by H. M. Ward
It’s as if holding onto me will make losing Seth less real, less painful. Trystan already lost so much it's hard to find words to comfort him in times like this. What do I say to him? Can I tell him he’s not alone? Can I even promise something like that? I won’t say it without meaning it.
And if I do make promises to Trystan, what does that mean for me? I have a boyfriend—a very sweet boyfriend—who will flip out when he finds out I spent the night in the arms of rock star Trystan Scott. I blink hard and swear I hear my eyeballs moving inside my skull. My head hurts, and everything is amplified. Even Trystan’s soft breathing sounds like a rush of warm wind as it washes over my cheek.
At some point during the night, I made a decision. I wasn’t aware of it until now, but it’s there all the same. I’m not the kind of person who will desert a friend when they’re suffering. I could have said no. I could have gone home and cried on my boyfriend's shoulder, but he didn’t know Seth. There’s something comforting about being around people who knew him—even Trystan.
During the night, both of us told random Seth memories, and the loss didn’t sting so much. Now, in the morning light, this all feels too intimate. I’d have a stroke if Derrick spent the night with his ex, for any reason, wouldn’t I? Can I justify this? Do I need to?
Nothing is going on here. Trystan might as well be my brother for how much he came on to me last night—he didn’t. It wasn’t like that. He cried and buried his face in my neck. He held onto me tightly and mourned the loss of his friend. I couldn’t walk away, and I didn’t want to. Is that bad?
Who am I becoming? I don’t know. I want to be trustworthy and dependable, but the lines are so blurry with this.
I pause for a moment. When did being trustworthy and dependable become my priority? I sound like a Cockapoo. Seriously? Those are the attributes I strive to be? What happened to me?
I roll out of Trystan’s arms and sit up on the edge of the couch. I stretch and feel the morning air kiss the skin of my midriff. Trystan props himself up on his elbow and watches as I stand and walk over to the huge windows overlooking the city. In the distance, wispy puffs of white smoke billow into the sky. Directly below us, the city looks peaceful.
I sense Trystan behind me before I hear him. It’s strange, but that man feels like a part of me. I don’t know how else to describe it. It’s as if he were the other piece of my soul and when we’re near I feel it. It’s like putting two drops of water too close together. They merge into one. I don’t mean that in a sexy way, either. It just is. I don’t question it anymore. At first it terrified me, but not anymore. If I keep my guard up, if I keep his hands off me, we’re still two drops of water.
Last night you were one, the little voice in the back of my mind reminds me.
That sounds way too intimate for my taste. I wish I could figure this out.
Trystan chooses that moment to speak. “Sometimes there isn’t anything to figure out.”
I round on him. It feels like he sucker-punched me. My jaw drops and quivers. I feel so exposed at that moment. Was that luck or something else? He wasn’t touching me! He didn’t see my eyes, so how did he know what I was thinking? “What?” My voice is shaky.
Trystan shrugs as if he has no idea what he did. He steps up to the window and reaches for a hidden lever. When he presses it, the piece of metal pops out. Trystan slides the expanse open and steps onto the balcony. The air is crisp and whips me in the face. He’s still wearing the dark clothes he left the hospital in last night. He leans on the railing and stares out at the city. “Sometimes there’s nothing to figure out, nothing to do. You have to take what life throws at you in stride and keep going.”
I’m next to him, at the railing. The wind blows my curls across my cheek, but I don’t move them away. I don’t even blink. I can’t tell if he’s responding to my thought, or if he even knows I didn’t speak out loud. Trystan seems pensive and somber, so maybe it’s me.
When he glances at me out of the corner of his eye, the connection solidifies. I can feel it lace down from my heart and tug in my gut. My shoulders tingle and the skin on my face feels warm. There were times I convinced myself I imagined this, that this pull to him wasn’t real. But here I am, and it clearly exists.
I swallow hard, not breaking eye contact with him. Not this time. I want to know the truth, once and for all. “Is that what you did? When my mother died? You promised you’d be there and then,” I shake my head, “nothing. You vanished.”
