Free Sweet Alibi by Adriane Leigh

through my head were terrifying and new and right all in the same breath. Tristan watched as my thoughts aligned.
    “I’m sorry. I don't know what just happened or why I said what I did, but it can't happen again.” I stood and walked back through the French doors and into the house, more confused than I’d ever been.

Eleven

    Georgia
    “HEY.” TRISTAN STEPPED up behind me.
    “Hey.” I was standing on the shore the following afternoon, my sweater-covered arms wrapped around my body and toes buried in the sand while the frayed cotton of my cutoffs tickled my thighs in the brisk breeze.
    “Okay?” Tristan stood next to me, eyes on the eastern horizon as the wind howled around us.
    “Yeah.”
    “Georgia,” he breathed and placed a hand on my shoulder. “Is this about ― ”
    “No,” I interrupted before he could continue. The memory of the kiss we’d shared yesterday morning had consumed my thoughts these past twenty-four hours. Shame clouded my mind, along with the overwhelming desire to feel his lips connected to mine again.
    “You look so sad out here with the wind whipping around you, like you want to blow away,” he said sadly. I forced a small smile before tears welled in my eyes.
    “How do you have the ability to be inside my head?” I whispered as my eyes bore into his.
    “I just…thought…” he hesitated, his eyes searching mine. I turned back to the horizon as my head swam with past memories ― the hurt, the pain, the healing. Always the quest for healing. While Kyle had  been physically present, he hadn’t always been emotionally. In recent years, Silas had been a far better companion. That realization crushed my heart. I had thought Kyle was the only person I would ever need ― the only person that was ever good for me, but a few mornings over coffee, a kiss, and a truckload of physical chemistry had me rethinking everything I thought I knew.
    “What's this?” Tristan slid his hand down my arm and took the book I was clutching to my chest.
    “I came down here to read,” I answered, thankful for the distraction. He turned the book over and read the cover.
    His lips parted before his eyes met mine. “Tristan and Isolde?”
    “It's been a long time since I’ve read it. I found it in town yesterday. I'm thinking it must be a pretty special story if your mom…” I paused, hoping I wasn’t drudging up a painful memory.
    I watched his throat contract as he swallowed. “Do you want to read it together?” he asked tentatively.
    “You want to read it together?” My eyebrows shot up.
    “Sure. It's been a long time since I’ve read it. My mom used to read it to me when I was a kid, like a bedtime story,” he said, his finger sliding across the loving couple on the cover. I watched him, lost in his own memories.
    “Sure.” I took the book back and sat in the cool sand, my toes just out of reach of the waves.
    I began to read.
    “ Triste means sad in French. Your name means sadness.” I looked over at him after reading just the first few lines.
    “Yeah.” Emotion swam in his eyes and a frown crossed his beautiful features. Whatever he was thinking, I wanted to take it away, to hold him as long as needed until the pain melted from his body. Suddenly I wondered if he had the ability to take my pain away too. My heart skipped a few beats in my chest before I continued to read.
    As I read, the fictional Tristan's childhood was revealed. He’d lost his parents at a young age, and was fiercely loyal to the uncle who had raised him, his sense of duty and honor unparalleled. He had first met Isolde after a battle ― she’d come upon him in a ditch and nursed him back to health. He was to bring her back to marry his uncle, but on the journey they’d mistakenly drunk a love potion together ― sealing their fates to each other forever.
    “Do you think the potion was really a potion or just an excuse?” I asked aloud.
    “An excuse?” he laughed.
    “Because they fell in love even