by Eden Bradley
She swept her hand down the front of her body, over her belly, brushing the curls between her thighs, and sighed. She couldn’t seem to forget that night with him, his touch, his cock inside her. And even though she was physically obsessed with him, just as strong in her mind were her conversations with him: at his shop, at Café du Monde, at St. Roch. It took every ounce of strength she had not to go see him, to make him tell her why he’d had sex with her, then chased her away.
She knew she hadn’t imagined that intensity, that level of connection. Had she?
Maybe she was finally losing her mind, as her mother had always promised she would if she didn’t change her depraved ways.
She really had to stop thinking about her mother. Her family was toxic for her, she knew that. But no matter how many times she thought she’d put them and all their head trips behind her, she couldn’t seem to let them go.
Maybe the key was not to let them go, but to find a way to sort of coexist with them? Even if she didn’t see them, speak to them.
She shook her head, started to comb her hair out. Almost impossible to think of Tristan and her family in the same breath. Strangely impossible not to. Why was it all mixed up together?
God, she was a mess. Even worse since Tristan. But she still felt so damn drawn to him. Needed him.
Damn it.
She yanked the comb through her tangled hair, pulling until her scalp burned. Punishment, yes. But never, never enough to chase away the thoughts she was having night and day about Tristan. Never enough to ease that hovering sensation of guilt.
And yet, she realized with a shock, the guilt had not been there while she was with him, while they were having sex. She’d loved what he’d done to her, what they’d done together. And while she’d had some fleeting thoughts about that whole idea of pleasure as sin, she hadn’t really felt at all bad, for the first time. No, it only made it hotter. What did that mean, if anything?
God, what a fool she was.
And even now, she burned for him.
She stroked her fingertips over her hardened nipples, felt them swell even more. And the vee between her thighs filled with need, until she had to press the flat of her hand against the hungry flesh.
Yes…
She slipped her fingers into that damp cleft, thought of the humming touch of the needle on her skin, of Tristan’s hands on her, shivered with pleasure. She paused to draw in a breath. The telephone rang.
Shit.
She was not the kind of person who could ignore a ringing phone. She ran into the bedroom and grabbed her cell off the nightstand.
“Yes, hello?”
“Sophie.”
Her mother. She hadn’t talked to her in months. Ironic that she was calling now. If she only knew that her sinful daughter was standing there entirely naked, her flesh aching with desire, the juices of her own arousal on her fingers. She took some perverse pleasure in that.
“Hello, Mother. How are you?”
“I’m fine. Which you would know if you ever bothered to call home.”
That is not my home. Hasn’t been for years. Maybe it never was.
But she couldn’t say these things. And she knew better than to get started. “How is Dad?”
“He’s fine.”
Ah, just the quarterly check-in, then. Excruciating, but she could get through it.
“I’m fine too, Mother.” Not that she’d asked. Of course, her mother really didn’t want to know how she was, what she was doing. “My writing is going well. I sold another book this year.”
“Well, I’m glad to know you’re not starving in that place. That awful city.”
“I love it here, Mother.”
“Yes, of course you do. It’s a place of depravity, Sophie. Not the kind of place for a proper young woman.”
“Have I ever really been ‘proper,’ Mother?”
She’d have a fucking heart attack if she saw the tattoos.
There was perverse pleasure in that idea too.
“When did you become so disrespectful? It’s all that traveling. That trash you write. Your whole life is a disgrace, Sophie. When was the last time you went to church?”
“I was at a chapel here a week ago.”
A small lie. One that made her smile. She really was going to hell.
“Well, it hasn’t done you much good, I can see. You need guidance. Your brother could help you—”
“My brother doesn’t give a damn about me, Mother.”
“How dare you use that foul language? You’re talking about a priest!”
“Yes. But he’s not God, no matter how much you’d all like to think so.”
Her mother gave a heavy sigh. “I don’t know why I bother.”
“I don’t know why you do either, Mother,” she said quietly.
“If you would just start—”
“Come on, Mother. We both know I’ll never be what you want me to be. I’ll never do what you want me to do. It’s sad, but that’s just the way it is. Why do we even do this? Why do we have these shallow conversations four times a year, when we both know we have nothing to talk about?”
“You’re still my daughter,” her mother said through clenched teeth.
“Am I? Not in the way Anthony is your son. I’m beginning to accept that.” She realized suddenly that it was true. That part of her was shifting, growing. And she was learning to live without her family’s approval. It didn’t hurt quite as much anymore. She wouldn’t have been tattooed otherwise. She couldn’t have done it.
And she was back to thinking about Tristan again. Her body heated, remembering the state she’d been in when the phone rang.
“I have to go, Mother. Say hello to Dad for me. We’ll talk…eventually.”
She hung up without waiting for a reply. More condemnation she didn’t want to hear, she was sure. What was the point?
