by Reese Ryan
Cyrus grabbed Tressa’s wrist and positioned his mouth close to her ear. “Are you sleeping with him? Don’t think I haven’t driven by your place and seen his SUV parked in the driveway. In my damn spot.”
Tressa’s eyes widened. “Driven by my place? Are you stalking me?”
Cyrus ignored the question, his tone softening. “Baby, please. Just give me another chance. I swear I’ll be the man you need. I’ll do right by you this time.”
“You had your only chance to do right by me. Now, let go of my arm, Cyrus, before I scream bloody murder.”
Instead of loosening, his grip tightened and Tressa thought he’d snap her wrist.
“Is there a problem here, Nurse Washington?”
Tressa recognized the voice and blew a sigh of relief, thankful for the intervention. Cyrus loosened his grip, and she yanked her arm away. Facing Dr. Benjamin Pointer, one of the cardiothoracic surgeons at the hospital, she said, “No, Dr. Pointer, everything is fine.”
Dr. Pointer slid his gaze to Cyrus. If she had to translate Dr. Pointer’s expression, it stated: though I might be Ivy League–educated, I’m from the streets. Obviously, Cyrus was good at nonverbal communication, because he backed away, collected his things and left with no further complications. But she had a feeling this wasn’t over.
* * *
Several hours later Tressa and Roth were led to one of the many tables inside Tegria’s, the Brazilian steak house she’d heard only great things about.
Roth pulled out her chair, and she eased down onto the burgundy leather. The aromas wafting around the room made her stomach growl. The fact she hadn’t eaten since one that afternoon—seven hours ago—didn’t help.
“This place is gorgeous,” she said, scrutinizing the lengths of burgundy fabric draped from the high ceilings, the modern decor and the eclectic light fixtures.
“You’re gorgeous,” Roth said, taking her hand.
Though the lighting in the restaurant was dim, Tressa feared he would see the nasty bruise Cyrus’s tight grip had left behind. Icing the area had done little to reduce the bruising. The chunky bracelet masked the black and blue for now, but she couldn’t hide it forever.
Maybe she could say it was from a disgruntled patient. It was plausible. She’d been socked in the jaw once. No, she wasn’t going to lie. Their relationship couldn’t be plagued with lies. She had to tell him about her encounter with Cyrus. No secrets, she told herself. But not tonight. Tonight she just wanted to enjoy a beautiful evening with her man. Her trifling ex had ruined her afternoon; she refused to allow him to ruin her evening, too.
Tressa reclaimed her hand. “Mr. Lexington, are you trying to seduce me in this restaurant full of people, then entice me to join you in the restroom?”
“Don’t give me any ideas, woman.”
When he winked at her, a few naughty thoughts ran through her mind.
Roth dragged a finger along her forearm. “How was your day?”
“Long.”
Concern spread across his face. “Did something happen?”
Tressa waved off the words. “No. Nothing out of the ordinary. Everyday stuff. A normal day in the ER. I just need a long, hot soak.” To stop her babbling, she lifted her water glass to her lips.
He leaned in close. “I think I can manage a long, hot bath. A nice rubdown afterward. How does that sound?”
“Excellent. I’d like that a lot.”
Over the next couple of hours Tressa and Roth enjoyed mouthwatering appetizers, several varieties of fire-roasted meats and sampled countless side dishes. To say she was stuffed would be a gross understatement.
“So, Chef Washington, does Tegria’s get your seal of approval?”
“Absolutely. I am officially in love with this place.”
“Did you save room for dessert?”
“Are you kidding me? If I eat one more thing, I’ll explode. Are you getting dessert?”
He nodded like an overly anxious child who’d just been offered free rein in a candy shop.
Tressa laughed. “Where do you put it all?”
“I have plenty of space left. I didn’t eat as much as you did.”
Tressa swatted him playfully. “I can’t believe you just said that.”
Roth snagged her hand and brought it to his lips. “You know I’m only playing with you.” He kissed the back of her hand, then her palm. When he slid her bracelet to kiss her wrist, he went still. He squinted as if he didn’t believe what his own eyes were seeing. Fine lines crawled across his forehead.
“What happened to your wrist? How’d you get this nasty bruise?”
Tressa’s heartbeat increased slightly. This was not where and how she wanted to tell him. “Today…um… Today, I…um…” She cleared her throat. “One of my patients… He was high on meth and had a psychotic break. He thought I was an alien coming to abduct him.” So much for the truth. It was just one lie for the greater good, she tried to convince herself. Still, she felt awful and guilty.
Roth’s features hardened. “How in the hell did they allow that bastard to manhandle you like this?”
Tressa glanced around to see if Roth’s words had drawn any attention. Luckily, the place buzzed with so much chatter, she doubted anyone even gave them a sideways glance. “Roth, sweetie, calm down. It’s really not that serious.”
He made a sound similar to what a tortured animal would make. “Not that… It is that serious, Tressa. I don’t like the idea of anyone putting their hands on you, especially aggressively enough to leave a mark like this.”
To ease the mood, she said, “You know, I bet if you kiss it, you’d make it all better.” She flashed a warm smile.
