Black Heart (Cursed Hearts 1)

"You look a little pale, sweetheart," Beth noted, frowning as she looked Marty over.

Marty started to tell her that she was fine again, but she just couldn't do it. She wasn't fine. Nothing about this was fine. Her stomach was twisted up into knots as she waited for Tristan to break her heart and she couldn't help but wonder why.

Why was she waiting around and leaving it all up to him? She wasn't a kid anymore, too afraid to say something and find out that it was because of something that she’d said or did that chased him off. If he wanted to end things, then he'd damn well better tell her to her face this time, she decided as she turned around to hunt the bastard down. She'd rather have her heart shattered quickly than to deal with this gut wrenching uncertainty for a minute longer.

"Marty?" her father called after her.

"I'm fine, Dad. There's just something that I need to do," she said, not bothering to look back as she stormed out of the kitchen and headed for the living room, more than ready to kick Tristan's ass if that's what she needed to do in order to get answers. If it turned out that he was walking away from her again, she'd accept it. She'd end things this time, making sure that he didn't know just how badly he'd hurt her and this time she would be the one walking away.

Only she wouldn't be coming back.

Chapter 23

"Oh.......shit," Denny and Shayne groaned as the three of them watched Marty storm out of his parents' house, looking furious. When she spotted Tristan, her eyes narrowed dangerously and her movements became clipped as she headed straight for him.

"You," Marty said, pointing a finger at him for emphasis, "and I are going to have a talk."

"We'll talk later," Tristan said with a resigned sigh as he moved to make his way to his parents' house, in no way ready to talk about the bullshit that went down today when Marty stepped into his path, blocking him.

"No, I think now's a good time, don't you?" she asked, arms folded over her chest as she looked up at him, cocking a well-trimmed brow in clear challenge.

"And I think that we'll talk about this later," he said, moving to step around her when her next words made everything in him go still.

"If you walk away again, Tristan, that's it. I'm done," she warned and he knew by the determined look on her face that she meant it. There would be no second chances with her. If he didn't talk to her about something that he'd rather never think about again, she would walk away and destroy him.

"I don't know what's going on," Denny said, confirming Tristan’s suspicions that neither Hank nor Marty had talked about what happened earlier, "but can't this wait until after dinner?"

"No, it can't," Marty said firmly. Her eyes pleaded with him not to f**k this up.

"I don't want to lose you, Marty," he said softly, praying that she backed off.

"Then don't," she said, her voice breaking as tears filled her eyes and he knew that the choice was no longer his to make. It didn't matter that this wasn't something that he wanted to do. He'd f**ked up and hurt Marty again and that wasn't something that he could live with any longer.

He reached out and took her beautiful face into his hands, tenderly wiping the tears away with the pads of his thumbs as he leaned in and brushed his lips against her trembling ones. "Okay," he said softly. "Let's go talk."

"Wait a minute!" Denny said, sounding desperate and for good reason. "Just come and eat dinner with us and then you can go talk afterwards."

"You're on your own," Tristan said with a shrug as he dropped his hands away from Marty's face and took her hand into his.

"You betraying son of a bitch!" Denny snapped, shooting an anxious glance towards his truck.

"You'll never make it," Tristan pointed out as he headed across the street with Marty.

"There's only one way to find out," he heard Denny say as he headed towards his house with Marty.

"Denny Black! Where do you think you're going?" he heard his mother demand and he probably would have laughed his ass off at his brother if he wasn't dreading this conversation.

"Do you mind if we go for a walk instead?" Marty asked and as much as he would love to say yes and buy himself a little more time, he couldn't. If she needed to talk then he'd rather just get it over with.

"Not right now," he said, heading for his house.

Once they were inside she got right to the point. "Do you want to end this?"

"No," he said with absolutely no hesitation.

He didn't want to end this. He didn't want to lose her and be forced to live without her ever again. Right now he wanted to make up for lost time and make every minute count. He sure as hell didn't want to waste any of those precious minutes talking about bullshit that was best left in the past.

She studied him for a moment before she nodded firmly, obviously accepting his answer. "Okay," she said, sounding relieved as she abruptly turned and headed up the stairs to the second floor.

"Where are you going?" he asked, admittedly confused. "I thought that you wanted to talk."

"I do," she said, shrugging as she shot him a look over her shoulder, slowing her pace. "But only when you're ready to talk, Tristan. I'm not going to force you to do something that you don’t want to do, but I needed to know where we stood."

When he could only stand there staring at her, probably like an idiot, she turned right back around and headed upstairs, disappearing around the corner and leaving him more confused than he'd ever felt before.

"Shayne?" he said quietly, knowing that he was probably close by.

"Aye, lad?" Shayne asked, materializing right next to him.

"Is this a trap?" he had to ask.

"I'm not sure," Shayne admitted, sounding unsure, which wasn't exactly comforting at the moment. "Maybe ye should make a run for it, lad."

Tristan turned a glare on the man. "How exactly is that helpful?" he demanded in a harsh whisper as his eyes darted back to the top of the staircase to make sure that they were still alone.

"That's all I have right now, lad," Shayne admitted sheepishly.

"It's not very helpful," Tristan said, slowly exhaling as he considered his options.

"It is what it is, lad," Shayne said with a shrug.

"Well, it isn't much," Tristan said, deciding that he'd rather get this over with. He didn't want to do this, but he'd hurt her and he'd do anything that he could to make things better.

He forced himself to walk up the stairs as dread filled him.