Chapter Twenty-Five – Tristan
Mabel’s father comes to pick us up promptly at six. Mabel’s wearing an adorably oversized hoodie that swallows her up and a pair of dark blue jeans that hug her legs in a way that’ll make it hard for me to concentrate on anything besides what I know lay underneath. Her yellow hair is freshly-washed and wavy, her gray eyes bright as she leads me from the house to her father’s car.
I step outside, into the early dusk, but I hear my name inside the house, so, half-in, half-out, I stop and I turn to view Wolf approaching me. The man is letting me go out in public without my collar and without his supervision; probably another one of his tests. See if I run or something.
But he suspects I won’t, because if I run, I’d leave Mabel behind—and there’s no way in hell I’d ever do that.
Wolf says nothing until he’s peering outside, at the car, where Mabel and her father are waiting for me. He gives a fake smile and waves for the benefit of her father, and then he turns his full attention on me. “Play nice. If you do, this could be the start of a new beginning for you.” He says not a single word more before he turns around and leaves me standing there.
I expected him to say more. The man likes to hear himself talk.
A new beginning. If anything, Mabel was my new beginning, and it began the first moment I saw her, not now. By comparison, going to dinner with her and her father is trivial. I already feel like a different person; I don’t know how much more I can possibly change.
I push Wolf out of my mind as I head to the car. Mabel got in the front seat with her father; when I scoot into the back I catch the tail end of their conversation. Her father, Mike, was saying something about Mabel looking good, to which I would heartily agree—however, I am of the mind that Mabel looks good all the time.
When I climb into the back, Mike trails off and turns around from the driver’s seat to look at me. He was lighthearted and happy to talk to Mabel, but those emotions fade when he lays his eyes on me. “Tristan. Good to see you.”
Funny. He’s never said it’s good to see me in all the times he’s come to the house to spend some time with Mabel, but I let it go. I let it go and I tell him, “Same.” Believe it or not, I don’t have much experience dealing with the parents of girlfriends. The reason why is obvious.
“Now, I hope you two are hungry. I, for one, am starving.”
We end up at a big chain restaurant a town over; it’s a bit of a drive for us, but Mike fills the silence with questions about Mabel’s new job. Of course, Mabel hasn’t even started yet, so she doesn’t really know the ins and outs, or even when she’ll be working, but it’s clear Mike is excited for his daughter.
I’ll be honest: it’s a strange thing to witness, a father caring for his daughter. My parents, both my mother and my father, never showed much emotion at all. It was seen as a weakness. To be a true weapon, you had to learn to shut them off… or maybe my parents never had real emotions to begin with. Perhaps it was to their detriment, since I killed them.
That’s not something that can ever be a topic of conversation when Mike’s around. Unlike Mabel, I don’t think he’d take kindly to knowing the truth about me and what I’ve done. Not everyone is as understanding and forgiving as Mabel.
I don’t deserve her.
But just because I don’t deserve her doesn’t mean I’ll ever let her go.
We get a booth in the corner of the restaurant, and I sit beside Mabel. She scoots into the booth first, leaving me to sit on the outside. Mike sits across from us, and I can tell he’s doing his best not to stare at me the entire time. He’s trying to watch me without being obvious about it—he wasn’t trained to be nonchalantly perceptive, so his studying is plain.
He’s watching how close I sit to Mabel, how my body is angled in slightly toward hers. He sees how Mabel leans toward me as she looks through the menu, trying to decide what she wants. It’s clear we are comfortable with each other, that we like being near each other, and if I have to guess, I’d say Mike isn’t too thrilled.
The waitress comes over and takes our orders, and once our drinks are in front of us, Mike dives right in. “So, Tristan. Tell me about yourself.”
“Dad,” Mabel whispers.
“What? Is it wrong I’d like to know more about him since you two are spending so much time together?” As he asks, he picks up his drink and cocks a brow at his daughter, and as Mabel sighs softly beside me, therefore admitting he’s right, he takes a sip.
“What do you want to know?” I say. I’m an open book, or as much as I can be, considering most of my past I can never tell him.
Mike shrugs. “Where are you from?”
This much, at least, I don’t have to lie about. “Cypress.”
His face twists in confusion as he must think on it. “Cypress. I can’t say I’ve ever heard of it. Where is it?”
“Not close” is my answer.
Mabel must sense her father is on the offensive tonight, because she jumps in and says, “We’re from the west coast, so we’re not from around here, either.”
