I Thought a Puppy Was Too Much...

[Alton (DELETED 7665)]

Grease and blood, two scents that he was more accustomed to than anything else in this world. Oil and exhaust, gasoline and nitrous oxide. These were mechanical scents; car scents. He had spent his whole life working on cars, this car, in particular. Old, powerful, reliable, sturdy, he never had to worry about her. Come race day, she was always ready to rumble.

Alton’s hands were coated in thick, black grease. The oilcloth he ran across his knuckles turned red with blood, the scraped and mangled flesh of his fist still healing from the bumps and bangs it had taken beneath the hood of the old 1969 Challenger. He was still growing accustomed to this new strength, the new speed, the stamina. He was like a man reborn. He felt fresh, like a child that couldn’t control his own body. The bloody, torn flesh of his hands could attest to it. He had punched nearly every part beneath the Challenger’s hood with each turn of a wrench.

Bolts that had used to give him such trouble were practically unfastened at all. Loose to the point that he would swear that they hadn’t been tightened at all, and when he went to tighten those bolts, he would pull too far, without any kind of notion that he was working the steel of the bolt beyond its intended strength, wrenching the caps off the bolts to leave the threaded shafts abandoned in their respective holes. He had spent nearly as much, if not more, time working out the broken bolts as he had actually fixing anything in the damned car.

He was proud when he was finished, however. When the engine turned, which it did without hesitation, the roar it made was a tremendous, bellowing growl with enough power behind it to make the entire garage tremble with its fury. He couldn’t hide the smirk as he cleaned his wrecked hands, watching the engine rock from side to side as it ran. It was a thing of beauty, a work of art. This was his canvas, and by all that was holy, he was a savant with a wrench.

He lifted a hand to the hood, ready to drop the heavy sheet of solid metal over the engine cavity as he heard the soft, feminine sound of a growl, clearing her throat. He had thought he had been alone. Startled, his hand jerked back from the hood and it slammed over the engine with a tremendous boom that echoed off the walls of the garage. He wheeled around, glancing around the garage and nearly bowing over the short, soft frame of the woman that had been all but staring over his shoulder as he worked.

“Hey, watch where you’re going.”

He glanced down, the short, pudgy woman holding her hands out to catch his tremendous frame before he crashed into her. His startled look melted into a slow, easy smile as he shook his head. “What are you even doing here, Triste?” The short, round faced woman grinned up at him and shrugged. He sighed, and she took a step back with a shake of her head. “I was coming down to borrow a few tools for a little project. Top secret. Sort of stuff I can’t have you running your mouth to the rest of the crew about.” She smiled that sly, half smirk that would have told him she was hiding something if she hadn’t come outright and said it.

He laughed, and waved a hand to his pit in the garage. “You’re welcome to anything you can find of use in my gear, just try not to take anything that looks like it might belong to somebody else? They might not like you borrowing their tools. Precious commodities and all that.” he chuckled, and she laughed, sauntering to his toolbox to root through the heavy steel drawers. The clangor of steel tools rattling around in the drawers as she searched filled the pit as he returned to his inspection of the Challenger.

The engine was running in its prime, the low, sweet purr a throaty testament to his handiwork. The body, as he ran his hands along the hood and door, was rust free on the exterior, no pocks or dents in the paint or body work that needed hammering out. He had kept it in much better shape than he had in the first few years in the circuit. A lot less slamming into walls, now that he had a much more intimate understanding of her power. Even fewer, now, he was sure, that he had a strength to match the tremendous increase in power beneath the hood after his last few modifications.

How fitting it was, he thought, that the both of them were beautiful beasts; easy to look at, the both of them, with a monster on the inside that could tear you a new one without ever giving the slightest suspicion. He knelt to begin an inspection beneath the car, checking its frame as he heard a steady, banging rock from the back of the pit. He sat up, just in time to see Triste’s heavy figure swinging back and forth from a precarious perch atop his toolbox, reaching for a set of drills hanging from a pegboard along the wall. “Hey, cut that out. You’re going to hurt yourself.” he spoke just over the clamor of sounds that filled the garage, but the curvy woman either didn’t hear, or didn’t care, and she continued to reach for her prize.

