The Werewolf Game

Chapter 7: Tristan Monteverde (part 2)

Author's Note: Chapter 7 is quite a long chapter so I separated it into three parts at almost 2000 words each. So, Happy Reading

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            Three days after Karen and Tristan fought, they still haven't made up. Three days after that night, Tristan had finally come to his senses and had opened a section in his mind that accepted the The Werewolf Game's existence. And finally, three years after Gia disappeared from Tristan's life; the husband and wife were finally, meeting to discuss their marriage.

Tristan unlocked his phone, debating whether to inform Karen of his meeting with Gia, but after a few minutes he decided against it. His pride wouldn't allow him to lower himself to the person he gave up a lot for once. He took his car keys and wallet before heading off to a café near Voclain Psychiatric. It was a modest café with a short menu, but the ambiance was something that could not be compared to the ones he was used to going. He smiled upon realization that not all cafés were created for business and educational meetings.

Gia arrived in the café wearing sweatpants paired with a plain white shirt, while her long blonde hair was in a high ponytail; a get up no rich heiress would usually wear outside. She placed her yellow umbrella on the rack before heading towards Tristan.

"Did you wait long?" she asked placing her clutch back on the table before she took her place on the chair opposite Tristan's. "I'm sorry I dragged you all the way here. With all the preparations going on at our building I couldn't just simply leave."

Tristan looked at her confused.

"I own Mirai Tech," Gia chuckled, smiling at Tristan brightly. "We're having our office's grand opening next week before I head to Chelsea."

"So, the American English you've been using all these time was not your normal English?" Tristan asked rhetorically, amused at his new discovery.

"No," Gia answered shaking her head. "I had a thick Russian accent as a kid that kind of dissipated after I went to this boarding school in the UK."

"Why Mirai Tech?" he asked curiously, wanting to hear her talk some more.

"I have a really bad naming sense, and I can't just name my own company as Smyrnoi Tech because people might associate it with Smyrnoi Hotels so, I decided to name it after my partner," Gia explained stopping once in a while to construct her sentence in her head. "I'm getting us off track."

"It's okay," Tristan told her. "I'm quite curious about the life you tread."

"Oh," she exclaimed. "It's quite embarrassing actually."

After placing their orders, Gia started her narration, while Tristan listened intently to her uninhibited manner of speech. Unlike the Gia he met inside their family's mansion, the woman in front of him has this strong English English that sounded more natural compared to her stiff American English.

"What do you want to know?"

"How come no one knew that a Gia Smyrnoi exist?" he asked as frank as he could, since this question had bothered him since the banquet.

"Because it's tradition," she answered simply. "Raising ones children away from attention till coming of age is a century-old tradition in the Smyrnoi Family. The family place a great importance on rearing a child in a normal and peaceful environment, which means only a handful of people outside the family know who we really are. And I'm an even more special case since my mom never married. No one really expects the reserved Alicia Smyrnoi to have a child out of marriage."