Chapter 7
Ella
Where was home now?
Tristan drove me to his house after the doctor released me with a good luck, a sad smile, and the name card of a therapist he highly recommended.
I watched Tristan pack my bag with the clothes I had worn last night, since someone working for him had brought me new ones that morning.
Denim jeans and a white tank top with a light blue cardigan, and white sneakers.
I looked the part. The human one, I mean.
Someone across the street seeing me would not be able to tell that I had been held hostage for days.
No one could even suspect the branding of a V, the size of my hand, on my shoulder.
Nor that I had slept on the floor in my underwear, eating with my bare hands.
I looked tired, but…normal. Things were coming back to me, from this life, the one I was living, not the one stuck in a loop in my head.
Dad. Anja. My job. My reading list that I was now so late on.
I hadn't checked my phone yet. Knowing I was about to give answers I didn't have to people I cared about, or needed to be accountable to, wasn't a sweet perspective.
Pressing the side button of the phone, I watch it come alive and then slid it face down on Tristan’s thick, expensive, glossy living room table.
It wasn't my first time there, yet it felt like new eyes had been grafted to my face, stapled on with force, making it impossible to see life from the same perspective.
This house that I had fallen in sync with on my one night there before being taken was buzzing and spinning and wide, too wide, offering places for monsters to lurk in the shadows and trap me.
Just like that, in the span of a few days, my whole world had shifted.
Sitting on the long beige sofa, in front of walls of books lining the chimney, I notice specks of dust flying in the air, pierced by the morning light. Flying. Freely.
Yesterday, he reached out to me, and I backed away.
Since then, he shifted from calm to agitated, talking more than his usual composed nature allowed.
Offering me water four times and a blanket to rest, flexing and unflexing his hands each time I believed he wanted to touch me, which seemed to be…
permanent. Steps come from the kitchen as he comes closer to me, now changed into a navy suit, white shirt, and a dark tie.
The ensemble is sharp, handsome, and mesmerizing.
An armor, perhaps, one I want to be the only one to know the man behind.
Pointing at him, then at the floor with two hands, followed by the swift motion of an exit, I sign to him.
You should go. Tristan hasn't signed back yet, and it pains me more than I can admit.
“I…” He runs a palm over his jaw, now perfectly neat and shaved with that aftershave that does things to me I have never felt before.
“I need to drive you to your dad first.” he reminds me.
“Matt will be there with other men I hired to make sure nothing goes wrong. You won’t even see them. They’ll be…outside, in other cars.”
“I just want to see my dad.”
“I know.” His hand clenches midair, trying to reach out to me. I bite the nail of my index finger.
“What if… What if he’s mad at me? What if Mara fed him lies and…” I stop, anxiety creeping in. “He’s been there for days without a clear explanation. He must be lost and…”
“The medical staff assured me he was okay, Ella. A little disoriented, but he understands something major happened, and I made sure he was informed that you were coming back as soon as possible.”
“Does he know?”
“No…I didn’t think you wanted me to tell him his daughter had been kidnapped. There’s something else, Ella… Technically, he doesn’t have to be there. We’re walking a tight legal line right now. If you want him to stay there, away from your stepmother, you’d have to become his legal guardian.”
“I know.”
“You do?”
“I can’t even tell you how many times I tried to imagine scenarios to get out of there, and yes, at some point, I thought about this, but Mara won’t ever let me do that.”
“And that’s why I have the best lawyers in town.
” He looks at me, long gone the sweet boyfriend, and here is the businessman again.
“I’ll start the paperwork. If we wait for Mara to agree, we could be stuck in an unfavorable position.
” He looks down, pained for me, and I know he wishes to carry it all by himself, and it only makes me love him more.
“God, Ella, I need to touch you. Even just holding your hand would make this whole thing bearable,” he mutters, a flash of agony dancing on his face.
He shakes his head, blinking. “I’m sorry, pardon me.
I don’t know what got into me. I didn’t mean to pressure you, sweetheart. I just…” My fingers snap twice.
“I miss touching you too.”
“You…do?”
