Like Rapunzel, but Not Really ✔

Chapter 18

"You're awfully quiet," Tristan remarked, his hint of British accent escaped him without his notice. It happened only very occasionally, but always when he was not articulating his words before saying something. I continued to gently dab the antiseptic onto the wound on his left palm from when he broke my fall earlier before forcing a smile at him.

"Is there a correct way to act after almost getting blown up?"

Maybe that was a slightly rude reply to somebody who was just trying to be civil. But the events that had just transpired the past hour was beginning to fully sink into my head and God knew. We most certainly almost got killed.

"He would not have killed you," he said quietly, as if reading my mind like the shrewd mind-reader that he was. I ignored his stare on me, concentrating on the wound on his palm. His statement was meant to make me feel better, I knew, but that just made me feel worse.

"Right," was all I could mutter back to him. My mind was also still reeling from the text message that I had received earlier. There was no way I could deny the fact that it was a threat to Tristan's life and I had to show it to him to warn him of the looming danger.

And yet I found myself not doing exactly that.

Because what if he decided to take off for the woods because of it? It'd be the last I would see of him. I mean, I didn't know exactly what was it that I was feeling for him that made it so hard to let him go but I knew that his presence had a way of making me feel safe and I was not sure I was ready to let that go.

Gosh, I was so selfish. Maybe I deserved everything that was happening after all.

I peered at Tristan with the hopes that I could search for an answer as to what I should do. Perhaps perplexed by my unfaltering gaze on him, his face scrunched slightly into a frown of concern. He opened his mouth to say something but the swinging of the creaky door to the ambulance cut him off.

"Ari, are you okay?!" Penny's wide, worried eyes on me caused me to drop Tristan's hand in surprise.

"Penny, what are you doing here?" Without even thinking, I stood up and yanked her into the ambulance before proceeding to shut the door hastily. This was bad. I did not need her to be involved with this messy situation. "You really should not be here; it's not safe," I told her gravely.

"I called Hunter's phone earlier to ask you out for lunch but a paramedic answered and said you guys escaped a bomb attack?" she took my hand into hers. "What is going on?" Confusion graced her features as she looked at Tristan's scratches and dry blood before shifting back to me.

"And why are you still hanging out with this guy? I told you he is dangerous!" She whispered the last part as if it would help prevent Tristan from hearing what she said, which was honestly impossible because he was literally just 2 feet away from us.

Tristan, unsurprisingly, could only refrain an eye roll and excused himself from the back of the ambulance, probably to spare himself from another session of back biting right under his nose. I shot Penny a look and she just looked back at me innocently as if she had nothing to do with him storming off.

"Be nice. He's saved my butt more times than I can count," I told her seriously. She really needed to see that he was a good guy.

Penny rolled her eyes at my request. "Well, you do have a nice butt so it's no surprise he'd be willing to save it." I could only smile at her comment on my rear-end. "But seriously," she changed the subject. "What happened?"

My lips thinned as my thoughts shifted back to what had just happened earlier. "Connor happened." I grimaced. Even saying his name brought bile to the back of my throat.