VICTORIA TOSSED HER controller onto the cushion next to her when she threw her hands in the air. “Owned.” Gaming was one of the few things she’d indulged in when she was younger. Between filming, she’d slip away to play against the other kids on set. She was horrible when she started, but she learned.

“I think that’s a draw.” Tristan was gentler in setting his controller aside.

“Nope. Twenty-five to twenty-four. Me.”

“Really?” Amusement marred the disbelief in his question. “I thought that first match was just practice.”

She was torn. On the one hand, imagining what kind of things Tristan could order her to do made need pulse between her legs. On the other, “Now who’s a sore loser? You said it was just practice. I didn’t agree to that.”

“Fine. You win. Though to be fair, this is one bet I don’t mind losing.” He stood. Before she registered what he was doing, he’d bent and scooped her up in his arms. She squealed in surprise, and had to throw her arms around his neck to keep from falling.

He carried her into his bedroom, then set her on her feet in the middle of the room. He knelt in front of her. “Your wish is my command.”

Shyness mingled with desire, and she bit her bottom lip. She couldn’t do what she had the other night, and move his hand to places. Not easily. Inspiration struck. “Whatever you can reach from down there.”

He raised his eyebrows. “I like that kind of challenge.” His position put his face at the same level as her stomach. He pushed her shirt out of the way and kissed along the skin.

He gripped her ass, the slid forward to tease his fingers under the elastic of her shorts. As he glided along the path of her waist, he followed with his mouth.

She could lose herself in this kind of attention. It wasn’t just that it was focused on her, it was because it was Tristan doing it.

He tugged her shorts down her legs, kissing over her thighs.

She started to step out of the bottoms, and he grabbed her ankle lightly.

“If you move, I might not be able to reach,” he teased.

She rolled her eyes, but she liked the playfulness, so she stayed planted.

He trailed up her legs again, to draw his lips over her mound. With her legs together, he didn’t reach that aching button that pulsed for attention.

When he licked over her skin instead, she clenched everything at the spike of pleasure. He moved his mouth along her pelvis, while he slipped a finger between her legs, to tease her sex.

He continued the attention, licking and kissing everywhere but the one spot she wanted it most, until she was squirming and wet. Apparently there was a flaw in this plan.

She could change that. He was her slave for the night. She liked the drawn-out teasing, though. He scraped his teeth over her hip, the sucked on the sensitive skin.

That was new, and seared over her, drawing her gasp into a moan. The gentle sucking grew more insistent, until there was no doubt he’d leave a mark.

When he feathered his fingers over her clit, she sucked in a sharp breath through her teeth. He looked up at her, blue eyes warm and playful. He kissed the fresh hickey. “I figured you don’t want it obvious, but I don’t want you forgetting any time soon.”

There was no threat of that, but that didn’t mean she wanted to stop him when he switched to the other hip, and repeated the process. He stroked her sex harder at the same time.

She tangled her fingers in his hair, as much to lock him in place as to keep her legs from giving out beneath her. When she came, she ground against his fingers, until she wobbled on her feet.

He steadied her as he pulled back to look up at her. “Do you still want me down here?”

Not unless she was going to join him, with her jelly-like legs. “Dealer’s choice?” she managed.

“I might have an idea.” Tristan stood and lifted her onto the bed. He tugged off her shirt, and then discard his own clothes. “Lay down,” he whispered, breath hot on her ear.

He kissed along her breasts while he rolled on a condom. The anticipation was delicious. She’d had good sex before, but none of it was in the same universe as intimacy with Tristan.

He stretched her out when he slid inside her slowly.

Anticipation would only her desire for so long. She wrapped her legs around him and pulled him in, setting a hard, fast pace. The intensity wrapped her up and chased away the outside world.

He gripped her thighs, his grunts telling her he was close. When he came, he didn’t slow down.

“Play with yourself.” His command was gruff.

She slid her fingers between them, finding her clit. The first touch was almost enough to make her come, and it didn’t take much to bring her to orgasm. She fell into the sensation, swimming in the haze of pleasure.

She was vaguely aware of him slowing to a stop, and sliding out of her. Her throat was raw. Had she been screaming? It wouldn’t surprise her, but it did terrify her. It was so easy to lose herself when it came to Tristan, and she didn’t think there was any coming back from this.

****

TRISTAN PULLED VICTORIA back to him when she tried to climb from the bed the next morning. Sleeping next to her was rapidly becoming one of his favorite things. “It’s still dark outside.”

“It won’t be for much longer.” She fell back against him, and tugged his arm tighter around her. “Work. You remember work, right?”

He let out a low groan. Last night was amazing. Falling asleep and waking up next to Victoria was pretty fucking good too. “Fine. But there was discussion of breakfast.”

“Hmm...” She pressed closer, grinding her ass against him.

