The door barged open. "Did I make you wait too much?" Tristen asked after he entered the room, removing his watch to place it on the nightstand. "No." Lavender simply replied, flipping the page from the top right corner of her magazine.
Tristen stared at her while opening his top buttons. It was a strange feeling, which he ticked off as some 'pregnancy thing' and shook it off. He proceeded to lock the door and retraced his steps back to the bed. "Shorts smaller than my fist and a completely see through shirt. What good did I do to get such a beautiful wife?" Tristen smirked, removing his shirt to give his beloved her most favourite scene.
His abs.
Lavender looked up from the magazine and found him smirking at her the usual way. Lie, she thought, gritting her teeth. "It's not that attractive. And we're not even married yet." She sighed.
Another strange feeling, but he still let it slide.
"We don't need to be married for me to call you my wife." He sweet talked. "Look at your legs, hottie. Look at those fine lines on them. You've worked so hard on them. Our child would have absolutely because of you, you know?" Tristen grinned, surprised that Lavender did not laugh.
She did not even smile or roll her eyes at his lame self, like she always did. "What's wrong, love?" He asked in concern. "Your phone rang. It was an unknown number. I didn't pick it up." She said, getting back to her magazine. "Is that so?" Tristen asked, going through his phone to check it.
"Don't worry. I already know what it's about. Not important." He threw it away before getting on the bed. Lavender closed the magazine and kept it aside, laying down on the mattress. "So, how would you like it tonight, Mrs. Killings?" He smirked, standing on his knees beside her. "I'm pregnant, Tristen. How many times are we going to do it?" She rolled her eyes as she made up an excuse. "It's perfectly safe to do it, baby. I wouldn't do it if it was hurtful. What happened, do you feel unwell?" He asked, caressing her hair.
"I'll go take a bath." She shook off his hand, getting up. Tristen rolled his eyes holding her arm to pull her back on the bed. "Tristen!" She exclaimed. "I know something's up. Tell me before I lose control." He said in a cold dominant tone, putting his finger under her chin.
"Was that a threat?" Lavender fearlessly stared daggers into his eyes. No, no one would dare. She did. "Lavender, do you really want me to wake Brendon up and send him off to whoever fucked with your brain? Because I can. And I will if you don't tell me." He said. He tried his hardest to keep his calm.
He couldn't lose control on Lavender, never. And specially not when she was pregnant.
"I don't know why you think that way. It's not like having vanilla sex with me is even that interesting for someone who's a mafia." She said, trying to breakfree.
"Lavender, what happened? How come you went from, 'Don't stop' to 'Mafias hate vanilla sex'?" He mimicked her voice. He was actually taken aback. He never expected to hear something like that from her.
"It is the truth, and you don't have to pretend anymore." Lavender said. "Who said that to you?" He looked at her in confusion. "Tristen, are you going to keep faking it? If you don't like it, just say so. Don't keep me in delusional fantasies about how you love it." She creased her brows as her lips quivered.
"Come on, Lav. Why're you being like this? You know only you can make me feel this way." He said, offending her. She slapped him hard right across his face, letting her anger get the best of her. After hearing about him and Cady, Lavender could not tolerate his sweet talk. She wondered how many times he must have said the same thing to that bitch.
Tristen was confused.
He did not know what he did to her that was wrong. Instead of getting angry or offended himself, he looked at her face observing her eyes. Had she been crying? He thought. "I dare you to say those words to me again, Mr. Killings." She snapped with red eyes full of tears. "Lavender, is there something that I do not know?" He asked, getting serious.
"You? Oh, you know everything, all too well. It's me who hasn't got a clue of what I've got myself into."
"Lavender!" Tristen creased his brows, feeling hurt by her words. "Oh, did I offend you? Are you going to do the same with me the way you do others?" She sniffled. "How could you even think like that like?" He argued, feeling agitated himself. She stayed silent, trying to hold back from crying. She simply got off the bed, Tristen doing the same.
Before she could enter the bathroom, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her back. "You either start talking or things are going to take a bad turn. And this time, I won't take it Lav." He said as calmly as he could. Lavender looked into his eyes; the eyes that were all confused and desperately needed an explanation of her behaviour. He was angry and offended but at the same time also worried and concerned.
