Ruthless Love (Ash and Innocence 1)

“…last fucking straw. Do you understand?” It was that deep voice I was now sure belonged to an adult.

“Yes.” Tristan’s voice was quiet, but not the cold and uncaring way I’d heard last night.

I moved down the hallway, hoping no floorboards would creak on the way. I got to the staircase and could see Tristan now, as well as the man standing in front of him. I couldn’t be sure, but the handsome features of the man made me wonder if it was Tristan’s father.

“What do you tell them?” the man asked in a mocking, cruel way.

“I don’t…” Tristan was speaking so softly I could barely hear him. His head was hanging, like he couldn’t bear to look the man in the face.

The man scoffed. He took a step toward the door, then a thought seemed to occur to him. He walked back to Tristan and gave him a hard shove that sent him staggering out of my view. “Clean this fucking place up.”

I stared in disbelief as the man walked out, slamming the door behind him. I felt overwhelmingly guilty for eavesdropping on that, and my guilt made me walk as quietly back to the bed as I could.

I lay there, squinting up at the ceiling, trying to figure out what pieces of the puzzle I was missing. Everything had made sense, except when he asked Tristan ‘what do you tell them.’ No matter what context I put it in, nothing felt quite right.

I still hadn’t figured it out when I heard him coming upstairs.

He stood in the doorway, looking nothing like the person I’d just seen hanging his head and getting screamed at downstairs. If anything, he looked even more in control than he had last night.

Tristan approached the bed, showing no hint of the conversation I’d overheard in his expression. “Time for you to die.”

I screamed at the top of my lungs, scooting back and holding my hands up.

Tristan paused. He was looking at me like I’d lost my mind. “Not literally. Jesus. You said your mom was going to kill you.”

I grinned, laughing a little nervously. “Got you.” I blasted him with double finger guns, internally wincing at how awkward I could be.

Tristan ignored me and went to scoop me up from the bed. He stopped, then noticed my socks and shoes were on. “What did you hear?”

“Hear?” I asked dumbly. “I just—I’ve been sitting on the bed. I couldn’t—”

Tristan bent down low, getting his face close until I could see every ounce of fury in his expression. “If you breathe a word of anything to anyone, I’ll make your life hell. Understand?”

“I won’t say anything about what I didn’t hear. I got it.”

Tristan put his hand on my cheeks, squeezing slightly. For a second, I thought he might push me down to the bed. Instead, he let go and straightened. “Do they work?” He asked in a frighteningly casual tone, as if he hadn’t just looked ready to murder me.

“What?”

“Your legs.”

“Um, well, that depends on—”

He didn’t wait for me to finish. He scooped me up, less like a sack of potatoes this time and more like a child.

The memory of how terrifying he’d looked when he loomed over me kept me quiet until we got outside. My wheelchair was waiting by the front door. I scanned it for signs of the damage he’d talked about, but all I could see were small dents in one of the wheels, almost like it had been hammered back into shape.

“You fixed it for me?” I asked as he sat me down in the chair.

“The alternative was carrying your ass back home.”

“Thanks.” I tested out the wheels. They didn’t seem any worse for wear. “Did you find my glasses?”

“Not my problem.”

I sighed. “What if I drive myself off the path and crash into a bush again because I can’t see?”

“Then you’d be solving a problem for me.”

I glared at him, searching for something biting to say back and finding nothing. I didn’t need to verbally spar with him. I just needed to go home and forget Tristan existed, even if that was going to be difficult considering he basically lived in my back yard.

“Go home,” Tristan ordered, as if the idea that I might disobey him could never enter his mind. “And remember what I said. Breathe a word of anything that happened here or anything you heard, and you’ll wish you never met me.”

“One step ahead of you.” My voice dripped with anger and embarrassment. I pushed myself down the path and away from his house.4TristanI waited until Kennedy got out of view to start following her. I knew her name because I’d gone through her stuff once she was asleep and found her license. It was all kept in a dorky little bag attached to the back of her wheelchair. Kennedy Stills. Seventeen years old. Five foot seven and an organ donor. She also had a birthday coming up.