Lingus (34 page)

I smiled at him and walked toward the other side of the bed, slipping under the covers so that a good two or three feet of mattress separated the two of us. His dark head of hair lulled to the side to look at me. "Are you ready to go to bed so we can get up early?"

"Sure," I told him.

He turned off the television and reached over to turn off the lamp on the side table before the darkness engulfed the room. Only the noises we caused shifting under the covers sounded before his husky voice cleared. "Goodnight, Kat."

"Night," I mumbled out, rolling over so that I faced his side of the bed.

I closed my eyes and immediately envisioned Tristan's sopping wet body against the doorframe again while I fell asleep. It seemed that almost immediately once my eyes were closed, I was dreaming of Tristan possibly for the first time. He was leaning over me, like he had been the day before when we were talking about the reasons why he quit, but he was whispering dirty things into my ear and grinding against me. I kept calling his name with each dry thrust and even in my dream it felt amazing.

At some point, my mind started to wake up when the rubbing felt a little too real.

Just like at the end of my hot yoga classes, it seemed like every inch of my body slowly awakened, every nerve heightened to the heat and the cold that lapped against it. It started from the cold tips of my toes and slowly ran up my exposed calves and then thighs, which were pressed from behind by muscle, hair, and
oh my god,
something thick, hard, and long rubbing gently against my bottom. The blanket was kicked to the end of the bed so the cold air of the room washed over me, or technically us, I guessed, but it only caused me to revel in the warmth behind me that much more.

One of his hands was on my hip, already underneath the t-shirt and skimming the skin on my stomach. His mouth was nipping at my earlobe, alternating gentle flicks of tongue against the shell. I moaned, deep and hoarse like a wanton whore. I was still half asleep as his long fingers circled their way up my flesh until the tips brushed against my chest, causing me to buck against him, whimpering. Was it wrong to want him this badly? Despite the fact that Nikki and Josh were into casual sex, I was not. Every man I'd been with — the whopping three — had all been boyfriends and yet, I'd never wanted any of them the way I craved Tristan. He was my crack simply put.

"You kept saying my name in your sleep," he groaned into my ear. "Do you have any idea how that makes me feel?"

Shamelessly, I pressed my back into his body, causing him to hiss. "I have an idea," I said, but my throat was thick and still full of sleep so it sounded raspy.

"It was the hottest fucking thing I've ever heard," he whispered before rolling me onto my back in a flash before his thighs pressed mine apart. It was so dark I couldn't see anything but the faint outline of his large frame hovering over me. Both of his hands were now on my hips, so I could only guess that he was on his knees between my legs.

"I hope this is okay," he murmured, and then gripped the edge of the shirt I had on, tugging it up so that it bunched underneath my chin.

Then I felt cold air brushing my skin before his mouth, with heat that rivaled lava, devoured me. "Holy shit," I panted and arched my back like I was trying to thrust more of myself into his mouth.

Despite the growl in his voice, his mouth was gentle but persistent as he sucked me into his mouse. His hands kneaded the skin on my ribs before I felt one hand glide down my side, leaving a trail of heat over my hip bone before cupping me through the material of my underwear. I couldn't think. I couldn't remember my fucking name when he started rubbing those fingers up and down my flesh, pressing deliciously right where I wanted him the most.

I bucked again, whimpering when he moved his mouth away to press against mine in a slant with a deep kiss. Just like his mouth on my breast, his kiss was slow and deliberate before peppering across my chin and down my throat, collarbones, and back down to the tender flesh that missed him. His fingers kept their slow rub up, down, circle, and then again. "I'm going to make you come, Kat," he said in the huskiest voice of all time.

"Please," I whined when his fingers started pushing aside the material covering me. "Please, oh please." I couldn't focus on anything but the parts of my body that were in contact with his. I couldn't think that we needed to talk. I couldn't do anything but beg.

He chuckled, sucking me a little harder into his mouth. "Tell me you're mine," he rasped against my skin.

Oh. My. Fuck
.

Oh. My. Fuck
.

I knew that this was totally possessive and territorial. I knew that it also wasn't the best time for us to have a talk about what could possibly define us, but fuck me. Who cared?

"Tell me, Kat. Tell me you're only mine."

I cried something that sounded like a noise a puppy made. "I'm yours… only… oh fuck," one long finger dipped between my heated flesh and I cried out again. "I'm only yours, Tristan."

He growled, sounding completely inhuman before sliding another finger in to follow the first. "I'm yours too, you know that?" he breathed against the sensitive skin on my chest and I felt my heart constrict. "I only want you," he groaned. Before I could even ingest his words, he twisted his wrist and flicked his fingers upward, brushing a spot that made me forget my name. I couldn't breath as his fingers twirled and brushed against me, making me whimper and cry out. "You're so wet."

Maybe it was his words but maybe it wasn't. When the heel of his hand started grinding against me, I cried out his name as the most delicious orgasm of my life made my toes curl and my vision literally go black. I'm not sure how long I laid there as a panting mess with my legs wide open and my underwear shoved to the side so my entire vag was out in the air, but it was the warm kisses to the side of my face that brought me back to reality. Tristan brushed his lips against my cheeks, chin, and then kissed my upper and lower lip repeatedly while I calmed down.

"That was—," I mumbled, feeling exhausted and warm again when the covers were pulled up over me. Tristan settled himself right next to me, draping a heavy arm over my bare stomach. His hips were pulled away from me just the slightest, but I couldn't forget the monster that had been pressing against my ass just minutes before. "Hey, do you want me to....?"

He chuckled, kissing my temple before he rested his head on the same pillow I had mine on. "No, I'll be okay," he said simply. His fingers brushed against my stomach, and I felt him shift just a bit to put his head on top of his folded arm. We were silent for only a minute before he cleared his throat. "Kat? I meant what I said."

