“Sorry to interrupt,” Jett said, “but I need to talk to Tristan.”

Darla shifted to look up at Jett, her fingers still toying with Tristan’s fly. “We met before, didn’t we?”

“Briefly.” Jett kept her attention on Tristan, whose eyelids were heavy and her gaze unfocused. Jett waited until she was sure Tristan saw her. “I fucked up. I’m sorry.”

“No harm,” Tristan said, her words slightly slurred.

“Yeah, there is.” Jett squatted down next to the sofa opposite Darla and spoke directly to Tristan. “You need to go home.”

Tristan looked around and grinned lopsidedly. “Aren’t I?”

“No.” Jett glanced at Darla. “I’m taking her home.”

“She seems to be pretty comfortable right here,” Darla said, rubbing Tristan’s thigh.

“She’s not. She’s hurting. My fault—or a lot of it is.”

“I take it you’re friends.” Darla eased away from Tristan just a little.

“Special friends,” Tristan mumbled. Then she laughed.

“No, we’re a lot more than that. Excuse me.” Jett leaned over, slid both hands under Tristan’s arms, and heaved her up. She held her for a few seconds tight against her body until she was certain Tristan had her legs under her. Tristan rested her head on Jett’s shoulder and Jett hooked an arm around her waist. Then she said to Darla, “She’s special to me, but not the way she thinks.”

“I can see that.” Darla stood and straightened her skirt. “She shouldn’t be alone tonight.”

“She isn’t going to be,” Jett said.

Chapter Twenty-six

“Okay,” Tristan said, “I’m okay now. Head’s nice and clear. I’ll just head on home.” Tristan patted her pockets. “Keys? Did you see my keys?” She spun in a slow circle on the sidewalk. “Have you seen my car?”

Jett grabbed her when she started to sway and leaned her against the front end of her Jeep. “Stay right there. Don’t move.”

Tristan frowned. “The last time you said that to me, you just about fucked my brains out. That was nice.”

“I remember.” Jett opened the passenger side door, collected Tristan, and, with a hand on the top of her head, guided her inside. Then she leaned in and hooked her seat belt. “Don’t move.”

“Are you going to do it again?” Tristan yelled as Jett closed the door.

Jett slid in behind the wheel, started the engine, and pulled out into the deserted street. Linda lived in a residential neighborhood and most of the houses were already dark. She glanced at Tristan, whose head lolled back against the seat. Her eyes were closed. Jett smiled. Even half drunk and dead tired, she was the most beautiful woman Jett had ever seen.

A few minutes later, Jett pulled into an empty spot along the curb a few doors down from her apartment building. She reversed the process, opening Tristan’s door, releasing her seat belt, and slipping one arm behind her back. “Let’s go, baby.”

Tristan turned her head on the seat and opened her eyes. “Did you go see Gail tonight?”

“We’ll talk about that later,” Jett said gently. “Right now, we’re going to bed.”

“Together?” Tristan frowned. “Nope. Bad idea.”

“All right.” Jett reached into the car, lifted Tristan’s legs out onto the sidewalk, and pulled Tristan out. “Up. That’s good.”

Tristan slung her arm around Jett’s shoulders. “Sorry about Darla.”

Jett shook her head and gripped Tristan’s waistband. “Come on, we’re right down here.”

“You mad?”

“No.”

Tristan sighed. “No, I guess not. We’re just fuck buddies.”

“We’ll talk about it later.”

“Nothing to be mad about. Nothing,” Tristan echoed.

Jett unlocked the outside door, keeping her arm around Tristan’s waist, and then the inner door. Three flights of stairs awaited them. She tightened her hold on Tristan, and they made it all the way up with only one missed stair that almost landed them in a heap.

“This isn’t my house,” Tristan announced.

“No, it’s mine.” Jett opened the door, reached inside for the light switch, and tugged Tristan into the apartment.

Tristan looked around. “It’s very neat. Very clean.” She turned and studied Jett intently. “Like you.”

Jett laughed. “Come on. The bathroom and the bedroom are down here.”

“Did you kiss her?” Tristan asked.

“No.” Jett took Tristan’s hand and pulled her down the hall. She pushed open the bathroom door. “Everything you need is in the medicine cabinet. All the toothbrushes in there are new.”

“Did she kiss you?” Tristan leaned against the doorjamb and spread her legs for balance.

“Yes.”

“I knew she would. I would. I’d come back for you too.” Tristan skimmed her fingertips over Jett’s cheek. “She got there first. God damn it.”

Jett gripped Tristan’s shoulders firmly and kissed her mouth very, very softly, then the line of her jaw, then below her ear. “No, she didn’t. Now shut up and get ready for bed.”

“You love her, though.”

