Knowing His Secret (12 page)

Pushing him was going to get me nowhere, of that much I was certain. But at some point, there had to be a quiet moment
unhindered by crisis or seduction when I'd be able to really know him better. He couldn't keep himself locked up forever. Could he?

***

Tom was grateful for the effort we made to get back into the rehearsals given what I'd told him about my father's injuries and the scare we'd had. Rehearsal that night was spotty, and it was pretty obvious that both Tristan and I were exhausted. By the time we wrapped up, I was ready for only one thing--a hot bath and bed. I was feeling achy all over, like I was coming down with something.

Tristan drove me home to the duplex where we said goodnight. "You look pale," he told me as he gently kissed me goodnight. "Get a good night's rest. We'll talk tomorrow."

The steamy bath nearly put me to sleep right in the tub. It was all I could do to dry my hair and stumble into bed. When I woke at
three in the morning, I was drenched in sweat and obviously had a fever. My throat felt like it was on fire and every joint in my body was throbbing. I had the flu and a rotten case of it at that.

When Tristan called me the next morning, I absolutely forbade him to get within twenty feet of me. He insisted that I should have someone to look after me. It was my turn to put my foot down.

"I've had the flu before. Twice in college as a matter of fact. Just leave me alone and I promise I'll drink lots of fluids and be back on my feet in no time." I coughed and it sounded like I brought up half a lung. "You don't want this. Trust me."

Unbelievably, he accepted my wisdom and promised to check on me later in the day--by phone. "I'm talking
to the PI around noon. I'll let you know what he says."

Before I put the phone back on my nightstand I called Mom in Maine. All I wanted to do was fall back into bed, but I knew I needed to talk to her first.

"I'm so sorry you're sick, honey," she said. "You probably caught something in the hospital. God knows a hospital is a great place to pick up germs."

"It's just the flu, Mom."

"Well if it feels like anything unusual, promise you'll get yourself to a doctor. You never know."

"I promise. How's the cabin?"

Mom laughed hard and called out to my father. "She wants to know how we like the 'cabin'." I could hear my father's belly laugh in the background. "The 'cabin' is an ocean side mansion that looks like it came out of some movie about historic Maine. I counted eight bedrooms last night, but I could have missed a couple. It's all done in cedar shake siding, slate roof, lots of stone. I guess it's what Architectural Digest would call 'rustic elegance'. There seems to be a fireplace in every room."

"His place here is way over the top."

"Well this house isn't. It's perfect--comfortable, homey, and down-to earth in an expensive sort of way. I'd kill for a kitchen like this. It's a cook's paradise."

"Sounds a lot more like Tristan than the French Chateau he's got here. I'd like to see it." I coughed again, so hard it made my head spin. "But not now, Mom. I gotta go back to sleep."

"Take care of yourself, sweetie. We're fine."

"K, Mom. Love you."

"Love you too."

By three in the afternoon I had been dragged from my bed four times. The drugstore delivered a vaporizer--something I hadn't seen since I was a kid--and a veritable medicine chest full of over-the-counter remedies. The deli delivered chicken soup and cookies. The florist delivered a huge bouquet of star-gazer lilies. Finally, a very large teddy bear arrived with helium balloons and a box of candy.

Tristan called at three-thirty.

"Thank you for all the thoughtful things."

"I wish I could do more."

"You've done so much already. And not just for me. Mom and Dad love the cabin."

"Great. They need to stay there. Artie, the PI called."

"And?"

"These are some freakin' dangerous characters. The word is that they want to 'make an example' of your father. It's going to take some time to figure out how to stop them."

"Maybe you should talk to the police."

"Not yet, not 'til we find out exactly who's involved and at what level."

"Tristan, I don't want you to get yourself in any kind of trouble."

"Trust me, that's not going to happen. Nobody knows I'm even involved. Artie's the one doing all the digging. I don't want anything or anybody connecting the dots."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that when you get back to the theater I think we need to keep a low profile. These people are professional criminals. If they put a tail on you…"

"Why in heaven's name would they do that?"

"Your father has just disappeared into the dark. Who better to get him back into the light than his daughter?"

"Oh come on…do you really think?"

"I really think. And if they connect you and I it won't be too hard to find out where your parents are hiding. My house in Maine isn't exactly a state secret."

"Are you sure you aren't getting overly paranoid about this?
"

"Raina, I'm going to have Kwan looking out for you. Don't be concerned if you see him hovering around.
If you do see him, don’t acknowledge him."

"Really, Tristan, this is ridiculous."

"It
is not
ridiculous. Bad men harm innocent people all the time. Bad men take lives simply because they're
connected
with the real object of their evil. It's called collateral damage and it's part of the game of war." It sounded like he choked. "Sometimes the best way to hurt someone is to target someone they care about. That's the easiest way to get what you want."

I had the eerie feeling we weren't just talking about my father and me. I hadn't thought about Elsa for nearly a whole day. Until I found out what had happened with her, she was goin
g to be a shadow over us. But, yet again, this wasn't the time.

"Well, right now, no one is going to see any connections between you and me or me and anyone else. I'm down for the count. I feel like shit."

"I'm sorry. I didn't want to worry you. Get some rest and we'll talk later."

"Tell Tom and the guys I'm sorry."

"They'll understand."

***

I could hardly lift my head from my pillow for four days. Tristan kept up a steady supply of deliveries of provisions and other treats. It was far more than I could consume, but Jenn was very impressed.

