Chapter 3: Sebastian Princeton, Prince of Hearts – Part 1

Sebastian Princeton wanted to throttle his triplet siblings—Tristan and Logan—for making his life a living hell. First, they invited themselves into his luxurious apartment in Manhattan. Though there were five large bedrooms, a fitness room, a modern kitchen, and a comfy lounge, he still thought it was a bit crowded, having gotten used to living alone for the past five years with only the occasional visits from his parents and grandparents.

The first night, they brought in their friends and had a blast partying in the house, emptying his cellar and fridge and destroying some of his precious paintings and photographs he’d bought from an unknown, talented artist he admired. The second night, they refused to let him stay home to finish his work and dragged him out drinking until the early hours of the morning. Their argument was, “It’s Saturday!” The third night, they told him to get packing because they were leaving for St. Joseph Island three days early for their cousin Mary’s wedding to surprise the bride-to-be—and their mom and dad, of course.

Sebastian knew instantly it was that damn Tristan’s idea, who only wanted to annoy the hell out of him, and naturally, Logan went along. Then Hayden arrived on his motorbike, crashing on Sebastian’s king-size bed without an invitation, informing them he was now homeless and girlfriendless. His girlfriend had kicked him out after she’d seen him hugging another guy and had wrongly assumed him to be gay and cheating on her. The guy, of course, turned out to be Darcy.

Tristan burst out laughing until his stomach hurt when Hayden explained that he’d been comforting Darcy by patting Darcy’s shoulder—not hugging him—who’d had a bad breakdown because his girlfriend dumped him for another guy. Then Darcy arrived—all wounded and heartbroken like a little pup—as Tristan kept telling everyone, including Darcy himself, who in fact didn’t give a shit whether this new ex-girlfriend of his dumped him or not and was indeed very glad the stagnated relationship was over.

Tristan insisted they had no choice but to comfort Darcy by taking him out drinking until early dawn, which in due course led to a house full of men with hangovers the next morning accompanied by lots of moaning, groaning, and of course, very colorful cursing from Darcy, who naturally wanted to also throttle Tristan for his distasteful tricks. They all knew Darcy couldn’t handle much alcohol, and they forced him to have shots after shots.

By that evening, they were completely sober except for Darcy, who was still nursing his headache. Sebastian, on the other hand, had had enough and swore if this ever happened again, he’d throttle his brothers for sure.

The next day, Sebastian was on a warpath once again. It was entirely their fault that he was now as wet and cold as a drowned kitten and his laptop stuffed up. If Tristan and Logan hadn’t been fooling around near the railing on the lower deck of their two-million-dollar, brand-spanking-new luxury yacht, trying to get a peek at his new apartment plan, then he and his laptop wouldn’t have gotten thrown off board into the ocean. Furthermore, if he wasn’t such an excellent swimmer since he’d been one of the best professional athlete swimmers during his late teens, he could have buried himself and his laptop deep under the ocean.

“I’m sure Hayden can fix it,” Tristan said coolly, throwing him a dry towel.

Sebastian glared at his brother as the towel landed on his head, partially covering his face and eyes that were glinting with fire.

“Nope. Can’t fix it,” Hayden said matter-of-factly. “It’s totally stuffed, bro. Better get a new one.”

“Jesus! My work!” Sebastian muttered, looking heavenward as he pulled down the towel. “It’s not the laptop! It’s my work!” he growled.

“Surely you have a backup, right?” Conrad, the youngest of the brothers, put in calmly from the other side of the pool.

“Of course, but—”

“Ah.” Logan butted in, putting down his martini. “Girlfriends.”

“What?” Sebastian snapped. He was at his limit and was ready to throw at least one of them into the ocean, and that person was preferably Tristan who was smiling cheekily on the other side of the pool a good distance away.

Tristan knew he was in trouble, and it was best for him to keep out of reach since Sebastian had very powerful fists. After all, Tristan had seen too many times to count when perfectly good-looking faces got restructured into very distorted ones with a few of Sebastian’s mighty punches. Of course, Tristan didn’t want his gorgeous face to be ruined, and what would he do without his handsome face and flirty smile? The girls wouldn’t bed him, that was for sure, and Tristan would be very devastated indeed.

“He’s pissed because all his girlfriends’ photos are ruined,” Logan said matter-of-factly, emphasizing the word girlfriends as plural.

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Sebastian replied. Though he had to admit it was losing the photos that really pissed him off since he hadn’t backed up some of the most recent ones on his hard drive.

“I didn’t know you had a girlfriend, Sebastian,” Tara said, sitting across from him, her slender body posing elegantly on the poolside lounge. She tossed her hair over her shoulder and leaned toward Sebastian—the brother she’d always wanted. Only, so far, she’d never been able to grab his attention let alone his interest in her as a woman. In fact, all the brothers had always treated her like a sister, like they treated Alaina, which annoyed the hell out of her.

“He doesn’t,” Alaina butted in, pulling herself out of the water. She grabbed a towel resting on the side of the pool, wrapped it around her, and sat down beside Tara. “My poor brothers,” she said. “When will you all get a nice girl and settle down? Aside from you, of course, Conrad, since you’re still too young.”

Conrad snorted at his sister to show her his annoyance and returned his attention to his tablet, playing the new, not-yet-released zombie game Hayden and Darcy had given him as a trial from their video game company, HD Game, Inc., which they had built themselves from scratch a year ago.

“Don’t feel sorry for me, Alaina. I’m not ready to get tied down yet.” Nicolas chuckled. “I like my freedom.” He took a sip of his cocktail and then relaxed back on the poolside divan, gazing up at the sky above. “Twenty-eight is still too young to settle down,” he murmured to himself.

“What about Dad’s offer?” Darcy asked.

Nicolas raised his brows.

“Didn’t he want you to take over Princeton Group?” Sebastian queried. “He’s ready to retire.”