Rhapsody (The Teplo Trilogy #2) (40 page)

She'd convinced him to let her help. She'd walked away this morning, too stupid to even realize what he intended to do.
She
was the only reason he'd gone in alone. Her and his need to protect her. And if he died now, it would be her fault because she'd been too stubborn, too stupid, to listen to him. How did you come to grips with such a brutal truth when every part of you pleaded for a different answer? For one where you weren't to blame?

While Tristan fought for his life, something inside of her died.

Hope.

The doctor stepped into the waiting room as she stared off into space, trapped in her mind and an endless cycle of prayers and
what ifs
. She lifted her eyes to him, oblivious to the fact that other eyes all across the room were doing the same.

"Tell me he's alive," she whispered.

"He's alive, Miss Maddox," the doctor whose name she couldn't remember assured her. "And he's out of surgery."

Something went through her as a chorus of exhalations resounded through the room. Relief. Pain. She didn't know what she felt, really. A weight lifted from her shoulders while another one settled heavily atop her heart.

Her dad wrapped an arm around her shoulders and squeezed.

"I want to see him," she said as soon as the doctor finished explaining the extent of his injuries. She didn't require a surgeon to tell her how close he'd come though. She'd seen it firsthand. For the last…seven hours and eighteen minutes, she'd seen it every single second.

And the cause of all the pain and heartbreak was so meaningless. What Marc had done to her a year ago. What Vetrov had done to Emma and the others. What Tristan was going through now. All for what? A temporary high? The desire to feel powerful? A nightclub? And who really won in the end?

Marc hadn't. Vetrov hadn't. Neither had she and Tristan.

Francisco and people like him,
they
were the only ones who won. They moved people around like pawns on a chessboard. Careers were ruined. Lives lost. And at the end of the day, even people like Francisco lost eventually. Someone bigger, meaner, and less scrupulous moved in, and the cycle repeated. She understood better in that moment why Tristan fought than she ever had before.

He'd always told her that someone had to do it.

He was right.

Someone
had
to do it because, in the end, even people like Francisco lost. And all that was left was addiction. It didn't care. It never had, and never would. It simply plowed through you, taking down anything it could, however it had to do it.

Someone
had
to fight it.

She wasn't sure how to deal with the fact that it might not be Tristan after this. The justice he believed in so strongly he'd given his entire life to fighting for it, Vetrov and Francisco had stripped from him. Sure, Vetrov would pay, but Francisco and Elijah were out there still, and so was the drug. Addiction had won.

She couldn't help but think that, if she hadn't said yes and gotten involved, things might have gone differently. Someone else might have come out on top. Tristan might not be in there right now, fighting for his life. He might not be broken.

"Only one at a time," the doctor cautioned. "He's not awake. We're keeping him in an induced coma until we can safely wean him from the ventilator."

He went on to detail more specifics, but the words didn't really register for her. Until she saw Tristan, those words didn't really mean anything. His family urged her to go first. If she were stronger, she would have sent them, but she wasn't stronger, and she needed to see him. She had to see for herself that he was still breathing, still fighting. That she hadn't ruined his life like Marc had ruined hers.

She approached his room on shaking legs, her hands clasped together in front of her. They quivered when she stepped through the door and saw him. Wires, machines, and gauze ran were everywhere, covering him and the cramped room. But somewhere beneath the myriad of equipment and the aftermath of this day was the man who owned her, heart and soul.

"Tristan," she mouthed, approaching the bed as tears welled in her eyes. He looked so different, so fragile and vulnerable as he lay pale and still, a machine breathing for him. "Oh, Tristan."

"I'll give you a minute," the doctor said from behind her as a sob caught in her throat.

She took another slow, pained step toward the bed and reached out for him. Her hand hovered over his battered face, scared to touch, but desperate to feel him. To know that he was there, he was real, and that this day hadn't taken him away from her.

"I love you," she said as her heart fractured a final time and tears rolled down her cheeks. She eased herself down into the chair beside his bed, wrapped his unbandaged hand in hers and rested her forehead on his good arm.

She cried hard as she leaned against his arm, broken, choking sobs ripping from her chest. For herself and what she'd lost. For Vetrov's victims. For Michael Kincaid, lying in a hospital on the other side of the city.

Mostly though, she cried for Tristan and all he'd lost.

And for a future she could no longer see.

The next nine days were agony. Tristan didn't wake up, and Lillian didn't leave his side. Her father tried to order her out. John, Katherine, Zoë, and Jason tried to cajole her out. Rachel and Jordan, even Kincaid, once he was released, tried to force her out. She didn't go.

