“Ophelia?” Tristan asked, sounding concerned.
“I do not wish to discuss this matter any further,” she snapped, blinking away the tears threatening to spill down her cheeks.
She tensed, figuring that Tristan was about to scold her for her reaction as he usually did when he found her to be rude.
“Very well.”
His calm response was not at all what she was expecting, and she turned to him again a wide-eyed expression.
“What is wrong with you?” She demanded. “You are different tonight. Where are your lectures? Your condescending remarks on my behavior.”
She watched as anger flickered through Tristan’s blue eyes; caught the ticking of his jaw.
“You want me to scold you?” He asked, his voice laced with irritation. “In truth I am in no mood to argue this evening, Ophelia, however if you insist upon it, I shall muster up the condescension you are requesting and berate you for your poor manners. Is that what you want?”
“What do you mean, ‘in no mood’?” She countered.
Ophelia took a step toward him and to her surprise,hetook a step back.
“That is none of your business,” he replied in an adamant tone.
“You are one of the richest men in our generation. You own a private club that caters to every sort of dark fantasy. You are single. You are aman of nobility!What could could possibly haveyouupset?” She demanded.
Tristan was towering over her in a second, his hand laced around her throat and forcing her to look up into his rage-filled eyes.
“You. Do not. Know me.” he whispered.
His tone was deadly, yet his grip seemed precisely opposite. His hand fit so snugly around her throat; yet there was no pain, no inability to breathe. In fact it elicited an exciting shiver up her spine, and she found herself leaning into it.
Even enraged, she realized, Tristan would not ever hurt a woman.
“You wish to be a man in power yet you have no idea of the responsibility such a role requires,” he went on, holding her gaze. “It is not as carefree as you may think.”
Ophelia’s brow furrowed as she felt something she’d never felt before for Tristan: worry. She reached up, slowly, and traced her fingertips along the hand he had fastened to her throat.
“What is wrong?” She asked, the gentle tone in her voice feeling strange to her. She was not in the business of coddling men she despised.
Yet when she asked, the anger in Tristan’s gaze faded. His grip at her throat shifted into a caress, and she watched his broad shoulders ease slowly from his ears.
“Ophelia, forgive me,” he whispered, caressing her neck almost lovingly.
His soft touch had her fighting off a whimper as it made her feel warm and lightheaded.
He reached up with his other hand and began to use both to massage the sides of her throat, the nape of her neck, and shoulders with startling tenderness.
“Did I hurt you?” He asked, his voice pleading for a truthful answer.
Ophelia shook her head, swallowed as his gentleness overwhelmed her. She could easily handle Tristan angry- but his tenderness undid her.
“No,” she rasped.
“This is not who I am,” he stated, shaking his head as he paid care to her neck. “Not in here and certainly not out there.”
Feeling half drowsy from his touch, Ophelia did not fight as he stepped closer and laid her head on his chest, moving his soothing hands down her spine. Her legs began to tremble as the stress of her other life seemed to release from her very bones.
“I thought that’s what this place was,” she murmured in to his chest, “A place for people who enjoy rough play such as the grabbing of ones’s throat.”
Tristan’s laugh was husky as his hand smoothed up into her hair and started to massage the base of her skull.
