Forbidden Sins

Chapter One

Estella

For the last three years, he’s been watching me everywhere I go.

From the time I get up in the morning and come downstairs until the time I go back up at night to go to bed, he’s almost always with me. Sometimes, a silent presence; other times, a talkative one. He’s my protector. My shield.

My friend.

I always loved reading stories as a child—and even now, if I’m being honest—about princesses and their sworn knights. Champions who served them, protected them, and guarded them with their lives. Who loved them—sometimes fraternally, and sometimes in other, more forbidden ways. Ways that they could never act on, without terrible punishment. Somehow, that made it all the more romantic, in the stories—that they couldn’t act on it. That feeling of longing, of yearning. 

In this story, I’m the princess, and Sebastian is my knight. My bodyguard.

And right now, I have no fucking idea where he is.

“Sebastian?” I call out his name as I wind through the halls of the house, my high, dark ponytail swinging against the back of my neck. “Sebastian!”

Sometimes, at home, he goes off for a little while to do something on his own. Touch base with my father’s head of security, Bruce—affectionately called Brick by Sebastian and me in private, because of his bulk—or work out in the mansion’s gym. The Gallo estate is well-protected, and here in the mansion especially, he knows that I’m safe. I don’t need to be watched every second while I’m at home, inside.

But since the day I turned eighteen, I was told that I’m never to leave the house without Sebastian at my side. Which is why I’m looking for him right now.

“Sebastian? I want to go for a run!” I call out, pushing open the frosted glass door that leads to the mansion’s gym. There’s no sign of him in the large room, but I hear a faint splash from the other side of the door on the far wall—the door that leads to the indoor pool. One of them, anyway. The one for swimming laps, not for recreation.

I stride through the gym, shoving open the door and stepping into the humid, chlorine-scented air of the natatorium. The splashing is louder, and when I glance over toward the Olympic-sized pool, I see Sebastian’s firm, muscled body slicing through the water with the strength and grace of a shark. 

Something predatory. Dangerous. Something—

A shiver runs down my spine, and chills prickle over my skin at the same time that I feel warmth bloom through me as I watch him glide toward the far end of the pool. I’ve never actually seen Sebastian shirtless. I’ve seen him in his usual bodyguard’s uniform, and I’ve seen him in gym clothes. I’ve tried not to notice how he looks in those—his muscled thighs and arms visible, his shirt clinging to his hard chest and abs after a workout, the way the sweat drips down the back of his neck. But I’ve never seen him in less. He’s careful about things like that—about not pushing the boundaries of what’s appropriate.

I bite my lip, my stomach knotting with a not-unfamiliar feeling as I see Sebastian push off from the far end of the pool and switch direction, swimming back toward me. It’s impossible to be around a man like this as often as I am, every day for three years, and not notice what he looks like. How temptingly desirable he is, in every possible way that a man can be.

Especially when those stories of princesses and knights that I still like to read aren’t as innocent as they once were.

I swallow hard as he reaches the end of the pool where I’m standing and surfaces, running one hand over the dark hair that’s slicked against his skull. He’s submerged from the neck down, but I can see the tantalizing glimpse of his tanned skin beneath the gently lapping blue water, the lines of black ink marking it in swirls and patterns from the sides of his neck down.

“Estella.” He greets me with a grin, his gaze swiftly sweeping over me appraisingly. He takes in my attire for a moment—the black bike shorts I’m wearing, the crossback red tank top, my hair up in a ponytail, and sneakers on my feet. “Headed for a workout?” 

“I want to go for a run. But I can’t leave without you. You know that. So I was looking for you.”

“Sure,” Sebastian says affably, still treading water. “Sorry about that, princess. You slept in, so I thought I’d get a few laps in.”

The familiar, teasing nickname warms something in my chest, distracting me from the fact that underneath the water, there’s more of Sebastian bare than I’ve ever seen before. He runs his hand over his hair again, and I frown at him.

“C’mon. Unless you need to do more laps?” I pout at him a little, and he laughs, though I could swear his gaze lingers on my mouth for a second too long. That I see him tense, just a little, his shoulder muscles tightening.