“Tressa, this is no joking matter. I—”
“Please.” She batted her eyes for effect.
Roth studied her long and hard, his displeased expression finally softening. A beat later he peppered her wrist with delicate kisses.
“See, it’s better already.”
Roth flashed a lazy smile, then slouched back against his chair. She’d seen the fury that had danced in his eyes. Thank God she hadn’t told him what had really happened. There was no telling what he would have done.
Continuing to give credibility to her story, she said, “I’m an ER nurse, Roth. I deal with the unpredictable day in and day out. Sometimes—” she lifted her arm “—things like this happen.”
His tone sounded weary when he spoke. “Yeah, well, I don’t like them happening to you.”
In that moment Tressa had never felt so protected in her life. She kind of liked it. Too bad it was based on a lie. The greater good, she reminded herself.
CHAPTER 15
On the drive to his place, Roth wanted to be elated that he was getting quality time with Tressa, but what she’d revealed at the restaurant had dampened his mood and he just couldn’t snap out of this funk. If he could just have five minutes with the asshole who’d done that to her wrist, he’d pulverize him.
Another wave of anger crashed through him. Sliding a glance in Tressa’s direction elevated some of his rage. He squeezed her hand. “Hey.” When she looked at him, he lost himself in the delicate expression on her face. How could anyone want to hurt her? “Have I told you how beautiful you look in that little black dress?”
“Only a hundred times, but a hundred and one couldn’t hurt.”
“You look beautiful.”
“Thank you. And you are looking dapper yourself. I love that sweater on you.”
“This old thing?”
A smile curled her lips before she turned away and slid her gaze back into the darkness outside the window. Something was bothering her. He could tell by the fact that she’d seemed distracted ever since they’d left the restaurant. But what? Then it hit him. The way he’d blown up when he saw
her wrist. Had he scared her? Damn.
“Hey?”
“Hmm?”
This time Tressa didn’t bother looking in his direction. “At the restaurant… I apologize if I overacted. If I frightened you.”
Tressa turned toward him, a look of confusion on her face. “Frightened me? You didn’t frighten me. You actually made me feel shielded. And I’m grateful that you have my back.”
Roth brought her injured wrist to his lips. “I do. Don’t ever forget that.”
To his credit—and fault—he was a natural protector. If you messed with someone he loved, you messed with him. That had been the case with his foster brothers, waging war on anyone who’d done them dirty. Now it was the case with Tressa. And there was no limit to what he would do for her.
A short time later he pulled into his garage and shifted into Park. Hopping out, he moved around the vehicle to open Tressa’s door. The fact he would fall asleep and wake with her in his arms lightened his mood considerably. Before he allowed her to escape from the vehicle, he leaned in and gave her a soul-shaking kiss, tasting and savoring every inch of her mouth. The sweetness from the mint she popped into her mouth right after leaving the restaurant still lingered and he tried his damnedest to rid her mouth of all its flavor.
When he finally pulled away, his lips ached. Damn, he had to have her. His erection made that painfully clear. Instead of a look of desire on Tressa’s face, she donned one of concern. Enough was enough. He wanted to know what the hell was going on with her and he wanted to know now. Obviously, she’d witnessed that on his face.
“Roth, I need to—”
His cell phone vibrated, causing Tressa to pause. “I’ll send it to voice mail.”
“No, take it. It could be important. We’ll talk inside.”
Nothing was more important than she was, but it was late for anyone to be calling. He fished the device from the holder on his side. Alonso. A smile crept across his face. He and Vivian had been trying to get pregnant. Was Alonso calling to tell him he was going to be a godfather?
If so, that would mean Roth was about to be out of 50K. Years ago they’d agreed that whoever had a kid first, the other would establish a college fund. It’d started out as a joke because at the time, neither of them could have put their hands on that kind of money. But they knew one day they would be able to.
“What’s up?” Roth greeted him, pushing open the door from the garage for Tressa to walk through. She mouthed that she’d be in the living room and he nodded with the promise to be there in a second.
“Shit, man. Vivian just got home from the hospital and told me what happened today. That shit is foul. Is Tressa okay? Are you okay? I know you blew a gasket.”
Roth figured Alonso was talking about Tressa’s incident with the meth head. His jaw clenched at the ugly visual that filtered into his thoughts, some big, burly biker type slinging her around the room by the wrist. ’Course if he was a meth head, he couldn’t have been so big, right? Still, that didn’t pacify him. Roth opened the refrigerator door for a bottle of water. “Yeah, everything is good.”
“It’s a good thing Tressa didn’t marry that lowlife. Any man who puts his hands on a woman is a punk.”
Roth stilled and his brow furrowed. His jaw clenched tight enough to crush his teeth. He slid a glance to Tressa, who was walking around the pool table using her hand instead of a cue to sink balls in. Had her ex done this to her?
“Let me call you back, Lo.”
“Okay, man. Peace.”
Peace? Peace wasn’t exactly something he was feeling at the moment. Taming his mounting outrage, he joined Tressa alongside the pool table. “Tell me what really happened to your wrist, Tressa.” He kept his tone as steady as possible. “The truth this time.”