She went to the old armoire in the corner of her room, an enormous piece with faded and chipping white and blue paint. She wondered vaguely how anyone had ever gotten it up the narrow stairs, as she pulled out her one G-string, a tiny scrap of black lace, added a black lace bra she’d bought on a whim and had never worn. She pulled on a simple black tank top and a pair of jeans. Her silver cross, hanging from the glass knob of the armoire, caught the morning light coming through the sheer curtains at the window, and she almost didn’t put it on, for once. But fuck it. It was hers and she loved it. Maybe it meant something different to her than it did to her mother, her brother, but that was her business. She slipped it over her head, let it hang heavy between her breasts.
She was going to him. Whether he wanted her there or not. She was not just going to lie down and take his dismissal of her. If Tristan Batiste thought he was going to get off that easily, he had better think again. He was going to have to deal with her. Now.
She looked for her sandals, realized she must have left them in the living room. As she went to find them, there was a sharp knock at the door. Probably Crystal. She’d have to tell her she was going to see him.
Tristan.
She swung the door open, and there he was, as if by magic. As though she had manifested him somehow. Her breath hitched. A shiver passed over her skin, almost as though he had touched her.
“Jesus, Tristan. What are you doing here? I was just…”
“Just what?” His eyes were that dark, smoky gray. He looked wary. He looked determined. “Are you going to let me in?”
“God. Yes. Sure, come in.”
She stepped back and let him pass by her. She caught his scent, couldn’t help but pull it into her lungs whenever he was near. So earthy, so elemental. So him.
She’d missed him. But he’d hurt her.
“Why are you here, Tristan?”
He stood in her tiny living room, dwarfing the place. The morning sun poured in through the windows, washing everything in pale golden light, making everything appear pure, clean; the old plaster in dire need of paint, the small, antique sofa with its decaying dark red v
elvet. Even the battered leather motorcycle jacket he wore.
He didn’t answer, he simply stared at her, his gaze roving her face: her eyes, her mouth. He moved in, slowly, and her legs went weak. She was paralyzed. And then he was on her, his mouth crushing hers, his tongue sliding between her lips.
She opened for him, melted into him. He dragged her in closer, his hands gripping her shoulders, biting into her skin.
She pulled her mouth away. “Tristan…you’re hurting me.”
“Fuck, sorry.”
Then he pulled her in again, as hard as ever.
Doesn’t matter. All that matters is that he’s here.
Her hands went to grasp his face, the stubble on his cheeks scratching her palms. But the sensation grounded her in the moment as much as his fingers bruising her shoulders did, the hard, hurting press of his mouth on hers.
Her clothes came off quickly, then his. She wasn’t sure how it happened. As soon as they were naked he was pushing her to the floor, onto the ancient Persian rug she’d found at a Sunday flea market. It smelled of mold, mothballs, years of footsteps and history. But it was worn and soft against her back as he covered her body with his.
Skin to skin. Yes. Ink to ink would be even better. An image flashed in her mind, of her entire body covered in tattoos. Her stomach, her breasts.
Yes!
Her sex clenched hard. She spread her thighs for him, felt his cock pressing hard against her belly, and ran her hands over his tattooed shoulders, over the serpentine swirl of the dragons on his arms. And his greedy mouth on hers didn’t stop. His thrusting tongue, his sharp teeth, bruising her, drawing a little blood from her lip. And all she could think was, More…
Her legs wrapped around his waist, spreading her body wide for him, but he slid down, dragging his open mouth over her breasts, her belly. He paused, bit into the soft flesh there, and she cried out. In pain. In pleasure. In the purest driving need she’d ever felt. He moved lower, spread her pussy lips wide with his hands and dove right in.
His mouth was all wet heat, sucking, licking. He flicked his tongue at her clit and she shivered all over. His fingers plunged inside her and she arced her hips, wanting more. He drove deeper, hurting her, but she needed it.
Penance, yes.
She gasped when he drew her clit into his mouth and sucked. And when he bit down on that hard nub of flesh she came, long undulating currents of pleasure rolling over her, crushing her. She was coming apart under him, her mind gone.
He left her shuddering in the aftermath, but only long enough to find a condom in his jacket pocket, to sheath his beautifully erect cock. He knelt on the floor, pulled her up and draped her legs over his strong thighs so that she straddled him. With one thrust, he stabbed into her body, impaling her.
Her arms wound around his neck. She watched him for a moment, panting with need, her sex clenching around his cock deep inside her. He was so deep it hurt. But she wanted it to hurt, wanted that primal sensation of his command over her body.
His flesh rippled beneath the dark ink on his arms, inviting her, and she bent her head, sucking his skin into her mouth. The texture from the ink beneath her tongue sent a jolt of sensation through her. She spread her lips wider, wanting to take in his tattooed flesh, to swallow it, to make it a part of her.
Yes!
This was the fulfillment of her darkest fantasies, the tattooed man, the ultimate bad boy, fucking her on the floor like an animal.
Pleasure shot through her as she writhed, his cock pulsing against her womb. She could almost come again just thinking about the ink on his skin, on her own, from his cock heavy inside her.
“Tristan,” she panted, “promise me you’ll tattoo me again.”
“Yes, the ink all over your skin. I want to do it. I’d fuck you and tattoo you at the same time if I could.”
He snaked a hand down beneath her bottom, holding her body over his, and drove into her, his hips pistoning.
