by Wren Weston
Lick it and other things.
Lila looked back down at the screen. She should have gone back to the compound. She’d been distracted for most of the afternoon, and Oskar would pay for it. As would the missing girls, now that they’d been added to her plate.
He tugged on his shirt and yawned. “I’m going to order us something to eat. Whether you eat or not is your choice.”
“I’m not hungry, especially for Chinese food.”
“Actually, I thought I’d order something more mundane. How about pizza?”
“Pizza? I haven’t eaten pizza…”
“Probably since the last time I ordered it for you. What’s the point of having a fancy chef if she never makes anything good?” He dug into his pocket for his palm. “Did you like what I ordered last—”
The door opened, and Dixon strolled into the room.
Tristan’s palm dangled at his thigh. Guilt flashed in his eyes. “Want some pizza? We were just going to eat.”
Dixon shook his head and shuffled to his room. He emerged a few moments later, carrying a small bag, his purple scarf wrapped around his neck.
“Where are you going?”
Dixon dug out his notepad and a small pencil from his pocket. Checking out the lead.
“What lead?” Lila asked.
“You’re not at one hundred percent. You need to rest.”
We went out today.
“That apartment was supposed to be empty, and Lila and I were with you.”
Fry and Dice are going too. We’re only watching. No fighting. Dixon didn’t look up as he wrote, neither requesting permission nor waiting to see if it was given. See you tomorrow.
“Just wait, okay? Let me get my things. I’ll come—”
Dixon cut him off with a look, a look that plainly said he wasn’t invited.
That wasn’t the only look Dixon threw out. He glanced at Lila for only a split second, but that glance said volumes. Annoyance and frustration twisted his face.
They’d been friends before the incident in the tunnels. They’d laughed and joked. He’d once pushed her closer and closer toward his brother.
Now he didn’t even want to be in the same room with her.
Dixon hitched the small bag on his shoulder and shuffled from the room.
Tristan followed him to the door. “Be careful,” he called out, frowning as his brother’s boots thudded on the stairs.
“What lead?” Lila asked again, instead of asking the question she wanted to ask. Of course, she already knew the answer. They hadn’t talked yet, for the wound between them still festered.
What would Tristan do if they did talk and Dixon spoke against her? Who would he choose this time?
She could barely handle a day apart from him.
She stared at her thumbs, realizing the truth. When had her feelings turned so serious? For gods’ sake, they hadn’t even started anything, unless awkwardness and far-off stares counted.
“I have a lead on Natalie, but it’s not much of one,” Tristan said, stuffing his palm in his pocket, pizza forgotten. “One of my people overheard a matron talking to a spy. Chairwoman LeBeau, so you can guess how seriously I’m taking it.”
“Seriously enough. You put two people on it.”
“Not really. Fry and Dice are still smarting over losing Oskar at the auction house. They needed something productive to do, even if it’s a fool’s errand. I’m no different. We’ve chased ghosts ever since. I should never have gone for the other kid. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“Your heart was in the right place.”
“Sometimes it needs be somewhere else.”
Lila looked down at her screen. “I’ve found a few places we can check out.”
“Where?”
“It’s not a short list, Tristan, and I’m not even done yet. I’ll finish going through Natalie’s account data tonight, and we can start tomorrow. I’ll work on the rest from home.” Lila tugged the star drive around her neck and stuck it in the port, saving her work. “I haven’t even begun to look into the oracle’s files.”
“Someone’s already looking for those girls. Oskar doesn’t have anyone looking for him, not anyone who doesn’t want him for their own uses. He’s our priority.” When Lila pulled the pendant from her laptop, Tristan took both from her and set them on the coffee table. Then he stood and offered his hand. “No. You’re going to have something to eat and a nap before you go.”
“You never ordered.”
“You never told me what you wanted,” he said, pulling her from the couch.
Tristan didn’t drop her hand. He intertwined his fingers through hers and stared as though he longed to say something more.
Lila didn’t push him away, even though she found it hard to breathe.
One minute their gazes were set upon one another; the next minute their lips were. He pulled her into his arms, hungrily sucking her lips, a wisp of a thumb trailing down her spine. The light warmth rolled down her back like the ghost of foreplay from lovers past.
She wove her arms around his neck, curling her fingers into his hair.
He sighed from it, jerked his head back, and closed his eyes as though dropping into early morning dreams. “Lila.”
She breathed in her name, the vowels rolling off his tongue. A tongue that darted into her mouth tentatively, a tongue that felt like velvet as it snaked across hers, lighting her taste buds on fire. He’d had a shot of whiskey not too long ago, either for courage or out of habit.
When the smoothness retreated, she returned the favor, sliding her tongue along his lips as she sucked each one in turn. They were soft and silky in her mouth, his stubble prodding against her every exploration.
The contrast delighted her, as did the hardness of his jaw.
Tristan pulled her in tighter, his erect cock poking her in the thigh as he worked at her mouth.
“It’s about time,” Lila whispered once they finally broke away, foreheads still touching, both panting, their hungry lips barely apart.
“You never told me what you wanted. Is this what you want?”
