Bad Things (Tristan & Danika #1)
Page 5
“Give us a minute,” Tristan said, moving a few feet away.
They had a short, hushed conversation before returning to us. Tristan’s face was very blank, but Jared’s looked slightly flushed, perhaps with temper.
“So are you in this band that Tristan claims to be in?” I asked Kenny.
Kenny beamed at me. “Yes, I am. All four of us are, plus one of our buddies who isn’t here tonight.”
“What kind of music do you play?” I asked.
“Rock.”
I wasn’t surprised in the least. “So who plays what?”
“I’m bass, Jared is lead guitar, Cory is drums, Tristan is lead vocals, and our friend Dean is rhythm guitar.”
I shot Tristan a look. “Gee, the lead singer of a rock band. I’m shocked. I never would have guessed.” Sarcasm dripped from every word.
He seemed to find that funny, which was good. I’d much rather have him think I was funny, than be offended by my sense of humor.
“So when and where do I get to see you play?” I asked, turning back to Kenny.
Kenny’s brow furrowed. “I’m not sure. Dean is setting up some gigs for us. Of course you’re invited, whenever that happens.”
“So what are your day jobs?” I asked, figuring they all had to have one.
“As you’ve seen, Cory is a bartender, and I’m a valet parker on the weekends here. Our friend Dean is a blackjack dealer. And Tristan and Jared are both in the club promoting business.”
“They get paid to party,” Cory added.
I couldn’t seem to keep my two cents in. “All I think when I hear club promoter is drug dealer, or unemployed.”
Jared grimaced.
Tristan just laughed. “You’re coming to the next club party I host,” he said, pointing at me.
I shrugged, giving him a sassy look. “Don’t threaten me with a good time…”
All four of them seemed to find that hilarious. I flushed with pleasure. I could get used to this kind of attention, especially since it was coming from four hot guys.
“Danika works for Jerry,” Tristan told them.
“We love Jerry!” Kenny said.
“She’s the nanny,” Tristan added.
“Holy shit,” Jared muttered.
“Did not see that coming,” Cory called out, his back to us as he mixed a drink.
“Not what I was expecting,” Kenny mused.
“Why is that so surprising to everyone?” I asked, baffled that all four of them had had the same reaction to my being a nanny.
“I had you pegged for a model,” Jared said.
“Tristan loves to date models,” Cory called out.
“Fuck off,” Tristan told him.
“We’re not dating,” I stated firmly.
“I would have guessed dancer,” Tristan told me, as though he hadn’t just told Cory to fuck off. Typical guys…
I pointed at Tristan. “This round goes to Tristan. I’m a full-time student, and a nanny, but I am an aspiring dancer, not that I ever have the time.” I returned his smile, utterly charmed by it. “And the model thing is very flattering, guys, but I’m a little short for that.”
“Not for Vegas modeling,” Jared pointed out.
“You’re what, five-eight?” Kenny guessed. “That’s tall enough.”
“I’d guess she’s five-seven,” Tristan mused, “and she is tall enough, but I’m betting she’s never even tried modeling, especially of the Vegas variety. Not your scene, right?”
I curled my lip at him. “You don’t know me that well. Quit pretending you’re an expert.”
“Am I wrong?” His brows shot up with the question.
“You’re not,” I grudgingly admitted.
I blamed the alcohol when he gave me a smug smile, and my reaction was to stick my tongue out at him.
He grabbed my hand, pulling me back out of my chair. “Just for that, we’re going for another round on the floor.”
“You’re a glutton for punishment,” I told him, but I followed easily enough.
The music had changed to Top Forty remixes, and something slow and sultry with a heavy beat had overtaken the room.
Uh oh, I thought.
My eyes narrowed on his as he pulled me flush against him, sliding one sneaky knee between mine. “What are you doing?” I asked pointedly.
“Just feeling the music. What happens on the dance floor, stays on the dance floor, and I really am just dancing with you, I swear.”