He pushed himself to his feet, all hint of his smile gone. She was going to seriously hurt herself. “Tristaine Femme Laurent, get down off that toolbox before I take you off that toolbox.” The command was a shout, his voice hard, brooking no argument. The heavy girl all but hopped off the tool box and turned to him, her dark, tan skin tinted a bright red. Her head was down, but her dark eyes watched him as he tossed his rag into the floor. “Sorry.” She muttered, and he shook his head. “Come here. Tell me what you want, and let me get it for you.” She moved closer, and lifted a hand to point at the drills again.

“That one. In the middle, please.” She said meekly, and he nodded, moving to reach up and pull the power tool down with an ease she could have never managed. He turned to her, and held it out for her to take. Something in her had changed, the coy, clever, stubborn woman gone, leaving behind this docile, obedient creature. “Hey, chin up.” He said, hoping to cheer her up. She tipped her head up, then, and gave him a smile. He found that strange, that she would react so quickly, without a sarcastic quip.

Something was off.

“Hey, Triste, how about you try taking one of the guys out this weekend? I heard Vice has a thing for the curvier girls.” She nodded, and gave him a smile, then. “If you think that’s a good—“ he stopped her there, then, and stooped down to look into her eyes. There was something odd about the way she just… stared. “What would Celeste think about that? I think she might be a little upset to find out you weren’t quite so objected to men as you told her.” She nodded again, and pushed dark, curly brown hair from her face. “You’re right.”

He sighed, and pushed his hands through his hair. He had been worried about this. This was exactly why he had been avoiding most of the crew the past few weeks. He still hadn’t learned precisely what it was that he was capable of, and this was one of the things that he had feared the most. It seemed that anything he might suggest, Triste was ready to leap at his command. He wasn’t about to test it further. She was a friend, a close friend, and she deserved better than to be tugged about by a leash.

“Why don’t I take you home?”

She nodded again, and she smiled. “Home would be nice. Thank you, Alton.”

He was going to have to find a way to explain this to his cousin.

[Alton (DELETED 7665)]

He would have been in the clear. If he hadn’t taken the dockside street past the pier, she would never have seen the restaurant. He sighed as she tipped her head at the pier, the lonely restaurant perched at its end. “Say, since you’re driving me home, how about treating a girl to something to eat? I’m starving.” She gave him an innocent smile, and he couldn’t deny her such a small request. He had, after all, just stolen her free will. In a manner of speaking, anyway. He sighed, and pulled the car into an empty spot by the beach lot, watching her squirming out of her seat to get out of the car. He shook his head, and stood from the seat, shutting the door with a thump.

It was a Red Robin, settled neatly on the end of the pier, looking out over the river. It was a neat location for a restaurant, he had to admit, as the curvy woman walked beside him down the length of the old pier, uneven planks beneath their feet sturdy, but ready to grab a foot at any moment and seen the unaware pedestrian crashing to their face. This was not the friendliest pier for your everyday drunk. Maybe that was why they chose the spot. Clever, if it was.

The hostess was friendly enough, though the look in her eyes when she looked at him, then looked at her was plain.

She’s just not good enough for you.

He had that look all the time, no matter how pretty the girl with him might be; no matter how smart, or talented, or quick, or strong. Something wasn’t good enough for the women that looked at them with envy in their eyes. This look was different. He turned, and looked at the woman beside him, and felt his jaw clenching lightly. She was a heavy woman. Not so overweight as to call her obese, but curvy. Appealing. She wasn’t even with him, and they had no interest in one another in even the slightest, so he had no idea why the subtle look was bothering him so much, but he found himself having to keep his fist in check, for want of punching the mousey hostess in the face.

She’s more like to hit on you than she is on me, you dumb twat.