“Not all of it,” Lila said as she sucked at his bottom lip and pushed him toward his closed bedroom door. They’d go further than a nap today. She couldn’t take it anymore. Damn the consequences; she wanted him inside her, needed him inside her. Either to get him out of her system or to get him into it, fully and completely.
“Dixon won’t be back until tomorrow morning. We have plenty of time,” he said when his back hit the door. He nibbled at her neck, fumbling behind himself to find the doorknob.
Lila pulled away. “Wait. That’s why you haven’t touched me?”
Tristan’s head thunked against the door. “I can’t when he’s here. Not after what I did.” Tristan’s cock strained in his trousers, but his eyes had begun to lose their resolve.
His cock would as well if she didn’t stop his brain with a kiss, perhaps more.
“Oh yes, you can,” Lila growled, grasping his erection through the thin fabric of his trousers. She smirked as he jumped and breathed in sharply at her touch, his palms smacking against the bedroom door, his eyes closing in a surprised moan. “Open the damn door,” she demanded, pressing her lips to his before he could second guess himself.
The door opened behind them, and Lila pushed him inside, flicking on the lights.
She closed and locked the door behind her in one fluid motion, kicking off her boots and peeling off her socks. Her tank, trousers, and gloves fell atop them seconds later, her palms still wrapped in a thin layer of gauze. Tristan’s boots hit the ground with two quick thumps, and he fumbled with his belt, staring. When Lila tossed her bra onto her clothes and grabbed the waistband of her panties, he’d barely gotten off his socks.
“You’re covered in bruises. Are you okay to—”
; “They look worse than they are. You’re overdressed. Are you shy?”
Tristan shook his head, licking his lips as she kicked off the last of her clothes.
Perhaps it was a good sign that he stared so hungrily, even with her bruises. His eyes snaked down her face, her breasts, her hips, her thighs. Usually the highborn didn’t linger on one another’s bodies; they were usually too busy tonguing them.
Playing was always more fun than staring at the wrapping.
Bored, she padded toward Tristan and unbuckled his belt, then lifted his thin shirt over his head and tossed it on the floor. She let her hands drop around his neck, tracing the broken, tanned skin around his scar before brushing across his shoulders. She moved down his chest and the ridges of his abdomen, each as hard as the erection she’d handled only moments before. “I’m going to lick you here,” she said, letting her finger drift down toward his iliac ridge, which had tempted her earlier.
His hands stiffened at the buttons of his trousers. “Now?”
“Now. Later.” She shrugged, unfastening his pants, yanking them and his boxer briefs down with one tug. They fell to the floor in a puddle, revealing his erect cock at last.
It was the only part of him she hadn’t seen. She grasped the hard velvet, stroking him while she spoke. “I’m going to lick this too,” she said before letting go and shoving him down on the bed.
She crawled atop him, sliding her chest and belly over his, liking the feel of his skin upon hers. It was smooth as silk in places, but he had the hands of a workman as they traveled down her back. Perhaps she would have the same sort of hands when they finally healed.
Gods, it’d been too long since she’d taken a lover inside her. Perhaps too long to take her time.
Tristan moaned at the contact, then wrapped his legs around her and whipped her onto her back in one quick motion, as if he’d thrown her onto a practice mat. He sat back on his heels and tugged at her ankles, yanking her toward him with a whoosh across his worn, soft sheets. He parted her thighs. His eyes traced her body again, and she grew wet from that alone.
A languid finger snaked from the back of her knee and up her thigh, deepening her arousal. Kisses landed next, full of warm breath and soft lips. He narrowly missed her clit and veered toward her thigh, her hips, her belly, and then her breasts.
He latched on to one, nibbling on her nipple, with just enough pressure. Her back arched off the bed, and he grabbed her wrists in a strong, insistent grip, bending them back over her head. His cock pressed against her thigh as his lips met hers again, kissing her, teasing her.
Lila grew wetter. Few senators would be so rough with a highborn heir.
Few senators would dare try to hold her down.
When she struggled against him, he released her. Her arms met behind his back, and she pressed him closer, too aroused to suffer through foreplay.
“Not yet,” he said, rocking forward to nibble on her neck. It seemed every bit of her could be contained before his lips, his roving hands, his arms holding her so tightly as he breathed in her hair.
His teeth clenched around her earlobe. He tugged slightly, before returning to her neck.
Lila shuddered and gave him full access.
Tristan took advantage of it. He’d likely leave marks, as though she were a schoolgirl again—not that she could pry her mouth open to warn him against it; not that she could do much more than moan.
Especially when his fingers drifted between her legs. He stoked her clit, and little swirls of heat and ache trailed in his wake, one unremoved from the other. “Gods, you’re so wet.”
“Of course I am,” she grumbled before her jaw opened in shock. “Oracle’s light, you have done this before, haven’t you?”
“Yes, Lila. I have had sex before. Lots of times. It’s just that the other women I’ve bedded weren’t quite this enthusiastic.”
“Their loss,” she said. “You’ve had the STD vaccine?”
“How very romantic.”
“Have you?”
