Tease Me Read online

  It hadn’t been my birthday, Christmas, nor had I been celebrating some milestone.

  He’d simply told me that on one of his visits home he had searched for something special for me, and since he hadn’t found anything, he’d had something made.

  I treasured that folio, those pencils, more than anything else I owned. And in the midst of cleaning them, the solution became clear.

  Kristian.

  As quickly as the thought had set in, I tried to push it out.

  He was my friend after all, one of the relationships I valued most in my life, and I wouldn’t see that friendship destroyed.

  But as I had thought that, it also occurred to me that the strength of our relationship, the familiarity of it, was the very thing I was seeking. And we were strong, or at least I thought so. I had no reason to think otherwise.

  Over the years, our relationship had deepened, strengthened, and I knew without a doubt that he cared for me, valued me just as much as I did him.

  Which made my solution ideal.

  We both cared too much about each other, and the friendship that we had, to ruin it. But I wasn’t certain. And besides, what did Kristian have to gain from it?

  That was an issue that had taken me a bit longer to parse out. And in the end, I had decided he had nothing to gain.

  I supposed I could have been arrogant, said that the opportunity to sip from the fountain of Dallas was reward enough, but my realism made thinking such a thing impossible.

  Over the years, I’d had the pleasure, or misfortune, of seeing many of the fountains from which Kristian liked to sip, and none were quite like me. In fact, there wasn’t really a universe where I would be able to compete. So that wasn’t a consideration, and Kristian’s reward being sex with me was laughable on its face.

  But I also knew that Kristian didn’t do things simply for the reward.

  More than most, he cared about me, genuinely, and would help me in any way he could.

  And so it simply came down to that. I needed assistance, and I trusted him above all others. He cared about me, and would give me that assistance.

  I’d looked at it from every conceivable angle, and my logic was irrefutable. Which was why I had been bold enough to ask in the first place, even though I knew this wasn’t necessarily the best time for him.

  He had thrown himself into his second restaurant opening, and it was taking all of his energy. But I told myself I was doing him a favor bringing this up now. The distraction might be exactly what he needed to relax about the restaurant opening.

  By the time I had mustered the courage to bring up the topic, I was convinced of the inevitable outcome.

  Which proved what a fool I was.

  I had been prepared to do some work to convince him. After all, Kristian and I were the same—stubborn—and if he simply acquiesced, I would be more suspicious than if he put up a protest. It was in our nature to question things, even if we ultimately came around.

  “We’ve arrived, ma’am,” the driver said as he pulled to a stop in front of my studio, which also contained my loft apartment.

  “Thank you. Please get home safely,” I said through the intercom.

  That was still a little bit weird, the heavy partition separating the driver from the backseat something I understood, but something that was also foreign.

  I had the urge to tip the driver, but knew he wouldn’t take it, and Kristian would be insulted that I had even tried.

  So I got out of the car, and quickly made my way inside, pausing long enough to wave at the driver.

  I closed and locked the door, and it was only after I was inside that he pulled off.

  I made my way through the studio, and up to my loft, feeling simultaneously drained and wired, at least when it came to working on this particular predicament.

  Because after all, I was still surprised by Kristian’s reaction.

  His no wasn’t one that was based on him being difficult.

  No, he had flat-out rejected me.

  I tried not to let that bother me, told myself it was nothing personal, but I could admit that my feminine pride was a little bit hurt.

  But that was something I pushed aside, something I recognized as small on the grand scheme of things.

  I didn’t exactly understand his reaction, but I wouldn’t begrudge him it. After all, it wasn’t something I could compel him to do, and it wasn’t something I would dream of compelling him to do. So, though it hurt, he was well within his rights to turn me down.

  I peeled out of my clothes and made a beeline toward my bed, deciding I would shower in the morning.

  As I lay down, my body was weary but my mind was still animated with thoughts of what had happened during that conversation.

  His reaction was something I needed to understand, and for a moment, I got a bone-deep fear, one that made me wonder if perhaps I had miscalculated.

  I still trusted Kristian, trusted the depth of our relationship, but maybe I had misunderstood the nature of it. I didn’t want anything from him, but as I thought about it, I could see how it might be easy for him to think otherwise.

  After that, I tried to let myself sink into his frame of mind, understand how that request may have looked to him.

  And when I did that, I felt a sinking sensation in my stomach, one that made me wonder why I had been so trusting of my own conclusions.

  I assumed that I possessed if only a little bit, then some baseline level of attractiveness that would have made completing the deed physically possible. But maybe that wasn’t the case? Maybe I was so completely outside the realm of acceptable that Kristian wouldn’t even be able to mechanically make himself get through the act.

  The thought left me cold, a little bit empty, but I couldn’t dismiss it out of hand.

  I also couldn’t resolve it without input from Kristian, so for the moment I left it where it was, dwelled on other considerations.

  Like the fact that a person in Kristian’s position had to be careful.

  I liked to think of myself as different, and liked to think that he thought of me that way as well, but that didn’t change the fundamental fact of who he was and who I was.

