Chapter 34
Tristan
"Fuck, Astrid."
She had no idea—no idea—what hearing those words from her lips did to me. And it also meant something else, something that meant the world to me.
"So..." I ventured, "you believe me now? You know I wasn't the monster you thought I was for the last ten years?"
"I do. I mean, I don't." She shook her head, then laughed. "Wait, what was the question? I got confused. I... I'm still thinking about what just happened in front of the mirror."
"Oh, yeah? You liked that?"
"I loved that."
"You know I have a room full of mirrors at my place."
A line formed between her brows. "You do?"
Not able to keep a straight face, I let out a laugh. "No. I'm just joking. But it might be something to invest in."
She smiled up at me. "It might."
For a moment, we were silent, and I reveled in how her body responded to me, the goosebumps rising up on her arms as I gently stroked her.
I noticed her eyes straying to the forgotten letter by the door, and I braced myself for her next logical question.
"What's in the letter, anyway?" she asked, just like I'd predicted. "I assume you wrote about what really happened and how you were innocent."
The specific words were fuzzy with the passage of time, but I did remember some of my thoughts as I wrote it. "No, actually, I didn't. It was just a general apology, probably a really lame apology."
She paused a beat before she spoke. "I'm guessing you were trying to protect your friends. Am I right?"
"I guess, although I really shouldn't have." The way my brain worked then was very different from who I was currently. "If I hadn't taken the blame, if I'd told everyone what really happened that day, it would have saved you from their bullying the rest of the year."
"I seriously doubt that. And I doubt the school would have done anything, only if I'd brought my parents into it."
"Fucking St. Lucius."
"You can say that again."
So I repeated it a few times. "Remind me to never give anything to their alumni fund."
She laughed, and I was glad we'd moved on from the awful memories. I'd talk about it all as much as she wanted or needed to, of course, but I was so ready to focus on the now, the possibilities before us, the baby coming in our near future. My God. The baby.
"I'm so glad you figured out who I was," she said. "I was terrible at the revenge game. My heart really was never in it."
I kissed her on the head, inhaling the sweet scent of her, peaches maybe.
"I wasn't going to stop until I found you.
I'm not sorry to admit that I kept notes on every little detail you said, about your family, where you lived, and eventually, it all pointed to the great Miss Astrid Stratton, and I can't fucking believe I didn't put it together sooner. "
"Yeah, what kind of stalker are you?"
She was so damn cute. "Any kind you want me to be. And can I just tell you something?"
"Of course. Anything."
"I'm so fucking excited for our future." I began to pepper her face with kisses, punctuating each word with my lips and mouth. "You. This baby. Our future. Together. A new life. A new job. A new—"
She pulled back to stare at me. "Wait just a second. The whole reason we came back here was so I could hear more about you quitting your job. What happened?"
"What happened?" I repeated, thinking about what to tell her. "Well, what happened was I just got sick of it. I'm not sure how much you know about the project I'd been working on—the Southside Flats revitalization."
At those last few words, her shoulders and arms stiffened beside me, and something suddenly clicked in my head. I turned us, shifting my body so I was on top of her, holding my weight off her with my arms.
"Astrid Stratton, did you by chance have anything to do with sabotaging the Southside Flats project?"
She wouldn't meet my eyes, her gaze roaming the room as she clamped her lips together. Was she trying not to laugh? Or was she actually worried about my reaction?
I moved my head in an attempt to get her to look at me, and she finally did.
"Well?" I asked, making sure my tone was light so she knew I wasn't mad.
"Maybe?" she answered, the definition of sheepish. But then her face changed to something more determined, and I fucking loved it. "You know what? Yes, I did. Because it's wrong what you were doing, and it was all part of the revenge thing. But revenge for a good cause."
"God, I fucking love you."
I let some of my weight drop on her, our bodies touching from head to toe, making my dick twitch.
Again? Could I really go a third time?
A look I couldn't decipher crossed her face.
"Am I too much?" I asked. "Can you breathe?"
"Not too much. No. But I had a question, and I can't remember what it was now that you're... you're..."
I couldn't resist her any longer, and my mouth landed on hers in a slow, deep kiss that was apparently all my cock needed. So yes, a third time was a definite possibility.
"Oh, I know," she said, breathless. "Let me ask before I forget. What are you going to do now? You know, job-wise?"
"I haven't exactly figured it out yet—it's still in the works—but whatever it is, it's going to be the exact opposite of what I was doing before."
