Chapter Twenty-Six
Isabella
I’ve been awake for a while now, just lying in Tristan’s arms.
He’s still asleep.
The last few days have been so strange. Mind blowing, but strange, and I don’t know what to make of them.
He’s in here. He spent the night again and he didn’t leave like he did yesterday.
I’ve woken up in his arms like we’re a couple and this is what we do in the mornings.
His arm is around me, holding me to his steel chest and my hand is laced through his. I remember doing so when I stirred from a nightmare. It was the feel of his fingers lacing back through mine that calmed me.
Now I’m awake again and faced with that same question I had yesterday of what we are and what we’re doing. The same question races through my mind, along with more things to worry about.
I know Tristan and I can’t be together, and this isn’t okay. We’re supposed to be forbidden and I’m pretty sure a secret.
Our situation isn’t the sort where he’s taken me captive to do what he wants with me. There are people here with him who have a plan. He’s not supposed to be up here with me playing house, pretending this is a home, and we’re the guy and the girl who went home with each other from the club.
This is not that. Not in the least. Not even a little bit.
I’m here in his arms and my mind is an ocean of confusion.
I should want to flee, to run forever, and never stop, but being in his arms is the safest I’ve ever felt. Next to him is the safest place I’ve ever been, and those are all thoughts I shouldn’t be having.
Soft lips press against my shoulder and I turn to see Tristan looking at me.
He gives me an uncertain smile. The sort that’s greeting me but acknowledging a new day with its own problems.
“Morning Bellezza,” he says.
“Morning…”
He leans forward and we kiss. We kiss like we’re still in the fantasy of each other. When we pull apart, he shuffles to sit and slides off the bed to pull on his boxers. I sit up then and look at him, wondering what it would be like to be his.
He was married.
What kind of woman did he love? What kind of woman did he give his heart to, to want to spend the rest of his life with her?
I imagine someone he loved fiercely and wanted to protect. Someone he loved with the same love he told me his father had for his mother.
He loved a woman like that, and my father got to her. Killed her. I feel ashamed to think of her. The same shame I feel knowing I’m Mortimer Viggo’s daughter.
He sees me looking at him and stills as he was about to shrug into his t-shirt.
“What, doll?” he asks as if we don’t both have a million things on our minds.
I shake my head. There’s no way I’m going to ask him about her and not when there are more pressing things on my mind.
“What are we doing, Tristan?” I mutter and he runs his hand through his hair in that habitual way.
“I don’t know. I …” He straightens up, pulls on his shirt, and looks at me.
“Tristan, what are you going to do with me?” I can’t live another day with that question hanging over my head. We haven’t talked about it. We haven’t done much talking in the time we’ve spent together, but that’s something I need to know. “I just want to have some idea of what you’re planning for me.”
“I know what I’m supposed to do with you… but I can’t do it yet.”