Tressa tensed but relaxed a moment later, refusing to look at him. “Obviously, you already know the truth, Roth.”
“Why did I have to hear it from someone else? You looked me directly in my eyes and lied to me.”
Whipping toward him, she said, “What would you have done if I’d told you Cyrus did this, Roth?” She lifted her arm.
“Don’t you mean what I’m going to do to his ass? Right now, in fact.” He turned to move away, but Tressa snagged the hem of his sweater, then moved around to block his path.
“Baby, he’s not worth it.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s irrelevant.”
Roth already knew that, but Cyrus’s irrelevance wasn’t what he was inquiring about. “Why did he grab you?” Tressa’s eyes lowered, which told him what he’d suspected. “He knows about us?”
“He has an idea,” she said, barely audible.
“And that’s why this happened?”
When she didn’t respond, he had his answer. He made a fist so tight his knuckles cracked. He was the one the bastard should have come for, not Tressa. But Roth would make sure he felt every ounce of that mistake.
Tressa rested her hands on his chest and he flinched.
“What are you going to do, Roth?”
He flashed her a do-you-really-want-to-know look.
Her words were sharp when she said, “You’re not a monster, Roth.”
His words were equally as pointed and urgent when he said, “No, I’m not. But I am a man who loves a woman and will be damned if I let—”
“Wh-what did you just say?” Tressa interrupted.
It took him a second or two to realize what he’d allowed to slip. Shit! This was not how he imagined saying those three words to her for the first time. He massaged his forehead. When he spoke, his tone was much calmer than it had been moments before. “I said—”
“You said you love me.”
He scrubbed a hand over his head, handling her trifling ex no longer seeming so urgent now. A lazy chuckle floated from him. “I guess I did.”
“Did you mean it?”
She seemed almost hesitant to ask.
“Yeah, I did.”
“I love you, too.”
Roth crushed his mouth to hers and kissed her long and hard. Without breaking their connection, he hoisted her into his arms and climbed onto the pool table. “Do you have any idea how much I want you right now? I want you so bad I’m bordering delirium.”
“Well, I can’t have the man I love going insane. I guess that means you better take me.”
Roth rolled her onto her stomach, then slowly unzipped the sexy-ass dress he’d fantasized peeling her out of all night. Leaning forward, he peppered tender kisses over her vanilla-scented skin. She always smelled so damn delicious. Maybe that was why anytime they were together he wanted to eat…her.
“You’re always so gentle,” she whispered.
Kissing his way to her ear, he said, “Not tonight, baby. Not tonight.”
“I think I like the sound of that.”
Roth made his way down her body, pushing her dress to her hips and exposing the black lace panties she wore. Her butt cheeks peeked from under the material. The sight was arousing as hell.
Dipping forward, he placed a kiss to her lower back. Tressa shivered, then moaned a low hum of delight. The sound made him all the more eager to please her. “You like that, I see.”
“I like it anytime you touch me.”
A confident smile spread across his face as he slid her panties down her legs and over the sparkly black stilettos she wore. Those stayed on. Starting at her lower back, he dragged an unhurried finger across the dip, along the split of her buttocks and to her core.
Tressa squirmed when he teased her with a bent finger, gliding his knuckle up and down her clit. She moved her hips in sync with the movement of his finger.
“Faster, Roth.”
Instead of doing what she requested, he stopped.
“Nooo. What are y
ou—”
She drew in a sharp breath when he slid his thumb inside her canal and moved it in and out of her. Slowly at first, then faster. Tressa rode his finger, her ass bouncing in his face. He smacked one cheek, then the other, causing her to purr.
“You’re so damn wet I could swim inside you,” he said.
“I…I told you I like your touch.”
“Oh, I’m going to be doing a lot of touching, teasing, tasting. I might drown tonight.”
“I’ll give you mouth-to-mouth.”
Shit. He couldn’t take this. Yanking his finger out of her, he climbed off the table and brought Tressa with him. “Let’s get rid of this,” he said, pulling the dress over her head and slinging it off to the side. Taking a step back, he admired her gorgeous body and thought about the sinful things he was about to do to it. His tongue glided across his bottom lip.
Tressa smirked. “You like what you see?”
“Love what I see.” He motioned with his head. “Come here.” Tressa glided toward him like a runway model. When they stood toe-to-toe, he said, “Kiss me.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled his mouth to hers. Their tongues fought a passionate battle. He walked her back until her body was pinned against the pool table. Lifting her, he placed her on the edge. Breaking their kiss, he said, “Lean back, but not all the way.”
Once Tressa had propped herself up, Roth dipped forward and kissed her collarbone, then dragged his tongue down the column of her neck. Working his way down her torso, he sucked one of her hardened nipples through the lacy fabric of her bra.
“Roth, please.”
“Please, what?”
“Make love to me. Make love to me now. Please.”
Hearing her beg for him made him throb even harder. Whether she knew it or not, he was inflicting as much glorious torture on himself as he was on her. “Soon, baby. I promise.” The reassurance was for them both.