The Sweet Spot (9 page)

Chapter Nine

Ani and Sebastian were silent, each lost in their own thoughts as they climbed into Sebastian’s truck for the drive down to the harbor to meet his dad at the dock.

“I remember those
,” Ani breathed in amazement as Sebastian tossed rubber coveralls, boots and gloves off of the passenger seat and into the bed of his pickup truck.

“I have Raffi’s for you,”
Sebastian said, bending forward and brushing his lips across Ani’s in a gentle caress. There was a peacefulness about Sebastian, and a calm that was evident in the set of his shoulders as he checked over their gear and climbed back into the truck. A soothing energy radiated from his entire body, blanketing them in its warm buzz.

“Your dad saved Raffi’s gear?” Ani asked
Sebastian softly as he drove them down to the dock.

“He saved everything for me,”
Sebastian replied quietly. “He bought his uncle’s lobster permit from him when he was ready to retire and transferred it into my name so it was waiting for me when I got out.”

“
How do feel about it all?” Ani asked carefully. “How do you feel about lobstering again?”

“I love it,”
Sebastian answered thoughtfully. “I love the honesty of the sea and the rewards that she offers in return for my labor. I love the mixture of the ocean’s savagery and its frailties. I love the quiet solitude,” he whispered, raising Ani’s hand to his mouth and brushing his lips across her knuckles.

“What’s it like being
out on the boat with your dad again?” Ani asked, scooting closer and resting her head on Sebastian’s shoulder.

“It’s great,”
Sebastian replied, his voice hoarse with emotion as he dropped Ani’s hand and slipped an arm around her to pull her closer.

“Do you
ever talk about Raffi?”Ani asked softly.

“Sometimes,”
Sebastian murmured, “and sometimes we don’t talk at all, but even in the silence he’s with us. I feel him out there A. I feel him when I’m hauling the pots up onto the boat and in the sea spray against my face.”

“Raffi
always said he could feel all the generations of the O’Reilly men with him when he was hauling lobsters out of the sea,” Ani whispered, trailing her fingers across Sebastian’s face and resting them on the teardrops beneath his eye. “I’m sorry about what Jordan said to you.”

“Don’t be,”
Sebastian replied quietly. “Sawyer was right you know. He is the innocent one in all of this. I would want to rip my head off too if I was him.”

“I don’t know what to do
Bast,” Ani confessed, turning her head into Sebastian’s neck and burying her face against the letters of her name.

“
We’re here,” Sebastian murmured, ignoring Ani’s admission as he put the truck into park.

“Ani
Mackenzie,” Sebastian’s father called out in wonder as he looked up from the bin of bait he was dragging onto his boat.

“Actually it’s
Winthrop now,” Ani admitted softly, walking over and into Sebastian’s father’s hug. “You got a new boat,” she observed, staring at the name Raphael that was painted on its side in a vivid emerald green.

“It was time,”
Liam O’Reilly declared, pulling a glove off and running his hand across the dark beard that covered his sea-weathered face. He was only eighteen years older than Sebastian, and at fifty-two, he could have easily been mistaken for Sebastian’s older brother instead of his father.

His body was lean and strong
, and as he hauled the bait onto his boat, his arms rippled with years of hard earned seaman muscle. He had the O’Reilly green eyes and the same dark hair as Raffi. As Ani stared at him, it suddenly occurred to her that he was only five years older than Jordan, and he looked exactly the way that she would have expected Raffi to if he had had a chance to grow up. Black Irish, Ani’s mother used to call the dark haired, pale-faced, freckled combination that Ani’s own father had too.

“Don’t fall in love with the
Black Irish,” she used to tease her daughters, “they’re nothing but trouble.”

“I fell for the blond one
and it didn’t work out too well mum,” Ani whispered to herself as she stepped back and took in the new boat.