Tristan was alive and eventually, he'd wake up and come back to her. She wasn't leaving him until those blue eyes opened and that crooked smile graced his lips. Until that happened, everyone else could go to hell.

She didn't want to go out and eat.

She didn't want to go home and sleep.

She didn't want to walk in the courtyard.

She didn't want to stretch in the hospital's gym.

She wanted Tristan back.

For nine days, watching him lie in the bed with wires shooting off in every direction killed her. She couldn't think because thinking hurt. She couldn't talk when the words choked her. And she didn't want to fucking
go
anywhere when leaving his side long enough to shower ripped her apart. She felt crazed.

So many thoughts ran through her mind that she couldn't catch hold of a single one for long. When she slept, her dreams were brutal. Each night, she jerked awake with tears streaming down her face and whimpers dying in her throat. Smoke, flame, Tristan lying crumpled on the floor of that cellar, and the roar of the fire as the building collapsed around her. The violent memories haunted her. And there was nothing she could do about them. They were hers now, permanently etched in her mind like the names and faces of everyone Tristan had ever lost.

God, he had to wake up.

He was alive, but when he lay so still, believing he would find his way back to her was hard. And she desperately needed to believe it. She needed him back because she couldn't take seeing him like this. She couldn't take being so helpless to do anything.

What Marc had done to her, what Malachi had planned to do…none of that even compared to sitting by Tristan's beside as machines fed medication into him that kept him asleep, that kept him alive. None of it compared to watching Zoë and Katherine, Rachel and even Jason, Jordan, and John walk into his room every day, red-eyed and fearful.

She wanted to scream that she was sorry, that she never would have gotten involved if she'd known it would end like this, but those words solidified in her throat and refused to come forward. Tristan was here because of her, and that was the biggest hell of all.

She
was the reason he was in that bed.
She
was the reason he had metal pins in his arm and an angry incision across his side.
She
was the reason he had bruises yellowing around the edges and splints on his fingers.

She was the reason he'd nearly died.

Had she never gotten involved, he never would have been there. He would have focused on the case instead of her, and found a safe way to send them to prison. She never would have been almost kidnapped. He never would have gone in alone. None of it would have happened.

How did she find the words to apologize to his family for all of that?

She needed Tristan. His arms around her and his voice in her ear as he lent her his strength as he had every day for the last weeks.

She needed escape.

It didn't come.

On day ten, the doctor turned off the medication keeping him knocked out.

She paced. She rocked. She stared. Prayed. Mumbled words to him through the painful lump in her throat. And when vivid, burning blue eyes opened on day eleven, guilt, fear and regret crashed like a tidal wave around her, drowning her in a storm of pain she couldn't hold off any longer. Seeing his eyes open overwhelmed her after eleven days of hell.

She couldn't breathe, her heart hurt so much.

"Lillian," he croaked.

As he reached out for her, his hand trembling and his eyes clouded with pain and confusion, she did the only thing she could do to escape the emotion shredding her from the inside out.

She ran.

Chapter Twenty-Two

"Lillian," Tristan groaned as her hands danced down the ridges of his stomach and brushed against his cock. They slid away before he could even shift his hips in her direction. He groaned in protest, his head falling back onto the pillows in frustration.

A soft laugh bubbled from her lips, causing tendrils of hair to tickle across his chest. They were soft, silky, complete torture. He ached for her, and she was torturing him. Slowly. Her hand brushed along his shaft again and cupped his balls before darting away once more.

Another tortured groan fell from his lips. "Beautiful,
please
."

"Nu-uh," she laughed, sliding out of his reach as he started to grab blindly for her. "Behave."

"I am behaving," he grumbled, opening one eye. He found her eyes locked on his face, her mischievous smile radiant and full of love. Further protest died in his throat as he stared at her, enraptured.

He didn't know how any one person could be so wholly perfect, but she was. From the little, barely there freckle beside her right temple to her dance-abused toes. Hell, even her stubbornness and ability to entirely disregard what she didn't want to hear drove him wild.

"How'd I get so fucking lucky?" he asked, the question tumbling out of its own accord.

That was a damn good question. He couldn't recall ever doing anything significant enough in his life to have made him deserving of someone like her. Not even anything he'd accomplished as an agent came close to being adequate recompense for being given this woman to love. But he had her, and he loved her more than life itself. If the adoring way she stared at him and the little breathless hitch in her voice when he touched her was any indication, she felt exactly the same way. No, luck didn't even come close to covering his really fucking excellent fortune where she was concerned.

