Chapter 12 – Tristan #2
I release her, and my mother takes her arm, smiling and chatting about nonsense. Waverly’s cheeks are red, and when she throws me a backward glance, I see the question in her eyes. What the fuck was that?
For a moment the room is silent.
“Well, I think it’s safe to say we absolutely adore her,” Grand-mère announces.
“So don’t fuck it up,” my father adds in English.
“My sentiments exactly.” Brax’s hand meets my shoulder. “Nice kiss,” he murmurs in my ear as we all follow after my mother and Waverly. “Got me hard.”
I elbow him in the flank, and he throws me a wink.
Dinner goes on forever. My father is grilling me and asking us a million questions about our company while commenting left and right about how I’m needed in Paris to learn the family business.
My mother and grandmother are filling me in on local gossip about how this one’s married and this one just had a kid. And Waverly won’t look at me.
I shouldn’t have kissed her.
I fucked up our truce and made her uncomfortable. I broke my promise to her too. I told her no sex. I told her she’d have to hold my hand at the most.
Desperation clings to my skin, making my muscles jumpy. I need to get her alone, but for what? I’ve never been this way. I’m the decisive one. The one always in control. And yet she makes me wild. Feral.
My eyes close and I picture her face as I replay that kiss.
I got more joy out of being with her these past twenty-four hours, helping her through her panic, watching her whenever I could get away with it, touching her and teasing her, than I can ever remember with anyone else. I want more of that, and I can’t lose her.
I can’t lose Waverly. Not ever.
I want to kiss her again, and I want her private smile aimed at me. I want her laughter and sweet innocence and fiery tongue, and I like her. A lot. Jesus fucking Christ, I seriously like her. One goddamn day, one orgasm, one amazing kiss, and all my resistance is gone.
I blow out a breath and glance over at her as she nibbles on her dessert, making small talk with my mother while I think this through. Think about what this means.
This relationship might be fake, but nothing that’s happened today is.
I look at Brax as he sips his wine and talks stock market projections with my father and Grand-mère. I take Waverly’s hand beneath the table, all of this hitting and hitting hard, but instead of making me want to run away, it fills me with a burning need to run toward her. Them.
I want to be who she wants.
But more than that, I want to be who she deserves. And I want to experience this with Brax. I don’t even know why, and it makes as little sense to me now as it always has. But he’s in my blood, part of my system, an extension of me as I am of him. There is no one without the other.
I let this sit with me. I give it room to move and breathe within me.
I picture my life, my days and nights, and I picture her there with me.
With us. Her scent on my pillows. Waking her up in the mornings with my face between her thighs or sliding inside of her, staring at her pretty, sleepy face while I do, and Brax is there.
He’s inside her too. Behind her. On top of her.
It's… happiness. Peace. It feels right. Like wayward, mismatched pieces coming together flawlessly.
A lightness fills me. A certainty takes root within me.
Christ, it’s Waverly. With Braxton as part of it. It’s been them all along.
But I have no clue how to make something as complicated as that work in real life. Is such a thing even possible for people like us in the world we live in?
Dinner ends, and Waverly declares that she’s exhausted. Neither Brax nor I fight this. We both are as well. It’s been a hell of a day with little sleep last night, and we head back to my flat downstairs.
“Well, goodnight,” Brax declares, his eyes on me as he crosses the room and kisses Waverly where she hovers on the edge of my room. I give them a minute together, heading to my bathroom, still unsure how this can or should or even will go.
Just because I feel like this doesn’t mean she does. In fact, I’m positive she doesn’t.
I wash up quickly, anxious and unsettled as I brush my teeth and strip out of my clothes, leaving me only in my briefs. My heart is pounding, and I laugh. I’m fucking nervous to sleep beside a beautiful woman.
But she’s not just any woman, and this situation is as different as it gets.
The room is dark but Waverly wordlessly scoots past me into the bathroom. I give her space, getting into my typical side of the bed.
Except I don’t want to.
I want to slide under the covers, wait for Waverly, grasp her hip, and turn her onto her back.
I want to look into her eyes as I crawl over her and kiss her mouth and then make my way down her body.
I want to remove whatever the hell she’s wearing—knowing her, it’s about ten thousand layers to keep me away—and sink inside her.
The thought has me panting right here in my bed.
I snap myself out of my fantasy and blink to allow my vision to adjust as she pulls back the comforter on my bed.
Waverly is stiff as a board, practically fucking the wall for how close she is to the edge, and for a few quiet minutes, I lie on my back and stare up at the ceiling of my childhood bed.
Then I smirk.
“I lost my virginity in this bed.”
She doesn’t respond, but if possible, she tenses up even more, and I keep going.
“It was with my high school girlfriend. It was pretty great for me for obvious reasons, and quite the opposite for her. I was only sixteen and didn’t know what the hell I was doing.
” I start to laugh. “My mom walked in on us as we were getting dressed. After that, I was never allowed to have a girl in my room again. It’s why I was shocked she let you sleep in here with me. ”
“It’s fine. You don’t have to explain it to me. It’s not like we’re having sex.”
I rub a hand over my jaw and smiling lips. Not yet, sweetheart, but we will. I have to work for it with you. I have to earn it.
“How old were you when you lost your virginity?” I ask, ignoring her comment.
“I’m not telling you that,” she squawks, affronted.
I roll on my side until I’m staring at the back of her head. “What will you tell me? I’ll take anything you’ve got because even though you’ll think I’m lying, I want to know about you. Everything about you, I’m finding.”
“You don’t need to do this.”
“Waverly, I’ve been a Scrooge. A prick. I know I’ve been a prick.
I just didn’t realize the extent until you threw it in my face and made me see just how much of one I’ve been.
I thought…” I blow out a breath and roll back away from her, my hands going behind my head, my elbows butterflied out on my pillow.
“I thought if I was a dick to you, then I’d stop thinking about you as much as I was.
I wouldn’t notice how pretty you are or how smart or how much I looked forward to getting into work early, because you were always there and I’d get to watch you even when you didn’t know I was.
It worked. I guess. But not really because my walls were paper-thin, and it didn’t take much to be torn down.
I need you, Waverly. I don’t think I know how to work without you anymore.
You read me, you anticipate me, you just know me.
And for two years, I’ve been fucking terrified to lose you. ”
She doesn’t respond, and I suppose that’s what I deserve.
I sigh. “I just want you to know I’m sorry because I’m likely confusing you with my hot and cold and everything in between.
I’m not saying this to step in between you and Brax.
That’s not what he and I do with each other.
I care about you. A lot, actually. I think you’re incredible.
So smart and sweet and perfect. You’re the heartbeat I stopped allowing myself to have.
” I clear my throat. “Anyway, I’m sorry if I haven’t shown it all this time, and I’ve been horrible to work for.
You have every reason to hate me because I haven’t given you any reasons to like me. ”
With that, I roll over, giving her my back and the space she wants. Even if it’s no longer the space I want her to have.