“Or we could call in sick.” That was pushing this do things for the hell of it attitude too far. He liked it.

“You’re serious? Have you ever in your life called in when you weren’t actually sick? Hell, when you were?”

“Twice.” Now that he had a taste of how replacing bad memories worked, he wanted to try it again. “Mischa convinced me to skip practice once. It was easy the first time. We fucked around the entire afternoon, and got away with it. So we did it again the next week. The second time my coach caught me. For months, all I heard, any time I made a mistake, was that if I wasn’t such a big faker, maybe I’d have gotten things right.”

She placed her fingers delicately on her lips, and let out a weak cough. “I think I’m coming down with something.”

“You’d better not risk infecting your coworkers.” He trailed his lips along the back of her neck. “And if you stay here, we can play doctor.”

“But I have so much work to do...”

“If I write your people a check, does that make your work go away?”

“It makes the IRS come knocking on our door. Apparently.” She rolled onto her back, so she could look up at him. “But if you’re not going to work, I’m not going to work.”

Instinct and years of habit warned this would be the one day things fell apart if he wasn’t there. That was ridiculous. Everyone who worked for him knew how to function on their own, and all of his appointments could wait a day. He’d have his assistant reschedule. He brushed his lips over Victoria’s. “Deal.”

They both made their excuses, then took their time getting up. They spent more time playing in the shower than getting clean. He had breakfast delivered, and they settled onto the couch for the Hellraiser movies that didn’t happen the night before.

Tristan’s phone rang, halfway into the first film.

“You’re sick. You can’t take calls,” Victoria teased.

He grimaced and wriggled his fingers. “It might not be work.”

“You should look. Otherwise you’ll get all twitchy.”

“It’s true.” He grabbed the device as it stopped ringing. The missed call was from Mischa. “I’ll call him back later.” A new voice mail buzzed through. “Or not. Just a sec.” He pulled up the message.

“Give me a call when you get this. It’s not like an emergency, but it might be important,” Mischa said.

“What’s up?” Victoria asked when Tristan frowned.

“He only said it might be important.”

She frowned. “You should call him back.”

Tristan was thinking the same thing. If Mischa put any manner of priority on it, he needed to follow up. He untangled himself from Victoria, and stood as he dialed.

“Where are you?” Mischa said as a greeting.

“Home sick. What’s up?”

“You don’t sound sick.”

He wanted to get back to cuddling on the couch. The thought was unexpected, but he couldn’t deny it. “I took the day off.”

“Just because? On second thought, you don’t sound like yourself. Maybe you should see a doctor.”

Tristan gave a dry laugh. “What’s up?” he asked again.

“Nope. You’re fine. I was thinking after you called yesterday, about things that Wolfram might know that would be enough to initiate an investigation like this. And that got me to thinking, did you know he has a PI check in on Ash sometimes?”

“That’s disconcerting.”

“And so creepy. But I doubt she’s done anything that has an impact on this. If she had, he’d go after her directly.”

Tristan hated the simple truth of the statement. “And?”

“Right. Anyway, I was thinking about PI’s, and that led me to another tangent. Did you know Victoria had me followed for a few months, last year?”

Tristan’s stomach dropped into his shoes, and he met her gaze. She was watching him from her spot on the couch, and she raised her eyes in question. “I don’t think you’ve ever mentioned that.”

“Because when I found out, I didn’t want to give you another reason to hate her. She was out of my life, so I let it slide. I’m boring to follow anyway.”

“Yeah. Good call.” Tristan couldn’t drag his gaze from Victoria. Betrayal grew inside, gnawing and shoving at his thoughts. Who was this woman? “Did she find anything useful?”

A frown whispered across her face.

“Don’t know. But I figured if the guy was any good at his job, it might be worth asking her to see if he found anything that could impact this. I don’t want to step on your toes if you’re working on something.”

“I appreciate that. How’d you find out about it, anyway?” Tristan struggled to keep his thoughts from spiraling out of control.

“He wasn’t that good at his job. I spotted him a couple times too many for it to be a coincidence. Told him I’d pay him more than he was already making if he’d spill about why he was following me. It’s possible I tossed a little Russian into my request, to imply that was better than the alternative. He didn’t hesitate. Said she hired him, and was looking for blackmail material.”

Jesus fuck. “When was this?”

“July. August maybe?”

Less than a year ago. Just a month or two before she insinuated herself back into their lives. The rational part of Tristan wanted to shrug it off. It was in the past, and it was never a secret she was obsessed with Mischa.

But the timing. The underhandedness of it. The entire situation. “I’m talking to her soon. I’ll ask her about it,” he said.

“Cool. Let me know if she’s got anything juicer about me than I do.”

Tristan hung up and set the phone on the coffee table. He couldn’t look at her. Didn’t have any idea how to start this conversation. What the fuck was he supposed to do?