“Is it a big city? Small town? Or… what?” Mike needs to know more.
Memories of Cypress flash in the back of my mind, so vivid it’s like I left the city yesterday. It’s a city by every definition of the word: huge skyscrapers, traffic that’ll make you pull your hair out, especially around rush hour, and crime levels an area like this could never dream of.
I say, “Big city. Real big.”
“I know you’re twenty-six,” he says, shooting a fast glance at Mabel, as if wordlessly reminding her that I’m too old for her. “Did you go to college?”
“No. I skipped it. There was no need. I…” I pause, feeling a pang of something strange in my gut. “I was supposed to work with my parents.” Work with them, work for them, take over their position on the Black Hand once they retire. Things were supposed to be very different than what they are today.
Mike perks up at the new bit of information. “And what did your parents do?”
Shit. I guess I should’ve had answers on the ready, pretty lies to tell him to make him happy—because I sure as hell can’t tell him the truth. “They… worked in security. Personal security. It was a family business.”
“Was?” Mike picks up on that lone word. “What happened?”
I can feel Mabel staring at me, and I slowly meet her gaze as I tell her father, “They died.” Because I killed them. “And I lost everything.” Because I dared to want to change my sister’s and my fate.
“I’m sorry,” Mike tells me. “Is that how you wound up as a patient of Dr. Wolf’s?”
“Yes.” Except there was a whole lot of death and mistakes in between.
“Dad,” Mabel says gently as she grabs my hand beneath the table. “Can we talk about something else?”
Whether or not Mike sees the fact that she’s holding onto my hand, he doesn’t address it. Instead, he nods once and says, “I’m sure it’s painful to talk about. We can talk about something else… such as the fact that my daughter seems to like you an awful lot. What exactly is going on between you two? Don’t lie to me. Be straight.”
I can feel Mabel’s tension in the way her hand tightens around mine. She’s nervous. I suppose it makes sense, given her recent history and the teeny, tiny addendum that she’s never been in a relationship before and therefore never had to introduce anyone like that to her parents.
The table is awkwardly silent after that. Mabel is probably trying to think of a way to say it without blurting it out or rambling. It’s a weight I’d gladly take off her shoulders.
“Sir,” I say, adopting a serious, earnest tone, “I care about Mabel a lot. More than I ever thought I could care for someone else. I understand you’re worried about her, and you only want the best. That may never be me in your eyes, but I can promise you that I will never hurt her. She is—” I pause as I glance at her. “—everything to me. And if there’s one thing about me you should know, it’s that I never say things I don’t mean. I was raised to be very direct.”
I don’t think he was expecting something like that to come out of me, because he leans back and does nothing but stare. After a while, he glances between Mabel and I, and whatever hardened resolve he came into this dinner having cracks and fades as he visibly relaxes.
“That’s… I appreciate you saying all that, Tristan. I do. It’s just rough for me, especially because Mabel’s all I have left.” Mike forces out a smile, but I can tell it’s not quite all there. A deep-seated sadness lingers behind it, a sign of everything he’s gone through these past few months.
And I can’t blame him for any of it. Losing his son after finding out the dark, dangerous deeds he was capable of. Losing his wife shortly after. The hate and ridicule that probably came with it. The blame, similar to the self-blame Mabel carries. And now, losing Mabel to Wolf and me. His life has been a rollercoaster lately. His mistrust makes sense.
“I understand.” I squeeze Mabel’s hand beneath the table. “I lost everything, too. Until I met Mabel, I thought my life was over—and then she came in and showed me it wasn’t.”
“He makes me feel the same, Dad,” Mabel says. “He makes me feel good.”
Mike leans forward, sets his elbows on the table as he balls up his hands into fists and leans his mouth on them. His gray eyes dart between us, blinking every few seconds. “Okay,” he says. After a few more seconds he repeats, “Okay.”
It must be a good thing, because Mabel grins at him and tells him, “I love you, Dad.”
“And I love you, too, kiddo.”
Kiddo . The words of affection. Neither of which I’m used to, so I don’t say a word. Is this how normal families sound? It’s like they popped out of a children’s movie or something—although, I guess, a children’s movie would have no place for people with pasts like theirs. Or mine.
And just like that, the attention is off me and my relationship with Mabel. Mabel asks her father about how his night was when he went out with his coworker buddies, and he launches into a story about so-and-so who he works with and their kids and whatnot.
