“I’ll take care of it this time, Tanner,” he says, waving me away.
I don’t move. Kane stares at me, mistaking my fury for loyalty. He thinks I’m trying to make this easier on him, diffuse the situation so the party can go on because that’s who I am, that’s what I do. I make sure nothing goes wrong on my watch, right?
Well, screw that. I swing my arm to land my right hook on his chin from below. He’s pushed backwards, loses his balance and collapses on his ass with a loud thud.
I grab a white cloth napkin from the buffet table and turn to Tris. I force her fingers open to remove the glass and then wrap her hand in the napkin. The cuts are not deep. She’ll be fine.
“Let’s go,” I tell her, taking her good hand.
She doesn’t ask questions. She follows, scurrying on her high heels to keep up with me.
“What the hell just happened?” she says when we reach my car. “He’ll never forgive you for that. You’ll be a marked man.”
I nod as I open the passenger door, but she doesn’t get in. She looks at me curiously, trying to figure me out. Good luck since I can’t figure that out myself.
“What are you doing, Tanner?”
“I’m doing what I’ve always should have done. Take you home. This time for real.”
“Where is home?” she says with a confused, but happy grin.
“That’s the thing, Tris. Home is what you choose it to be. Not some fucked-up mansion with guards. You get to choose from now on. Let’s start with a place for you to live. A home.”
“When did you become such a sweet, crazy man? It’s not that simple.”
“Of course it is. Isn’t this what you’ve been trying to tell me? I’ll take you home and I’ll stay there with you. If that’s what you choose.”
Her eyes water a little as they lock on mine. I realize she’s shivering. I take my jacket off to wrap around her bare shoulders.
“What does that mean?” she says.
I lean in for a soft kiss of her luscious lips. “It means, Merry Christmas, Tris. My holiday wish is a second chance. Is it possible?”
“Isn’t that what Christmas is all about?” she says, crying for real this time. “Wishes coming true and being with the ones you love?”
I take her in my arms. I rain down kisses on her sweet hair and face. I don’t know what the future holds but I do know my life’s new mission is to keep Tris Kane safe and happy and away from all those things that would try to hold her down.
“Tanner,” she says, wiping the tears off her cheeks. Her voice is urgent, worried.
I follow her gaze to the west wing of the mansion. Derek stands against the wall, staring at us. I can’t make out his features but his stiff body language tells me everything.
He was ordered to discreetly take us back at gunpoint but he doesn’t seem in a hurry to do so. Maybe he doesn’t want to take any chances trying to stop me. He knows I possess skills he doesn’t.
Maybe he just sees his opportunity with me gone to be number one finally. We never had a beef with each other and I’d be happy for him if that happened. Whatever his reasons may be, he just raises his right hand making the sign of peace. We’re free to go.
“It’s fine,” I tell Trista. “He won’t stop us.”
She gets in the car slowly, cautiously. “I’m honestly not sure what’s happening,” she says, “but I think I like it.”
“Me too,” I say as I put the car into gear and drive off into a whole new world, one full of endless perils and eternal hope.
PART THREE
Home Is What You Make It
Chapter 9
Trista
Passing cars and distant street lights race past us on the dark freeway. It’s hard to control my manic thoughts to make sense of things. When Tanner knocked my father onto his hypocritical ass, my vision of my future was flipped on its head. It felt good that Tanner stood up for me and even better that he wanted to take me away—take me home, as he put it—like my knight in shining armor.
Twenty minutes have passed and what had been clear then has already become tangled and messy. I have no idea if these events will lead to happiness or to any good whatsoever.
I don’t know all that much about Tanner. I don’t know where he lives. I don’t know where he’s from or if he has family somewhere. Shit, all I really know is that he’s good at intimidating and/or protecting people. Is this a sound foundation for an elopement?
Okay, Tris, chill on the hyperboles. You’ve slept with him once and you’ve hated him for three straight years. You’re not eloping, for heaven’s sake, you’re just taking a break from misery—both of you are.