He sighed, pushing his hands through his hair as he followed them back to their table, letting Triste have the first seat before he slipped into the booth with ease. The dark tan of her skin was a striking contrast to the bright red of the table cloth, her smile was a warm curve of her lips that lit up her eyes. She was truly excited. About a Red Robin. The thought made him want to laugh, but he kept quiet as she ordered. When she was finished, he glanced over the menu and closed it with a shrug. “Bring me whatever you think is best.” As he turned from the waitress back to the woman across from him, the look of horror on her face had him thinking that something terrible had come through the door. Reaching for the pistol at his hip, he turned to glance over his shoulder and saw the doorway empty. No one had entered.

Confused, he turned back to her as she leaned forward. “You never do that. Asking the waiting staff to just bring you whatever… they’ll just hand you the food nobody else wants to eat, you know. Whatever they’re trying to get rid of. The dregs and the leftovers. Just… no.” She shook her head, and he chuckled, resting back into his seat. “You worry too much. I don’t have to worry about that, for obvious reasons. Though, I see now that if I want to do some serious fine dining, you are the company I need for all the right tips.”

He smiled, and she smiled back, before he turned to look out over the river.

Where is Charisma right now?
Maybe I should call her.

“Thinking about blondie, aren’t you?”

He shook his head at the sound of her voice, turning to the woman across from him. “What? Sorry, I was just thinking.” “About Charisma, I know.” She smirked, and reached out to gently pat his hand. “You should try and talk to her. It’s been strange, seeing everyone around the garage without you. When she shows up and you aren’t there, it’s almost painful to watch.” She shrugged, and squeezed his hand. “You should go. Once we’re finished here, of course.” She smiled, and watched as their food was being carried from the kitchen.

He turned, glancing over his shoulder to catch a glimpse of it, and he felt his wallet grow light as air. They set his sandwich in front of him, a monster of a burger, clearly the most expensive thing they had on their menu. In front of her, they set another of the monstrosities, with an extra side of onion rings, and a plate of loaded fries. She gave him a smile, and set about her meal. She ate quietly, neatly, and surprisingly quickly. He was only two thirds through his, when she was ordering a dessert. Two slices of cheesecake.

He had thought she had ordered one for each of them, smiling his thanks for her thoughtfulness as he continued to eat. However, as she finished hers, she set in on the second, as he was finishing his burger. He just smiled, and shook his head. She wasn’t kidding when she said she was hungry. It made him wonder how well she had been eating. She had appeared quite a bit thinner since the last time he had talked to her. As he mused, he waved down their waitress for the check. She smiled, and tapped at the pad she carried with her. “Will that be one check, or two?”

Alton smiled, and held up a finger. “Just the one, please.” She gave him another smile and tore the check from the pad, leaving it on the table as she sauntered off to the kitchen. He picked up his phone, and decided that now was as good a time as any to text Charisma. As he tapped the messaging app, the phone’s screen went black, the green and red ‘answer’ and ‘cancel call’ buttons flashed across the screen as it began to vibrate. He tapped the answer key, seeing the name before the ringtone even had a chance to mutter a note through the phone’s speaker. He pushed the phone to his ear and nodded.

Are you alright? Are you going to be okay? Did you seriously ******* do what I think you are telling me that you did?

“Really, I’m okay. You don’t have to worry so much. Yeah, seriously.” he sagged under the weight of the voice on the other end of the line. He couldn’t help but smile as his cousin’s sharp, lecturing words cracked through the speaker like a whip against his conscience. On the best of days, the woman was a master of guilt tripping. The risk you took was stupid tremendous, Alton. Do you have any idea what the hell you are getting yourself into? “Seriously, listen, I know, okay? I took a huge risk, but look at things now. They paid off, didn’t they? What was your plan, to leave the rest of us behind? You know I wasn’t going to let you leave me in the dust. None of you.” A long pause followed as the voice on the other end grew much softer.

Okay, I’m sorry. You know I would do anything for you. For all of you. But this is something that we can’t all share. Some of us have to bear this alone. My son is like us too, you know. You won’t be leaving him behind anywhere, either. Anyway; the other reason I called. Have you seen Triste? She was supposed to be back a while ago. “No. No, not him either. And yeah, she’s with me. We had a bit of a… running in. She’s fine, I’m not letting anything happen to her, not ever. No, I haven’t told her girlfriend yet.” He turned his powerful, friendly green gaze to the heavyset woman sitting across from him in the booth. She just smiled, and kept quiet. She was always so polite, it was unnerving sometimes.