“Shut up, Tris. We’ll talk later.” Jett pushed her over to the sink, and Tristan braced herself with both hands on the sides of the vanity, her head lowered. Jett found a toothbrush and put toothpaste on it. “Here.”

“She’s beautiful.”

“So are you. Here.”

Tristan took the toothbrush. Jett stood with her arm around Tristan’s waist while Tristan brushed and splashed cold water on her face. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” Jett said.

Tristan looked at Jett in the mirror. “I want you so bad.”

Jett closed her eyes because she recognized the longing in Tristan’s. She’d seen it in her own eyes for years and never knew quite what it meant. Tristan was in no shape to hear anything right now, and if Jett kept looking at her, she was going to have to touch her. She opened her eyes, dropped her arm, and backed away. “The bedroom is right next door, Tris. I’ll see you in the morning.”

Tristan watched Jett’s reflection waver and fade in the glass and she panicked. She spun around. “Jett. I’m sorry.” The sudden motion made her dizzy and her stomach took a nasty dive. She closed her eyes and fought to stay upright. “Always push you away. Don’t mean to.”

“You don’t.” Jett steadied her. “It’s okay.”

“Please don’t go.”

“Come on.”

In the bedroom, Jett turned down the covers. “I’ll stay for a while. Get undressed so you can sleep.”

“I’m okay now,” Tristan muttered.

“I’m not.” Jett kept her eyes on Tristan’s face as she kicked off her shoes, unzipped her pants, and took them off. Then she pulled her T-shirt over her head and let it fall behind her. She slid between the sheets and Tristan hurriedly followed.

“Turn on your side,” Jett murmured, and when Tristan complied, she spooned against her from behind and wrapped an arm around her. She nuzzled her face in the bend of Tristan’s neck. “Now go to sleep.”

“I’m so fucking tired.” Tristan found Jett’s hand and molded it to her breast.

“I know you are.” Jett kissed her neck. “I know.”

“No,” Tristan protested, sounding on the verge of sleep. “Of all of it. Being lonely. Being alone.”

“I know, baby.” Jett kept her hands still, even though Tristan’s nipple was a hard knot against her palm and Tristan rocked her hips slowly in the curve of her pelvis. Desire pounded through her, warring with a tenderness so profound she wanted to weep. She squeezed her eyes tightly closed and rubbed her face over Tristan’s shoulder. She needed her in a place so deep she had no name for it.

“I can hear the way you’re breathing,” Tristan muttered. “You’re hot, aren’t you? Hard, too, like you were before.”

“Yes,” Jett said thickly. “You do that to me. Now shut up, and go to sleep.”

“Make yourself come,” Tristan whispered. “Do it for me.”

Jett shuddered. “Tristan.”

“Please, babe. Hold me while you do it.” Tristan clasped Jett’s hand and squeezed Jett’s fingers around her breast. “I need you and I’m so fucking tired.”

“It’s about more than just being hot, Tris,” Jett whispered.

“Yeah. For me too.” Tristan released Jett’s hand and rolled onto her back. She hooked her arm around Jett’s shoulder and pulled her close. “But that’s part of it. Isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Do it.” Tristan kissed Jett’s forehead. “Do it.”

Jett slid her thigh over Tristan’s and reached down. “Hold me.”

“You too.”

“I will.” Jett turned her face against Tristan’s neck and filled her mind and senses with Tristan. She moaned when she came, and Tristan, sighing with pleasure, finally relaxed into sleep.

Five hours later Tristan opened her eyes, sat up in the strange bed, and took stock of her surroundings. The room was spartan. A single dresser with items arranged in orderly rows on top of it. A double closet, the doors closed. A chair beside the closet with a pile of neatly arranged clothes, probably waiting to be put away. Books on the bedside table. Sunlight just beginning to break through the windows. A small electric clock reading 6:32.

She pushed the sheet aside and swung her legs to the floor. She was naked. She ran her hand over her chest and down her abdomen, and then she remembered Jett. She remembered Jett shuddering in her arms, softly whispering her name as she trembled and came, and the memory took her legs out from under her. She ended up back down on the bed, her limbs shaking and her heart doing somersaults. God, she couldn’t think of another night, another woman, another moment that had felt so special.

The rest of the evening came back in a flash, and she remembered pretty much all of it. Except how she’d ended up on the sofa with Darla on top of her. For a few minutes there she’d checked her sanity at the door. Christ, and Jett had found her that way. Now Jett was missing.

She looked around again and saw her clothes folded on a battered locker at the foot of the bed. She was certain she didn’t do that. Jett must have done it after she was asleep. Jett had taken care of her. Not the way Darla would have, but Darla would only have done what she knew Tristan wanted. Only now, Tristan realized that this was what she wanted. A stack of folded clothes, the safety of being held, someone to look in on her in the night. No, not just someone. Jett.