I can live with that, I thought, moving against him, letting the music take me over for another intoxicating spell.
We danced close, but he still didn’t cross any lines. We kept our lower regions very carefully apart, though our chests rubbed together more than once. I didn’t know what it said about me, or my previous relationships, but I didn’t think I’d ever been more turned on in my life as I was just from dancing with Tristan. My breath came out in little pants, every inch of my skin overheated, and not just from exertion.
“You’re absolutely positive that you don’t hookup? Not even one really awesome night together before we settle down to being friends?” His voice was a rasp in my ear that made me shiver from head to toe.
I shook my head with no hesitation. It wasn’t that I wasn’t tempted; I just knew that I would feel like shit in the morning, if I did something like that. I wasn’t someone who could handle sex without commitment. I never had been.
“I’m positive,” I said into his ear.
“No friends with benefits, either?” he asked hopefully.
“The friends with benefits thing never works.”
He pulled back to meet my eyes. “I agree,” he said, though he didn’t look happy about it. “That never works. Someone always ends up getting hurt. Sorry, I just lost my mind for second. That was an asshole thing to say.”
“It’s okay. Just don’t let it happen again.” I smiled while I said it, and there was no anger behind the words.
I just wasn’t sure how many times I could tell him no and mean it. I wanted him, and I wasn’t dense enough to deny it to myself.
“I’ll try my best,” he murmured.
CHAPTER SIX
I knew before I’d even opened my eyes that I had a raging hangover. You couldn’t go from hardly ever drinking, to losing count of your drinks in one night, and not feel it, and Lord did I feel it.
I checked the clock and groaned out loud when I saw that it was seven a.m. That’s how I knew that my hangover was truly heinous; it had woken me up after only three hours of sleep.
I sat up reaching for the glass of water I kept on my nightstand. I drank the entire glass, even though drinking was the last thing I wanted to do, because I knew that getting rehydrated was the best way to recover from the hangover.
Dot, who’d been sleeping in his own doggy bed near the foot of mine, moved to my feet. He put his head on his paws, and looked up at me. I couldn’t decide if he was giving me a sympathetic look or a condescending one.
My door opened, and Mat peeked his head inside, grinning. “Good morning, boo,” he said, using the nickname he’d given me when he was four.
“Morning, peeka,” I told him, using my own nickname for him.
Mat was always the first one awake, but everyone else quickly followed, usually due to the noise he managed to make. “Everybody else is still sleeping,” he said in a whisper that managed to be louder than outright speaking.
“I figured,” I said with a rueful smile. He always woke me up first, since I cooked breakfast. “Whatcha want for breakfast?”
“Blueberry pancakes, please!” he nearly shouted.
I winced and held up a hand. “Coming right up, but I’m going to need you to stay nice and quiet this morning, okay?”
“Got it!” he said in a slightly quieter voice. “Will you turn on cartoons while I wait for my food?”
“Of course, bud. I just need to go to the bathroom, then I’ll be right out.”
I used the restroom and made my way to th
e living room, Dot dogging my steps.
Mat was sitting on his kid-sized couch on the floor, Pupcake in his lap. He was staring in confusion across the room, and as I stepped into the room, I saw why.
I padded quietly across the room, switching on the TV and finding a channel with some cartoons. Mat fixated on the television, and I walked quietly over to the shirtless hunk of a man that was sprawled out on the sofa. I was so fuzzy headed that I’d forgotten he was even crashing here.
He was lying on his back, a pillow pulled over his face, and another one draped over his lap. He’d completely kicked off his thin blanket. I could just make out that he was at least wearing boxer-briefs, which was good, but the rest of him was all tanned, bared, tattooed skin.
Not good, I thought, taking him in. I’d had no doubts that he would look good naked, and I certainly didn’t need to see just how good.