I knew we needed to talk, but his words flirted through my brain. I was his and he said he was mine. It felt engraved into me already. I knew Tristan, and I was fully aware that he didn't say things just for the heck of it. "I did too."

"You'll be mine?" he asked in a voice so low I almost didn't hear it.

It shouldn't be so simple, should it? To just commit myself to someone?

I wasn't sure at all but it felt like it was with him. He bared himself to me, made his move, so didn't he deserve the same?

"That's all I want."

Chapter
49

The next day, I felt like I was living out one of those coffee commercials with the shy smiles that Tristan shot me from across the bed. As soon as I started blinking the sleep away from my eyes, I spied him in his shirtless glory holding up two cups of coffee in those amazing hands that I'd gotten well acquainted with just hours before. The smallest memory of the prior night managed to make me blush as I remembered his dry lips on the skin his shirt was now covering. Warm rays of sunshine slipped in through the cracks of the curtain over the window making it feel even more surreal. I probably looked like a hot mess with dried drool on my face and knots in my hair, but right then I could not have given less of a shit.

I was in bed with Tristan. My brain lit imaginary fireworks in celebration of the occasion.

"Good morning, Sleeping Beauty," the rich, deep voice that had purred into my ear last night said. He handed me a cup of coffee over the bed covers, and then maneuvered his way over to rest his back against the headboard just a foot away from me. "We need to get going in an hour to make it in time."

I kicked the sheets off my legs, sat up, and smiled in his direction before sipping the coffee he'd handed me. It was just the way I liked it with four sugars and so much cream it made the normally dark color look milky. Glancing back and forth between my mug and the handsome face just to my right, my brain tried to cope and understand with what had happened just a few hours before. The sequence almost seemed dreamlike. Technically, it was something out of my dreams because it had seemed that we would never get to that point.

Plus, who gets to wake up with this type of perfection between their legs in real life?

I couldn't even get started trying to replay the fact that he didn't ask for me to be his, but rather told me. Sweet baby Jesus, I had never been one for liking possessiveness but the idea of being Tristan's was just too fucking perfect. I would've settled for a simple, "I think we should date each other exclusively." The dreamy smile on my face must have given me away because I heard him snort. "What are you thinking?" he asked with a tinge of humor in his voice.

For a moment I debated whether or not to be coy and pretend like I wasn't thinking about where his fingers had been last night, but screw it. "Last night," I admitted with a waggle of my eyebrows.

The smile that spread across his face was the most brilliant thing I'd ever seen in my life. Solar panels be damned, Tristan's smile could provide enough electricity to support a small town. "Which part specifically?"

I rolled my eyes at his question and sipped my coffee. "The entire time, doofus."

"I had a lot of fun last night," he chuckled, blushing across his high cheekbones. "Would it be needy of me to say that I'm glad that you know how I feel about you?" He looked up at me through those long, dark eyelashes. "What I want from you?"

There's no doubt in my mind that my mouth dropped open at least a fraction of an inch then, but I hoped that I recovered quickly enough to not look like a fool. "No, that's not needy at all," I said in a breathless voice. I felt like my heart was in my throat. "I like knowing that you want me in your life as more than just your friend. I had no idea, you know? Until you kissed me last week, I didn't have a solid clue that you looked at me as more than just your buddy Kat."

"I don't think I had a clue for a while that I saw you as more than just my buddy. It was like I woke up one day and realized it," he sighed out the words.

I could appreciate his honesty more than I could ever explain because it made sense to me. He had been so hot and cold with me for weeks that his struggles seemed logical. Part of me liked the fact that he grew into his feelings instead of just admiring some superficial aspect of my outer shell. He liked me for me and that just felt right.

"I've always liked you," I blurted out. Shit.

His megawatt smile brightened the room again at my response. "You're just—," he sighed, clearly struggling for words. His eyes were wide and bright as he thought about what he was trying to say.

"Amazing?" I offered with a laugh.

Tristan rolled his eyes then and grinned. "That's not the route I was going but it'll work too." He set his cup down on the side table and crawled over to me. The rippling of his muscles seduced my eyesight for the first time that morning. Mother fuck. All that was mine? He was mine? The clean and distinct curves of muscle that shaped his entire upper body flexed deliciously so close to me, I had to reign in my inner slut to keep from tracing all that flesh with my tongue. "Goldie?"

"Hmm?" My eyes were still glued to the expanse of peachy skin he had exposed.

His large, calloused hand stroked my cheek with a tenderness I'd never felt before. It was enough to make my sight depart from its current residence on the trail of dark hair that led underneath the cotton of his sweatpants. "I just want you to know that I'm dead serious about what I told you last night, okay? You're all I want, and I don't want anything to make you think otherwise."

I took his words and stitched them onto my heart while we showered separately and got ready to head out for breakfast. Tristan dyed his hair while in the bathroom and came out with his mop of black strands for Robby Lingus' short and last stint at the porn convention we were heading to. The whole atmosphere between us was different. It was almost like we had this nice, warm bubble wrapped around us that we used to shield us from the pollution we were heading to. He held my hand walking down the elevator, in the car, into the diner for breakfast, and back in the car. His long fingers reassured my shorter ones constantly. The rough and strong tips of his digits grazed the skin on the inside of my wrist and palm in sensual strokes that made me blush.

I didn't want to constantly keep reminding myself that this thing between us was real, but I had to. I was never blessed with the best of luck, so how could I manage to get this sudden oncoming of greatness? Tristan was not just the most attractive man I'd ever seen, but he was smart, funny, and a little loony. Best of all, he understood me. Every time I thought that, I had to be my own cheerleader and remind myself that I was attractive, smart, funny, and a little loony too. I couldn't sell myself short either despite how much the little voice in the back of my head wanted me to.