But I’m imagining things, surely. He’s just paying attention, like he always does. And he’s still swimming—of course his muscles are flexing.

All of them. Every hard, tight—

“Estella?” Sebastian raises an eyebrow. “How about I meet you outside the gym? I just need to—”

“Why do I need to wait?” I raise an eyebrow right back, and I realize a moment too late that my tone is more flirtatious than I meant for it to be. I think Sebastian realizes it too, because his smooth strokes in the water slow for a moment, and I scramble to fix my slip.

I’ve tried to avoid him ever catching me checking him out—any sense of attraction or impropriety. Sebastian has always been professional, even if we have become closer friends than I think my father would have liked, and more familiar with each other than a bodyguard and his charge probably should be. But the things I think about sometimes would cause him to lose his job if he ever acted on them, even the slightest bit. They might even make him leave of his own accord, just to protect me and my innocence.

I wrinkle my nose at that thought. It’s a word I’ve heard far too many times from my father—how important it is to maintain, how valuable it is, how special it makes me. And I’ve stayed innocent… mostly. My thoughts are my own.

Sebastian frowns, and I make an impatient gesture. “Just come on, okay? I’m hungry, and the longer I wait to go run, the longer it’ll be until breakfast.”

He hesitates for a second longer, but he seems to take it as a command—which I hoped he would. He glides toward the ladder that leads out of the pool, and the moment he pulls himself up out of the water, my mouth goes dry and every other thought flees in an instant.

He looks like a fucking Greek god. Like the statues I’ve seen in museums. His shoulders and chest are broad and corded with muscle, just like his arms, veins running along the muscles in his forearms. Tattoos wind their way down his body from the sides of his neck, down his arms, chest, and back, stopping just above the cleanly cut lines of his abs. Water is dripping down his chest and arms, rivulets running into those ab lines, sliding into the deep V cut of muscle on either side of his hips that leads into the shockingly small pair of swim trunks he’s wearing—

Swim trunks that are clinging to what looks like an impressively large shape just beneath—especially considering the fact that he was just in the water. 

I’ve never seen a man nude in real life. I’ve looked up pictures and snuck a few porn videos—I have access to the Internet and the good sense to delete my browser history afterwards—but staring at what’s between Sebastian’s thighs, I’m gripped with a sudden, aching need to see what it would look like in reality.

Sebastian clears his throat and my gaze shoots up to his face, mine flaming red. I can feel myself blushing, heat running up from my throat to my cheeks and all the way up to my hairline, and I think I see a faint flush color his tanned cheekbones as well.

“I’ll—I’ll meet you outside,” I stammer, and pivot on my heel, ponytail flying as I all but run for the door to the gym.

The air-conditioned room feels frigid compared to the humidity of the natatorium—which was warm for more than one reason, I think. I rub my palms over my burning cheeks, embarrassment washing over me. Sebastian caught me staring at his—

I close my eyes tightly, swallowing hard. We’ll just pretend like it never happened, I tell myself. When he comes back out, I’ll act normal, and it’ll be like I never saw him getting out of the pool dripping wet and—

“Estella?”

I turn swiftly around at the sound of Sebastian saying my name, knowing my face is probably still tomato-red. He’s standing just inside the gym, dressed now in a pair of loose basketball shorts and a workout tee, sneakers on, and his dark, wet hair looking as if he’s run his hand through it several times. “Yes?” 

Despite my best efforts, my voice comes out in a squeak.

Sebastian’s cheekbones still look slightly flushed. “You said you wanted to go on a run?” he asks calmly, and I nod, a little too hard.

“Yep! A run. Just around the path that leads around the back of the estate and to the stables, maybe two miles or so, nothing too strenuous.” I clear my throat. “I mean—just in case you’re not up for it, after the swimming, and whatever else you were doing… for a workout. Whatever other workout you already did.” I clamp my mouth shut, well aware that I’m now rambling.

“I can go as long as you need me to.” Sebastian’s eyes widen slightly the moment he says it, as if he realizes immediately just how inappropriate that sounds. “I mean—I’m fine, princess. I can manage a couple-mile run.” He gives me a lopsided grin, running his hand through his hair again. “I’d hope I could, anyway. I’m not much good to you if lifting a few weights and swimming a handful of laps means I can’t chase a man down afterward if someone comes after you.”

