Tristan's Loins (11 page)

"Don't let your husband's opinion stop you,
Selene," Axel replied. "If you want to write, do it and don't
apologize for it. It's obvious you were defensive of it last night.
I admire you for it."

Selene let her guard down a bit. "As I said,
I need to finish it, which is why I need to cut this short. I have
to get something done today."

Axel looked disappointed but nodded. "Liz and
Becca will be here in a couple of hours anyway. We’re going to
Trillium later to see a movie if you want to join us. My daughters
only let me see Chick Flicks. The offer is there."

"I'll let you know, but I really need to get
some writing done this weekend. Besides, you need to spend time
with your kids. I don't need them hating on me when I just met
their dad."

"Liz and Becca had their reasons for not
liking Jenny, Selene. Let's just say she never really tried to get
along with my daughters, more like she went out of her way to
exclude them."

"I'm sorry. I don't have kids, but I can just
imagine."

"It's tough when your Mom runs out on you and
your Dad is all you got," Axel said and sighed. "Jenny could not
relate to it and understand why they acted like they did. She went
down to their level. They were fifteen and seventeen."

"I get it, but it's rough for a woman to be
involved with you," Selene countered and secretly applauded this
Jenny for standing up to Axel's daughters. "You can't enable their
territorial tendencies, or every relationship you have will be
defined by them."

"You’re probably right. My Mom says she feels
sorry for any woman I introduce to them."

"There you go," Selene added. "They have to
realize you’re entitled to your own life too."

"You’re not going to meet us at the show, are
you Selene?" he asked with a knowing grin.

"Ah, no, probably not." Selene smiled at his
hurt look. "I don't think it would be fair to sick them on me this
early. I don't even know if I like you yet."

"You like me." Axel sat back and regarded her
with a smile. "You like me a lot."

Selene looked away from his blue gaze,
reminded of another blue-eyed man who disturbed her far more than
this one. Tristan was right when he accused her of lusting after
him. She knew it was easier with him because he was not real. He
would disappear when she rewrote his story and live happily ever
after with Rhiannon. Axel was sitting in front of her waiting for
an answer.

"I like you, Axel, and for now that's enough
for me." Selene met his gaze squarely. "We both have baggage we
need to sort through."

Axel seemed disappointed at her words. "Don't
let my girls send you running before you meet them, Selene. I think
they have both grown up a lot. They both have boyfriends now."

"It's a Daddy-daughter thing, Axel and it
doesn't matter if they are forty," Selene informed him quietly.
"They won't let anyone near their Dad."

"That's what Jenny said before she left."

"She's right. You have to set your boundaries
with your kids. They have to know they can't get away with running
off every woman in your life, and you can't let them either or you
will always be alone."

"Your pretty perceptive," he noted ruefully.
"I have let them run me ever since Linda left.”

"That's the first step to solving the
problem."

"I'll work on it," he promised and his blue
eyes were earnest. "Tell me you won't run off just yet?"

Selene felt a sudden twinge of unease,
knowing Axel liked her quite a lot. She could see it now. She was
not ready for a relationship. Alarm bells went off in her head.
Something more than told her Axel was intent on a relationship
between them or he wouldn't have been honest about his control
freak daughters. Did she really want to go there? The waitress
brought the check and she was torn from answering the question that
lingered long after he walked her to her car, kissed her chastely
and she drove home.

She entered her apartment to find Tristan
avidly watching Gunsmoke, unable to take his eyes off the screen,
barely acknowledging her coming home. She was grateful. The
disturbing conflict of her emotions was unsettling. She decided not
to disturb him. She pulled her flash drive from her hard drive and
retrieved her laptop.

Selene opened the laptop and plugged in the
flash drive. She pulled up her manuscript. She reread some
passages, as was her habit. A glaring realization stood out. The
changes she had made that day had not taken. She saved the
document, recalled even going back to check it twice. The changes
she made to it were gone. The original document stared back at
her.