"Good timing," she suggested, stroking his jaw.

"Mm," he agreed, kissing her fingers. "Very good timing. Speaking of timing, are you going to stop torturing me any time soon and let me make love to you?"

"Depends," she answered without hesitation, pulling her fingers away from his greedy lips.

"On?"

"Whether or not you say it." She arched a brow at him as if to say
obviously
. Amusement and desire burned in her brown eyes as she waited for his response.

He couldn't formulate it though. He had no idea what she wanted him to say. That he loved her? Done. That he needed her? Done. That every beat of his heart belonged to her? That he was going to explode if he wasn't inside of her soon? Done and done. None of that had been what she was looking for though.

"I am the Walrus?" he suggested, grasping at straws as she continue to stare at him expectantly.

"Tristan, I'm serious," she laughed, swatting at him. She rose to sit beside him, her bad leg extended over his thigh.

"So am I, sweetheart." He shifted impatiently on the bed, wanting her back against his chest. She felt good there. "I have no clue what I'm supposed to say." What he did know, however, was that it physically hurt to be this close to her and not be inside of her. His balls ached. His skin crawled. His body literally craved hers, and controlling the desire to flip her over and bury himself inside her wasn't getting any easier the longer she teased him.

He couldn't even remember how long they'd been at this. Hours? Days?

He didn't know.

As if trying to sort it out had pulled some forgotten injury to the surface, a sharp pain raced through him, setting fire to his ribs and his left arm. It hit hard and fast, and was gone before he could even figure out what it was or where it'd come from. But for a minute, for just a minute, something felt…off. He frowned, trying to place the fleeting sense of unease.

"Ah, come on," Lillian teased, noticing his frown, "it's not that hard." Her hand bumped his cock and another giggle bubbled from her lips. That sound, so incredibly carefree and sweet, popped the little sliver of disquiet like a pinprick to a balloon, leaving behind nothing but him and her.

"Or maybe it is that hard." She nudged his dick to indicate what she meant.

Tristan growled playfully as she snickered at her little joke and launched himself toward her. She shrieked in laughter and fell backward onto the bed, his hand beneath her head to keep it from bouncing. His body settled over hers as she laughed up at him, trying, and thoroughly failing, to pout.

"You're a tease," he muttered, grinning as he kneed her legs apart and settled between them.

"Am not," she retorted, breathless.

He arched a brow as she wriggled beneath him.

"A tease doesn't deliver. I, on the other hand, fully intend to." She wrapped her good leg around his hips in exactly the right way. His cock landed against slick, wet heat, pulling a soft moan from each of them. "As soon as you say it."

He groaned at her breathless demand, his stomach muscles rippling as sensation shot through him. She felt so good beneath him. So much softer than cement.

Cement?

What the fuck?

Something flickered. He didn't know how else to explain it. One minute, he was in bed with Lillian. The next, he wasn't. He was lying on the floor in some sort of cellar, a blond smirking down at him as pain clawed its way through him. It flickered again and he was somewhere else. Somewhere dark and cold. Soft, steady beeping echoed through the darkness. Indistinguishable voices murmured. He hurt everywhere.

"Tristan?" Lillian cupped his cheek, the concern in her voice pulling him back to her. "What's wrong?"

"It's–" Even as he started to explain the pain and disconcerting impressions and images, they faded away as if they'd never been there at all. He shook his head to clear it and glanced down at his ballerina. Her face was etched in worry, her brown eyes brimming with fear. He smiled reassuringly. "It's nothing, beautiful." He rolled his hips into her, causing his cock to bump her clit. "You're driving me crazy."

She moaned loudly, distracted. "Say it," she breathed.

"Say what?" He rolled his hips, teasing her as the playful mood began to fall away. Electricity leapt to life between them, charging the air with that inexplicable tangle of emotion so very familiar to him. Lust, need, love. God, so much love.

He dipped down and captured a tight nipple in his mouth, rolling it with his tongue.

"Oh, God," she groaned, bucking beneath him.

He grinned, his lips curving on her breast. "Say what, baby?" he asked again, pulling back to look at her.

"You know," she huffed, trying to force him closer with her heel on his ass.

"Afraid not," he said before flicking his tongue across her nipple. "Tell me what to say and I'll say it." Hell, he'd tell her anything she wanted to hear, however she wanted to hear it, as often as she wanted to hear it. Endlessly. She owned him that completely. He merely needed a clue as to what she wanted to hear.

