Chapter Seventeen – Mabel
Sometimes avoidance is easier than its opposite. I’d be lying if I said I feel ready to talk with Tristan, but at the same time, I can’t keep putting it off. Spending all that time alone, lost in my own thoughts, reliving scenes where Jordan saved me, helped me, proved to me that I was the only person he really cared about, was driving me nuts.
But I don’t want to have the talk in the house, where Dr. Wolf could stumble upon us, so I put on my tennis shoes, tug on a heavy hoodie, and search for Tristan. I find him sitting outside, staring off into the distance, and I march right up to him and say, “Tristan. Let’s go for a walk.”
I’ve never seen a man jump up so fast. His reflexes are amazing; he’s as graceful and quick as a cat. His dark eyes study me. “Are you sure you should with your ankle?”
“If it starts hurting, we’ll stop, but I want to go for a walk.” My ankle feels better today; it really only hurts if I put my full weight on it for extended periods of time or bend it weird. I can walk just fine.
I think.
Tristan nods. “Okay. Then let’s go.”
Tristan knows the woods around the house better than me; he ends up leading the way to one of his chosen spots. It’s not too deep in the forest, though it’s far enough away the house is nothing but a memory. A small creek runs through the forest, its water crystal clear and its short shores full of pebbles and smoothed-out stones. It flows a constant, gentle current, and the sound of it fills the air and brings a sense of serenity to the surrounding area.
I watch as Tristan kneels beside the tiny stream. He divides his time between watching the water flow and looking up at me. He doesn’t say a word; the man waits for me to speak.
“Who is Shay?” The question comes out faint, soft enough it’s not easily heard. It’s something I’ve wondered since he showed me the name etched on his skin, but I only ask now because Dr. Wolf suggested it—and because of that, it must be related to this clusterfuck in some way.
Tristan tugs at his sleeve, revealing the name carved into his flesh to us both. He runs his fingers over the uppercase letters while I ready myself for what I assume will be a doozy of an admission.
“She’s the one who shot me,” he whispers. “The only one in the world who could’ve stopped me.” His hand curls into a tight fist, and the muscles beneath the name on his arm flex in response. “Everything I did… it was for her.”
The more he talks, the more I get it. This Shay person is someone he loved, someone he probably loved more than life itself. It’s something I can understand.
It’s also something that makes me weirdly jealous, but I’d never admit that out loud.
“I gave up everything for her. I would’ve changed the damn world for her. I tried to give her what I knew she always wanted.” Tristan shakes his head as he mumbles, “I killed our parents for her. I killed so many—”
I’m sure he says more, but I don’t hear him. My mind is too busy replaying what he said before. Our parents . He killed their parents. Their , as in, their shared parents… meaning Shay is his sister.
Oh, my God. This has to be a joke. There is absolutely no way this can be real.
Before I know what I’m doing, I’m laughing. It’s a crazed, out-of-my-mind sort of laugh, but a laugh nonetheless.
Tristan stands, his expression twisting into a severe scowl. “What’s so funny?” He tugs down his sleeve and covers up his sister’s name, but it’s too late. I already know the truth, and I can’t believe it.
“Nothing,” I say as I throw up my hands. “It’s not funny. It’s terrible. It’s—” I can tell he thinks I’m laughing at him, which isn’t the case. “We make a fun pair, don’t we? The guy who loved his sister a bit too much, and the girl who—” I bite my bottom lip to stop myself from saying it.
Even now, I don’t know that I can say it.
“Before Dr. Wolf said something, I never thought about it. It never occurred to me that, maybe, what Jordan and I had wasn’t normal. I would’ve blindly followed him anywhere. He was everything to me. He was my whole life. I never really cared about not having friends. It didn’t bother me that I never got asked out. I didn’t care about boys. The only boy I ever cared about was my brother.”
I meet Tristan’s gaze. He doesn’t scowl at me anymore; I think he’s realizing that I wasn’t laughing at him. “When I first met you, you did remind me of him. You’re violent. You’ve killed. But now… you’re nothing like him. He was all charming smiles and pretty lies while you don’t hide from the truth of what you are. You’re not Jordan.”
A shaky breath leaves me before I whisper, “And I hope I’m not Shay.”
Tristan steps over the creek to reach me, and his hands lift to cup my face. “You’re not.” He steps closer to me, his tall figure blocking out the rest of the world. “You’re so much more.”
My eyelids fall as I listen to him. Strange how effortless it is, how I believe him. Realistically, we’re strangers, but on a deeper level, I think we recognized each other immediately. Everything that could’ve been, everything that wasn’t, only led to everything that is and will be.
This is where I’m supposed to be.
As my eyes flutter open, Tristan watches me with concern. His thumbs caress my cheeks. “You don’t… think less of me?”
It’s hard for me to think about Tristan being different, about him being as dangerous as his past shows. Then again, it’s difficult for me to look back and think about the person I used to be, too. The old me, for example, would’ve been terrified to be alone with someone like Tristan.
Now? Now everything has changed. I’ve changed—and I think Tristan has changed, too.
We are two souls, broken by our pasts. Maybe together we can be whole.
So I give him the only answer I can, a short and simple “No.” As soon as the word leaves me, Tristan’s face tilts down, and his tall frame bends to close the distance between us. With his hands on my face, I couldn’t turn away even if I wanted to—but I don’t want to.
The world fades away around us. With the truth out there, with both our truths out in the open, there are no walls up. Nothing to stop us. Nothing to hinder the absolute yearning boiling inside us both.
Nothing else matters except the here and now. Everything in my past, everything I did, everything that haunts me, is gone just like that. The only thing I can focus on is the way Tristan kisses me, like he needs to steal the air in my lungs for himself and he can’t survive on any other air. The heat, the passion, the desperate eagerness laced with each push and pull of our mouths together.
This is it. By a twist of fate, I found someone who understands me, who doesn’t judge me, someone who can look at me without hatred in their eyes.
Tristan’s mouth doesn’t leave mine as his hands fall to my sides and he picks me up. I wrap my arms around his neck, and within five seconds my back is against a tree, where he pins me, holding my legs on either side of him.
He kisses me hard, so hard I fear my lips might bruise, but I welcome it. The intensity swallows me completely, and the only thing I can do is hope that I match it.
His lips break away so they can nuzzle my neck, and I breathe out a sigh as I shiver against him. “Maybe,” I whisper as he nips my earlobe, “we should go back to the house.” It’s not that I don’t enjoy making out in the middle of nowhere, but I think we’d both be more comfortable at the house, where I can take off this hoodie and feel even closer to him.
Tristan leans his forehead against mine, his black eyes boring into me. “Whatever you want.”
He ends up carrying me back—even though I tell him I can walk just fine. I think he likes having hold of me. Soon enough we’re upstairs, in my room, on my bed, no jackets hindering us as our bodies entwine.
God. I never knew things could feel so… so natural. Kissing him, feeling him hold me; it’s effortless, and I never want this moment to end.
Tristan must be on the same wavelength as me, because he breathes out the words, “I never want to let you go.”
“Then don’t.” It’s out of me before I can stop it, and as we lay there on my bed, side by side, Tristan brings a hand to my face. The way he touches me, so gently, truly makes me feel like I’m this amazing, precious thing. I can’t say I’ve ever felt anything like it.
What makes it so easy? What makes it so perfect? Beyond the fact that our pasts have tried to suck the life out of us, deep down we both always wanted more. Tristan needs someone to hold onto, and I… I need someone to hold onto me, to ground me to reality, to keep me sane.
If this is anything close to the movies, then I get it. I totally get why people turn into fools for love.