I roll my eyes. “Like you’ve ever had to worry about that.” In the three years that Sebastian’s been my bodyguard, the most dangerous thing that’s happened is him having to ward off overly interested guys at the campus coffee shop when I was in college. We’ve never actually run into any of the situations that my father worried about when he assigned a personal bodyguard to me—his enemies targeting me, someone trying to kidnap me for ransom.

“Still, I should be able to do my job.” Sebastian shrugs. “Ready to go?”

I nod, grateful to have the embarrassing moment from a few minutes ago over. Still, I can’t shake the image of those swim trunks soaked through, clinging to the long, thick shape of—

“Christ.” Sebastian looks around as we step out of the gym into the hallway and nearly run into two maids carrying boxes big enough that they have to look around them instead of over. “What’s going on?” He frowns, looking down the hall to where there’s more staff hurrying to and fro, carrying boxes and long strings of lights and other things that I can’t quite make out. 

I flush red for the second time this morning. “My birthday party.” I press my lips together, twisting them to one side. “Dad’s going all out for my twenty-first.”

Sebastian glances at me. “Your actual birthday is Monday, isn’t it?”

I feel that spark of warmth again at the knowledge that he remembered it. He doesn’t have any need to, really—I shouldn’t care if my bodyguard remembers my birthday, any more than I should care if the cook does, or Bruce, or anyone else who works in the household. That’s what my father would say, anyway.

But it means something to me that he did remember.

“Yeah.” I bite my lip, glancing back down the hall at the bustle and chaos that I can hear from the adjoining rooms. “But the big party is tonight. Everyone’s invited.”

Sebastian smirks. “By everyone, I assume that means everyone important to your father, and no one important to you?”

“A few people important to me.” I make a face as we walk toward the kitchen. “I got to invite a few of my friends from college. One of them even RSVP’d. I guess for the others, a stuffy party at a New York mansion wasn’t their idea of how they wanted to spend their Saturday night.”

It’s not really the way I’d prefer to spend mine, either, if I’m being honest. The party will be full of my father’s friends and business associates and people I barely know, and while I don’t want to sound ungrateful for the celebration, I’m going to spend most of it smiling and nodding and pretending to have fun while making sure to not sip too much champagne and get tipsy by accident. It’s not a birthday party so much as it’s a social event for my father’s image—and possibly a way for him to introduce me to the sons of those business associates.

I wince at the thought. That, too, is something I have no interest in. I’d much prefer to be curled up in my room in the soft pajamas that I love, with a glass of champagne that I can sip on at my leisure and a good book or an episode of the latest TV show I’ve been watching on my tablet. At most, I might enjoy going out to a fancy dinner and then coming home. A huge party where I’m the center of attention isn’t my cup of tea, really.

Sebastian chuckles. “Well, I’ll be spending my Saturday night wherever you are, princess. I just go where I’m told.”

I swallow hard, not looking at him as I push forward into the kitchen. This kind of banter is normal between us—the teasing, the nicknames—but it feels charged suddenly, full of innuendos that I’ve never really noticed before. Like seeing him come out of the pool, his muscular body dripping wet, shifted something between us.

I’m not sure that I wanted it to shift. As much as I enjoyed the view, I almost wish I could go back and never have gone into the natatorium at all, just so that I didn’t feel this way. It’s confusing, especially when I know that fantasizing about Sebastian can only damage the comfortable friendship that exists between us. I try not to.

Even so, after three years, it’s hard for him not to factor into those fantasies sometimes.

The kitchen is just as chaotic. The moment we walk in, heading toward the back door, we’re hit by a flurry of voices filling the room—the housekeeper barking out orders to staff, going over the menu with the cook, discussing the ins and outs of everything that’s meant to be served at the party tonight. I can feel the stress in the air, and I bite my lip, wincing as I look at Sebastian. He shrugs, smirking, and we both dart out of the back door and into the warm summer morning.

“Glad to get out of that racket,” he says with a grin as we pause on the grassy lawn. “It’s a madhouse in there.”