He takes an exit off the freeway before I have a chance to read the sign. One thing’s for sure, I haven’t been up here before. Nothing’s remotely familiar about the long, empty road we’re on.
I turn my face to look at Tanner sitting next to me. His stern expression is back but for once I don’t think it’s directed at me. He probably has similar doubts, wondering what the hell came over him and why he kicked his entire life to the curb for an erratic rich girl who’s unstable at best.
“Canyon Country,” he says when he senses my eyes on him.
“We’ve only driven forty minutes. How could I have never heard of this place?” I wonder aloud. His jacket is still around my shoulders, warming me and tingling my nostrils with its masculine, cinnamon and clover scent.
“There’s no Tiffany’s here,” he answers. “Tris, this won’t be what you’re used to,” he says as he drives down a gravel road and then pulls over in front of a lonely, older ranch-style home under a streetlamp. The lawn in the front yard is completely dead, making the place look even lonelier.
“Is this your place?” I say, not quite sure what I expected.
“It’s not in my name and I haven’t been here since summer,” he says, “but, yeah, it’s pretty much mine.”
He opens my door and offers his hand for support. Such a gentleman all of a sudden. He’s like a different man today.
I linger on the cement sidewalk, breathing in the cool night breeze. “Did we really just flip off my father?” I say as I try to distinguish figures and shapes in the dark. “Did you just bust me out of prison?”
“Don’t be dramatic. We’ve just moved to another kind of prison,” he says, taking my hand and guiding me to the door. “It may not be much on the outside,” he says, “but the inside is probably worse.”
“Funny,” I say with a short laugh. “I’m sure it’s fine.” He can hear the truth in my voice. I’m not sure at all of this place. It’s small and dreary and I am already thinking about mustiness and mites and, I don’t know, moths?
“I’m sure it’s not,” he says, opening the door to total darkness.
I’ve been in small houses before. I was willing to live with Vaughn and his Grandma for as long as it took and I wasn’t even in love.
In love? What am I thinking? I can’t control my thoughts lately. Just because words pop into my head doesn’t mean they are real. Thoughts just kind of float around confusing us with contradictory emotions.
He ushers me through the door to a narrow hallway. We linger here in the dark for a second or two. I’m standing behind him, so close that I can almost feel the hard, strong muscles on his back without touching them.
I yearn to touch him. I want to rest my head between his shoulders so badly, so urgently, but I need to wait for his cue. I want him to initiate any intimacy between us tonight. It feels like last time it was all me and I need him to take initiative now, to show me that he truly wants to be with me and that he didn’t just react out of instinct when he bandaged my bleeding hand and took me out of the Kane mansion.
I need him to show me how much he wants me.
He reaches to his right to turn on the light. I’m disappointed and relieved all at the same time. I’m conflicted. He practically confessed his feelings for me only moments ago, so why won’t he touch me or even look at me?
&nb
sp; “You weren’t kidding,” I say as he takes a few steps and I get an eyeful of the sparse, yet untidy living room. There’s a worn sofa and a coffee table with ancient leftovers and a small TV set with a bunch of DVDs and video games on the carpet in front of it. “This place is sad.”
“Let me confirm the kitchen is safe before you go in there,” he says with a grin as he finds the thermostat on the wall and turns the heat on.
I walk over to him and give him a smile. “If you had taken me to a palace, I wouldn’t be any more content,” I tell him.
He lifts my bandaged hand gently. “We need to take care of this,” he says as he tenderly removes the cloth napkin he used to cover the cuts.
Tanner leaves the room. He returns in seconds with a first-aid kit. He cleans my hand with water and softly covers the tiny cuts with an antibiotic gel. He carefully places a band aid over his work.
“Tanner,” I say as he closes the kit. “Why are we so awkward together?”
His eyes lock on mine. “Are we?”