No, she doesn’t need to know. I doubt Triste even knows. Just let them go on with their lives, and you be careful with her, Alton. “No, you’re right, she doesn’t need to know. The less the others know the better. Listen, I need to go before she tries to order another cheesecake.” The voice on the other end laughed, before slowly fading into a final question. Have you talked to Charisma? She’s going to ******* kill you. “No, I really do need to go. I’ll talk to her soon, I promise.” His cousin’s voice ramped up into lecture mode again just as the phone clicked, disconnecting the call. He looked back to the woman across from him as she gave him the cruelest smile she could summon.

“You’re fortunate I like you, Monsieur LeBlanc. Talk about me like that again and I’ll have half a mind to hurt you.” He couldn’t help but smile, her own smile growing softer at that. “Come on, Triste. I need to get you home. I should probably do what the Tyrant Kitten tells me. I haven’t talked to Charisma yet about all of this.”

She had only half stood, her curvy frame still bent over the table as she stopped, her soft, fleshy figure froze in place. Her one hand gripped the edge of the table, the other holding her handbag aloft, the heavy, dangerous looking accessory looking more and more like a weapon with each second she remained locked in that position. Gentle, brown eyes went wide with a kind of horror or shock, he wasn’t sure which, that he doubted he had ever seen on the woman’s face. “Just what the hell, Alton?” She asked, her eyes still wide with what he had decided was pure horror at his confession. She immediately launched into a tirade of words from more languages than he cared to try to follow. He knew it to be the three she spoke with easy fluency; English, which he picked up right away, French, which gave him only slightly more trouble, and Spanish, which he was only to catch snatches of, when the words were similar to the ones he knew in French.

He watched her arm, wary of each and every time she moved, ready for that heavy bag to swing for his head. He even caught himself ducking out of the way of a swing that never came. The caution was fraying on his nerves, and it made him feel ridiculous. He was supposed to be some kind of superman now, right? So why was he afraid of a little chubby girl and her purse?

Because that woman can kick your ***, and there's not much you're going to do to stop her. She's a lot easier for you to break than for her to break you. You don't want to hurt her.

He held up his hand and the woman finally slid from the booth. “I had to know that nothing would happen to me before I went to her. I think I’m safe, now.” She let loose an angry huff as she shook her bag, his body ready to duck from her swing any second, again. He had a sinking feeling that he was going to be feeling the urge to duck around her for some time. “Fine. But you are telling her. Now.” she muttered, her voice brooking no argument. He smiled at that, and pushed himself up from the table. “Of course, Femme. Just after we get you home.”

It was her turn to hold up her hand, and tossed her head. Silky brown strands tossed over her shoulder as she stuck her nose into the air. “I can walk myself just fine, Monsieur LeBlanc. You have much more pressing business than walking the likes of me a block in the dark. I can handle myself fine. You go to her.”

He sighed at that and shook his head. "You at least have your gun, right?" She rolled her eyes at that, and hefted the .38 Special from her bag, flashing the nickel finish, just for him. "Satisfied?"

He smiled, defeated, and let her go. She sauntered from the diner, and turned to walk down the street, passing along the length of the restaurant to stare at him through the plate glass window. Her hand lifted, pressing her fingers beneath her eyes, then pointed to him. He lifted his phone and wiggled it at her in the air, before tucking it into his hand to send the text, leaving a stack of bills on the table.

[Alton (DELETED 7665)]

Days went by without a word between them. The most communication he had with Triste was the odd text here or there, checking on her, making sure she was okay. They met up from time to time, each day, for his dose. He couldn’t stomach the thought of feeding from a stranger, not when she was willing, and he knew that he could trust her. It was just bothering him, how he just took from her what he needed, and just sent her on her way. That just felt wrong, somehow.

