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Chance shrugged, taking another sip of water.
“You asked. And I thought we were just talking.”
Trystan was clenching his jaw so hard, he could hear his teeth grinding.
“What do you mean she hides out in her flat all day long?” he heard himself asking, his tone of voice intense, as if the words were being spoken by another iteration of himself. One who cared very much about the answer to that question.
“Well, she can’t leave without being accosted by the press. She’s shut down all her social media accounts—not that she was very active on them before, mind you… terribly negligent for an attention hog to not post every detail of her life on social media. Anyway, shut them all down because of the harassment.”
“What harassment?” Trystan asked tautly and Chance’s gaze sharpened on his face.
“The usual unimaginative bullshit, people calling her a whore, slut, cunt…”
“Jesus,” Trystan muttered, running a shaky hand over his face. The thought of the sweet, gentle Iris he believed he’d known confronted by such hatred and ugliness was sickening.
“Well, they think it serves her right for the way she treated you. And then all that stuff in her journal about her anxiety and phobias. Fucking weird shit to reveal about yourself to an unforgiving public, if you ask me. Don’t know why she’d do that.”
Trystan glared at the man, knowing what Chance was doing, recognizing that he had a point to prove, but unable to stop him from doing so. Because he wanted to—needed to—hear this.
“Those are the randos on the street. The paps are worse. Because she’s refused to grant any interviews, they’ve gone feral on her. All the pseudo-psychological articles about her so-called clinical depression, pathological stalking tendencies. I think she was described as psychotic and psychopathic in a single article.”
“She’s staying with her family, right?”
“She didn’t want to bring the shitstorm to their doorstep. That was a little naïve of her… because, of course it affected them. They’ve lost business, been harassed, had to change their numbers. The kid brother has been in several fights already.”
Chance said naïve, while Trystan called it innocent. She was so damned innocent. Despite what and who her father had been, despite what she had aspired to be, she had no real concept of how ugly people could get. After all, she’d once confronted a near-rabid beast with sweet optimism and confidence and the belief that he would never really hurt her.
“And Iris is where?”
“Trapped. In her flat.”
Trystan swallowed back a moan at those words.
Trapped. God. She would hate that. She had to be terrified. With no freedom of movement, it was her worst nightmare.
“She checked her messages for the first time last night. Thousands of them. Dozens were threats of bodily harm or death.”
Trystan’s head shot up and his stomach churned.
“What?”
“You had to know this would happen,” Chance said, his voice even—almost affable—and his green eyes somber. “You’re you. She’s a little nobody from Southfields with no weight behind her name. And when you left her unprotected to face the wolves by herself you sent out a very clear message to all the sickos and fuckin’ crazies out there: open season on Iris Hughes.”
Chapter Twenty
Open season on Iris Hughes.
The five words rattled around in Trystan’s brain for the rest of the day. He couldn’t get it out of his mind. Along with the fucking horror he felt at the knowledge of everything she’d been subjected to these past few weeks.
Chance had clammed up after that last statement, going back to his usual monosyllabic, taciturn self. Although Trystan was starting to believe that the usual that Chance showed Trystan was not the usual he presented to everyone else.
The other man had politely deferred from answering any further questions about Iris and had excused himself to take a quick shower. The rest of the day he’d spent lurking and hovering, occasionally playing with Luna, and vetting any of Trystan’s unscheduled drop-ins—from the pizza-delivery guy to Trystan’s PA. He’d left at six-thirty, when Caleb had arrived to take over babysitting/bodyguarding duties.
After picking at the pepperoni pizza he’d ordered for dinner, Trystan eventually retreated to his den with Luna, leaving Caleb in the living room with a thick book. Trystan didn’t usually have a round-the-clock in-house protective detail, but Sam felt the extra precautionary measure was necessary for the next few months or weeks, at least. And Trystan found it easier to acquiesce than argue with the man.
Luna settled down on the sofa next to him and immediately fell asleep. Trystan envied her that easy descent into oblivion. He scratched behind her ears, and she moaned in contentment without opening her eyes.
He reached for his laptop on the coffee table, hiked an ankle onto the opposite knee and rested the lightweight device on his thigh. He stared at the closed computer for a second before swallowing thickly and opening it.