Trystan steps away and I swear I hear his pulse pounding in my ears. His body tenses as a lie forms on the tip of his tongue, but I can’t understand why. Without thinking, I reach for him. My fingers wrap around his wrist, and I hold on tight.
A rush of sounds, sensations, and images flicker through my mind like an old movie. Parts of the memories are missing, burned away as if overexposed. Everything floods my senses in a rush, out of order, and the only thing that I feel for certain is his remorse. It’s a massive storm I’m unable to navigate, one emotion transcending all others, impossible to miss.
Trystan jerks his hand out of my grip and steps away. A deafening silence fills his wake until I hear my own heart thumping in my chest again. I blink rapidly, trying not to cry. I don’t understand. Why did he leave me? If he left me because he'd finished with me, why would he feel remorseful?
Trystan sucks in a jagged breath and shakes his head. “Don’t do that to me.”
Anger springs up from inside me. There’s so much I don’t understand about him, about us, and he's hiding the truth. I'm suddenly sick of the lies. “To you? Don’t do that to you? You do that to me every time you touch me! You can look at me and know everything!”
I search for the right words to navigate such a strange situation, but there aren’t any. Tears prick my eyes, and a scream builds inside me. I finally land on the one thought I want him to hear most of all. “You hurt me. You left me when I needed you most, and it’s difficult to stay here with you now, but—.”
“Then leave.” Trystan turns his back on me and pads inside. He gathers my things and shoves them in my arms. “No one is holding you here, and I don’t need your pi—”
I drop my things on the floor between us and shake my head, “That’s not what I’m saying, and you know it!”
“You said you don’t want to be here, now go!”
“Trystan,” his name comes out in a growl, and I reach for both his hands and hold on tight. His anger is hot and itching to strike. It’s surging through him, hiding old wounds, and this invasion fuels the fire, but I don’t release him. “I’m saying I can’t hide from you. I don’t know what this is between us, but it’s always been there. Sometimes it’s good, but most of the time it’s terrifying. You know my thoughts before I say them. You’re so tuned into me that you can sense how I feel, and I swear it’s more than that. It’s not possible, but here we are, and—whether it’s a gift or a curse—the one thing I want to know most is hidden from me. No matter what I do, I can’t see why you left me. It’s been nine years! Tell me. Please.”
By the time I stop speaking, my hands have slipped from his wrists. I’m spent. For some reason, confessing those things sucked all the emotional strength out of me. My knees feel ready to buckle, and my stomach twists into knots. I can’t stand the silence following my plea. It’s as if I didn’t speak at all. Trystan just stands there staring at me. Apathy feels so much worse than if he'd confessed he'd cheated or done something even more horrible. It’s like a knife in the back, in my heart, and in my eye. There’s nothing that hurts more than realizing he never cared about me.
To keep my lips from trembling, I bite down on them once and avert my gaze. I don’t want him to feel anything, to know anything about me. Not anymore. Without a word, I bend over and scoop my things off the floor. I head to the door hoping he’ll say something, wishing he’d stop me. I can picture the smile on his face as he finally drops his guard completely and tells me what happened that night—why he failed to keep his pr
omise to be there with me—but that doesn’t happen. Trystan remains still, his lips pressed firmly together, his strong arms folded across his chest, his jaw locked.
I cross the room and pull open the door, thankful his apartment doesn’t connect directly to the elevator the way most penthouses do in the city. When my fingers touch the handle, I turn back to look at him. I can’t help myself. I have to say the words that are burning a hole on my tongue. “Out of everything I gave you—my heart, my body, my friendship, my trust—this hurts the most. I helped you tonight, more than once. I did it even though it ripped open old wounds, scars that never healed because I couldn't understand why you would sleep with me then bail. After everything we went through together,” I shake my head and look at the wooden floor. When I glance up at him, I force a smile to my lips. “For the longest time, I thought people couldn’t change—that it was impossible. Congratulations, you proved me wrong. People can change. They can become calloused enough to lose the spark that made them unique. You had that spark, Trystan, and now it’s gone. Have a nice life.”