  It might be easy for me to think of him as my best friend, the chef/restaurateur, who also happened to be a prince, but his status was something that he could never lose sight of. And an entanglement with me, even one as clinical as what I proposed, was something that he wouldn’t be able to take on lightly.

  That sinking feeling got worse, but I didn’t allow myself to abandon the train of thought. I needed to understand what had happened, see what, if anything, I could do to salvage the situation.

  Then, there was something else I hadn’t fully accounted for.

  We were friends. I trusted that, knew it, and also knew that outside of his brothers, Kristian didn’t call many people that. It was hard for him to trust people, and I understood. So many of his relationships had been predicated on people wanting things from him. I’d always prided myself on being different, but maybe I had been a little too hasty in patting myself on the back.

  Because while my intentions were pure, while I didn’t want anything from him, I knew he had to be wary. And if things went wrong, he’d have to deal with the fallout.

  So perhaps I had been naive in thinking it wasn’t possible for anything to go wrong.

  But Kristian clearly hadn’t shared that as confident as I had been.

  Finally, just as I was drifting off to sleep, I considered another possibility. Maybe Kristian worried about what sex would do to our relationship. He wasn’t a fearful person, but he also wasn’t one who embraced change easily. At least not change that he hadn’t initiated.

  He liked to keep things predictable, steady, found a comfort in routine, which I was very well aware of. I was convinced that was more than part of the reason he had become a chef.

  Yes he loved to cook, but even more, I knew that he loved being the complete master of his domain, liked having a hand in every
single thing that happened.

  I told him that life wasn’t like that, but he still tried to keep everything as he liked it.

  And that included our friendship.

  He had long ago gotten past the idea that he’d be able to change me, make me be different, and deep down, I didn’t think he wanted to.

  But one of the things I knew he relied on, knew it because I relied on much the same thing myself, was that he could count on the nature of our friendship.

  No matter how hectic things got, no matter who wanted what from him, no matter how flighty or whimsical I could be, he could always count on me to be there for him, know that no matter what, if he needed someone to kick back with and have a beer, or someone to just be on his side, I would always be there.

  Introducing a new variable into that was something Kristian would reject.

  I sat up in bed, no longer feeling sleepy, cursing myself for not having had that foresight before.

  Of all the potential explanations, that was the one that made the most sense.

  Kristian didn’t want to risk changing what we had, losing me.

  That last thought was something I liked far too much, so I ignored it and instead thought through this issue that should have been glaring, but was one I had missed.

  Adding a physical component to our relationship was a variable Kristian couldn’t control.

  Kristian didn’t do variables that he couldn’t control.

  In fact, if he had reacted any other way, I would have been surprised.

  All of a sudden, I felt like the world’s biggest asshole.

  I flopped back on the bed, my thin pillows barely giving when my weight hit them.

  I’d fucked up, and I needed to fix it.

  It would be a tough sell, but I needed Kristian to understand that nothing between us had changed or would change, and that there were no hard feelings.

  As I closed my eyes, the last thought in my head was that I hoped I hadn’t ruined one of the best things in my life.

  Three

  Kristian

  Dallas had been right that I was dead tired, but there was no way in hell I could go to sleep after she dropped that bomb.

  So instead, I made my way to my laptop and looked over the plans for the second restaurant again, even though I knew them by heart.

  I smiled, glad that no one was here to see me grinning like a lunatic. Dallas had really thrown me for a loop, but there was no surprise in that. I was halfway convinced she lived to throw me for loops. I tried to look at the bright side. Yes, Dallas had shocked me and asked for something that would change everything about us, but at least she’d made me excited to think about the restaurant again.

  It had been besieged by problems and issues from the onset, so a diversion was welcome. But even as I flipped through the plans, made a few minor corrections, some enhancements, my thoughts didn’t stray from her. It seemed not thinking about Dallas wasn’t an option.

  Some part of me wondered why she had asked me. I hadn’t had the courage to pose that question because the answer didn’t matter.

  No matter the reasons, the answer would be no. I was unwavering in that.

  But I still pondered how I had missed such an important thing about her. Dallas and I were close, but it occurred to me that she had never mentioned dating anyone, and I’d never thought to ask.

  In my mind, no one else was a part of the equation. Dallas was just Dallas. Crazy, quirky Dallas. If I’d stopped to think about it, I guess I would have just assumed that she kept whoever she was seeing to herself. Which was fine with me, because when Dallas and I were together, the outside world didn’t exist to me.

  That was selfish on my part, but being with Dallas was a completely immersive experience, and when I was with her, I didn’t have to worry about the restaurant, the kingdom, the future, anything but simply being. Still, that I’d missed something that important about her made me feel like a jerk. She was one of the most important people in my life, and I’d been so focused on myself that I hadn’t thought about her.

  It sucked to acknowledge it, but I’d been a shitty friend, too wrapped up in what being around her gave me instead of paying attention to what she needed and wanted.

