Sweetie?
“Ah, yeah, I am.”
She then throws her blanket off and strolls over, wearing nothing but a bra and panties to kiss the man beside me on his cheek. “I’ve got to go tinkle.”
Before she even closes the door to what I’m assuming is the bathroom, I turn around and reach for the door.
“Wait, Kirsten. You promised,” Tristan says behind me.
“That was before we walked into your sex dungeon, harem, or whatever the fuck this is!” Someone shushes me from across the room, and I shout, “Oh, fuck you!” I open the door and flood the apartment with light from the hallway, making the occupants groan in complaint. Or at least, it opened a few inches before slamming shut again. Tristan reaches over me and flattens his palm against the door to keep it closed. He wraps one arm around my waist and drags me away from the structure so he can lock up.
“Let me go!” I slam my fists down on his arm. Unaffected, he hauls me deeper into my own personal hell.
“No. It’s late. You’re tired and crankier than usual. We’re going to bed, and the girls will all be gone by the time you wake up in the morning.” With that pronouncement, a chorus ofawwsounds in unison. “Sorry, ladies. I’ll help you find alternative housing for tomorrow night,” Tristan tells them as he climbs up a set of metal stairs. “Good night.”
Several voices call back the same sweetly.
At the top of the metal stairs, he uses a key to unlock the door, then strides inside while my nails try to gouge his arm through his leather coat, wanting him to put me down. The room is pitch black with no windows. He flips on the overhead lights revealing another giant bed, empty and unmade, a dresser, chair, and normal bedroom furnishes. There are a few items of clothing strewn on the floor and chair, but it’s otherwise tidy.
“This is my room. I’m the only one who sleeps in this bed,” Tristan tells me before he tosses me onto the mattress so hard, I bounce. When I try to scoot to the edge and stand up, he climbs over me and pushes my shoulders back. “Lie down and get some sleep. I’ll go grab your luggage and then lock the bedroom door.”
The weight and heat of his body on mine short circuits my brain. I hate that his face is so close to mine and so gorgeous. My body relaxes underneath him against my will, melting into the comfortable mattress. Still, I’m not ready to let it go. “Who are all those…women?”
“Friends.”
I roll my eyes.
“Friends who worked for an awful man.”
“Whores who worked for a pimp, you mean?” I ask, quickly putting it together.
“Yeah, that. They’re good girls who just needed a place to crash for a few days…”
Oh, and he just so graciously offered his apartment to a harem of freaking prostitutes? “How long have they been staying here with you?”
His eyes close on a wince. “I haven’t been home in a few weeks, so it wasn’t a big deal.”
Not a big deal? Is he fucking kidding?
“Did you fuck them?”
“Well, yeah. They’re whores.”
I scoff and shove at his chest to get him off me. Despite using all my strength, he doesn’t move. If anything, he just gets heavier, flattening me even more into the mattress.
“Only if they wanted to, and I didn’t pay them,” Tristan explains.
“You just let them live here rent free!”
“I didn’t offer them my place to fuck them. They just…really enjoy sex. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“They fuck men for money!”
“Not anymore. They’re all going back to school to get their GEDs or trying to find real jobs while they’re staying here.”
Whipping my head from side to side I tell him, “You are so full of shit.”
Tristan’s eyes narrow and then his lips twist. “Are you jealous?”