“Aren’t we? It seems like we’re more comfortable with each other when we fight than when we have moments like this.”
“What do I look like, a fortune cookie?”
Smiling relaxes me. “You’re sexy when you’re a smartass,” I say.
“Seriously, change is not my thing. Never comes with a road map or any fucking clues. I like to consider every eventuality.”
“So you want like infrared military mapping for your life?”
Now he grins and fixes his eyes on me. Everything inside me turns into a hot whirlpool of anticipation. “Something like that. You’re a curious little creature, do you know that?”
“In case you didn’t notice it,” I answer as my heart begins to thump louder by the breath. “You just admitted to acting on impulse. It sounds like you’re having second thoughts.”
“You’re a pain in the butt,” he says, pulling me to him, placing a kiss on my forehead. His hands fist my hair and then slide down to my waist, a finger pressing against the small of my back.
“I love your butt,” I whisper. My heart beats faster than a locomotive as I find myself pressed against him, feeling him everywhere at once. I realize that I’ve dreamed of this moment too many times to count.
“I don’t want to overwhelm you,” he says. “I dragged you away from everything you know without asking. I just reached my limit. I needed to touch you, to protect you. I want you, Tris. I want my intention to be clear.”
He calmly kisses me. It’s like he’s just waking up and searching my mouth for oxygen. Then it turns urgent and rough. I get on tiptoes, lacing my hands behind his neck as our tongues intertwine.
His hands move to my hips and just like that a switch is flipped. He pulls me to him and lifts me up, his hands under my ass. He takes a few steps carrying me like that, plastered to his chest, and places me onto the cold kitchen island.
“I thought the kitchen was too dirty,” I say, panting.
“I don’t care,” he says, kissing my neck. “It’s about to get dirtier.”
Oh fuck, did my big brute really just say that? I like how he breathes hard now, so strong and commanding and vulnerable at the same time. I like how I ache for his touch.
Tanner’s mouth crushes on mine again, exploring every pore on my tongue and lips, as he positions himself between my legs. His right hand reaches for the back of my head, undoing the carefully coiffured bun to let my hair fall loose on my shoulders.
I wrap my legs around his hips, pulling him closer as if that were even possible. His erection bulges against my stomach. I whimper. All brain functions except one are about to shut down. My eyes close.
It’s all as it should be, only better. He grabs the straps of my lilac dress, sliding them down my shoulders and arms slowly until my breasts are exposed. He takes them, one breast in each hand, squeezing gently, rubbing his thumbs over the eager nipples, already hardened and needy.
“Tris,” he says against my lips.
My pulse is pounding all over the place. “Yes?”
“You have no idea how many times I’ve thought about your tits, cupping them, squeezing them like that, feeling every tiny delicious molecule of skin and flesh.”
I throw my head back a little to look at him. Did he just say that he’s been lusting after me for a long time? “You have not.”
“Have.”
“That’s a lie.”
“It’s not.”
And it’s not even my birthday. Well, it is Christmas Eve. “So you’ve fantasized about my breasts? Even before Canada?”
“Oh yeah. And not just your tits. Say it, Tris.”
“Say what?”
“Tits.”
“You want me to say tits?” I say, laughing. “I just did.”
“Ask me if I like your tits.”
Tanner Hayes takes control of every situation, doesn’t he? I take a deep breath before I ask. “Do you like my tits, Tanner?”
“I fucking love your tits,” he says, lifting my ass off the counter to practically rip the dress off my body.
I gasp. He’s too much.
“And then I fantasized about your nipples,” he whispers. “Rosy and big, bunching up under my fingers.”
“You did pinch one when you shouldn’t,” I say, breathless, as his rough fingers pinch both my nipples now.
“You totally deserved that, you can be a horrible brat. Showing off your delicious body like that.”
He has a point. I arch my back, moaning, when he lowers his mouth to one nipple.
“I dreamed about getting them in my mouth,” he says. “Sucking on them until you begged for more.”
