𝐕𝐄𝐗𝐄𝐃 ❷

𝟒𝟐. ✭ 𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐍 ✭

I sit back on the lounge chair in the corner of our bedroom watching Dani braid her hair absently. She looks deep in thought after just having a conversation with Torey and Brooks. I'd watched her facial expression as she spoke to them, her mannerisms. She'd continuously wrung her wrists which they couldn't see. I'd wondered if either of them knew that nervous, uncomfortable habit of hers.

Half of me wants to ask her about it and the other half tells me to mind my own business, keep my nose out of their relationship. What's between the three of them has nothing to do with me. Their dynamic doesn't involve me. I'm the fake fiancé. Anything between me and Daniela is superficial, at least it's supposed to be.

My eyes roam over her petite form, the subtle curves of her slim body clad in a thin silk night dress, and a deep frustrated breath leaves me. The crimson color against her olive skin screams seduction in the most delicate of ways. Because that's what Daniela is— she's delicate.

Playing house with someone like her became harder and harder each day. Our little game of pretend was more blurred with each passing one of them, with each and every night she spent in my arms. The times where she'd cry and find solace in my arms, cling to my chest like I'm a life raft, the only thing keeping her head above water, that made it especially hard not to actually feel something for her. Then the happy moments we had with Wolf that were filled with smiles and laughter. All of those things had planted a seed inside of me, one that I hadn't wanted to register previously, but like a creeping vine, it'd slowly found its' way into a place that it shouldn't, that it can't.

Daniela turns to me with a soft smile, those grey eyes of hers looking at me in the same manner, like velvet plush. It makes my insides churn in a way that it really fucking shouldn't. She strolls idly over to me, playing with the hem of her dress, an action that has my eyes wandering to it, more specifically to the skin of her naked thighs.

I want to push that lacy hem of her dress up as I pull her onto my lap, kiss her with everything in me. I want to feel her lips against mine, her tongue pushing into my mouth as her hands wander my body, touch me in a manner they never have. I want all of that and so much more from the woman who's now standing in front of me.

But I can't want that— her.

I swallow uncomfortably and make myself look away.

"You haven't dressed for bed yet, why's that?" I close my eyes at the sound of her voice because it does nothing but make all of that want come pummeling to the forefront of my mind. "You even have your suit jacket on still." She palms the lapel the runs her fingers along it before pulling away. It makes me want to snatch it back and pull her body into my lap. "Do you have plans this evening?" Not trusting my voice, I give her a brisk nod. "Oh." The noise sounded disappointed but that could just be me imagining things. "Tris?" My eyes flicker to hers in response to my nickname, one that she's gotten accustomed to frequently using. "Are you alright?"

I clear my throat before answering, "yeah, of course. Why wouldn't I be?" Her brow furrows slightly as she looks me over knowingly and then she shrugs. "I'm fine, Dani."

"Are you sure? You seemed kind of off after, uhm," she fidgets, doing that fucking thing with her wrists again, "after the, uhm, talk tonight." I purse my lips and shake my head in disagreement. Those greys look me over in a manner that let me know she doesn't believe me. "Tristan, what is it?"

I stand up and walk away from her with, "I've got to go talk to Malyssa." At least I was going to try and talk to her. Agelos hadn't mentioned anything about the prisoner to me other than the fact that there was one. The perpetrator had been caught. "I'll see you later."

"Do you want me to wait up for you?" The question was asked so honestly it hit me in a way it shouldn't. Regardless of not wanting to feel sentimentalities, I felt them all the same.