Even at rest, I could see the hard ridges in his abdomen. And his arms. Jesus. His arms were huge, which was kind of a thing for me. I thought they might have been bigger than my waist, and for sheer perverse reasons, I wanted to measure them to see if I was right. And the tattoos…God, the tattoos. I didn’t have a bit of ink, but I loved his. He didn’t have full sleeves, like his brother, but he wasn’t too far off. His arms were covered with intricate designs, and it wasn’t all black, either. I loved all the color. It stood out startlingly against the other black ink, as though the black was just there to frame the color.
I told myself it was totally necessary as I reached out and touched his bare shoulder. I nudged him, and if I enjoyed the feel of his muscular flesh, what was the harm?
“Tristan,” I said quietly, nudging him again. My hand stayed there, and I tried to shake him a little, but he was too big for that…
He started, pulling the pillow off his eyes and blinked up at me. “Fuck, Danika, it’s early.”
“He said a bad word, boo!” Mat called out, clearly affronted.
“Fuck, sorry,” Tristan said, then winced.
I couldn’t hold back a grin. “You can use my bed to sleep it off. This living room is about to turn into a war zone, and I need to make some blueberry pancakes.”
“Is that what you want for breakfast?” he asked, sitting up.
I backed away like he was on fire. Which he kind of was…
“Huh?” I asked him, totally distracted by the sight of that perfect body, practically naked, and moving around. I went to the gym often, and I stayed in good shape myself, but I didn’t think I’d ever seen a body so perfect in my life.
He stood up, and I took another step back. He started to move around the couch, and something he was doing finally snapped me out of my trance.
“Why are you still holding a pillow over your lap?” I asked.
He sent me a wry smile, bending down to pick up his duffle bag, which he’d set behind the couch. “Can’t you guess? I’ll give you a hint; the first word is morning, and the second rhymes with hood.”
I blushed, feeling stupid. “Oh…well, you can use my bathroom, and you can stash your bag in there, so it’s not in the way.”
“Okay. Thank you. Just give my five minutes, and I’ll cook breakfast for everybody.”
I waved him off. “Go back to bed. I’ve got it. I know you must be feeling rough.”
He sent me a rather stern look. “Give me five minutes. I said I’d cook for you. I’m cooking. And you have to be feeling just as rough.”
“I’m fine. I’ve got this.”
He pointed at me. “Don’t go near the kitchen until I get back.” He strode away, and I made a face at his retreating back, though I was secretly pleased, and still shamelessly checking him out. I’d seen what he could do with cookies. I wanted more.
Normally I just had a Greek yogurt for breakfast, but hungover and hungry, I was already planning to indulge.
I sat down on the couch when I heard the shower in my bathroom turn on. There was plenty that I needed to do, but I just sat there for a solid five minutes, my mind on Tristan in the shower.
He was back out quickly, wearing a fresh white T-shirt and jeans, his short hair still wet from his shower.
“Come keep me company while I cook,” he said, tugging me up from the couch.
“So bossy,” I muttered.
He completely ignored that statement, pulling me into the kitchen. He cupped my hips, lifting me onto the counter exactly where I’d sat to watch him bake cookies.
He moved away before I could do more than gape at him.
“So Mat wants pancakes for breakfast. What do you want?”
I opened my mouth to tell him I’d just take that, but he spoke again. “I know you don’t want pancakes. We need something salty and greasy. Let me whip us up some hangover food.”
I had to make a conscious effort to close my mouth. “You read my mind,” I said.
He had the sheer gall to wink at me. “No. I’ve just been hungover enough to know just what to do. So tell me why Mat called you boo? Is that a nickname?”
“Yes.” I didn’t elaborate.
“That’s adorable,” he said opening the refrigerator and studying its contents. “Where did it come from?”
“I don’t remember when it turned into an actual nickname, but we used to play peekaboo a lot. He named himself peeka and me boo, and it stuck. Two years and counting.”
“Well, boo, how does bacon sound?”