“Yes, Lila. I’ve had it.”
“Good.” She placed his hand over her clit as she lay back down. “Keep going.”
“Stopping never crossed my mind,” he said, his fingers continuing their exploration.
Lila’s breath caught as he stumbled into touching her the right way. He planted whisper-kisses across her neck, her breasts, her belly, and her thighs before his tongue joined his practiced fingers. Her legs rocked and her back arched as his warmth slid over her, as his fingers entered her in her a rush.
She gasped, looked down, saw his eyes fixed on her, gauging her.
“There,” she moaned, her thighs parting wider as his fingers slid inside her once more, his tongue lapping as though she were a cherry stem to be tied. As the waves of arousal crashed against her, as the heat of an orgasm burned within her, she fumbled at his headboard and gripped the bars, crying out “Tristan” over and over while she squirmed and bucked against him.
Tristan would not be thrown off, even after she stopped moaning and thrashing. She nearly told him to stop, but when his tongue lapped at her clit again, her voice went astray.
The warmth and aching came back quickly. She thrashed and bucked again, calling his name even louder. Her orgasm deepened as she rolled and crashed once more.
Tristan did not let up. She’d barely opened her eyes when she found him, staring at her face, dropping his lips to kiss her once more, brushing his body on skin too aroused and too sensitive to take it lightly. She could taste herself in his kiss and let her fingers fall to his cock. She gripped it, working it in her palm as he took her lips roughly.
He groaned against her mouth with each stroke, biting down on her lip.
“If you want a turn, you’ll have to get off me.”
“No.” He shoved her hands above her head once more. “I like where I am, and I’m not done. I like when you writhe under me. I like when you shout my name.”
Lila writhed underneath him twice more, coming from his mouth and fingers alone.
When he dipped his head for another pass, she closed her thighs before he could reach her, pinning his hand. “If you don’t want my hands on it, then put it to better use. I want you inside me.”
“I wasn’t done.”
“Yes, you are.”
Grinning, he sat back on his heels and grabbed the back of her knees, pulling her toward him in one fluid motion, more strength in his arms than she would have guessed. He thrust inside her, finally quieting the need that had welled inside her all evening.
A need that grew as he rocked into her.
She wrapped her legs around his waist and rocked back.
Both stared at one another’s eyes as they worked.
A thin sheen of sweat broke out on Tristan’s forehead and over his chest.
In that moment, Lila knew she was ruined. Whenever she thought of Tristan, she’d return to this moment when he moaned and bucked against her, fierce and sweaty, all his attention fixed on her.
All at once, he thrust hard inside her as though sheathing a boot knife. He then sprawled atop her, settling his body against her arms as they kissed, still pumping inside her. “Say my name,” he whispered into her ear. “Say my name and come for me.”
“Tristan.” She grabbed his ass and gave it a squeeze, directing him deeper and harder inside her. “Say my name and come for me,” she whispered into his ear, biting the lobe as he had done to her.
Tristan paused. “Fuck, you have a mouth on you, don’t you?”
“I didn’t say anything you didn’t say.”
“It’s not what you said, it’s how you said it. All husky and sexy. It’s hard not come inside you right now.”
Lila moaned as he began stroking again. Faster this time, pushing her closer and closer toward the edge.
She came at last, shouting hi
s name as she pawed at the headboard.
Tristan followed suit, whispering hers as he filled her.
Chapter 15
Lila felt the arm around her waist before she saw it. She opened one eye and then the other in the cold, dark room. The little clock on Tristan’s nightstand read three o’clock. They’d fallen asleep around ten, both exhausted from the last couple of weeks as well as several hours spent in one another’s arms.
The ensuing five hours had been the best sleep that Lila had gotten in years.
Her eyes fell upon the string of bottle caps in the window. Tristan’s arm tightened around her, tugging her closer.
She felt his naked body, warm across her back.
And his erection.
Stretching like a satisfied cat, she turned in his grasp, shaking the bed. He yawned and rolled over body. He said nothing, merely latched on to her lips, tracing them with his tongue.
Her breath hitched as his cock pressed against her, and she grew wet instantly.
She spread her legs, inviting him in.
Tristan didn’t wait for any other signs. She gasped as he entered her, amazed she wasn’t too sore for his languid thrusts. Lila reached around his waist as the bed rocked back and forth gently. His lips worked at her mouth, her ear, her neck.
They both came in a sleepy heap on Tristan’s bed, all soft moans and hoarse voices.
“That’s a nice way to wake up.” Tristan yawned, pulling her back into his body. “It’s even a better way to fall asleep.”
“I can’t.”
“Shhh…” He yawned again. “Go back to sleep, Lila. Just for a little longer.”
Lila knocked his arm away. “I can’t, Tristan. I still need to finish my list. Oskar’s still out there somewhere. So are the missing girls.”
“You’re no good to anyone if you’re exhausted.”
“I’ll sleep after I find them.”
“With me?”
Lila laughed and slid out of bed, leaving the warm sheets and Tristan’s body behind. “One thing at a time,” she said, eyeing the pile of clothes near the door.