“Isn’t it?” I wrinkle my nose. “You’d think the President was coming to visit instead of it being my twenty-first birthday party.”

“Nothing but the best for the princess.” Sebastian grins at me, stretching one arm over his head and then the other in preparation for our run, and my mouth goes dry once again when his shirt rides up and I catch a glimpse of the taut, tanned sliver of flesh beneath it.

What is wrong with me? I tear my gaze away, turning so that I’m not looking at him as I run through my own stretching routine. When we’re both limbered up, we start off down the path at a slow jog that will shortly turn into a run.

“You should try to enjoy yourself,” Sebastian says as he jogs easily alongside me, making it clear that any worries I had about him being too tired were misplaced. “This is probably the last big party like this. It might seem overblown and chaotic right now, but your father isn’t going to be throwing big galas for your twenty-second or twenty-third birthdays, and so on.”

“Until I get engaged. That’ll be a big blowout. And my wedding.” Out of the corner of my eye, I think I see Sebastian flinch. I glance at him, worried he might have tripped on a rock or something, but he seems fine. He’s keeping pace with me as easily as ever. Actually—I frown. It seems like he’s slowing himself down to stay next to me. Like he could take off if I weren’t holding him back.

A bit of my competitive nature takes over, and I speed up a little sooner than I’d meant to. Just as I’d thought, Sebastian matches my pace easily, making it seem effortless.

“Do you ever get tired?” I demand, and Sebastian chuckles.

“I told you I could go as long as you need me to, princess.”

“That’s not what I asked.” I can feel my ponytail starting to cling to the back of my neck, more strands of it sticking to my skin every time it bounces. “Seriously. I think you could lap me right now if you wanted to.”

He shrugs. “That’s not my job.”

I almost shoot back a retort, but I bite my tongue. I know I’m prickly today because of the party, and I don’t want to bicker with Sebastian. Aside from my brother—and as sad as it probably is—he’s my closest friend.

But then again, we’ve spent so much time together over the past three years. He’s seen all of my life, the ins and outs, all the things that happen day to day. I made some friends at college, but I’ve always felt like an outsider with them. I’ve lived all my life so far with more money and privilege than most of them will probably ever have. And it’s not like I can talk about being the younger child of a mafia don. That’s not exactly the sort of thing you bring up during the icebreaker in class… or ever, really.

My brother has always been my closest confidant, because he, too, lives with the pressures of being the child of a powerful mafia kingpin. As the heir, he has pressures even I don’t have to deal with. And Sebastian knows what this life is like. The highs and the lows, the good and the bad. He’s never judged me for being frustrated with it sometimes, even though I have so much money and luxury all around me.

“I think your pace is improving,” Sebastian comments as we round a corner and run through a stand of trees, getting a bit of welcome shade. The air is a bit cooler here, and I let out a sigh, brushing the damp hair away from my neck. “We’d have to time you, but I think we made it here faster than last time.”

“Doesn’t really matter if I can’t enter a race.” I shrug, trying not to sound as bitter about it as I feel. I’d broached the idea with my father of starting to train for a half-marathon and then a marathon, but he’d said it was too dangerous, being out in the open around so many other people all on my own. Too much of a chance for someone to take a shot at me, or enter the race just to grab me.

I think he just doesn’t want me mixing with the riff-raff. He doesn’t see any value in trying to interact with the things ordinary people do. He likes being on his metaphorical golden throne, overseeing Manhattan like a king. I know he sees himself as above the other bosses, Dimitri Yashkov and Rowan Gallagher. And maybe he is. From what little my brother Luis has told me about the family business, the Italian mafia holds the most territory and the most wealth in New York out of the three crime families. 

My family is the closest thing that there is to royalty here in New York—albeit criminal royalty. But if there ever was a king, a prince, and a princess, it would be my father, my brother, and me.

At least here in this state. There are plenty of other mafia families as close as Boston or Chicago, and I’m sure a lot of them think just as highly of themselves.

“We should probably loop back,” Sebastian says, glancing at his watch as we come out of the stand of trees. “It’s past breakfast now. If you’re not careful, with all that chaos going on, they’ll forget all about bringing you something.”

