Tristan groaned into her mouth and tugged her closer, needing to feel her beautiful little body moving against his. She didn't disappoint. As he held her to him with one hand at her nape and the other on the small of her back, her breasts met his chest. She circled her hips with his, bringing her pussy close to the hard ridge of his cock in her search for friction and relief and him.
With her in his arms, it was easy to say what he hadn't earlier.
"Christ, beautiful, I want you. I wanted you to say yes, because I'm bastard enough to want to keep you here like this. You… fuck, I want this, Lillian." His mouth landed on hers.
"Tristan," she groaned, her body shuddering. "Please."
One word, one please, and all thoughts of stopping vanished, melting away as if they hadn't been there at all. For all he knew, they hadn't. They were just smoke and mirrors. Bullshit lines he fed himself because the truth scared him. He released her nape, his hand traveling down her back and onto her ass. He cupped, squeezed… and groaned again when she whispered another little plea into his mouth.
"Where's your bedroom, baby?" he demanded. Their tongues still danced with one another in an erotic promise. He sucked her bottom lip into his mouth and tugged with his teeth before pulling back and pressing his erection into her through her skirt. "I need you naked. Now."
Lillian froze as soon as the frantic confession left his mouth.
"No," she said, no longer pulling him close but pushing him away. "No, Tristan. Let me go."
"Shit." Heat gave way to ice in an instant.
His arms slipped from around her as soon as her feet were on the ground. She stumbled and then righted herself, one hand pressed to her mouth and her eyes wide and wary in her flushed face.
Tristan cursed at that look. "Lillian, I'm-"
"No." She shook her head, her hand still pressed to her swollen lips. Her expression hardened. "You don't get to kiss me like that, Tristan. You don't get to rile me up and then walk out. I won't-" She gulped, practically babbling. "You can't just…. Not again."
"I'm not going anywhere," he said, looking down at her. "I'm not going to-"
"Not going to what?" Her eyes flashed, daring him to answer that question.
"I'm not-" He wanted to tell her he wouldn't walk away, but he wasn't so sure that was true. He wanted her, but he wouldn't fuck her when she'd only regret it, and she would regret it if he took her now. "It's not you," he told her instead, wishing he could take back the ill-advised words the moment they left his mouth.
Lillian flinched as if he'd struck her, her face paling beneath the flush in her cheeks. "Not me?" She laughed, the sound jagged and harsh, angry. "Right."
Way to go, you moron, he cursed himself.
"I want you, Lillian. That hasn't changed." He blew out a breath, frustrated that he couldn't seem to think straight around her, let alone find words to explain why he kept walking away from her. "I just-"
"You want me, just not enough." Her wide, angry eyes met his, held for a moment, and then darted away. She ran a hand through her hair, fingers catching in snarls he'd helped cause. "Fine. What happens now?" The faint tremble in her voice screamed that he'd hurt her.
"I want you more than I did the first night," he said, ignoring her question. They weren't doing that shit, avoiding the issue until one or the other of them snapped. Christ, his blood still boiled. His mind was clouded by her scent, her taste. And yet again, she got it all wrong, assumed he didn't want her enough when the problem was that he wanted her too much. But he didn't want her to hate him, and he certainly didn't want her to regret what he'd do to her when she finally gave in to him.
"Do you trust me, Lillian?" he asked instead of trying to explain.
She took another shaky breath and then cursed and squared her shoulders. Her expression firmed into one of cool resolve. "No, I don't trust you. And I'm not sure I even like you."
He nodded once, refusing to give in to the little ripple of hurt threatening to shoot through him at her answer. It wasn't like he hadn't expected that truth. Hell, wasn't like he didn't deserve it, either. "I want you, Lillian. I want you against that fucking wall." He jerked his chin in the direction of the wall in question. "I want you bent over the table by the door. On the floor. In your bed. In mine. Across the street in the middle of the dance floor. Anywhere you'll let me and every way you'll let me." He looked at her, letting her see exactly how much he meant that.
