Page 83 of Bitter Burn
“It won’t be forever,” he says with a certainty that I envy.
Isolde’s eyes lift to mine and then dip back down. “That’s right,” she says, soothing in her own quiet way. “Just until this is over.”
But I saw the understanding in her gaze. She might not know how I think things will end, what I’ve planned for, but she knows that there’s something underneath the casual way I hedge around the future.
I clean up as Tristan and Isolde finish eating, enjoying this little domestic eye of the storm, even with the thunder that only I can hear rumbling at the edges. Petitcrieu has passed out under their feet, lulled into submission by the occasional rub from an affectionate foot. They murmur to each other between bites: Tristan telling her about his day, Isolde asking questions about Armorica. Tristan’s shucked his suit jacket, and Isolde is barefoot in loose lounge pants and a sweatshirt that hangs off one shoulder. An old Army one of mine that she must have found in the bottom of a drawer somewhere.
Maybe while she was snooping, which is a charming thought. My pretty little spy.
When they’re done, I coax Petitcrieu into her crate, clear away their plates and wineglasses, and ask lightly, “Does anyone want to join me upstairs?”
They look at each other and then at me.
“Yes,” answers Tristan.
Isolde nods.
They go together, hands linked, Isolde only coming to Tristan’s shoulder—though the businesslike muscles of her exposed shoulder keep her from looking like a prototypical damsel.
I do feel like a villain following them, however, chasing them up to my wicked bower and feeling absolutely no shame about it. If this is the last time I get to trap my knight before the world unravels, then I plan on enjoying every last second of it.
Plus I worry about them, my darling playthings. I worry that Tristan is too good and that Isolde is too used to thinking of herself as the hand of God to act on her own. That simply won’t do, and I’ve always known that would be the case, but as with everything else, I thought I had more time.
Tristan and Isolde mount the last step to the loft—I treat myself to a final glance at both their backsides, works of art even beneath trousers and lounge pants—and then I follow them into the open space, which is separated from the penthouse with a glass railing. The rest of the loft is lined with cleverly fitted cabinets and spotted with debauched furnishings: a low leather sofa clearly designed with sex in mind, a leather-upholstered table with a hole in the middle, and a St. Andrew’s cross.
I turn on a lamp in the corner and then pad over to one of the cabinets. “Isolde, you’ll want to take off your pants. Tristan, why don’t you roll up your sleeves?”
I am already quite ready for the evening since I’ve been planning for it all day, so I’m already barefoot and wearing nothing but sweatpants. I’m not shy when it comes to my many scars, but I am deliberate about when I show them. Tonight, I want to show as much of myself as possible. The skinny ridge and uneven scars under the ink on my forearm, the snarl of scar tissue on my shoulder. The now-healed scratch marks on my chest from an angry cat in Morocco.
I gather the things I need and turn to see Isolde rolling up Tristan’s sleeves for him. She’s already obeyed my request and stripped from the waist down, but she still wears my sweatshirt, and the overall look is so adorably sexy that it’s easy to forget that she left four men bloody and lifeless in a Serbian nightclub only a few months ago.
She finishes with the sleeves as I set everything down, and they both watch me as I approach. I come up behind Isolde and slide her hair away from her shoulder so I can kiss it. Her skin is like silk under my lips.
“Safeword?” I murmur.
“Hyssop,” she says, my wife who constantly seeks atonement and who, like King David, probably needs it.
“Hazel,” adds Tristan.
And then for the hell of it, I say mine. “Honeysuckle.” They look at me, surprised, and I shrug. “It’s good for Dominants to have a safeword too.”
“You’ve never used it before,” Isolde points out.
“How often am I good?” To illustrate my point, I slide a hand down over Isolde’s luscious backside and squeeze until she shivers. “Now, Tristan, you should sit down. Yes, there on the sofa. And, Isolde, allow me to help you onto his lap.”
Tristan looks up at me with confusion all over his lovely face. “Um. On my lap?”
“Yes, yes, look alive now. There you go, Isolde, exactly there. Good girl.” Once Isolde is where I intend, she looks up at me too, a question on her face. I kneel on the floor next to the sofa, where she’s braced up on her elbows. “Do you trust me?”
She narrows her eyes. “I think you know the answer to that.”
“Do you trust me for the next twenty minutes?”
Her gaze remains doubtful, but a smile pulls at her mouth. “Maybe for the next fifteen.”
I brush some hair away from her face, wishing I could etch her features into my memory, wishing there was some way I could promise myself that I’d never forget the sea-colored eyes, the narrow nose, the winged brows, and the delicate jaw.
That I’d never forget the perfectly imperfect parts of her: the slightly overlapping front tooth, the upper lip with no dip in the middle, the haughty cast to her chin. Like God was too excited by his own creation not to rush through the details.