“I have a daughter named Rap
hael,” she told Sebastian’s father softly as Sebastian unloaded their gear from the truck and started to suit up in his rubber coveralls, boots and gloves.

“Yes,
I know,” Liam murmured, studying Ani thoughtfully.

“She’s beautiful,”
Sebastian called from behind them. “She has her mother’s eyes.”

“It wasn’t Ani’s eyes that you were always following around like
a pup in heat,” Sebastian’s father teased his son, shoving his glove back on and leaning back down to finish dragging the bait onto the boat.

“Mr. O’Reilly!” Ani exclaimed, her face turning red as
Sebastian joined in his father’s laughter.

“
Ha, You’re a married woman now Ani, and a mother to boot. I think you know exactly what I’m referring to,” Sebastian’s father teased with a warm twinkle in his eye. 

Ani joined in his laughter as
Sebastian tossed her Raffi’s old coveralls and boots.

“Oh she knew what I was chasing
after back when she was thirteen too,” Sebastian assured his father as Ani swatted him with a glove.

Ani sat on the boat
all morning, watching Sebastian and his father work side by side in harmony, hauling up traps and weighing lobsters. They banded the legal ones and passed them to Ani who dropped them into the holding tank on the boat. Then Sebastian and his father dumped the illegal lobsters and occasional crab or fish back into the sea and re-baited their traps before lowering them back into the ocean. 

No words were necessary as the three of them inhaled the sea air and exchanged occasional glances across the deck of the boat.
There were no words needed to convey that Sebastian belonged here, that he felt free and at peace here on his father’s boat in the middle of the sea.

“So tell me about your Raffi
,” Sebastian’s father finally said, breaking the silence as they all sat down at midday to take a break.

“She’s amazing,”
Ani murmured, her eyes lighting up at the thought of her daughter. “She plays the violin and she loves to help me out at the bakery on weekends. She’s already creating her own concoctions, including a banana peanut butter disaster that she tried to pass off on a customer when I wasn’t looking,” Ani laughed.

“And what about your husband
, Raffi’s father?” Liam asked, gazing at Ani and his son thoughtfully as Sebastian slipped an arm around Ani and drew her close. “What’s he like?”

Ani’s mouth went dry at the mention
of Jordan and she took a sip of coffee from the thermos that Sebastian passed her.

“He’s a great guy,” she whispered, looking down at the ther
mos in her hands. “He’s a pediatric neurosurgeon and a wonderful father.”

“I’m glad to hear that you
found someone and had another child Ani,” Sebastian’s father said softly. “It was what Sebastian always wanted for you,” Liam pointedly reminded his son as he stared at him. “That’s why he refused to see you all those years that he was in prison; he didn’t want you to waste fifteen years of your life waiting for him.”

Ani looked up and met
Sebastian’s father’s brilliant green gaze.

“But he’s out now,” she whispered back.

“Yes,” Mr. O’Reilly agreed. “And you’re a married woman with a child,” he replied quietly, holding her gaze. “Don’t you two think it’s time you let each other go?”

“Is that
true Bast?” Ani whispered. “You didn’t want me to wait for you? You don’t want me now?”

Sebastian
stood up and walked over to the edge of the boat, staring out at the sea.

“My father’s right,” he murmured
, closing his eyes against the wind and relishing the feel of the sea spray on his face. “I didn’t want you to wait for me because I wanted you to go on with your life. But that doesn’t mean that there wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t yearn for you by my side.” Sebastian confessed softly. “It doesn’t mean that I don’t wake up every morning wishing that you are lying beside me now. I understand that Ani’s not mine to have anymore da.” Sebastian turned around to face his father. “I understand the consequences of everything that happened between us. I’ve lived with them for over fifteen years. But I still hope for her each night when I lay my head down on my pillow, and each morning when I wake up and start a new day.”

“An
d you
a leanbh
?” Sebastian’s father asked Ani gently, addressing her with the Irish term of endearment for my child.