"It sure is a shame you haven't got any appetite. I haven't eaten this well in years," she told me.

Tristan called twice a day, at least. He kept me posted on Artie's slow-moving process of discovery and how the play was progressing.

After Thursday night's rehearsal he told me that everyone was completely off book and the blocking was starting to move like a ballet. "Tom really is a master choreographer," he said. "There's not a static moment on stage."

He also told me that Suze had come in that night to 'pinch hit' for me in my absence. That certainly didn't make me feel any better, but it gave me a damn good reason to recover. By Sunday afternoon I felt human again. I decided to take my flu-weakened legs for a walk in the late summer sun.

I walked a short few blocks before I had to turn around, exhausted. There'd be no marathons for me any time soon. The streets were pretty empty. Kwan was reading his paper on a bench in front of the dry cleaners at the intersection near the duplex. I smiled when I saw him and he completely ignored me. A woman jogged past me toward the park and a couple of cars went by.

As soon as I got into the duplex, Tristan called. "Kwan thinks it's possible you've been marked."

"Marked?"

"He's not sure. But he wanted me to tell you to stay alert."

A very creepy feeling came over me.

"Don't worry. Kwan's the best. He won't let anyone get near you. But right now, we have to watch and wait."

"I was hoping we could have dinner tonight. I feel much better and I could really use your company."

"Out of the question."

"I had hoped you would be missing me like I'm missing you…"

"If you only knew."

"Why don't you tell me?"

"I'll make a deal with you," he said in the throaty way he had when he was about to say something sexy. The purr was music to my ears after all the serious talk. "I'm going to call you at eight. Have dinner, relax in the tub, have a glass of wine or two. When I call, I want you snuggled in bed, waiting for me."

Eight o'clock seemed to take years to arrive. I followed his instructions and had a nice big glass of wine that I had nearly finished by the time he called.

"I'm going to tell you some of the things I'm going to do with your heavenly body. While I do, I'm going to imagine you touching yourself and I'm going to do the same."

"Phone sex?" I giggled.

"Prepare to be pleasantly surprised just how hot a phone can be…Right now I am laying here on my bed, completely nude. Are you picturing that?"

"I can picture you nude, but not your bed. I haven't seen your bed, remember?"

Tristan cleared his throat. "Never mind the bed. Think about my cock that's just asking to be stroked. Just half awake, waiting for you to tell me what you're going to do to it."

"The first thing I would do is take you in my hand and hold you while I felt the blood pumping into your shaft. I'd feel you grow right there in my grasp."

"Very nice. While you hold me I can feel your soft fingers play with my cock and reach down and cup my balls and roll them gently."

"I would start to move my hand up and down your shaft, playing at the cockhead when I reached the end and twisting, ever so slightly."

"You're good at this, Raina. My dick is getting harder and harder."

"Are you touching yourself?"

"Oh yeah."

The thought of Tristan, on the other end of the line, pulling on his erection sent my own body into action. "My hand is between my legs and I can feel that I'm already wet just knowing…"

"Knowing that I'm going to jack off listening to you tell me how you masturbate? Knowing that there's already a glistening drop seeping out of the end of my cock?"

"If I was there, I'd lick it away. I'd taste your salty sweet essence and twirl my tongue around the soft sensitive ridge…"

"I'd pump my cock into your mouth but I wouldn't come there, this time. Because I want to fuck you."

"Oh god, Tristan, I really do want to fuck you."

"You will, sweet. Now just imagine it. Take me into your pussy. How do you want to do it?"

"On top of you. I want to ride on you."

"Impale yourself on me and buck away."

"I want to press my clit against you hard."

"Your breasts in my hands. Your knees around my waist."

His breath was coming faster. He was talking to me and he was stroking his magnificent cock as we played with our words. It was hard to believe I could say the things I said. Before Tristan, my sexual vocabulary was limited to unngghh and oh god. Now I was asking him to fuck me, come in me, eat me, finger me, take my pussy, take my ass.
He told me that I felt like a tight tunnel of wet silk when he entered me. He described feeling the ridges and folds inside me and how they caressed him when he thrust. He described my orgasms in such detail, I was amazed.

All the while we touched ourselves, miles apart. He came first. He stopped talking. All I could hear were the guttural sounds of his release. I encouraged him to come for me. I told him I would drink him with my mouth, my pussy and my ass. I told him to watch his semen splash on my face, my breasts, my stomach. I could hear him going crazy as all the words and all the ways tumbled through his ears. His desire and his satisfaction were the biggest turn on of all. The ecstasy I heard him release released me. I rocked against my fingers and told him.

"You've got it. Now. Yours…your body, it's coming for you." Then I closed my eyes and let the pleasure take over.

We laughed at ourselves afterwards, and why not? I was learning that there were so many different ways to touch, to find satisfaction. There was gentle, rough, passionate, lusty, needy, and even something as almost comical as phone sex. Tristan was a voyage of sensual discovery in so many ways. I found myself hoping the journey would never end.

Twelve

The next several weeks were a combination of torture and triumph. He stayed true to his conviction that
our relationship should remain a secret. He had serious fears about the thugs connecting him to me and consequently to my parents at his home in Maine.

My father was recuperating nicely thanks to Mom's ministrations and the beautiful, carefree setting Tristan had provided for them. Mom even hinted, as the time went by, that she was seeing something in my father that she hadn't seen in a very long time
. I didn't ask. I didn't want to embarrass her. But I read between the lines and was happy for her.