Taken [Zayn Malik]

ch.24 One on one

Sebastian tightened his grip around my hand and stood in front of me, which only pissed Zayn off that much more. Sebastian squared his already broad shoulders, making it hard for Zayn to even make out one of my eyes let alone my face.

Zayn's guards jerked forward, ready and eager to finish Sebastian in a heartbeat, but Zayn wanted to fight old school: one on one.

"You locked me up, not her. She has nothing to do with this!" Sebastian reminded Zayn. 

I almost laughed out of anxiety and guilt. I was right dab in the middle of this and I couldn't scream at Zayn without Sebastian realizing that I had been unfaithful to him.

But, I also couldn't save Sebastian if he was too busy trying to protect me from a man who had taken me in the first instance, but who I had  already and happily given myself to.

Zayn was about a hair's breath from beating Sebastian to a pulp when he returned his attention to me. His neanderthal rage subsided the faintest bit and he realized that I had not only seen Sebastian in the cell he's been locked in for months, but I was holding Sebastian's hand instead of his.

"Tarini, I-I can explain everything" Zayn mumbled desperately.

"You're such a goddamn liar!" I screamed furiously. 

"Tar, please-"

"GET AWAY FROM ME!" I shouted.

Zayn looked down shamefully. Then his jaw tightened and I knew the gears in his psychotic brain were twirling and spinning, thinking of ways to torture me and Sebastian.

I held tightly onto Sebastian's upper arm, which made Zayn angrier and that much more desperate.

Sebastian blinked.

"How do you know her name?!" he demanded. He took a confident, but still stupid step forward and Zayn's guards yanked him away. 

Sebastian turned to me momentarily and then looked down at my corset and my heart sunk low in shame. He knew the truth, that I had gotten over him and fallen for Zayn, but, just like my reaction to Jimmy's news that Sebastian was not only alive but in the castle, I refused to believe it.

Sometimes, it's just easier to believe in a pretty lie because the reality of the matter is too ugly to bear.

"Tarini, please, come on" Zayn nodded hurriedly. He reached for my hand, but Sebastian shoved him back.

"Leave her alone, you perv!" Sebastian shouted furiously. He grabbed Zayn's perfectly pressed suit collar and pinned him against the grimy dungeon walls.

Zayn's eyes glazed with such raw and infinite fury that my chest tingled anxiously. He clenched his fist and swung at Sebastian's face, hitting him right smack in his nose.

"SHE IS MY QUEEN AND IF YOU DON'T LET HER GO BY THE TIME I SIFT MY FINGERS THROUGH MY HAIR, YOU WO'NT SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY AGAIN!"

Sebastian blinked. He didn't take a moment to wince or hold his easily broken nose.

Instead, he turned to look at me over his shoulder and swallowed hard. A sudden, but much deserved pang of betrayal whispered from his soft, usually teasing, but still warm brown eyes and I looked away.

Yet, instead of yelling at me and leaving me for leaving him, Sebastian turned to Zayn.

"YOU SICK BASTARD, HOW DARE YOU TOUCH HER!" he growled. 

Not only had Zayn kept him hostage for the past few months, he had also somehow convinced me to fall in love with him and stay with him. The fact that I stayed on my own terms after he revealed his so-called "curse" made me even more sick than the months that he had forced and chained me into staying.