18 The Lecture

‘Take a seat, Sebastian. We all know you did not come here to complain about the security system we’ve installed or to ask for more enhancements, or even to give us feedback.’

‘We have been monitoring your system for three weeks. It has undergone extreme scrutiny by your own security team, and so far, it has proven to be stable. So let’s cut the bullshit.’

‘I know you’ve had our family investigated, and you already know that all three of us come from the same orphanage.’ Jeremy started. Sebastian shrugged, not denying his accusation. ‘Did you find anything useful?’ he inclined his head and moved his lips, showing he found nothing.

‘We love Clara to death. She is our whole world, and we will do everything possible to protect her.’

‘She is not one of your business ventures. Don’t look at her like she’s one of your new shipping lines or unchartered territories you’ve come to conquer.’

‘Nor is she to be one of your conquests. She will not be your flavor of the month.’

‘Look here…,’ Sebastian tried to interrupt, but Jeremy was half done with his tirade, ‘Shh.. let me finish.

‘If you’re here because you want to get in her pants, please leave. There is too much going on in her life already. She doesn’t need another heartache.’

‘If you are here to be her friend. Pretending to be there for her, so she could eventually fall in love with you. I would say no to that as well.’

‘We’ve already seen what happened to her relationships. In a couple of weeks or months, you’re going to break up with her because you’ll hate that we come first in her life. You’re going to be just like everybody else, finding issues about us spending so much time together,’ Jeremy warned.

Sebastian couldn’t believe he was getting a lecture from this 25-year-old twerp. ‘What does he know? Huh!’ he thought.

‘I’m not here to break her heart. Whatever relationship we have is between us, and thank you for the concern, but who do you think you are to judge me? You don’t know me.’

‘I’m not here to get into her pants. Yes, she intrigues me. Even lit a fire inside of me that I once thought was dead. I want nothing more than to win her friendship and to challenge her to open her heart to me.’

‘I hope that she’d find it in her heart to trust me and allow me to show her how much I feel for her. This will be my cross to bear, so please let me do it. I can’t say I didn’t try.’

‘As for you and Max, I am not intimidated or insecure about your relationship with her, you guys are just protective. It’s natural, you’re her brothers.’ he saw Jeremy’s eyebrow raised defensively. Even he got surprised he was able to say all that out loud.

‘Get to know me first, then you can have your protest.’ Sebastian hasn’t even acknowledged his feelings to himself, yet here he was, baring his soul to Jeremy. ‘Well, I guess this is one way to break down one of her walls,’ he thought.

Jeremy felt impressed. ’Damn, this guy is either really in love or stupid. I don’t think what he said was rehearsed, and there was sincerity in his voice. I wonder if she’s ready for this.’

He was biting his inner cheek so Sebastian won’t see him smile. He couldn’t show him that he liked his answer. Plus, he and Max bet on how long it would take before Sebastian came knocking at their door, and Jeremy won with his 3-week estimate.

Max comes by with a huge grin on his face. He had been watching the security cameras and heard everything. He sits down on the other chair in front of Jeremy and says, ‘I know you had the talk already, and let me add this. We will make you suffer if you hurt her. You cause her to shed even one tear, and we will end everything for you,’ he winks.

‘Yes, that was a threat. Always remember that we have eyes and ears at Navio. You invited us in, and you can never cast us out. I hope you’re scared.’

‘We’re still okay if you don’t sign the project, but remember, Clara is our life. She comes first.’

-=-

Max and Jeremy escort him to see Clara. They barged into her office, knowing that she was probably either doing paperwork or research. They checked her schedule to make sure they wouldn’t be interrupting anything important and saw that she had nothing until after lunch. She had blocked her cameras, and they couldn’t see what she was doing in her office.

Max saunters in first. ‘Hey sis, how’s it going? Are you busy? You’re not, right?’ She ignored both of them. She knew Jeremy was right behind him. When they needed something from her, they just walked into her office like it was their own, never telling her they were coming.

Clara looked like a kid sitting at her enormous desk. She had one knee propped up and one laying cross-legged on her chair. She was wearing a dress today, so most of her legs were modestly covered, and her strappy sandals were discarded on the side hidden by the trash can.

She had her hair held up in a bun by a scrunchie that had seen better days. It didn’t really hold up all of her hair, so her bangs and some tendrils fell around her face, giving her a very messy, romantic look about her.

Sebastian was stunned. All he could do was stare at how beautiful she looked right now like she was very comfortable and content. All she was missing was the smile. ‘God, can she be any more gorgeous?’ he asked himself as he felt his heart miss a beat.

‘You might want to fix up yourself, coz, Tada! Look who the cat dragged in?’ Max said as he made the magician’s hand gesture to acknowledge Sebastian.

Clara’s heart skipped a beat. Sebastian was the reason she was at the pool this morning. She was trying to exercise him out of her thoughts because he kept texting her these nonsensical messages, which had the side effect of making her giggle like a schoolgirl. She did not want to acknowledge that she looked forward to getting them every day. Because that meant he was growing on her.