He read her facial lines, indicating that she was about to let go and cry it all out. He found her eyes looking at him in disbelief, as if she was betrayed. Tristen's expressions loosened up when he realized what was going on.
"You saw it all, didn't you?" Tristen asked softly, putting a palm on her cheek. Lavender stared at him for a while, realizing she could not put up with her act anymore. She made a crying face before closing in the distance. She lowered her gaze full of tears while her hands locked themselves behind his back.
"That Cady, such a little piece of..." He pursed his lips, hugging Lavender. His blood boiled with rage when he realized the reason why Cady kept looking behind him. "How much did you hear?" Tristen asked, patting her head.
"Everything. I saw how you touched her knees." She cried. "Shit..." He shut his eyes in regret. "Love, I swear on our child, she had spiked my drink. I felt dizzy only for a while. I have high tolerance of drugs, I swear. It was not intentional at all." Tristen tried to explain.
"I know you didn't do anything; she was forcing you. I clearly saw it. But I definitely did not need to know that you guys had sex when you were young. You even said that you used to love it. How am I supposed to feel after listening to that?" She complained. "Lavender I swear, things are different now. I'm so sorry that you had to hear that, love. I'm really am. Please, do not let her complicate things between us. I love you very much." He said, cupping her cheek.
"You know she only does that to make me feel like I'm nothing compared to her. She's belittling me for not coming from a mafia background, and basically for just existing." She sobbed. "You're the one with whom I'm going to spend my entire life with, not her. I feel burdened to Granna for staying at her place, that is the only reason why I need to sit and suck up her drama. Had she been at our place..." Tristen shamefully confessed.
"Tristen, am I ruining your life? Your businesses? Am I really that boring to sleep with? Am I the reason you cannot fulfil your personal desires?" She broke down into tears. "Good lord, none of that is true, love. I told you, Cady does it on purpose. I can explain only to you, not her. Because you matter to me, she doesn't." He rubbed her back in a consoling manner.
"Tristen, do you feel trapped because of the baby? Do you feel like you could have gotten better if I was not carrying?" She asked with blood red eyes. "No, Lav. I'm the most excited about our baby! And you know it too." He tried to explain. After looking at his face, she felt convinced. She let out a huge sigh before speaking.
"Tristen, I swear I try to make our moments more like how you would like. I try everything! How can she say that I'm a boring person?" She sobbed. "Baby, that's not the case. I love you and everything about you. Even the smallest of your habits and actions affect me." Tristen insisted. "But she said you loved to sleep with her. And you said that too!" She argued.
"That stupid little b- I mean that stupid girl is just a nuisance to me, Lavender. Hell is better than spending a minute with her, you know? She is the most pretentious girl when it comes to doing what we both do the best. No one can ever replace the emotions of the moments that we had together." He bitched about her.
"You're so beautiful and pure and innocent and lovely and adorable that comparing you to that little whore is a sacrilege. You are incomparable to anyone, because you're special. And you're the only one I want in the present and the future, until death do us apart." Tristen took a huge breath before exhaling it. Lavender seemed to have calmed down after hearing him badmouth Cady, which was all she needed.
"That was all when I was a stupid teenager. But now, my entire life belongs to you, and only you. I am a man now, Lavender. You're a woman, my woman. A girlfriend is replaceable, but a wife stays forever. That's what men care about; someone who can stay by your side forever, not someone who would play with you one day and pick a new toy the next. Not that you're a man, but you get it." Tristen smiled, quickly pecking her on the lips.
Lavender broke out a little smile, but immediately covered it up. "But still. Accept it, Tristen. I'm just too 'plain' for you. You can't go rough because I'm not used to it. Doesn't that make you feel like you're missing out on something?" She asked, fuelling the fire in hopes of an honest answer.
Tristen had had it enough. He squeezed her love handles and brought himself closer to her ear. His warm breath caused her neck to get goosebumps. "If you switch places with me and see yourself from the top, you'll never think the same again." He whispered, tickling her ear. "That's too cheesy." She mumbled, attempting to pull back. He was holding her very firmly, so she had no other option but to give up. "You should see yourself, pinned to the bed. Your hair laying scattered on the soft pillow, the way you bite your lip when I hit all the right spots inside you. You submitting to me is just enough to make me reach my high." He smirked.