  I slammed my laptop closed, then leaned back in my chair, no longer able to pay any attention to the restaurant plans. Dallas a virgin? There should have been no fucking way.

  She wasn’t beautiful.

  Perhaps that was a harsh thing to think, but it was true, and I knew Dallas would agree.

  What we wouldn’t agree on was that beautiful was too mundane a word to fully capture what Dallas was.

  I’d never met anyone like her, and didn’t imagine I ever would again. Her personality was like a living, breathing thing around her, one that called out like the flame to the moth.

  That magnetism alone should have attracted countless suitors. But even without that unnamable thing that made Dallas so irresistible, she still had an understated physical appeal.

  She was tall, nearly six feet, not remotely skinny, but she carried her weight in all the right places. She was perfectly proportioned, her hips, small waist, full breasts, and long legs the epitome of woman, all of it wrapped in a package of dark brown skin that practically begged to be touched.

  So while I hadn’t missed her physical appeal, I’d only viewed it intellectually and had taken it as just a part of Dallas, no different than her horrible sense of direction or wonderful sense of humor. In all the years I’d known her, I’d never allowed myself to think of her as anything other than a friend, my very best friend.

  Tonight, my thoughts started to stray.

  No, Dallas wasn’t beautiful, but she was so much more, compelling, like a rare butterfly.

  I wondered how I had gone so many years without noticing. Then I decided that I hadn’t noticed because I hadn’t wanted to notice. Willful ignorance wasn’t like me, but I understood what had driven me to ignore those sides of her.

  When I’d first met Dallas, she had cemented in my brain as a friend, and as the years had passed, that bond had grown stronger, as had my unwillingness to do anything that would jeopardize it.

  Especially not something as fleeting and fruitless as sex.

  I was tempted to call and reassure her that she would have no trouble finding many, many people to fill the role she wanted, and I didn’t doubt that she would, especially if she put effort into it. For all of her artistic flightiness, Dallas was as driven as anyone, and there was nothing she couldn’t do if she tried.

  But I didn’t reach for the phone. I couldn’t reach for the phone, not when my stomach was churning at the very thought of Dallas with someone else.

  The idea of some random stranger touching her was one that didn’t sit well with me.

  Didn’t sit well?

  Who the fuck was I kidding?

  The idea felt wrong on every single level, and stirred an anger and possessiveness in me that I dared not examine.

  She was worth more than some random fuck or some short-lived fling. And even though this whole scheme was ridiculous, I wanted her to know that. I wanted her to be treasured in the way she deserved.

  But I couldn’t be the one to do it.

  I cared about her and our friendship too much, and I wouldn’t do anything to change it. Dallas would say we could do it, just add in the sex and leave everything else as it was.

  But even if we tried, I couldn’t trust that we could pull it off, and I wouldn’t risk the consequences if we didn’t.

  Denying Dallas was something I almost never did, but I would have to now.

  Because I wouldn’t let anything come between us.

  No matter how much I might want to.

  Kristian

  The next morning came way too fast, and when I heard the alarm, I was shocked out of a deep but troubled sleep.

  I’d thought about Dallas all night, and now that it was time to move, I wanted to stay in bed.

  But after a few moments, I
shook off the grogginess and got ready for the day.

  My home was pretty simple, if you could overlook the fact that it was on the top floor of a billion-dollar skyscraper. Not my choice, but I knew when to pick my battles with my brother Leo, and my living quarters weren’t worth the fight.

  Besides, I wouldn’t pretend that I didn’t enjoy the view, and didn’t enjoy the way others—especially Dallas—enjoyed the view.

  When she’d first seen the place, she’d squinted, her nose wrinkled as she looked at the over-the-top fixtures in the lobby, the futuristic elevator, all of the little touches that were added to embellish the value and make the place scream wealth, and in my case, royalty.

  She hadn’t been impressed by any of it.

  I hadn’t expected her to be.

  Of all the people I’d ever known, she stood alone as one who’d never been impressed by anything I had.

  But when we’d entered my penthouse, and she had seen the wall of windows going from the floor to the twenty-foot-high ceiling, she had been instantly enthralled.

  So enthralled, in fact, that she hadn’t even taken time to tease me about how the place was almost devoid of furniture, nor the fact that I still had the futon from our college apartment in the middle of the living room.

  No, she had been drawn to looking out of the windows, and I’d been drawn to looking at her as she stared at the skyline.

  I could practically see her artistic brain firing as she took in the view, and in the years since I had moved here, she’d come countless times and spent hours on the balcony simply staring, sometimes sketching.

  She told me the balcony refueled her, the height, the view, the sense of weightlessness that she got when she was there all helped clear her head and refocus her work.

  I’d never acknowledged it, but Dallas was a big part of the reason I hadn’t fought Leo about living here.

  On some level I had been aware of that, but on another it was surprising to me. I guess I’d never acknowledged how much Dallas’s comfort and pleasure meant to me. But I couldn’t deny it now, not when I’d made a place my home because she liked it.