“Jesus, Sophie. Jesus, Jesus…I need to fuck you. I need to fuck you so hard.”
“Yes…Tristan…”
The tension built in her body once more, his cock slamming into her. He moved one hand up and slid it around the back of her head. His fingers gripped her hair, pulling her head back hard, and the look on his face was so open, so torn with pleasure, she could hardly stand to see it, to see him so vulnerable. But soon the lovely friction of his cock moving inside her, right up against her G-spot, was too much. She felt the first waves of climax, surges of heat burning through her veins. She shook as she came, cried out his name over and over. And when he tensed, a new wash of pleasure moved through her, driving her orgasm on, further, deeper. She felt him shiver, felt somehow the heat of him coming inside her body.
“Damn it, Sophie,” he muttered, his breath hot on her cheek. “I couldn’t stay away.”
“Good.”
He was quiet for several long moments, the only sound his panting breath, the slight creaking of the old floor beneath them.
“No, it’s not good. You don’t understand.”
“Then tell me, Tristan. Tell me why being with me is bad. How can you say that? Especially right now?”
“I’m sorry. Fuck, I’m sorry, Sophie.”
“Tell me what you’re sorry for.” She took his face in her hands, forced his head up, forced him to look at her. “Because you are here with me. And you’re still inside my body. And it’s all good, as far as I can see.”
He shook his head. “No. You don’t know me.”
“Do you remember what you said to me that day at Café du Monde? I do know you, and you know me. Don’t tell me I’m wrong, that I’m…delusional. I get enough of that shit from my family. This is true, you and me!”
He paused. “It is. It’s why I had to see you. But I shouldn’t be here.”
“Why do you have to be so mysterious, so vague, Tristan? Tell me what this is all about. Because I really don’t understand.”
He dropped his head onto her breasts, the weight of him heavy on her sensitive flesh. She could not believe they were having this conversation, with his softening cock still inside her, their breath still ragged with pleasure.
He lifted her from him, his cock slipping out of her, then sat back on the floor, looking a little dazed. Well, so was she. The rug was scratchy beneath her bottom, and it was only then she realized he’d left marks from his nails digging into her.
His voice was rough. “I think I’ll need a drink for this. What do you have?”
“There’s some vodka in the freezer.”
“That’ll do.”
He got up, naked, wandered into her tiny kitchen. God, he was something. All muscular male beauty. Like some sort of ancient god, and covered in the most exquisite artwork. His tattoos alone made her sex give a hard squeeze of longing. He pulled the condom off with a paper towel and dropped it into the trash, opened the freezer and pulled out the bottle of Stolichnaya that had been there since the last time she and Crystal had had a girls’ movie night: chocolate and martinis and a good cry.
She felt like having a good cry now.
Instead, she got up and pulled her G-string back on, her T-shirt, and sat cross-legged on the sofa, trying to hide her shaking hands beneath a pillow in her lap. Tristan came back with vodka in two glasses, handed her one. She wasn’t sure she wanted it, but he threw his back in one swallow before bending over to retrieve his discarded gray boxer briefs. He pulled them on, then joined her on the old sofa, the weight of him making it creak as he settled in beside her.
She waited, cradling the glass in her hand. A series of emotions passed over his features. She couldn’t figure it out, but she was certain he was going to tell her something important. Her stomach was one hard knot, her palms slippery, and it was all she could do not to allow the tears burning her eyes to spill over. Because she didn’t know if this conversation would end with them being together, or if this would be the last time she saw Tristan Batiste.
CHAPTER
&
nbsp; Seven
Tristan ran a hand over his stubbly hair, as though it might help him think. Damn hard to think with Sophie sitting half-naked in front of him. Even harder after what they’d just done. But she deserved some answers. And he knew that right now, while he was still loosened up from the sex, the shot of vodka, might be the only time he’d be willing to tell her. Things he hadn’t spoken to anyone about since his mother died four years ago.
“Sophie,” he started, “there are some things you should know about me.” He paused, looked at her. Her eyes were dark, somber, full of emotion. Better not to look her in the eye right now. Instead, his gaze wandered to the window behind her. The blue and gray New Orleans sky was hazy through the sheer fabric of the curtains. That’s how he felt now, hazy, dim. His pulse was racing. “Are you going to drink that?”
“What? No. Here.”
She handed him her glass and he downed the vodka; it burned sliding down his throat. Pathetic that he needed to be half-buzzed to tell this story. Pathetic that this story was his.
Fuck it. Spit it out.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I told you I came back to New Orleans because this place is home for me. That it’s in my blood. But that was only part of the story.”
“So tell me the rest,” she said quietly.
He drew in a deep breath, looked down at the empty glass in his hand. His fingers tightened around it. “My brother’s name is Phillipe. And I want you to know, I do not talk to anyone about him. And I mean no one. Not even my staff at the shop know about him.” He could feel his face heating up.
“Why not?”
“Because he’s always been my responsibility.”
“Why is he your responsibility, Tristan? Is he a minor?”
“He’s dead.”
She was looking at him now, her gaze unavoidable. “Tristan, you’re not making sense.”