Bittersweet Chocolate (49 page)

Disheartened, he fell back in the chair, held Marissa’s hand, and talked to her throughout the night.

Coming awake with a start, he sat up and looked over at Marissa. Hand trembling, he reached out, touched the side of her face, and came to his feet. “Yes!” he whispered. “God, thank you.”

She’d proved them wrong again. He was so damn proud of her. He’d started brushing wispy tendrils of damp hair from her forehead, when the nurse came up to the bed, patted his shoulder, and smiled. “It’s been over eighteen hours and she’s hanging in there. That’s a good sign.”

For the first time in days, he had reason to return a smile. He stretched and felt the tension ebb from his body. He pressed Marissa’s hand to his cheek for a few seconds, replaced it on the bed, and left intensive care. Damn, she did it, made it through the night. Complete recovery from such a brutal attack would be rough, but she typified tough.

Barring any unforeseen circumstances, they were getting a second chance.

With unparalleled intoxication of spirit, he strolled to the waiting room. For several moments, he stood on the threshold, watching his family sleep, before he approached his father-in-law and touched his shoulder.

Stephen came awake instantly and stood. “Is it Marissa?” His voice woke Christopher and Anthony.

“What is it?” Christopher inquired.

Tristan waited until he had everyone’s attention. “It’s unbelievable, but damn it, she did it.” He wrapped his father-in-law in a bear hug. “Stephen, she...” His voice trailed off as he struggled to compose himself before continuing. “I’d given up, telling her goodbye when her eyes opened, and she seemed to stare right at me. Something in her look...was she trying to tell me...” Tears he’d tried to hold in check inched down his cheeks. “I don’t deserve her.”

Anthony approached and hugged him. Vi was clinging to Christopher, sobbing. Daniel and Clarisse held hands, fingers intertwined. Stephen walked to the window where slim fingers of light stretched out from behind early morning clouds, heralding the dawn of a new day.

Tristan heard Stephen whisper, “Once again, thank you, Lord.”

Two months had passed since his wife’s brush with death. Tristan lay awake watching her. She’d spent six weeks in the hospital, her hand was still in a cast, but the bruising on her face was fading.

She stirred and stretched. The covers slipped below her breasts and he tensed. Every time he saw that scar, the anger and fear came rushing back. Even now, he couldn’t understand why something as mundane as an adolescent altercation could’ve caused this type of destruction, and attempted murder.

With Matthew dead, there never would be an accurate explanation for what had prompted his insanity, and Tristan couldn’t wrap his mind around his brothers’ iffy interpretation.

Christopher had said, “In all probability, while applying for the position at Garrett Industries, Matthew discovered Marissa worked there. She still used her maiden name back then. Hal would have filled Matthew in on the business aspects of Marissa’s life, since she’d become Matthew’s admin when Hal left. Any curiosity on Matthew’s part would have seemed normal to Hal.

“Personal information Hal provided about Marissa didn’t include a pertinent detail. Hal didn’t know you were white, Tristan, and Matthew didn’t find out until the day he met you. Before that day, maybe he had delusions of getting together with Marissa again.”

Anthony had picked up the threads of explanation. “We’ll assume meeting you was the trigger igniting his latent hostility. Remember, Matthew was born in an era when integration wasn’t a consideration. Caucasians weren’t the only folkes with the segregation mindset. Matthew wasn’t willing, or able, to let go of the old racial rhetoric, and he resented Marissa’s crossing the line.

“Combined with Marissa’s treatment of him years ago, he couldn’t separate the woman from the teenager, and then, she dared to interfere when he tried to rape her secretary. Her defense of Megan would have added fuel to his latent enmity. Clearly, something made him snap.”

Tristan had shaken his head.

“Hey, unreasonable as it may sound, think about what our family put you through over your relationship with Marissa,” Anthony reminded him.

“How did he get the house?” Tristan inquired. “A property management company bought the place.”

“He rented it from that company. By coincidence, he’d been looking to rent a home when he came to town, and used the same management group,” Christopher stated. “Can you imagine his elation when your house came on the market?”

“That’s probably how he gained access to the house, huh.”

Christopher nodded. “The man was obsessed.”

Tristan never would understand that depth of unmitigated hatred, but he had acknowledged some truth to his brothers’ theories. His family and friends proved Matthew’s racial sentiments weren’t exclusive to him, or outdated.

He gently brushed his fingertips across the length of Marissa’s scar. It would always be there as a stark reminder of the heartbreaking loss he came close to experiencing.

* * * *

A feathery touch glided across the scar on her chest and she opened her eyes.

Marissa smiled at her husband and watched the play of emotions change the intensity in those gorgeous aquamarine eyes. She could guess what he was thinking and grasped his hand, raised it to her lips, and placed a light kiss in his palm.

“Do you know how much I love you?” she asked. His eyes became shadowed.

“As much as I love you,” he said gruffly. “Don’t ever leave me.”

“Hey. It may seem like a lifetime ago, but after my trip to Tahoe, I remember promising I’d never leave you. I believe I’ve kept my promise.”

Tristan pulled her close. “Did you ever.”

Snuggled up against his side, comforted by his heat and the steady rhythm of his heart, she silently berated herself for all the time wasted because of her asinine racial profiling. Assuming Tristan couldn’t understand, or accept her juvenile lifestyle and the associated violence, just because he was Caucasian. God, she loved this man. He gave her a new respect for the hazards of preconceptions.

Since her brush with death, Tristan was the one who became wary and edgy each time he left her. She no longer had lingering qualms about her past.

It is what it is.

Damn straight,
life goes on,
regardless of debilitating mental and physical life experiences.

After surviving a second, near-death episode she’d become an expert, reinforcing her revenge philosophy. And with a personal history littered with self-styled enemies, Matthew one example, she could never let her guard down. Not with Joel out there, lurking, a perpetual threat, believing he had a valid grudge, believing he owed her.

If Matthew, who never had a justifiable reason for revenge, shot Tristan, went after her kids, and tried to kill her, what should she expect from Joel? What if coming after family was the new payback and Joel’s choice of retribution. Who’d become the next victim of her unconventional youth―Vi, one of the children?

Uh-uh. She’d done her damnedest to move on, change her gangster ideology, keep her promise to Graham, but folkes wouldn’t let her. In the future, if she only suspected a threat to her family, all promises were null and void, her turn to exact revenge―street rules.

One left standing.

Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, currently resides in Bullhead City, Arizona.

Very reclusive (shy), and when not writing or mired in research, spends time enjoying the company of two adopted/rescue pets, Apache, a Giant Schnauzer and Mason, a Weimaraner. An insatiable reader and music enthusiast with eclectic tastes.

Writing both m/m (M.E. Reid) and m/f (Emily Wade-Reid) genres of mainstream and romantic suspense.

http://m-e-reid-puts-it-in-writing.com