“They wouldn’t dare,” I laugh, but I veer back toward the mansion anyway, taking the fork in the path that will lead us on a shorter route back. Part of me would rather have a shower first, after how hot the run was, but I’m starving.

We come in through the back entrance to find the noise in the kitchen somewhat quieted down. The cook and the other staff barely glance at us—they’re so busy working on the menu for tonight. I think I catch a glimpse of some kind of birds being taken out of brine, and I wonder what exactly the housekeeper came up with for a party menu. My father definitely wouldn’t have had a hand in it, and no one asked me.

Yet another reason why it doesn’t really feel like my party. More like a Gallo event, where I’m expected to be in attendance.

“I’m going to go up and shower and change,” Sebastian says, glancing at me. “While you eat. I’ll come find you later, princess.”

“I’m sure I’ll be fine.” I shove playfully at his arm, and I could swear that for just a moment, I feel the muscle flex and stiffen under my touch. The hair on my arm prickles, like an answering charge to a static jolt. “No one is going to slip in and carry me off while I have breakfast and putter around doing whatever I feel like this morning. Take all the time you need.”

“I like keeping you in my sight.” Sebastian looks at me for a moment, and I feel that prickle again, down the back of my neck and sweeping down my spine in a burst of warmth. “It’s what your father pays me to do, after all.”

The warmth dissipates. I hate being reminded that he’s here because it’s a job, and because he gets a paycheck. It feels like my best friend is someone my father bought and paid for. I know it’s irrational, that Sebastian’s feelings for me run deeper than that, just as mine do for him. But still… I hate it. 

“I’ll see you later,” I say casually, veering off into the dining room. Moments after I sit down, a maid sweeps into the room with a tray that has a glass of orange juice, another one of water, and a cup of coffee that I already know will be made exactly how I like it—cold with a generous splash of white mocha raspberry creamer.

“Here you are, Miss,” she says, setting it all down. “I’ll have breakfast right in for you. The cook already has something staying hot, waiting for you to come back in.”

A few minutes later, the maid comes back with another tray—this one with a plate of eggs covered in shredded cheese, green onion, and chili sauce, as well as a side of fruit and blueberry sausages. She sets it down, waits to see if I need anything else, and then vanishes.

I quickly dig in. I’m extra-hungry after the run this morning, and one perk of no one else being at breakfast with me is that no one will say anything about how much I eat. My father tends to side-eye whatever I put on my plate at meals, clearly worried that I’ll put on weight and become unattractive to whoever he wants to marry me off to. The amount of time I spend running to stay in shape doesn’t factor in, since he’d rather I not do that at all.

Sometimes, I think he’d rather I sit up in my room like a Victorian waif, drinking tea and nibbling at bites of food until he needs me for something. Which isn’t often, since I’m not the heir. Luis is.

“Good morning, 'Stel!” As if summoned by my thoughts, Luis comes hurrying into the room, looking more rushed than usual. He’s wearing black suit trousers and a dark red button-down without a tie, the sleeves rolled up. His dark hair looks messy, as if he’s been running his fingers through it, and I frown at him.

“You, too? What’s got you running around like crazy this morning?”

“A job.” Luis pauses, catching the look on my face. “Don’t worry, ‘Stel. I’ll be back in time for the party, I promise.” He swoops in, dropping a kiss on my cheek. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

“You better be there!” I call out after him as he rushes back out of the room as quickly as he came in, narrowing my eyes after his departing figure.

Other than Sebastian, I’ll only have one other friend at a party that’s meant to be for my birthday. And honestly, the person I want there most is my brother. We’re close in age, only a year apart, and our birthdays are only separated by a month. In a way, I feel like the party should be for him, too, although my father doesn’t celebrate Luis the way he celebrates me. Men don’t have big birthday parties, as far as he’s concerned. Luis is supposed to be tough, indestructible, inured to things like birthday parties and affection.

But as far as I’m concerned, that’s bullshit. We might not have loving parents, but Luis and I have always loved each other enough for an entire family. And tonight?

The thing I want most is for my brother to be there to celebrate with me.