Oh fuck, I can beg right now if it will make him happy. He wraps his lips around my sensitive nipple, sucking roughly, giving me a perfect combination of blinding pleasure and pain.
“And then I thought about the sweet little button between your legs,” he says, kissing behind my ear as his fingers dive under my panties, finding my happy clit.
“Your little confession speech is crude but extremely effective,” I say between shallow breaths. “Hits on all the key points.”
“Does the little college girl think she’s so smart?” he says, pressing the tip of his finger firmly against my sensitive nub, circling it, around and around, causing every nerve in my body to respond.
I nod. “Ah hah. I must be. I have Tanner Hayes playing with my clit.” I’m not even sure if the words really came out or if I imagined I said them. Brain shutting down for good now to conserve energy for something explosive.
He pushes me backwards on the island. I have to support myself on my elbows. He undoes his blue tie and then unbuttons his white dress shirt. I just about come on the spot as he reveals his incredible torso and impeccable skin.
“What else did you imagine?” I say as he pulls his pants down.
“I thought about how you’d trap my cock inside your pussy, strangling it with your tightness,” he says, sliding my panties down my thighs and knees until they’re off me.
“I think I did that for you already.”
His eyes grow darker as he licks my upper lip. “It wasn’t enough. I want to feel your pussy squeezing me all night. It will never be enough.”
His boxer briefs come off. He grabs his cock, pumping it a few times, and then positions it against my opening. He pushes all the way in and I cry out with pain a little, as he takes a tit in one hand, pressing on my throat with the other. It’s not rough, it’s gentle and sexy the way he caresses the sensitive structures on my neck, claiming me, asking for permission to take everything.
I give it to him. Everything that I am and everything I have, body and soul. It’s all his now. “Fuck me, Tanner,” I say. “Reshape me. Make me yours.”
He growls as he begins to own my pussy, his hands under my thighs, pulling my ass on the very edge of the counter so he can slide his arms under my knees to support himself and spread me wider.
Damn. It’s even better than I rememb
er. He’s relentless and passionate and he makes my head spin. I love how he thrusts into me like there’s nothing else in the world, like it’s the only thing that matters, like I’m bottomless.
I surrender, dropping my head back as an incredible force builds inside me, fevered and frozen at the same time, a fucking hot avalanche of sensation that threatens to erase me, wipe me out, make me his and his only.
My eyes open only seconds before I implode and as I take in the perfection of his sculpted torso, glistening with sweat, and the look of complete abandonment on his face, I’m driven over the edge. My core is shaken with frenzied tremors of immeasurable pleasure and I cry out again and again.
“Tanner!”
I feel him tremble, too, going faster and harder and then slowing down, gripped by his own repressed orgasm. And then, his incredible, wild, shocking orgasm overcomes him and he makes the most delicious animal sounds ever uttered on this Earth.
He puts his arms around me, holding me tight as if I might vanish if he let go. I hug him back with my weakened arms. His fast breathing enters my ears and fills me up everywhere at once, calming me into an almost drugged bliss.
There’s so much I want to tell him but I feel useless now.
He gives me a smile as he pulls back a strand of hair off my forehead. “That was better than my fantasies,” he says.
“Ya think?” I tell him, biting his lip gently.
He brings my hand to his mouth, kissing the band aid. “Don’t ever do anything like that again,” he says. “I need you in one piece.”
Fine by me, Tanner Hayes. I’m all yours.
Chapter 10
Tanner
Thirty years of living and never have I felt every heartbeat like I do now. It’s nothing I can explain. The quiet of her sleeping soothes me. Not even Anisa could take away all the unrest of both my past and present. Already I fear losing Tris. How can I let this feeling go?
I know how crazy it sounds, but maybe she and I are meant to be, maybe being with Tris Kane is where I belong, maybe she is my destiny, my home.
Bodyguard Dearest (Bodyguard #1) Page 6