Triste was a smart woman. Bold, beautiful, kind; she was a good person, and a good friend, and Alton wasn’t treating her fairly, and he knew it. He sighed, pushing his knuckle into his eye as he thought, still tapping his thumbnail idly against the black screen of his locked phone. He should do something for her, or spend some time with her. Really sit down with her and see how she was doing. The last he had heard, she and Celeste were having some trouble, and he hated that for her. Her constant disappearing to see him for his nightly visits wasn’t helping her relationship, he was sure. It made everything worse, knowing how much Celeste meant to her, even if he could barely understand a word of her Swedish gibberish. He was still convinced she could speak English, she just liked to use her cryptic language when they had company. Their own way of keeping their words private.

It just irked him, sometimes, the way this had all turned out. He sighed again and tapped his thumb against the screen in a soft melody that had been buzzing in his head all day, even if he couldn’t recognize the music and it was driving him slowly mad. Maybe she would know. It would be something besides the business as usual to strike up some kind of conversation between them. He tapped the lock key on his phone before he began to ponder just how ridiculous that really was, and he made an agitated sound in his throat. He locked the phone again and dropped it onto the table.

“Maybe I should invite them both. Show Celeste she’s been meeting with me, make some kind of excuse. Some kind of story she’d believe… hm. That could be it…” He turned from his spot in the garage, sitting alone in the light of a single lamp to look at the sleek, shadowy frame of his beast. Even sitting in cold silence, it looked fast. A machine of that caliber required constant tweaks and maintenance, adjustments and repairs. Triste was an incredible mechanic. Maybe he could see if she would be interested in working on his car full time. That would be a satisfactory reason for her daily disappearances, and one that Celeste would trust.

There was no lust between them, Triste and himself that is. No spark of romance, no desire of any kind. They were the purest of friends, and always had been. Triste was, for all intents and purposes, like his little sister. She had never had a girlfriend that hadn’t trusted him completely. He had never given anyone a reason not to trust her with him, and neither had she. It was a rare and beautiful sort of thing, to have someone of the feminine persuasion to sit down with and be completely unafraid of complications. He missed having her around more often, and this was just the thing to put Celeste’s absurd jealousy and mistrust to rest.

He lifted his phone again and tapped out the message, inviting the girls to dinner over the weekend. His treat, as usual. That was sure to have her running. It usually would. He smiled to himself and tapped send, before he finally allowed himself to relax.

[Alton (DELETED 7665)]

A week passed.

Two.

Finally, Celeste submitted to his insistence. She tried her hardest to be unpleasant, to be as shrewd and barbed as she could stand, but she had softened at his explanations, until finally she’d assented to meeting with him. The dinner was scrapped for a simple night of talk and drink, something he was certain he could handle without issue. Talk. Talk was easy. He was good at talk. They were going to be coming by the garage, a place they could all agree was neutral ground. A place they all knew, that they all called home. He had made sure that the wine he’d picked up on his way had been a pleasant one, a local vintage from a very expensive, very classy place he’d only seen once in passing before remembering to give it a glance.

He was not disappointed.

The winery was sublime, the vintages they sold were incredible. He had settled for two bottles of red, and two of a blush, very expensive, and very classy wines, he was assured. He had paid, and left in a hurry to be there ahead of the girls by several hours, letting the wines chill in ice while he had made a space habitable in the pit. A comfortable set of chairs tucked neatly around a wide table, the ice buckets set in the center awaited the women when they arrived in Celeste’s CC8S. A flashy, over-engineered European piece from some gibberish speaking backwater, the car was more pomp and less muscle. Another difference that set him and Celeste at odds. The soft, powdery blue color of the paint was a maddening contrast alongside the jet black of his old Charger. The two things looked ridiculous astride one another.

His beast of a car was an antique beside hers, and its age showed in the way it sat, wide, heavy, and huge, a titanic behemoth next to the sleek, slender profile of the Koenigsegg. Long, light doors swung open and Celeste’s slender, tanned leg pushed to the ground aside the car’s runners, even as Triste all but bounced out of the passenger’s seat and popped into view with a beaming grin.