“Each time I try, I see…him,” I admit. “I need to talk to this therapist and make it all go away. That’s no way to live.” I look away.
“Hungry?” he asks, changing the subject.
“Not really?”
“You have to eat.” His gaze runs over me, my obvious loss of weight appalling and difficult to look at.
“I’m not hungry. It’s just…gone.”
“Ella, I’ll feed you myself if need be.” He frowns, and I want to chuckle, because him turning all protective over me eating makes him even more handsome, but then I get hit by the memory of the moldy porridge they fed me on the floor, and I want to vomit.
“Okay, I’ll…I’ll try. I promise.”
“What if I cook you something?”
“You can…cook?”
“I can, um, reheat stuff? Not sure if that’s called cooking, but…
” He shrugs. “I can make you an omelet.” I nod, not having the heart to tell him I am not sure I can stomach any food right now, even though I know how urgent it is for me to eat, get stronger, and recover.
Turning slightly, I observe him in his kitchen, in his fancy suit, his hair brushed like a world leader, his hands opening all sorts of cabinets, looking for plates and groaning at the sight of the glasses instead.
Tristan Ashford, not quite the domestic man.
On my end, I am wearing the fitted denim and white tee his assistant, or whoever is in charge of this, bought for me.
It had been a while since I had, well, new clothes.
Mine were either worn out and stretched from my sisters, or secondhand from the cheapest thrift shops I could find.
My skin has gone pale. I cannot tell if it is the days without sunlight or if whatever I endured simply drained the life out of me.
Mirrors will have to be avoided in the foreseeable future.
Usually, my skin carries a warm golden-brown tone inherited from my mother, but now it looks washed out, almost translucent.
Just…off. I brushed my hair this morning while standing over the sink, expecting to fight through a nest of knots.
There had been far fewer than I anticipated.
Tristan must have worked through most of them yesterday when he washed my hair.
I shut my eyes for a second. Thick, large hands.
Running circles on my nape, scalp, temple, untangling the mess of everything, cleaning and washing away the hurt.
Only the hurt runs too deep, and the wound is too fresh to be sewn yet.
Nibbling at my fingers, I bite my cuticle too hard, gasping. “Don’t bite your nails,” Tristan calls me out from the kitchen with a serious frown that I have missed.
Talkative, moving around, anxious Tristan is not familiar to me, even if that is a side of him.
I would much rather his stern emotional composure that he only opens up to me.
Like a vault, I am the only one with the key.
Ruthless, cold Tristan is familiar. More predictable.
I want to swim back to him. I want to tell him to wait for me on the shore, that I'll be there soon, but that I need to swim on my own.
Rolling my eyes as I hear him tsk me, he finally sets a plate on the dark gray counter, forming a sort of rectangular bridge with no bottom.
“Just a heads-up, my cooking skills aren’t…
” He tilts his face sideways, then winces a little.
“I’m better at other things.” I rest my face over my hand, above the sofa headrest, watching him silently as he busies himself in the kitchen.
Removing his hand quickly from the heater, he shakes it above it, as if he has burned himself.
“Son of a…” I hear him mutter while I repress a smile.
A road made of flowers opens in a street of my heart.
I can see it, even try to smile at it, but I cannot access it.
Each time I try to step onto the cushy grass, an invisible force drags me back to a black forest, where the dark keeps getting darker, and I cannot differentiate fear from horror and night from day.
Despite not being able to touch him, I need to be close.
Close to Tristan means close to the man shielding me, holding a massive iron, shield as hundreds of arrows fly, protecting me from them.
Walking to him, I stop by the sink, playing invisible piano on its edge.
“Sit, sweetheart. It’s done.” He nods, crossing his arms at the plate, giving it a not-so-modest shrug. I wait, for what, God knows. A miracle? A TV host coming out of nowhere with confetti screaming, surprise, it was just a prank; you’re not shattered; please go back to your life.
“What is it?” He frowns, taking me in, his forest gaze mapping my face, searching for answers I do not have. “If you don’t want the food, I can order something.”
I shake my head, signing, “Was it your first time using the kitchen?”