Chapter 16
Mari
I don’t think after that. I run. Tears well up in my eyes and before I can wipe them away, the elevator doors slide open. I shove through the front doors before the doorman can speak. His hand is in the air, and he calls after me, but I don’t stop.
I should have stopped.
When I’m on the other side of the glass doors, a barrage of camera flashes blinds me. Confusion pinches my face and my arm instinctively darts up to cover my eyes. They hurl questions at me as they take my picture.
“What’s your name?” One man calls out.
A woman with huge dark hair shoves a microphone in my face and bumps it against my mouth. I try to push it away, but she doesn’t back off. “Are you in a relationship with Trystan Scott? Or was this a one-time affair?” I turn away from her and slam into another guy. I expect him to shove a microphone up my nose too, but he doesn’t. The guy takes my arm and elbows his way through the crowd with me in tow until we’re in front of a limo. He opens the door, and I jump inside. The man closes it behind me and gets into the drivers seat. Within seconds, we’re driving through the empty streets of New York City at god-awful o'clock in the morning.
I rub my eyes and feel like scream-crying. I haven’t done that since I was six years old. My dad slapped me across the face because it was inappropriate. I don’t care what’s appropriate right now. I bury my face in my hands and lean forward in the seat.
The driver is quiet for a little while, before asking, “Do you want to head home, Dr. Jennings?”
I glance up at him, surprised he knows my name. The man has a big build, a thick neck, and a shaved head. His skin is dark and tattooed. I don’t recognize his appearance, but his voice jogs my memory. “Bob?”
He grins at me in the mirror. “The one and only.”
“Wow, you look different. Very kickass.” I try to sound light and carefree, but I don’t pull it off.
“I know what you did for him last night, and it was nothing like the paparazzi implied.”
I watch a few cars go in the opposite direction as we head into a tunnel. The yellow lights whiz by as I settle back into my seat. Jumping into a car was nuts, even for me, but I didn’t have much of a choice. “Did he tell you to rescue me, or did you just happen to see me walk out?”
Bob gets a sheepish smile on his face, and I know it wasn’t Trystan. “Dr. Jennings—”
“Call me Mari—unless you want me calling you Mr. Bob.”
He snorts a sharp laugh and looks in the mirror at me. “Mari, he’s not been himself lately.”
“If lately covers the past decade, I’ll agree with you.” I fold my arms over my chest and slump down in my seat. My head is screaming. I close my eyes and tip my head back against the seat.
“It’s not my place to say, but with your showing up when you did—well, I wondered if he pulled that stunt last night hoping to see you again.”
I open my eyes and sit up a little. “That’s insane. Why would he do that?”
“Like I said, he’s not been himself lately.”
I shouldn’t tell him, but Bob is one of the last few people who care about Trystan. “Oh, Bob, it's going to get a lot worse. Seth died last night.”
Bob swears under his breath. We spend the rest of our drive in silence.
As we emerge on the other side of the tunnel, I wonder if Trystan is flaming out. He’s been in the public eye every day for nearly a decade. He’s been showing signs of distress for a while. It’s like watching the hull of a ship get laced with hairline fissures. One day they’ll cut too deep, the waters will come rushing in, and he’ll be over.
I hang my head between my shoulders and regret saying the things I said as I left. No matter what happens between us, I don’t want Trystan to lose it so badly he takes his life. Damn it. I screwed up. We’re not the same. He doesn’t have the luxury of wearing his heart on his sleeve, not anymore. I pressed him for the one thing that would make it easier for me to be around him and didn’t consider how it would affect him.
What if he did crash to get my attention? What if he wanted to say something and I didn’t give him a chance?
