2. Tristan
TRISTAN
I enter the locker room, and I'm alone with my thoughts, with none of Hayden’s theatrics to distract me.
The memory slams into me, the one that rips me open no matter how many times I replay it.
The night of the carjacking, we were on our way back to campus from a family outing Dad insisted we go on.
It wasn’t that long ago, but it feels like a lifetime of torment since that night.
The crunch of gravel under the tires when they forced us off the road is so loud in my mind that it feels like I’ve been transported back in time.
There was a smell of gasoline, and I’m not really sure where that came from.
The car doors were yanked open, and everything I knew about safety was gone.
My mother’s scream was loud as they dragged her out and shot her in the head, killing her almost instantly.
My father didn’t even put up a fight when they punched and kicked him.
Sebastian did because he knew I had to protect Winter.
It was three armed men against the two of us, and all I had on me was a pocket knife.
I remember Winter’s body jerking when Sebastian’s head struck metal, his body crumpling unconscious beside the vehicle.
When one of them tried to jerk Winter away from me, she cried out, her arm twisted hard enough she couldn’t lift it for weeks after the incident without being in pain.
So for weeks I was the one who braided her hair because she couldn’t raise her arms. I did it with hands that had already broken her, and she let me.
She let me close. She let me touch her, even though I didn’t deserve to.
I can still see her terrified eyes locking with mine in the dark that night. She was looking at me to protect her like I had for all the years she’d lived with my family.
They said they were going to take her. One of them laughed, said he wanted to see me fuck her first that their boss wouldn’t know the difference.
That still sticks out to me. I don’t know who wanted her so badly they were willing to go to these lengths.
One of her previous foster families seems unlikely, but I haven’t marked it off the list of possibilities.
No one has been marked safe if I’m honest, and I will find out who was behind it.
I can still hear it, the filth in his voice, the way the others jeered about how she probably wasn’t a virgin because of how old we were.
We were in college, it wasn’t that long ago, but she was.
I was too. She never really showed an interest in dating anyone, always so content with hanging out with me and sometimes Sebastian.
And anyone who remotely showed an interest in her?
I’m no better than Hayden and Callum. I took care of them in any way I saw fit, and I’d do it again.
I don’t really have that problem now because I’ve made a reputation for myself on this campus and the surrounding universities.
They know the rules. Hands off what’s mine if they want to keep their body parts intact.
Hot water stings my skin as I step into the shower, and my stomach clenches when the memories come back in waves.
I had a choice that night: let the men drag her away and hope I could track her down and get her back before they killed or delivered her to their boss, or buy time the only way I could.
So when one of them, clearly thinking we were blood siblings, said it would be hot to see me fuck her.
I did it. I hurt her with my own hands. She looked at me and nodded, like she knew the cards we’d been dealt.
But her choosing me in that moment over violent strangers doesn’t do anything to quell the ache in my heart.
With their eyes on us, with their laughter echoing around us, I forced myself over her and took from her what should have been hers to freely give.
My body obeyed while everything in me screamed that I was a monster.
I am a monster.
When Sebastian woke up and was looking for an opportunity to jump in, I knew he needed a distraction.
I also knew if she was injured, it would be harder for them to just grab her and run.
I waited until Sebastian was able to grab my father’s gun that had fallen to his side, and I gave him the distraction he needed by slicing into Winter’s thigh, just deep enough to make her bleed.
“What the fuck?” One of the men had yelled, but it was too late.
Sebastian shot them both in the head, and the third?
He took off running as Sebastian shot at him.
I watched as he grabbed the side of his black mask near his cheek, and I knew one of the bullets nicked his face.
I’ll never stop hunting him, and when I find him, he’ll wish he had died that night.
Ultimately, Winter should hate me. She should recoil from every touch, every glance, every reminder of what I did.
But she doesn’t. She still lets me close.
She still lets me breathe her in, and that’s what ruins me most of all.
Because she’ll never understand that she is the only one I will ever want, and I already destroyed her.
She’s supposed to be off-limits in every single way.
Every part of me knows that. Foster care papers, society’s rules, every line drawn in permanent ink that says she’s untouchable.
But it doesn’t matter. Because if I can’t have her, no one else will.
No one deserves her. She’s mine in every way that counts, even if I’ll never be good enough to keep her.
I try every fucking day, but it’ll never be enough.
The truth I’ll never say out loud is that I haven’t come once since that night.
Not once, not even from thinking of her, imagining how our first time should have been.
Still with each other, but alone. I always want to just be alone with her, and that’s been since day one, so I doubt that will ever change.
Winter is the only woman I’ve ever touched, the only body I’ve ever been inside.
And it kills me that the memory isn’t ours.
It isn’t love, it isn’t gentle, it isn’t anything but survival for her.
She doesn’t know that every time I close my eyes, it’s her I ache for.
Her scent, clean and soft and just her. Her warmth pressed against me when she curls into my lap and breathes against my chest like I’m not a monster.
I get hard just thinking about her, so hard it hurts, but guilt crushes me flat before I can ever finish.
I don’t deserve the relief. Not when I stole everything from her that night just to keep her breathing.
I would have rather hurt her myself than watch someone else touch her.
I’d like to say I’d make a different choice now that I know the consequences, but that’s a lie.
Last night was supposed to be like always…
me unraveling, Winter slipping into my room, soothing me until I had enough control to send her away.
My routine. Our routine. But last night I was too weak.
I didn’t let her go. I let her stay like a selfish bastard.
I already miss the rise and fall of her chest under my face, my breath syncing to hers until I finally passed out.
Forbidden. Perfect. Mine.
The intimacy sears me from the inside out.
Her hand stroking my hair like she didn’t realize how dangerous it was to touch me that way.
My face pressed into her breasts, the safest place I’ve ever known.
I shouldn’t crave it, but I do. I crave this girl like oxygen.
The shame coils with the desire until I don’t know which is worse…
wanting her or needing her. All I know is both burn hotter than anything else in my life, and she consumes me.
I can’t sleep without her.
I can’t focus without her.
I can barely fucking breathe without her.
She owns me in the most complex sense. Mind, heart, body, and soul.
I belong to Winter LeBlanc.
I barely hear the guys entering the locker room, and it’s only when I’m out of the shower, putting in my headphones that the pain in my chest eases slightly.
I hear her, the way she breathes when she’s sleeping peacefully.
This is the only soundtrack to my life I’ll ever need.
She doesn’t know that I record her while she sleeps, that the sound of her breathing is the only thing that gets me through the times we’re not together. Somehow, I don’t think she’d mind.
That’s the most heartbreaking thing about my girl, she never minds anything when it comes to me.