At least the ride over was pleasant enough. Maybe I’ll get lucky, and they’ll both be in good moods.

Like she was reading his thoughts, Celeste swept from the extremely low seating of the car in a graceful arc, tossing her golden hair over her shoulder as she pushed the door shut, her laughter cutting across the sound of the dying engine. “You’re so crazy, Triste. Come on.” She turned, her superiority in every inch of her posture as she threw back her willowy shoulders, her spine straight as a razor’s edge as her freckled face found the man sitting at the set table, her lips pulling into an amused smile.

Good, she’s not going to make this difficult… I was so ready for the worst, too…

He shook his head and gave her a greeting smile, and stood as the ladies made their way to the table. “Triste, Celeste, it’s great to see you ladies. Sit, please, I brought some wine I think you’ll both enjoy. Lovely as always Celeste. I like your dress, Triste. Very tasteful.” He grinned, pulling a chair out first for Celeste, and another for Triste. The Puerto Rican woman was a head taller than the slender Swede, and much heavier, much softer. Where Celeste was thin, angular, small, Triste was heavy, soft, and curvy. They contrasted one another like night and day, and he supposed that was what they liked in one another. He couldn’t find either of them attractive, not with what he had at home waiting for him. They were both too far to either end of the spectrum, neither hitting that happy medium that he had found he was more than a little partial to.

Celeste cleared her throat, and Alton smirked, mocking a smack to his brow. “Almost forgot.” He arranged the three glasses, pulling the first bottle, already opened to breathe, from the ice chips in the bucket with a clatter of the remaining bottles before he tipped the long neck of the dark bottle, filling each of the tall, fluted glasses. He set the bottle back into the ice and pushed either of them a glass before taking one for himself. He lifted the glass to his nose, sniffing the bouquet before he grinned, satisfied as he lifted his glass. “To friends. Good and not so good. To Q5.” The girls parroted his words before they sipped from their glasses, Triste upending hers in an instant and swallowing back the sweet red as he took a healthy sip.

Celeste took a portion somewhere in the middle, doing her best to conceal her itching desire to set the glass aside and claim a bottle for herself. He could see it in her face, in the way her eyes stared at the wine in the glass as it shimmered a deep, bloody red. It sang to her, a song of silent reverie that called to her like a siren at sea. She was lost to it, and he knew it when he saw it in her deep blue stare. This would be both good, and bad. The trick was balance. Who knew that the small blonde was such a sucker for a good glass of red?

He chuckled quietly to himself as he watched her struggle with the drink, sipping at it again as he poured Triste a fresh glass. “I hope you both are doing okay. I was worried, with all the time that Femme and I were spending together, that you might have been a little uncomfortable with me, Tråka.” Celeste laughed, and shook her head as she slipped a hand beneath the table to rest across Triste’s broad thigh, squeezing it in her grasp. “Of course not! I am perfectly trusting of mine Triste. She is a sweetheart, a very friendly person. I know she would help you any way she can. She is, of course, mine. I do not doubt her, in the least.”

Good. Maybe she can see the foolishness of it, then. Triste and I… there’s nothing but a fraternal love between us, familial, and not even an ounce of romance to be seen. There wasn’t so much as a spark between us, even now with her here. She must see it, because she’s much more relaxed, even as she speaks.

The blonde’s Swedish influence almost destroyed the English of her words, but he could just understand her. He smiled, and refilled her glass as he looked from sharp blues to soft and friendly browns, their eyes watching him as he settled back into his seat. “She does adore you. She’s prone to chattering about you while she works. Always pleasant of course. Usually about how lovely you look, though she hardly does you justice.” Triste all but blushed at his confession of her talking, her brows knit angrily at him even as she chuckled beneath her breath, Celeste’s laughter much richer and rising into the air around them. “Of course she does. She has seen me.”

I wouldn’t say you were so special, dove. You’ve both seen Charisma.

He smiled, smug with his own private thoughts as he sipped at his wine again.

“Did you plan to be racing this weekend?”