“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I told him, which was a lie. I could feel it spilling out of my eyes, covering him like some pain-relieving salve. This was something I gave, and he took, and we were both more lost for it, or at least, that’s how it had worked out the last time.
“Yes, you do. You can’t give me that look without feeling that look.” He took a deep breath, and then another.
“It’s probably all this powder. You’re seeing things.”
That didn’t even faze him. “I swear, it feels like there’s been a bullet lodged in my gut, buried there for ages, and it just got pried out. Thank you.”
I looked away. “Don’t thank me. Just do what you need to not to hurt me.”
His breathing grew ragged. “Do I get to ask the same of you?”
We shared a raw look, but I didn’t answer him.
“I didn’t realize how hard it would be, to be around Mona,” I said, changing the subject. “I think it’s best for me to avoid that in the future.”
He was the picture of yellow, purple, and pink faced remorse. In spite of myself, I found that so incredibly endearing. “I’m so sorry for that. It’s turned into a bad situation.”
I shook my head at him. “What were you thinking, sleeping with someone you worked with? When does that ever turn out well?”
He looked wildly uncomfortable.
I shook my head at him some more. “Oh you naive bastard. Still thought f**k buddies could work, huh?”
He flinched. “I did. I was an idiot. But let’s not do this to ourselves, okay?”
He had a good point, and I dropped it, since I was done making mine.
We went to his house, and I finally got that tour.
“It’s huge,” I told him before we’d even finished with the first floor. “What single man needs this much space?”
He gave me an enigmatic look for that bit of sass.
We f**ked our colorful way all over his kinky bed. Afterward, we took a shower together that bled into a rainbow down the drain and he took me again against the shower wall.
It was as I was drying off that I noticed a half used bottle of women’s perfume on the counter, near his own assortment of colognes.
I grabbed it, holding it up. “Care to explain this?”
He smirked. “Sure. Don’t get mad, but I stole that from you back at James and Bianca’s wedding.”
I just blinked at him. “You went into my room at the ranch and took something? And what on earth could you possibly use my perfume for?”
“You probably don’t want to know.”
I blushed, head to toe, and I couldn’t look at him for a solid five minutes. It didn’t help that he was na**d and I was close to it.
He took me into his closet to try to find me a T-shirt. I froze in the doorway, staring inside.
With just a towel clutched to my chest, I stared at his closet for the longest time. It was huge, and much stranger, it was full. Long lines of suits, a wall of ties, racks upon racks of dress shirts. There was only one small space allotted for T-shirts, and the wall of shelves that held his folded jeans wasn’t much bigger than the section allotted for ties.
“Holy shit. What happened here? This is not you.”
He looked sheepish as he ran a restless hand through his hair. “I have a dresser.”
“Huh?” I made a face. “Explain that to us poor people. A dresser?”
“For the show, there’s a lady that does my shopping, puts clothes together for the act. A stylist, I guess. She put this closet together, as well, for all of the events associated with the casino. An extensive wardrobe is part of the job, I guess. So you got that part right, this is not me.”
He snagged a T-shirt down from where several were folded, and I dropped my towel, going for it.
He held it out of reach with a smile. “I just rethought the whole giving you clothes idea.” He tossed the shirt over his shoulder and reached for me. He kissed my forehead softly while he cupped the back of my head, gripping my hair; he turned my body so he was behind me, then prodded me forward.
“Grab my wrist,” he told me, and I reached my arms up and behind, gripping the hand that held my hair. This exaggerated the arch in my back, and he stroked his other palm up my torso, gripping a breast as he led me into the bedroom.
He walked me up to a strange, dual arched leather bench. It was about six feet long, with one arch that reached three feet high before it sloped down low then rose into another arch that was maybe a foot shorter than the other one. It was a narrow bench, as well, and I didn’t imagine for a second that this wasn’t for a reason.
I gave it a squinty-eyed look. “Okay, I give up. What is that thing?”
He walked me directly to the rounded edge of the higher side. He pushed me forward until I lay with my ass was pointed straight up, and my feet dangled off the ground.
His hand still held my hair, and I still had a tight grip on his wrists.
“It’s called a Tantra Chair. In case that doesn’t describe it well enough, let me put it this way: We are going to clock in some hours on this chair. Days.”
I wriggled, the position alone a turn on, with my h*ps flush to the soft surface of the chair. Of course, having Tristan na**d behind me was more than a little responsible for getting me wet and ready for another round.