She swallowed, her wide-eyed gaze darkening, held captive by his own.
He took a step toward her, reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Sparks sizzled and popped where his skin met hers. He let his arm drop slowly, dragging his fingertips down her cheek and onto her neck before shoving his hands deep into his pockets.
Pitching his voice low, he killed them both with words and one long, heated looked. "I want you panting, moaning, and screaming until you can't move, baby. But I'm not going to fuck you when you'd just regret it later. When I take you to bed – and I do mean when, Lillian, not if. When I take you, you're not going to regret sleeping with me. You're going to know exactly how much I want you, and you're going to beg for it."
He fucking meant that too. When she begged him, told him she believed him, he'd fuck her until she couldn't move and her voice went hoarse from screaming his name. For days, if she'd let him. But not until, even if keeping his hands to himself did kill him.
"No. I won't." She shook her head, almost as if trying to deny to herself that she'd give in to him. She would though. They both knew she would.
He chuckled at the outraged, excited look on her face. "You will, Lillian. You'll want it as badly as I do, and you'll beg for it, sweetheart." A wicked smile curved his lips upward as he imagined her spread beneath him, pleading for more. "Or maybe you won't." He forced himself to shrug. "Either way, I won't fuck you until you beg me to."
He waited for her response, waited for the inevitable explosion.
She didn't blow up though. Instead, she shocked the hell out of him by ignoring his little barb. "The case, Tristan," she said, arching a brow as if unaffected by him.
He wanted to gnash his teeth in frustration at that response. He wanted… something. A fuck you, a glare, a derisive laugh, for her to seduce him, slap him. But Lillian wasn't that simple. She challenged him by ignoring it altogether… and that made him want to wrap her legs around his waist all that much more.
If she didn't cave sooner rather than later, he wouldn't survive the coming weeks.
"You drive me insane, beautiful."
"Welcome to the club." She turned on her heel and limped further into the house, a breathless hitch in her voice. "You've been driving me crazy since I met you, and you know what's really messed up about it?"
"Hmm?"
"I said yes to Jason anyway."
Lillian wound her way through the living room, Tristan following behind her. He came to a dead stop in the center of the room, trying to take it in. She'd decorate the room simply, and he had a feeling it wasn't what she would have picked given a real choice. Aside from one deep chaise, the furniture was functional, and looked uncomfortable as hell. Pieces designed for ease of use rather than comfort. The tables beside the couch and chair were bracketed to the wall as if to help provide support. A collage of ballet photographs spread across the wall above the couch, Lillian's past screaming a warning at him.
Christ.
He closed his eyes and drew a deep breath, feeling like a bastard. If he hadn't known before how hard things were for her, standing in the middle of her living room illustrated the depth and breadth of her injuries in a painful, blatant way. She struggled just to make it through the day, and he planned to drag her into the middle of a war.
"Don't you dare, Tristan Riley," she whispered from across the room.
He popped his eyes open to find her glaring daggers at him, her back as straight as it'd been when she'd stormed away from him half an hour before. "Don't you feel sorry for me, or pity me, or say anything." S
he turned around and shuffled away without another word.
Pity her?
Tristan eyed the wall-to-wall shelves of books and DVDs, the uncomfortable looking furniture, the photographs spread across the wall, and saw nothing but her determination and persistence, and his own selfishness.
Following after her, he stopped in the doorway to the kitchen when he found her propped against the island, her head thrown back with her eyes fixed on the ceiling and the long line of her neck exposed. He fought the urge to put his lips to the pulse he knew raced there.
He didn't pity her, not even close.
"Most people who've been through what you've dealt with would have run screaming from Teplo and from me." He waited until she tilted her head forward to look at him before continuing. "They would have run and they wouldn't have looked back, but you didn't. You came back here after what I did, and you told me to go to hell."
"Still haven't changed my mind about that," she muttered.
