Sebastian said those words while sliding from the back seat with effortless grace.
His hair caught the sunrise like spilled ink. Without looking back at Lucas' direction, Sebastian asked the same question that he had heard for years.
He had been giving him the same answers, such as "No, I brought my car with me," or "No, Max will give me a lift," or "We still can't be seen together, Seb."
But not this time.
Lucas leaned against the car. "Nope," he emphasized the "p" sound more as he felt as if the metal were biting into his spine. "The tribe has this grand meeting about a certain trip somewhere. And as pack alpha, I had to be there."
His gestures were all over the place in a mocking tone of what the elder may have told him before meeting Sebastian at their usual getaway room.
Sebastian nodded, easy as breathing, and slid into the driver's seat. He turned on the engine before looking back to where Lucas was.
Their eyes met, blue and brown, ocean and earth, and for a heartbeat, Lucas let himself drown in the fantasy that Sebastian might see him.
But the vampire's gaze was a locked door. Lucas knew every hinge, every splinter, and every No Trespassing sign nailed to the wall.
Sebastian smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. His eyes held a language Lucas wished he'd never learned.
This cursed ability to read the truth in the flicker of a gaze was a gift from his ancestor, Silas Red. And what he saw now carved into him like a dull knife:
He felt fondness, but it wasn't love.
There was a desire, yet it was not a necessity.
It was a goodbye that Sebastian hadn't even realized he was saying.
Lucas looked away first. "Drive safe," he said, smiling around the lie festering in his ribs. The engine roared, and then the taillights vanished.
Lucas exhaled. Somewhere, Becca was waking up to coffee and kisses that didn't come with caveats. Somewhere, Sebastian was already forgetting him.
And Lucas?
Lucas stood there exactly where Sebastian had left him.
The rising sun painted the world in gold. "But this is how it has to be." Lucas turned his face in the opposite direction, letting the sunlight scald away the fantasy he'd clung to:
That maybe, in another life—a kinder, softer one—they might have been something simple. That Sebastian's hands would have learned him for joy, not hunger. The bond could have been a beginning rather than an end.
Slowly, Lucas stepped in the direction away from his present without looking back.
—
The rising sun painted the world in gold, but Lucas felt no warmth.
This is how it has to be. He couldn't stop repeating it in his mind. The words tasted like rust on his tongue. He turned away, not towards home, not towards the direction of the packlands, and with no grand exit and no dramatic last look.
Just one foot in front of the other, past the flickering neon lights of the motel sign. He stopped by the huge dumpster where Sebastian used to throw used condoms when they did it the first time.
He looked down at the jacket he was currently wearing.
It was Sebastian's.
He inhaled deeply, and without a heartbeat, he took it off and stared at it for a good few seconds before dumping it inside the dumpster.
This is it. I am finally doing it.
The morning light gilded the pavement, turning potholes into pools of molten amber. He stared at the harsh light, eyes squinting when he felt his phone buzz.
Probably Max asking where he would be patrolling or Lucian asking him to patrol with him. Maybe even Sebastian—somehow half-assed. "Are you good?" text that didn't mean what Lucas would pretend it did.
He didn't check.
Because he knew, somewhere behind him, Sebastian's car was slicing through the dawn, hands soon to curl around Becca's waist, mouth forming words Lucas would never hear.
And him? Just good ol' Lucas.
"You know this may kill you, Lucas. I may not know how this works, but the ending will just be the same; the elders said so." He laughed to himself as he recalled what Lyla told him while she watched him pack lightly to avoid suspicions.
"I don't know, Lyla. It's just…" He sighed heavily and quietly as he looked at the familiar closet in front of him. "I can't watch him marry Becca. It hurts so much."
"I know, Luke. We feel what you feel. But there's always another way. And Tanesab is not the way."
"I don't have any other choice, Lyla. It's Tanesab or nothing."
Lyla could only sigh and cursed at how stubborn Lucas was being at that moment. And he knew he agreed with her. "Fine, forget it. Just tell me you have a plan to suppress how much pain you will be going through the moment the imprint feels you are miles away from your imprintee."
Lucas looked at her. He stared at her, contemplating whether to tell her that he was ready to die if that's the only way out of this cruel fate. "I do," he lied. Lyla looked at her disheveled friend and sighed.
"Good. Because we need to know if we will still eventually see you alive and breathing after this ordeal."
Lucas laughed, hugged Lyla tight, and thanked her for the support. "Come back to us, okay? We will wait for you."
Of course, he lied again. He stepped over the potholes carefully, as if his boots could still be stained by something as simple as dirty water.
The city woke up around him: a barista unlocked a cafe, an old man walked a dachshund, and a child kicked a soda can down the sidewalk. They were ordinary people, dealing with ordinary problems.
Lucas envied them violently.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. Pack messages. Max's demands. Maybe even Sebastian's reluctant, "Did you get home okay? "
He put it on airplane mode.
One step. Then another.
So, this is how you unlove someone, he thought to himself. The city inhaled around him, buildings rising like the ribs of some massive beast.
One step. Then another. Not toward anything. Just away.