I managed to slam my foot onto the brake, bringing the vehicle to stop on the gravel. The rock music was still blaring through the speakers, a sickeningly upbeat contrast to the horror paralyzing my chest.

“Leo... man... did we hit a deer?” Matthew’s voice was shaking, his face pale as he stared out into the pitch black road behind us.

“I... I don’t know,” I whispered, my hands trembling so badly I could barely unbuckle my seatbelt.

We stepped out of the car, leaving the headlights cutting through the dark fog, slowly I walked back towards where the impact had occurred. Using the car headlights to see through the darkness, I stood still, denying to believe what was in front of me.

It wasn't a deer.

A man was lying face down on the gravel, his body twisted into an unnatural angle. A thick, dark pool of blood was already beginning to seep out from under his head, staining the black road.

“Oh my God... oh my God, Leo, it’s a person!” Matthew fell to his knees, his hands flying to his mouth as he began to hyperventilate. The alcohol in his system seeming to disappear into panic. “We killed him! We f*****g killed a man!”

I fumbled around the body, my knees buckling as I dropped beside the stranger. I reached my hand out, checking for a pulse on his neck, but my fingers touched his blood instead.

There was nothing.

No breath. No heartbeat. Just a heavy, dead silence.

“Matthew, listen to me,” I hissed, my voice cracking as I grabbed his jacket, forcing him to stand up. “We are drunk. We have a bottle of alcohol in the front seat. If the cops come, we go away for vehicular manslaughter. For life!!. Do you understand me? Your mortgage, your life with Ava—it’s all over!”

“We can’t just leave him!” Matthew sobbed as he looked around the empty highway.

“There are no cameras here, Mat! Nobody saw us!” My survival instincts took over. I shoved him back toward the car, my mind racing along.

“We are taking this secret to our graves. Both of us. You say a word, and we both rot in jail. Let’s go. Right now!”

We scrambled back into the sedan, the doors slamming shut as I threw the car into drive, peeling rubber and sped away from the crime scene behind us in the dark.

Neither of us said a word for the rest of the drive.

The rock music was turned off, replaced by thick, silence that felt heavy enough to choke us.

The tension between us was a physical entity, building with every second that separated us from that body.

By the time I finally reached Matthew's small house, the dashboard clock read 1:45 AM. The house was dark, indicating that Ava wasn’t back yet.

I killed the engine, but neither of us made a move to step out of the car, silence stretching across both of us.

Matthew reminded seated, his chest heaving with tears running down his now pale cheeks. He looked completely broken, his jaw trembling as he stared at his own hands, as if he could still see imaginary blood on them.

“Leo...” he whispered, his voice cracking with a raw, vulnerability. “What am I going to do? How am I supposed to look at Ava after this? I'm a monster...”

Looking at him, a sudden, twisted wave of possessive desperation hit me. He was suffering, he was broken, and I was the only person in the entire world who shared his sin.

Serge was trying to manipulate Ava. Matthew was completely alone, and so was I.

“You’re not a monster, Mat,” I choked out, turning my body fully toward his seat and without thinking, I reached across the console and grabbed his jacket, pulling his face toward mine.

He didn't pull away but he gasped, his eyes wide with a desperate, fractured longing, like he was fighting with his own brain.

I leaned in and slammed my lips against his, pushing back all the thoughts of why I couldn’t.

It was a deep, desperate, and unhinged kiss. It tasted of bitter bourbon and raw salt.

We clung to each other like two drowning men. our mouths colliding with frantic hunger that spoke of everything we were forbidden to say out loud.

And In my dark bent up sedan, we became one, shutting out all the chaos both our worlds were waiting out with.