Page 47 of Heart to Heart
To my surprise, he chuckled as he stood up and extended his hand to help me up. “Did you climb from that open window?” he asked, both horrified and impressed as his gaze trailed up the lattice to the window that looked much higher than it had seemed moments ago.
“I mean, technically, I only climbed about three-quarters of the way. The rest of the way, I, well, you know.” I inspected what I could of him in the minimal light we had. “I’m so sorry for falling on you…again. Curiously, that’s not the first time I’ve said that to someone. Oh God, I didn’t hurt you, did I?”
He shook his head. “I’m fine…but, Avery, you’re bleeding.” Without hesitation, he grabbed my arm, inspecting it with his phone’s flashlight as blood dripped from the tips of my fingers.
“It’s fine,” I said, trying to shrug it off, even though a searing pain was beginning to snake its way around my arm as my head started to spin. “It’s just a scratch.”
Tristan glanced up at me, one eyebrow arched in an expression I’d seen on his numerous characters right before they called someone out on their bullshit. “If this is just a scratch, then I’m the King of England. Come on, let’s go back to my trailer so I can patch it up.”
“Didn’t you play the King of England once?”
I hissed back a squealof pain as Tristan dabbed a wet hand towel across the gash on my forearm, oddly turned on by the way he cradled my arm in his hands while gently washing away the blood. The wound had stopped bleeding, but the pain was just beginning to fire up.
“It doesn’t look like it’s going to need stitches,” he observed, his concentration laser-focused on the task at hand. He turned around to the first aid kit he’d pulled out and placed on a small sink in his trailer, grabbed a foil packet of antibiotic ointment and tore it open before applying a thin strip of the opaque gel over the cut. Gently, he massaged the ointment into my skin as I tried my damnedest not to imagine his hands massaging the skin over the rest of my body.
“Here,” he handed me a handful of the same foil packets, “you’ll want to reapply the ointment tomorrow after you wash it out again.”
“Are you a doctor, or do you just play one on TV?” I asked, wishing instantly I could take it back.
Tristan smirked as his thumb rubbed in the last glob of ointment, making me wish that time would stop so he could keep touching me forever. Not even when I was with Guy had I felt such attentiveness. I once dropped a bowling ball on my foot and almost passed out from the pain while on a date with some friends of ours, and all he did was tell me to take a couple of deep breaths and suck it up. But this, this was nice. Even if I felt like, for the sake of feminism, I should be patching myself up, I couldn’t stop Tristan from doing something that so clearly came naturally to him.
“It’s funny you should mention that,” he said, washing the ointment from his hands in the sink. “I did play a paramedic in one of my earlier roles. To prepare for the role, I trained with some actual paramedics and learned basic first aid. If you would have needed stitches, I wouldn’t have been able to do much for you, though.”
“So modest,” I mused, smiling as he reached back inside his kit.
“We’ll just wrap it, and you’ll be as good as new.” He held the end of a roll of gauze steady with his thumb as he wrapped it around my arm, forming a couple of layers, cutting it, and then securing it in place with tape. “There,” he said, admiring his handiwork. His eyes flickered to my face, meeting mine as the burning sensation crept from my arm into my cheeks.
“Thank you, Tristan,” I said, breaking our moment.
“What were you doing climbing from that window, anyway, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“I needed some space, some air. A walk to clear my head.”
“And going out the front door was too easy?”
“Wicked first aid skillsandjokes. You’re bringing it all tonight. As a matter of fact, the door would have been my first choice if not for the security guard making his rounds downstairs. I didn’t actually want an audience on my solo walk, if I was even going to be allowed to take one.”
Tristan nodded. “Makes sense. But with your track record, I probably would have found a different way to get down other than, you know, leaping from the side of a building.” His eyes sparkled in that leading man kind of way that had to be a requirement to step foot into Hollywood.
“Look, I was scaling the side of the wall pretty well until I heard a certain person talking on his phone and had to stop to avoid being caught like a teenager sneaking out after curfew.”
No sooner had I finished my sentence than Tristan’s face fell, and I wished I hadn’t said it at all. That call had been both private and damning. Not something he was ever going to share with anyone but the person on the other end of it.
“How much of that call did you hear?”
Gone was the fun sparkle, replaced by concern, his brows knitting together as though his mind were working overtime to respond to whatever my answer may be. I could lie to him, tell him I heard nothing at all. But I just couldn’t bring myself to do that. I knew what it felt like to be lied to, and if I were to do it, I would be no better than those who had lied to me when all I’d ever wanted was the truth—something that I didn’t think was freely given to Tristan much.
“I heard everything,” I admitted. “And I understand, Tristan. I do. If I were in your shoes, I’d probably be doing the same thing.”
“Shit,” he muttered, covering his face with his hands before sliding them over his forehead and through his hair.
“Tristan, I’m not going to say anything to any of the other women in the house. I promise you that. I don’t want to be here, either.”
My stomach dropped, knowing there was no coming back from that. Sure, I could make up a lie, tell him I was just kidding. And given the stricken look that melted into surprise on his face, I should probably do just that. My pesky conscience, however, wasn’t going to let me do anything of the sort—that trifling bitch.
“You don’t want to be here?” Tristan reiterated what I’d just said. “As in, you don’t want to be part of the competition?”
“Yes. No. God, I don’t know,” I said. It was my turn to bury my face in my hands, but instead of the cool, composed way that Tristan had his meltdown, my meltdown had a few—okay, a lot—more tears associated with it.
