Colleen shoved her summer jammies on a plastic shelf above the toilet in her bathroom and turned back.
Tristan was right there, blocking the doorway and looming over her. “Where do you think you’re going, princess?”
The answer to that question was not one of her approved words, so Colleen remained silent.
“Tell me your safe words.”
“Red and yellow.” Safe words were always approved things to say.
“I want you to begin to think of some private safe words for just the two of us, but those will do for now. And now, my princess, this is where I have to warn you that I wash my toys, but only after I’m done playing with them.”
A subtle thrill ran through Colleen, and she bit her lip to hide her smile. The day had droned on and on, each new horror worse than the last, and a part of her was still cringing in mortification at bringing the sophisticated and successful Tristan King back to her apartment hovel.
But as his fingers touched the hem of her tee-shirt and lifted the soft cotton, all that began to fall away.
His fingertips brushed the soft skin of her tummy as he dragged the tee-shirt over her head and unhooked her bra to let it fall to the floor. Colleen sucked in the deepest breath she’d breathed all day and sighed out the terror and anger from the last few hours.
Tristan retrieved one of her hairbrushes sitting on the top shelf and combed the brush through her hair, starting with the ends. The bristles slid over her scalp, and he let up the pressure when the hairbrush encountered tangles to tease them apart.
“You’re weirdly good at that,” Colleen muttered.
“Oldest of nine. I had three little sisters to get ready for school every morning. I can braid hair, too.”
He tugged the rest of her clothes off her body, started the shower, and then undressed as she rinsed off.
Warm water sluiced down her back and legs, and it was just a moment before Tristan joined her, taking up most of the room in the tiny shower stall. He found her bar of soap and washed her body, spreading the foam over her skin in long sweeps over her arms and legs, and then he stroked down her back, caressing her until he rinsed her off. The fear-stinking sweat and residue from the restaurant’s fire sprinklers washed off her skin. Grabbing the shampoo, he washed her hair and massaged her scalp, kneading the stress of the day away.
His hands and the warm water soothed her, unknotting the muscles of her shoulders and around her eyes. He stroked conditioner into her hair, and Colleen closed her eyes to lean back against his firm chest.
The pressure from his caresses dragged over her shoulders, and he was almost supporting her weight as his hands dipped lower. His fingers stroked over her shoulders and down to her breasts, where he tenderly slid his fingers around her nipples, the gentlest touches that fluttered slow ripples of pleasure through her body.
He held one of her breasts in his hand, still drawing lazy circles around the peak with his thumb, and his other hand slid down her tummy.
The delirium of his hands and his muscular body held her helpless as his torso pressed against her back. She raised her arms above her head and looped them around his neck like she was dangling bonelessly from his shoulders.
His lips and softening five o’clock shadow brushed her ear as he whispered, “You are absolutely stunning.”
The ache in her heart was almost physically painful, a yearning for all this and more. His tenderness made her other encounters with men look fumbling, and the feeling of peace was something she’d missed her whole life. The yearning for his touch and his words became loneliness, a recognition of how alone she was in the world.
No one would come to Colleen’s rescue if she texted red flag. If she were absolutely in dire straits, she might be able to call her parents or her siblings, but it would be an admission that she’d been wrong even to try to go to college and do something other than be her parents’ retirement plan and full-time caregiver in their future old age.
After these days were over and Tristan moved on with his life, she would be alone in this crappy apartment again, talking to her internet friends she’d never met.
His fingers crept lower, caressing her and then deepening the soft circles until he was stroking her clit and slipping his fingers inside her. She arched, gasping softly as he quietly, expertly, strummed her body and brought her to another throbbing, mind-blanking orgasm.
While the world was spinning, Tristan moved, and then she was gasping against his chest as he cradled her, murmuring as he turned off the water. After he toweled her hair and body, he pulled her jammies over her head and held her while she stepped into the shorts, and then he carried Colleen to her mattress on the floor and knelt to lay her on it.
“You should take the bed,” she whispered.
“You’re not allowed to say that,” he said, stroking her hair back from her forehead. “What do you say?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And shall I join you?”
“Yes, please,” she whispered, already drifting off because she was so tired.
After a moment, the lamp clicked off, and then Tristan slid onto the twin mattress beside her, curling his strong body around hers. His arms and chest were thick with muscle, and when he laid his arm across her waist, his weight comforted her.
His lips brushed her temple as exhaustion took over and dropped Colleen into sleep.
She breathed, cradled in the darkness by his steady warmth.
But the following day, she was ready for battle.
In the corner of her apartment with the kitchen, she fretted about the few supplies she had on hand. “I’m sorry that I don’t have bacon or sausage or anything—”
“Don’t say you’re sorry,” Tristan said, yawning.
“But I have cereal, and there still should be some milk in there. I only left here the day before yesterday.”
“That’s great. I’ll have something delivered if we’re going to be here more than a few hours.”
She flipped the cereal box out of the cabinet and caught it. “And while we’re eating breakfast, Tristan, you are going to tell me exactly what was in that goddamn letter that has you so riled up. I want to know everything.”