Tristan ignored the little barb. "You had every reason in the world to tell Jason no today, but you didn't. You looked him in the eye and you told him that you'd do this. Even if you have to put up with me to do it, and even with that limp you try so hard to hide, you agreed to walk in there, knowing exactly what you risk by doing so. So no, Lillian, I don't pity you or feel sorry for you. I admire the hell out of you."
She swallowed hard, but didn't break eye contact. "You wouldn't do the same?"
"I'd rip your partner's balls off for hurting you," he answered, moving closer to her. "And then I'd tell me and Jason to fuck off for even asking for help after the things I said to you." He held her gaze, groaning aloud when her lips parted and her tongue darted out to wet the bottom before disappearing back into her lovely mouth.
He was so very fucked… and he wasn't stupid enough to try to pretend he wasn't.
Please, let her cave soon, he pleaded to whichever God still listened to people like him.
"I, uh, still haven't ruled that out." Lillian took a hurried step away, though not quite fast enough to hide the shiver that raced through her when his arm grazed hers.
"Good idea," he murmured.
"Would you really have said no if you were in my place?" she asked after a long moment, curiosity brimming in her tone.
"Yeah," he said, "I would have." He wasn't a forgiving person. He wasn't a particularly giving person either. Lillian though… Lillian was. And that was just one more reason she didn't belong in his world any more than people like him belonged in hers.
"Why's this so personal to you?" she asked.
"Why is what personal?"
"The Vetrov family. This case. Why do you care so much?"
"Someone has to," he said, skirting around the truth. "Drug addicts are nobodies to the rest of the world. They're a problem, subhuman. And when they die, they're nothing more than another statistic to most of society."
"Hmm." Lillian traced the edge of a tile on the countertop, her lips pursed.
"Hmm?"
"You don't believe that?" she asked, still tracing the edge of the tile with one finger.
"No. I don't." Addiction pissed him off, but the people battling those addictions were still people to him. And so long as they were alive, they had a shot at turning their lives around, of being something more than just another nameless, faceless drug addict. "They do some messed up shit, but even the worst of them deserve for someone to give a damn whether they live or die. They deserve a chance."
"That's the difference between you and me then." She looked up at him, her expression hard. "You look at them and see a reason to hope. I look, but all I see is someone else ruining lives for a stupid drug."
"If that's all you see, why did you agree?"
She shrugged a shoulder, her expression softening. "Because you're right. They don't deserve to die for their addictions." She paused, her bottom lip caught between her teeth. "You really believe these people are being murdered?"
"Yeah," he said, wishing that weren't true for a thousand different reasons. If he didn't believe in his gut that Anton and Paulo Vetrov were killing people intentionally, he could walk away from this case, and so could Lillian. The loss of life would still suck, but he'd learned a long time ago that he couldn't save everyone. This time though… well, this was different than an accidental overdose. This was murder. And that made all the difference in the world to him, for reasons he didn't plan to explain to her. Not now, and maybe not ever.
"You don't want me to do this, do you?"
"No, I don't. I know what seeing this shit every day does to a person. And I know how badly things can end. The thought of you getting caught in the middle bothers me a whole hell of a lot." He took a deep breath, staring down at the countertop instead of at her. "But we need your help enough for me to justify getting you involved."
"It's my choice, Tristan."
"Maybe so, but that doesn't mean I couldn't have refused your help."
"You wouldn't have."
"No, I wouldn't have," he muttered, not even attempting to lie to her. "But that doesn't mean I like it. The thought of you getting hurt because of my stupidity is intolerable. I need you to be safe." So far as brutal honesty went, that'd been both.
She scrutinized his expression.
He held his breath, waiting for her to demand to know why her safety mattered so much to him. But she didn't. She simply nodded her head as if whatever she'd seen on his face was answer enough for her.
"Where do we start?" she asked.
"We'll start with moving me in here." He leaned against the doorframe, smirking at the thought. He'd be in her face day after day, posing as her boyfriend. And she really thought she'd be able to resist him?