I want to pull my hair out. I can’t live with ‘what ifs’ crashing into my skull all day. I have to work later. I need to pull myself together, but I can’t help feeling like I tugged at a string on someone who is coming apart at the seams.
Chapter 17
Mari
Bob drops me off at Katie’s apartment. I want to check on her before I head home. I knock on the door, but there’s no answer. I wonder if she’s still at Seth’s mom’s house or if she’s in bed. I don’t want to leave without checking on her, so I knock again. “Katie?”
If she’s there, she won’t open the door if she’s crying. Katie hates crying in front of people, even me. I turn around and lean against the door with my back while fishing my cell phone from my pocket. I pull up her name and text her.
ME: SO, I SPENT THE NIGHT WITH TRYSTAN LAST NIGHT…
KATIE: WHAT?!?
She races through the apartment and yanks open the door so quickly, I fall backward and slam my butt on the floor. I shriek, and my phone goes flying.
A moment later, Amy opens her door from across the hall. “Are you two all right?” She’s wearing pink slippers and a matching bathrobe.
Katie’s face is glistening with freshly shed tears, but her eyes are wide with curiosity. She gives Amy a thumbs up. “Yup. Mari’s just a klutz. Sorry.”
“Hey!” I protest, but I’m too tired to get up. “My butt hurts.”
“You dirty girl!” Katie bellows as she closes the door on Amy.
I groan and cover my face. “Dear God! You know that woman now thinks I like butt action, right? Jeeze, Katie!”
She smiles and blinks her wet eyelashes at me innocently. “Get up! Spill your guts and all the glorious details of your sexy night with your ex!” She grabs my wrist and starts pulling me across the floor.
I laugh so hard I can’t get up. Katie finally plops down and sits on me. I make an oof sound as Katie laughs. “TELL ME!”
“Fine! I slept with him after patching him up at the ER.”
She bounces on my stomach twice and protests. “That’s not dirty details! You can do better than that!”
“There are no dirty details.”
Katie’s teasing dissipates, and she slides off of me. Katie’s always had radar that could focus with pinpoint precision. “What happened?”
I give her the highlights, starting with thinking Trystan was dead and ending with Bob rescuing me from the reporters and bringing me here. When I finish, my head is against her shoulder, and I want to cry.
Katie listens quietly then wraps her arms around me, giving me a tight hug. “Yesterday sucked.”
“Yes, it did.”
She takes a deep breath and adds, “Thank you for talking to Trystan about Seth. I was so scared to call him an
d tell him that myself. I know that put you in a weird spot, and I can’t thank you enough. I could barely talk last night, and I didn’t want him to find out from a reporter or something.”
I shrug as if it didn’t matter. “That’s what friends are for. Do you need anything today?”
She shakes her head and pushes up off the carpet. “No, I don’t think so.” Katie looks so forlorn, which is strange for someone like her. Normally, she’s all bounce and smiles—a human version of Tigger. I wonder who she’s going to be when she gets through this. I hope I can be there for her, and figure out what she needs.
I get up and follow her into the kitchen. Katie pours a cup of coffee and offers me one. I take it and sip the hot liquid slowly. “My schedule sucks, but I think I can get a few days off work. I’ll go with you to the funeral home and whatever else you need. Just tell me where and when.”
“Thanks, Mari. What I really need... Well... Could you stay here tonight?” Katie asks uncertainly. Her brows scrunch together as she stares at her coffee. “I don’t think I’ll sleep, but I don’t want to be alone right now. I feel strange—like this is a dream I can’t wake up from.” She tucks a piece of hair behind her ear and glances up at me.
“Of course I’ll stay, Katie. I’ll help you however I can, but the thing that helps the most is time. Sometimes the only thing you can do is breathe. These days will come and go, and I can stick around as long as you’d like, okay? Don’t be afraid to ask.”
Normal Katie would give an over-exuberant response, but this time she just nods. After chugging the cup of coffee, she looks at me from over the rim. “I missed something in your story. How did you end up at his place last night?”
“What?” Her question catches me off balance.