I listen, I do, but most of my attention remains on Mabel. She’s the only thing I care about in the world. Having her next to me, her hand resting comfortably in mine, is so surreal to me, so much so that it feels like I’m caught in a dream.
And if that’s the case, I never want to wake up.
Our food comes after a twenty-five-minute wait. Mike got a steak and some fries, while Mabel chose chicken tenders. I got some type of pasta with some creamy white sauce and grilled chicken on top. When our waitress comes with our food, she’s all smiles, and she sounds nice enough as she sets our plates before us and tells us to enjoy, but her facade is just that: a facade, and it cracks just a bit when she looks at me.
At my face. The scars on them.
She tries not to stare, but her eyes linger on me just a few seconds too long. It would bother me, if I wasn’t beside the one person in the entire world whose presence helps calm the inner turmoil inside me.
Seriously, if Mabel wasn’t here, my inner beast would be tempted to run a sharp knife along the waitress’s throat.
But that’s the old me talking, and as soon as the image of me committing a little murder pops in my head, the waitress turns around and leaves.
The food is good, and I don’t mind it when the topic of conversation once again returns to me. Mike wants to know more about me. Hobbies, what I plan to do once I’m no longer a patient of Wolf’s, stuff like that. Easy questions if you’re anybody but me.
For me, however, they’re anything but. I can’t tell him my hobbies include finding new, fun ways to kill people, so I have to make something up—and it takes me a while. I eventually settle on painting.
Why? It involves patience and a certain degree of knowledge, none of which I currently have, but it always looked like a calming hobby. I wouldn’t mind learning about color theory and all that other shit. Plus, it’s the furthest thing from assassination I can come up with.
As for what I plan on doing once I’m no longer in Wolf’s care… I don’t know. The question stumps me, mostly because I never thought about it beyond wanting to murder Wolf. I don’t know what the hell I’ll do, if the day ever comes, but one thing I do know for certain.
Anywhere Mabel goes, I’ll follow. If she wants to stay here in this small mountain town, then that’s where I’ll gladly spend the rest of my life.
I don’t tell Mike that, though. I just shrug and say I don’t know, to which he responds, “I’m sure you’ll figure it out. You might be twenty-six—” At that he coughs, like he’s reminding Mabel I’m a bit too old for her. “—but you’re still young. You have a lot of life ahead of you.”
“Yeah,” I say. “I guess I do.”
A bizarre notion to me, seeing as how I would’ve sworn my life was over when my plans in Cypress failed and backfired, blowing up in my face. To have a life ahead of me, to be able to choose what I want to do… it’s all new to me. Every single aspect of it. It’s almost overwhelming.
And I wouldn’t have any of it if it wasn’t for Mabel.
By the time Mabel and I are back in her bedroom, it’s just after eight. The sky is pitch-black outside, a sign of the approaching winter months, ready to knock. Wolf doesn’t bother us, which leaves us to cuddle under the sheets. Mabel lays on her side, curled into me, and I have a single arm around her.
“That actually went better than I thought it would,” she whispers, and I can practically hear the grin in her voice. “I thought my dad would put up more of a fight about us.” She angles her face up toward me. “It definitely helped that you were so nice.”
“What can I say? You bring it out of me.”
“Maybe you’re nicer than you think you are.”
That makes me chuckle softly. Laying there in her room, with nothing on but a lamp on the nightstand, I know exactly what I am, what I used to be. None of which I would call nice .
Mabel senses my thoughts and says, “You can do terrible things. I know. But just because you can do those things doesn’t mean you can’t also be nice. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that we’re all capable of both. It just takes the right moment to pull it out of us.”
Her words strike a chord within me, make me feel some kind of way. “How’d you get so smart?”
She hums as she rests her head on my bicep. “I guess I’ve just had a lot of time to think lately.”
I roll onto my side and angle her head back by moving my hand to her jaw. She’s pliant in my grip, ready and waiting, and I bring my mouth to hers, kissing her slowly, taking immense pleasure in the way her supple lips give in to mine. She moans quietly into the kiss, and I gobble up the sound as my body naturally moves to be on top of hers.
I am a man with nothing to prove, not to Mabel, but that doesn’t stop me from worshiping her and every inch of her body like I have the world to prove. She is my salvation, and I will forever treat her as such.
It’s something I’ve come to realize a while back, but it really hits me right then.
There is absolutely no future out there for me if Mabel isn’t by my side.