Her eyes grew fearful as she heard Tristan
chuckling at something from the old western. She had to redo the
chapters again. If the same thing happened, she did not know what
she could do to help him. Thinking of his disappointment to know he
would never be able to take back what happened to Rhiannon at his
hands made her flinch. She closed the laptop and sat back against
the pillows, feeling a sense of dread.

His enjoyment of TV was contagious and soon
she joined him, frowning to see him leaning out the window of the
castle glued to the set in front of him. He saw her and
grinned.

"Thank you, Selene. I have a better knowledge
of your world now. The wonders I have seen coming out of the black
box have been very informative."

"That stuff is all made up drama, Tristan,
like my book you realize?" she reminded him.

"Such wonders exist in your world." Tristan
smiled widely. "I like the beach program. I would like to meet this
CJ."

"You and half the men on the planet," Selene
sympathized with a chuckle. "She's an actress, Tristan. These
people are all not real; they are actors who play a part on the
television. Trust me they have very different real lives and
names."

"What is CJ Parker's real name?" he asked
eagerly.

"Pamela Anderson, and trust me you don't want
to go there."

"How was your day, Selene? Did you get your
errands done?"

"Yeah I'm all done, but I have a problem with
the manuscript so I'll be working all day. Are you hungry?"

"I have been seeing this story on the black
box about The Taco Bell all day," he began and she smiled in
amusement. "I would like to think outside the bun today,
Selene."

Selene giggled at his words and pulled up the
file on the computer, typing in a twelve pack of hard and soft
tacos, nachos, burritos, and a large Pepsi. She saved the document
and cleared the screen, delighted to see his satisfaction with the
fast food. She was fast turning Tristan into a junk food junkie.
She would have to rectify that.

"I'm going to have to get back to work," she
told him as he mowed on the food and grunted his reply. "If you
need anything, let me know."

Selene changed the channel on the TV to the
Lifetime channel and returned to her bedroom, grabbing her laptop
and starting over again. Two hours later, she got up and stretched.
She had successfully changed all the scenes again, checked and
double-checked her work. She did not know what was going on, but
she had to get to the bottom of it. Tristan needed to get back to
the business of wooing the beautiful heiress so she could finish
her book.

She opened her manuscript up and scanned each
chapter later, deflated to see the changes were gone. Shutting down
the laptop, she entered the living room. Tristan watched some drama
with a pained expression on his face, sucked into the tale.

"Tristan, we have to talk," she began, but he
held up his hand, looking shaken.

"Selene, can we wait until after Nora finds
out her test results. This is all very bad," he said grimly. "She
might have the cancer back."

"Tristan, this is more important!" Selene
snapped and flipped off the TV, gazing at him in determination. "I
have tried many times to change those scenes and I can't. Each time
I change them, they go back to the way they were. I have done it
three times now. I cannot change the past. The only thing I can do
is go forward with the story now. I'm sorry."

Tristan looked like he had been punched in
the gut by her words. "You’re very sure, Selene?"

"I redid it enough to know I can't change it,
Tristan."

"Selene, she will always hate me!"

"You must change her mind, Tristan." She saw
his devastated expression and shrugged. "You have to try and get
her to forgive you, as hard as it sounds. I do not know how you’re
to do it, but I can write in stuff to help you. Rhiannon's father
was abusive. I can help you there; make him appear more a monster
who got what was coming to him. The scene in the woods cannot be
changed. You have to try."

Tristan looked disgusted. "Easy enough for
you, Selene, but she hates me. You do not have to deal with the
girl, I do."

"You forget, I'm writing it," Selene pointed
out. "I have all the control over her. I’ll make her forgive you,
Tristan. It is the only thing I can do. So all is not lost."

"What if I no longer wish to go back
there?"

"What do you mean?"

"I like it here, Selene." He gazed up at her
with a secretive smile. "I do not want to go back."

"Tristan, you can't stay here!" She shook her
head. "This whole thing is just a stopover. When I begin to write
from here on out, you will be gone from the castle room and on your
way back to Raven's Keep."

