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“Iris, I’m more experienced than you. Maybe he’s reluctant to be interviewed by a complete novice, but I have some credentials at least. I’ll even share the byline with you.”
Iris hated that it had taken her this long to recognize that the person she’d considered her best friend was just another bully, and had always been a bully. Only she’d been slyer about it, with her subtle little put-downs, her gentle concern about how Iris just wasn’t tough enough for the industry. Everything she’d ever said and done had been to make herself look and feel more important by making Iris feel small.
Now, as Evan continued to plot and plan and ponder ways to snatch Iris’s so-called big fish right out from under her nose, her callous disregard of Trystan’s wishes infuriated Iris and stirred up her protective instinct. Evan was never getting her greedy hooks into Trystan. Not if Iris had anything to do with it.
“Evan, back the fuck off!” Iris snapped, shutting the other woman up, and Evan’s mouth dropped open. “As soon as I hang up this phone, I’ll be blocking your number. There will be no contacting him with unsolicited requests for interviews. Ever. Am I making myself clear.”
“Jesus, when the fuck did you get so selfish, Iris? You’re the one who doesn’t want the interview, why not give it to someone who does?”
“Goodbye, Evan,” Iris disconnected the call without another word and instantly blocked and deleted the woman’s number from Trystan’s phone. She then had a moment’s panic that Evan could somehow track down the phone’s GPS location and went into his location services, which she discovered were already switched off.
She heaved a sigh of relief and then shuddered in reaction. The thought of the ugliness of the real world intruding here, in this safe haven Trystan had found for himself, was disturbing and she hated that she’d been the one to nearly ruin it for him.
Of course, there was no guarantee that Evan wouldn’t just try to contact him from a different number. Nausea surged in the pit of her stomach and Iris actually retched at the thought, and her hand flew to her mouth as she fought back the urge to vomit.
Trystan sauntered back into the kitchen and when he saw her sitting there, pale and trembling, rushed toward her.
“What’s wrong? Iris?” She stared at him, panic and sorrow rendering her temporarily mute. Her silence alarmed Trystan. “C’mon, sweetness, talk to me. Tell me what happened.”
“I th-think I messed up,” she whispered. “Evan, she…” she tried to explain but everything came out in an incoherent, jumbled mess. He seemed to get the gist of it though and made soothing noises while she spoke.
“It’s okay, baby, my number isn’t traceable, and no unsolicited messages from strange numbers will ever make it past the firewall. Don’t worry about it. I’m so sorry about your friend, though.”
“Time to make better friends, I guess,” she whispered shakily, trying to hide her grief from him. But he knew her well enough by now to see straight through her facade, and he tugged her to her feet to enfold her in a hug.
“So, it’s official,” Trystan told her the following morning at breakfast, after checking his messages. “The road and bridge will be fully repaired by tomorrow morning. They estimate that it’ll be done by about nine a.m.”
Iris didn’t know how to react to that. What was supposed to happen now?
“I should probably contact the rental company about getting a new car,” she finally said.
Her proclamation was met with utter silence and she lifted her head to find him staring mutely at her, his eyes blazing with emotion.
“Trystan, don’t look at me like that,” she admonished. “I have to go home at some point. I can’t stay here forever.”
“You don’t have to do anything, Iris. Of course you can stay here, with me… for as long as you fucking want.”
“You have to go home at some point too. And what then? Do I just travel from place to place with you like some—I don’t know—some good luck talisman?”
“I don’t see why not.” He tried to play it off as a joke, but it fell flat.
“Trystan, I am not—nor will I ever be—an extension of you! I’m my own person, you don’t get to cart me around like a personal possession.”
“Fuck, Iris, I don’t want that. I want you to live with me, be with me. Write, edit, do whatever you want, but do it with me by your side. As my partner, my lover… even my wife. I’ll take you any way I can get you because I don’t want to lose you.”
“That wouldn’t work,” she said and he swore, the expletive loud and violent, startling Luna into lifting her head to stare at him quizzically.
“How do you know it won’t work when you won’t even give us a chance? You’re running scared about us. You’re a lot of things, Iris Hughes, but you’re not a coward… so don’t chicken out over this.”
“Trystan, what I meant by that is your vision of what a life together would be for us is flawed, and it’s doomed to fail—” She tried to reason with him, but he interrupted her.
“No, we can make it work. Iris and Trystan’s world, the two of us and no one else. I told you—I don’t have to go back to my old life. I want a new one with you. But I need you to be brave, Iris. For us. I need you to be that woman who faced a wolf and a beast in the same night and survived. No, thrived. I can’t be the only one willing to fight for what we have and for what we could build.”
She swallowed down a sob but couldn’t prevent the tear from slipping down her cheek. His tormented gaze tracked its path and he reached out to catch it on his thumb.
“I love you, Iris,” he whispered, his voice taut with pain. “And I want you to stay with me.”
Iris’s eyes memorized each beautiful feature individually, lovingly brushing over the hills and valleys of that gorgeous face. Her gaze snagged on the scar. This man. This beautiful, terrified man, who was still here hiding from his ghosts, afraid to face his future. He wasn’t even aware of what he was asking of her, what he was asking of himself, and if they were ever going to stand a chance Iris had to make him understand.