“I moved on like everyo
ne wanted me too,” Ani choked through the tears that poured out of her eyes and streamed down her cheeks. “I married a wonderful man and had an amazing daughter with him, but I’ve never been able to let go,” she confessed, weeping with the relief of finally admitting it out loud. “I also go to sleep every night wishing that Sebastian was lying beside me, and I wake up every morning with a tiny spark of hope for him buried in my heart.”

“
This is all
ballax
,” Sebastian’s father sighed, shaking his head at Ani and Sebastian hopelessly. “You can’t go around sleeping with another man’s wife Bast. She’s not your Ani anymore. She’s the mother of another man’s child. Mind yourself,” Sebastian’s father cautioned his son. “It’s against God, it’s against The Church, it’s against your heart.” He rose up and placed his hand on Sebastian’s shoulder. “You waited so long for your freedom Sebastian; don’t imprison your soul.”

“
Ani,
a stór
,” Sebastian’s father addressed Ani tenderly, “I know you love my son. I watched you trail after him when you were just a little thing. I held your hand in the hospital when the child you created together bled out of you. I heard you screaming on my porch when I refused to come back to Sebastian’s trial after Raffi died,” Liam said quietly. “I watched you walk home from the bus stop every weekend brokenhearted because my son refused to see you in prison. But is this how you want him, love?” he asked Ani, taking her shaking hands in his own and staring at her with his heart in his eyes.  “You have to choose
a leanbh
, you can’t have both or you’ll end up with none.” He leaned forward and placed a tender kiss on Ani’s forehead.

Ani and Sebastian returned to their work at a loss for words after Sebastian’s father’s speech,
and when the boat finally docked, they headed for Sebastian’s truck and spent the ride back to his apartment in silence.

“A,”
Sebastian began when he finally pulled the truck to a stop in front of his apartment.

“I can’t,” Ani whispered, holding up her hand to stop
Sebastian from speaking. “Whatever you’re going to say, I can’t take it. Whatever we decide, I can’t take it,” she cried hopelessly, throwing the truck door open and running out.

“Ani!”
Sebastian yelled, jumping out of the truck and running after her. “Don’t run away,” he whispered, pulling Ani into his arms. “Don’t run away from me. Stay with me tonight. Wake up with me in the morning.”

“What about what
your father said?” Ani choked.

“I’m not my father,”
Sebastian murmured into Ani’s neck as he scooped her up in his arms and carried her into his apartment. “Do you want to know the truth A?” Sebastian laid Ani down on his bed and peeled her clothes off of her body. “The truth is, I don’t care about your husband. The truth is that I’m not the boy you used to know anymore. I’m more sinner than saint now, and I want you whatever the cost,” he confessed, trailing his lips across Ani’s breasts.

“I want you too,” Ani breathed
, pulling Sebastian’s shirt over his head and unbuttoning his jeans.

“I want to b
rand you as mine,” Sebastian confessed huskily, flipping Ani over onto her stomach and trailing kisses down her back. “I want to mark every inch of your body.” He dipped his tongue into the crease that led down to Ani’s ass.

“Yes,” Ani moaned, “
brand me with your scent, I want to smell you on my skin forever.”

Sebastian
spread Ani’s legs open and buried his face on top of her ass with a moan, trailing his lips down her cheeks and gathering the soft skin of her inner thigh between his teeth, sucking gently.

“
Tell me you’re mine,” he whispered, sliding a finger inside Ani as he continued to suck on her skin, branding her thighs with his mouth.

“I’m yours,
” Ani moaned helplessly, writhing beneath him.

“Forever,”
Sebastian whispered, flipping Ani back over and lowering his mouth to her breasts.

“Forever,” Ani
echoed, closing her eyes as Sebastian sucked and licked his way down the front of her body, marking her breasts, stomach and thighs.

“
Who do you belong too?” Sebastian demanded as he pushed Ani’s legs open and thrust into her.