"Then do not finish the book."

"Tristan, I can't do that."

"Selene, I don't wish to leave you. I want to
stay."

"This is no kind of life for you, Tristan,"
she protested. "You’re living in my computer. You deserve to have a
life of your own, whatever that is."

"Write me into your world, Selene," Tristan
said softly, his blue eyes filled with heat. "You can write things
into my world, write me into yours. Do it. What do you have to
lose?"

Selene shook her head, staring at him in
confusion. "You think I can just write you into my world as I do
the tacos into yours, and it will work?"

"Why wouldn't it? You have to try. I do not
wish to deal with what I have done to Rhiannon. She might forgive
it, but I can never look at her and not feel ashamed. Do it,
Selene. What do you risk?" he whispered gravely.

Selene thought about what he said and
struggled with it. She had worked on the book for six months and
Tristan asked her to abandon it now, and write him into her world
and what then, if it even worked? She had to worry about a medieval
lord heading to LA to find Pamela Anderson. Oh brother!

"Let me think on it, ok? What you ask is for
me to give up my dream of writing this book to bring you here, and
then what? What are you thinking?" she said and stared at him in
dismay.

"I’m thinking I have no wish to live in this
world. It is cold and cruel, and we have no modern conveniences. I
very much want one of these IPods I have seen so much of. The music
I have heard, the places I have seen. I want that, Selene," he said
with urgency in his voice. "Give that to me."

Selene saw his anguish and regretted
unleashing the TV into his world. Now he found his own lacking.
This was getting worse and it was all of her making. She knew what
she should do is get on the computer and continue her book,
reasoning he would be propelled back into the story. Another part
of her wanted to know if it was even possible to write him out
completely. What she was thinking was completely insane. Yes, this
would take more than a snap decision. She would have to sit with
this.

"It might not even work." She chewed her
lower lip.

"Please think about it, Selene, that is all I
ask," he replied and turned away from the window, walking back
inside his room.

Selene knew he was depressed and she could
not blame him. She had shown him the wonders of her world and now
expected him to be content to go back to twelfth century living
without a thought. She worried the matter and the phone rang.

It was Darcy. She giggled as she answered the
phone and heard the suffering in her friend's voice.

"It's about time you got up."

"Oh shut up! I'm so sick," Darcy whined,
sounding pathetic. "My kids made a huge mess of the house and I
can't put one foot in front of the other. Why did not you stop
me?"

"Hey, you said you wanted to live
dangerously, sister. This is on you!"

"Sal wants to take me for a ride on his bike
later today," Darcy disclosed with a sigh.

"Darcy, I don't think you should go there.
Stick with Ted," Selene argued, worried for her friend pairing off
with motorcycle Sal.

"Ted is dull and you know it! His idea of fun
is putting a puzzle together! Come on at least don't lecture me.
I'm going!"

Selene counted to ten. "Ted is a nice guy,
Darcy. He has stuck by you all these years since your divorce. Why
would you throw it away on a guy whose hair is longer than
yours?"

Darcy made a disgusted noise. "That's your
problem, Selene. You judge people too much. Sal is a hell of a nice
guy! He might look like a biker, but he's got a good job at GM and
he likes me! Ted has had five years to make it official, and let us
not forget he still lives with his Mom!"

"Darcy, it's your life. Do what you want. I
just think you and Sal haven't got a lot in common, is all."

"Selene, for the first time in five years, I
feel sexy," Darcy said tightly. "I feel desirable. Is that so
wrong?"

"No, I just don't want you to get hurt."

"No worries, were wearing helmets."

"That's not what I meant and you know it!"
Selene argued.

"Selene, I'm a big girl. I'll be fine."

Selene gave up trying to talk Darcy out of
the ride with Sal. They talked a few more minutes and she hung up,
thinking Darcy was losing her mind. She could not live her friend's
lives for them. Just then, she thought of Maggie and gave her a
call.