Page 44 of Filthy Rich Santas

I squeeze my eyes closed, breathing through the fresh wave of disappointment, then suck it up and finish my shower, not letting myself dwell on it anymore. There’s just no point.

I find a text waiting for me in the group chat when I’m done, and as soon as I dress and repack my suitcase, I follow its instructions and meet the guys downstairs for breakfast. It’s awkward, but I’ve pulled up my big girl panties and accepted the way things are, so I get through it with a smile that’s only a little bit fake.

Once we all pile into the car, though, there’s no denying the tension going in every direction.

“Do you want the front?” Tristan asks me politely after Beckett gets in the driver’s seat.

“No, go ahead,” I tell him, equally polite.

For a second, just like back in his room, he looks like he wants to say something else, but once again, I don’t give him a chance. I hop in the back next to Ryder and pull out a sketchbook as the three of them discuss the route and who knows what else for the first few minutes of the drive.

All around, everything feels weird. I expected it between me and Tristan, and I’m not all that surprised that the casual ease I’ve felt for the last few days with Ryder and Beckett is gone too, since they caught my walk of shame, but it’s definitely not all centered around me.

I can tell that there’s strain between the two of them and Tristan, and I can’t help wondering if they—ifhe—talked about me.

But I try very hard not to wonder about that, because it will drive me crazy if I do.

I start randomly sketching, but I have trouble focusing, and it’s not until I realize I’ve started drawing a rough outline of Tristan in the shower this morning that I give up with an annoyed huff and slam my sketchbook closed, tossing it onto the seat.

“Writer’s block?” Ryder asks with a small smirk.

“I’m drawing, not writing.”

His smirk turns into a full grin. “Actually, it looks like you’renotdrawing.”

That gets a laugh out of me, which I can tell by the glint in his eye was kind of the point, but just as I’m enjoying the tension relief, he ruins it by clearing his throat and bringing up the one topic I was hoping we could all spend the rest of our lives avoiding.

“So, why were you in Tristan’s room this morning, love?’

“She had a bad dream,” Tristan answers from the front seat, too quickly for me to decide what I want them to know.

And honestly, that’s probably what I would have gone with too. It’s not just the truth, it feels far less embarrassing than admitting that Tristan considers me amistake. But now that he put it out, any lingering embarrassment is completely overshadowed by how annoyed I am at the way he tried to backtrack so hard after the fact.

He came all over my body. He was so hungry for me that he broke his own rule and touched me after he said he wouldn’t.

It was the best orgasm of my life, and something bold and reckless rears up inside me, refusing to let him downplay how fucking good it was.

“The bad dream is why I was in your roomlast night,” I remind Tristan, giving him a sweetly murderous smile. “But that’s not what Ryder asked, is it? He wants to know what I was doing there this morning.”

Tristan clears his throat. “Well, you slept over. I was… happy to comfort you.”

“Thank you.”

He’s hoping I’ll leave it at that. The silent eye contact I’m getting from him couldn’t be any clearer. And why that turns me on even as it sort of pisses me off, I’ve got no idea.

I’m not sure I care, either. For better or worse, the emotional roller coaster this man is putting me on is exhilarating.

But if he thinks I’m letting him off the hook, he’s wrong again.

“And are you going to tell them what else happened?” I ask him, arching an eyebrow.

Tristan’s lips tighten, emotions I can’t identify flashing across his face.

Ryder looks between the two of us like he’s watching a ping pong match, and I catch Beckett’s gaze in the rearview mirror a couple of times too.

“Well?” Ryder finally asks, breaking my stare-off with Tristan. “Are you going to tell us?”

“No,” Tristan says.

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