Her smile lit up her face, lighting me up inside, because that look? It was something I'd rarely seen in life. She was clearly proud of me. And to have the most important person in my life be proud of me?
The feeling was indescribable.
Right when I went for another kiss, my phone made a noise.
"Ignore it," I said, nibbling on her ear.
And we did as I practically made love to her neck, loving that part of her, how sweet she tasted, how she moaned and stretched to give me better access.
But then my phone started up again. And again. Whoever this was, he was a persistent bastard.
"What if it's Archie?" Astrid pulled away. "In the middle of some kind of emergency?"
Shit. She was right.
Reluctantly, I removed myself from the best place on earth and went to retrieve my phone from my pants. And sure enough, it was my little brother.
"Hello?" I answered, doing my best to smother my annoyance.
"Don't act so excited to hear from me, bruh."
"What do you need, Archie?"
"Nothing. I just wanted to say hey. See how your big night out was going."
"It's going great."
"Good."
A moment passed, while my eyes took in Astrid laying on the couch, looking like a queen. No offense to my brother, but I couldn't wait to go back to her.
"What do you need, Archie?" I asked again.
"Okay, so here's the thing..."
I only half-listened because, well, just her existence was distracting, and the fact that she was naked? Fuck me.
But it was something about a friend, food, a zombie apocalypse, and needing money. So cutting to the chase, I quickly sent him a hundred dollars, anything to get off the phone.
Interrupting his shocked thank you speech, I told him to only call me in case of an emergency, to which he argued that this was an emergency, forcing me to hang up and toss my phone aside, quickly taking my place back on top of Astrid, shifting most of my weight to the side.
"Where were we?" I asked, grateful for her smile.
The truth was most women would have been annoyed by something like that, by Archie's huge presence in my life. But not Astrid. She was beaming at me.
Her hand reached up to my bicep where she began stroking my skin. "So tell me what happened at McDonald's."
McDonald's? The question seemed so out of the blue, it took a second to figure out what on earth she was talking about. But then I remembered the comment I'd made that day in the closet, and I laughed.
"You really want to know? Right now?"
"Yes, I've been dying to know."
"It's, uh, kind of gross."
"Tell me," she insisted.
Please don't let this totally ruin the mood.
"So one time Archie went up into this rocket thing in the play area, and after a while, he called down to me, yelling to everyone that he'd pooped and he needed me to come up there."
She collapsed into giggles. "Oh, my God, no."
"Right? But what could I do? I had no choice. And let me tell you, it's not fucking easy for a person my size to maneuver in those small spaces. So I went up there and tried to get him to come down. But he wouldn't. Not until he had on clean underwear."
She snort-laughed, and it was adorable. "So what happened?"
"So I had to go down and get some, then squeeze my way back up there, help him change in this tiny, wobbly rocket ship, handle the poopy underpants, and get us both back down."
Her laughter made me laugh too, our bodies rubbing together, her bare breasts enticing me with every little movement. My God.
Once she finally quieted, she asked, "How old was he?"
"Oh, this was last year," I joked. At her look of horror, I grinned at her. "Just kidding, baby. He was three and fresh out of potty training, just barely made that start of preschool deadline. We seriously had a week to spare. No joke."
Astrid's eyes softened, so much so, I could practically feel the emotion emanating from her.
"What?" I asked. "What are you thinking?"
"I'm thinking you're going to make a great father, Tristan."
That destroyed me, in the best possible way. "You have no idea how much that means to me."
I began to show her, again, but thought better of it. I needed her naked on my bed, totally comfortable with lots of space to explore every inch of her body, to do everything I wanted to do with her.
So I pulled her upright. "Speaking of my brother... he's spending the night at his friend's house. So what do you think of coming over to my place?"
"I'd love that."
I kissed her nose, then helped her with her dress, the two of us working together to look somewhat presentable. As we were leaving, we took one last look around the room.
"I might have to see about buying this room or something," I said, glancing at the mess we'd made on the couch. "Or at the least have it professionally cleaned."
Her laughter was everything to me. "I'm not sure it can be salvaged."
"Maybe we'll just have to set it on fire."
She laughed again as we left the room, the door clicking shut behind us, something about it final, like a goodbye to the past and ten years of misunderstanding.
Together, we walked down the hall, hand in hand, and she leaned into me... warm and soft and mine.
Thanks so much for reading Astrid and Tristan’s story! And that completes this series!