“Bacon sounds great, but you can’t call me boo.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re not a rapper, and I’m not your shorty.”
He laughed, a low, deep rumble that made muscles in my stomach tighten. “You’re just making me like the nickname more. Here’s the plan, buttery biscuits, scrambled eggs, bacon, and some hash browns. Oh, and some blueberry pancakes for the kids. Any objections?”
“That sounds amazing,” I said, meaning it. “But it’ll take forever.”
He shrugged. “It’ll take how long it takes. What’s the rush? You got a date?”
I sighed. He was stubborn, to be sure. “Can I help?”
“You can entertain me while I work.”
“If you have this handled, I should probably go work on some chores.”
“If you want bacon, you’ll keep your ass right where it is while I cook you breakfast.”
I did want bacon. “I can’t believe we stayed out that late,” I said, thinking back to the night before. I’d never stayed out that late dancing, and I’d never had a night fly by so fast.
“We going again tonight?”
“Are you joking?” I asked.
“No. Didn’t you have fun? Let’s do it again.”
“You’re batshit bonkers.”
“Sure am. And I want to take you dancing again. What do you say?”
“We barely got three hours of sleep last night.”
“So we’ll take turns getting naps in later, if the kids need watching. What do you say?”
He was giving me his most irresistible smile, his dimples making me want to slap and/or kiss him senseless. I held out for maybe five seconds before I was smiling back at him.
“No funny business,” I told him.
“No funny business,” he agreed. “I took care of that in the shower. Should tide me over for a solid two hours.”
I blushed. I hadn’t even known I had any blushes left in me. “What happens after two hours?”
He stopped what he was doing, setting an egg down to give me his full attention.
He gave me a once-over that was borderline indecent, then went back to cracking eggs. “I might need to take another shower.”
That shut me up for a while. I watched him work, studying the myriad of tattoos on his arms, and the ones that showed through his white T-shirt. As he mixed the pancake batter, the stark muscles in his arms working, I thought that I’d found my new favorite hobby—watching Tristan cook anything at all.
“Bev has this really great frilly pink apron,” I told him. “What would I have to d
o to get you to wear it while you cook for me?”
“You don’t even want to know, boo,” he said.
That effectively shut me up again.
Within ten minutes, he had the kitchen smelling divine. I moaned as the aroma of sizzling bacon reached me.
His gaze flicked to me, then quickly away. “Tease,” he muttered.
He had the pancakes done first, prepping a heaping plate for Mat.
“You realize that he’s six, right?” I asked, eyeing up the huge plate.
“Does he like bacon?” he asked, ignoring my comment.
“Yes!” Mat shouted from the living room.
Tristan handed off the plate, and I brought it to Mat in the living room. Bev didn’t care if they ate on their little couches. The dogs always picked up any scraps they happened to leave behind.
By the time I got back into the kitchen, Tristan had a biscuit breakfast sandwich waiting for me. He handed it to me with a paper towel, then took a huge bite out of his own.
The smell of the eggs and bacon had me salivating, and I tore into the sandwich. I had to close my eyes with the first bite, chewing very slowly to savor every second of it.
“What do you do to food to make it taste this good?” I moaned.
I opened my eyes when he didn’t answer me. He was staring at me with a look in his eyes that made my toes start to curl.
He set down the uneaten half of his sandwich, striding out of the kitchen.
“Where are you going?” I called to him.
“I’ll be back in five minutes,” he called back.
I wasn’t sure if I was pleased or appalled when I heard my shower turning on.
CHAPTER SEVEN
TRISTAN
I turned the shower on, giving myself a good berating while I stripped down and got inside. I’d never been the guy that had to have a girl just because she was a challenge. I hated that guy, in fact. I usually thought that guy was a douche bag with little to no redeeming qualities.
I liked to keep sex in a separate category from all other parts of my life. Things just worked better that way, for all parties involved. I didn’t do the girlfriend thing, and the fuck-buddy thing was full of land mines.