"Tell me—ah–" she moaned as he pulled her nipple into his mouth and tugged with his teeth, "that you'll never let me go again."

Tristan paused, his eyes seeking hers. "I never let you go, beautiful."

Except even as he said it, he knew he was wrong. He
had
let her go.

Hadn't he?

She frowned as he leaned back on his knees, and scrambled up into a sitting position. "You did, Tristan," she whispered when he met her gaze. The hurt in her voice was like a knife to him, twisting deep, though he couldn't say why. He didn't know where he'd sent her or when. "You let me go. Why?"

"I don't– Oh!" He doubled over, gasping for breath as another pain rocked through him. This one was far more intense, leaving him feeling as if he were being ripped apart inside and out.

He could see Lillian scrambling toward him on her hands and knees, could see her mouth forming his name and her brown eyes widening with fear, but the sight was overlaid with other, more painful images. Lillian's little body curled into a ball on the ground while she cried. Her eyes brimming with tears as she stared down at him. Her face pale as she turned and stumbled away from him.

And others….

Jason shouting at him.

John holding him back.

Kincaid frowning somberly.

The blond from earlier rearing back to kick something. Him?

Sounds….

Soft crying.

Lillian's voice begging him to come back to her.

Zoë whispering to him.

Lillian again, apologizing over and over as warm, wet drops landed on his face.

"I don't–" He couldn't get the words out.

Oh God. What was wrong with him?

He fell forward on the bed as image after image raced through his mind. Each brought with it a new wave of pain. And a new realization. He had sent Lillian away. He'd sent her away and went after someone. Vetrov?

Ah, fuck. He'd gone after Vetrov.

He'd nearly died, or maybe he
had
died. Was this hell, then? Reliving it over and over for eternity? Having to hear her beg, over and over, for him not to make her leave him?

He wasn't going to survive it.

Lillian screamed his name as he curled up, trying to fend off the pain or shut it out. He didn't know what hurt worse: feeling as if he was being physically ripped apart, knowing that he'd hurt Lillian, or knowing he couldn't do anything to make it stop. It went on and on. Image after image of her hurting rolled through his mind like a photo album flipping through the same painful pictures.

"Tristan, oh God, Tristan," she sobbed.

His eyes met hers for a minute, saw the hurt and fear there before another image—a storm drain—came rushing up.

"Don't leave me," she mouthed, her face distorted by the scene unfolding in his mind. "Please don't leave me."

But he was already leaving and he couldn't stop it. He was being pulled, pushed, and shoved through that storm drain into the vacuum of memories beyond. And it hurt. God, it fucking hurt. Everywhere. He struggled to reach for her, to keep her with him, but she was already fading. His hands grasped nothing, falling through her form as if through a ghost.

"You're leaving me." She frowned sadly, a single tear rolling down her cheek.

"Lillian," he tried to tell her he was sorry, that he couldn't stop it, but the words wouldn't come. "No, Lillian! No!"

His eyes flew open, her name a strangled cry on his lips. He hurt everywhere, but none of that mattered. Neither did the fact that the beeping he'd heard earlier was louder here, or that there were rails on his bed.

He was in a hospital? Didn't matter.

Red-rimmed brown stared down at him, fear, regret—a thousand emotions welled in her eyes. She appeared so different than she had mere seconds before, rolling around with him on their bed. She looked broken. But she was here. Wherever here was, he hadn't left her. He hadn't lost her.

"Lillian."

He reached for her, aching to touch her and know that she was real, but he couldn't seem to do it. He felt sluggish, his body not his own. His arm lifted slowly, heavily. He knew before he ever got it off the bed though, that touching her wouldn't change anything. He could see it in her eyes, the same hurt that'd been there when she asked him why he'd let her go.

He could barely remember it, but he knew she was right. He'd let her go.

And it was too late for either of them now.

Tears rolled down her face, her expression crumbling as if she knew it too.

She seemed so lost, so scared, desolation and grief in those beautiful brown eyes.

Oh baby
, he wanted to say, but no words came out.

He opened his mouth, but it was too late for that too. Always, he was too late.

Lillian turned, a sob choking her, and stumbled away from him.

"Lillian," he said, pain cracking him wide open.

She didn't stop.

His eyes fell closed on a chorus of voices calling out to the woman he'd broken.

The one he loved.

The one he'd pushed out the door.