Not a chance in hell.
"Today?" she asked, the word little more than a squeak.
"Is that a problem?" He arched a brow.
"Ah… no."
Liar, he thought, amused.
He stepped forward, backing her up into the counter, before leaning down over her. She shivered and inhaled when his lips grazed the shell of her ear. She grasped at the countertop, her eyes locked on his.
"Hope you have a spare room, beautiful," he whispered, "because I sleep naked."
Chapter Twelve
"It isn't important, Lillian," Tristan muttered an hour later, glaring at her from the driver's seat.
"Seriously?" She rolled her eyes at him, flipping closed the vent in front of her before she froze. Did he have to keep it below zero in his car? "I'm supposed to be your girlfriend. I think your girlfriend would know what happened to your parents."
"I already told you what you needed to know," he argued, reaching out to adjust the air conditioning.
"No," she said, shaking her head, "you didn't. You told me you have an assumed name which, for the record, isn't assumed if it is your name."
"Tristan Riley isn't my name."
"Oh my God," Lillian groaned, fighting the urge to bite him. "You were born Tristan Alexander Riley. Assuming the Angelo last name after your uncle adopted you doesn't mean you aren't a Riley any longer. Your "fake name" is your actual name."
"Whatever," he said, turning his head to glare at her. "Christ, you're irritating. Has anyone ever told you that?"
"You just don't like being wrong," she snapped, turning to stare out the window. The early afternoon sun stood like a giant ball overhead, its light reflected back in prisms from the water spread like tentacles throughout Seattle.
Tristan maneuvered the SUV in and out of traffic, passing people as if their cars sat still.
Did all cops drive so fast?
Even now, her dad drove the exact same way.
"I'm not wrong. My assumed name is Tristan Riley. I'm twenty-nine. I write freelance for various high profile magazines. I have a trust fund, and I like to party."
She didn't even know why they were fighting over his name, for God's sake. So far, they'd spent more time arguing than they had coming up with a cover story. And all she had to
show for it was an intense desire to strangle him and tidbits of information that made her more curious than anything. He seemed to derive an almost psychotic pleasure from irritating her. He dodged questions he didn't want to answer, telling her that she didn't need to know, or just outright ignoring the question altogether. It was infuriating!
"Where did we meet?" she asked instead of arguing with him any further.
"We met at the club and fell madly in love," he said, his tone so full of amusement she turned to scowl at him, annoyed by his teasing.
"And I just let you move in two weeks later? Um, no."
"Why not?" He swung the SUV onto the exit ramp at Northeast 8th Street in Bellevue. Posh homes peeked through a cover of lush green foliage all around them. "Stranger things have happened."
Lillian arched a brow, just daring him to point out that she'd let him do worse. A lot worse, and a lot sooner than a week after meeting him. More like five minutes.
He sighed, the amused grin on his face slipping. "Keep it simple, sweetheart. The fewer lies you have to remember, the better. It's easy to slip up when you're stressed, and you will be stressed. Don't make it more difficult than it has to be. Just relax."
"I can't hide my past like you can, Tristan. How am I going to explain that if it comes up?" she asked, ignoring his command to relax. How was she supposed to do that when she'd agreed to let him invade every aspect of her life for God only knew how long?
"We'll tell the truth." He flashed her a tight smile. Trying to be encouraging, she thought. It didn't work, not with the worried furrow between his brows. "You're recognizable, so there's no point trying to hide who you are."
"So until two weeks ago, everything that actually happened in my life is my cover story? And then I moved into my grandmother's house, met you at the club, fell madly in love, and now accompany you there because you like to party? Great."
Tristan smirked, his expression downright wicked as he guided the Range Rover through a quick turn onto a side street. "You accompany me to the club because I like to dance with you, beautiful. It's a highly erotic experience."
Ravished (The Teplo Trilogy #1) Page 14