"Tristen..." She buried her head on his shoulder, letting her smile surface. "The way you moan for me, constantly pleading to not stop, you don't know what that makes me feel. You cannot imagine what I feel down there, when I'm inside you, when you keep pulling me closer by the collar of my shirt." He whispered while tracing his hand up inside her shirt from behind.
Lavender finally showed her smile, not being able to resist his dirty talk. But she was hurt. Nothing in the world could comfort her other than listening to what she wanted to hear from Tristen. Except him, no one could change her mind or lighten her mood.
"I love you so much, Tristen. I can't stand the sight of some girl trying to take you away from me. She makes me feel so bad and angry." She sniffled. "I'm here with you, aren't I?" Tristen cupped her cheeks. "Yes." She replied with a cute snort.
"Because you're the one I care about. Not her. She'd yell about how I belong to her and then spend a night at another man's house. Narcissistic bitch, that's what she is." He said, wiping her nose with a napkin that was in his pocket. "I'm sorry. I got upset because of such a petty thing." She cried, hugging him tight. "No, love. I should be sorry to make you go through this." He apologized.
"So, I'm not being childish?" She pouted innocently. "You are. You're the most childish person I've ever seen." He smirked, holding in his laughter. "Tristen!" She whined annoyingly. "That's the girl I fell for." He smiled. "You slapped me really hard, you know?" He added.
"I'm sorry, I never meant to." She cooed, feeling guilty for her actions. "It's fine, give yourself a break. You must be tired after carrying our little heir for so long. You can make up to me, if you still feel sorry." He smirked, leaning in to kiss her.
"U-Uh, I need to take a bath, remember?" She blushed, pulling back. "Need my help?" He teased. "Tristen!" She pretended to scold him when she was dying out of excitement. "Let's go." He smirked. "Are you really coming in?" She rolled her eyes.
"You're ill, aren't you? I should help you take a bath." He said, giving an excuse which was far from being his only intention. "Goodness." Lavender looked at the ceiling before marching towards the bathroom. She stood in front of the bathtub full of hot water as Tristen followed her inside. He pushed the door behind him, leaving it unlocked. He wrapped his arms around her from behind, holding the end of her shirt to gently lift it off her head.
"I can do this." Lavender said, spinning around. "I missed them so much." Tristen immediately lowered his gaze to her chest, lifting his hands to caress them. "Ahem, I'm ill, remember?" Lavender raised her brow, making him look back up. "Right." He said, holding the waist band of her shorts to push them down. Lavender spun around and sat in the warm water of the bathtub while Tristen kept her clothes on the counter.
He then started undoing his own shirt, making her jaw drop. He knows my weakness, Lavender bit her lip, desperately waiting for him to undo all the buttons so she could have the sight of her favourite part of him. She watched him remove his pants as he stepped into the big tub. "You're coming too?" She asked, as if she didn't already know. "Obviously. You'll need the heat to bring your body temperature back to normal." He shrugged, sitting opposite to her. "Isn't my body temperature already high?" She scoffed.
Tristen gave her a soft smile, gently blinking his eyes at her. He opened his arms, resting his back on the wall of the tub. Lavender internally squealed and wasted no time to rest her back on him. "Perfect. I won't mind if we fell asleep here." He sighed, hugging her close. "We'll get wrinkles." She giggled, before shutting her eyes. "Is that so?" He murmured, doing the same as he firmed his grip around her waist.
He slowly drifted off to sleep just like Lavender did. The water drowned their shoulders, leaving only their necks untouched. The ripples in the water gradually started fading away, as the water became more calm. Soon enough, the water was steady and still. The two had fallen into a light sleep surrounded by the warmth of the water as well as that radiating from the candles kept near the bathtub. The oils in the scented candles improved the ambience of the room, only to make it more cozy and sleepy.
Cady, on the other hand, was in the kitchen, completely drunk. She drank up the entire bottle of wine, placing it beside the other three bottles. "Who the fuck does she think she is? Lavender Hills, I'll throw you out of my way one day. You and your unborn child can live happily in grief of being such unworthy brats in Tristen's life!" She snapped, opening up the fourth bottle.
She had been drinking for the past hour and a half, grieving over her childhood love. "He promised me that he'd be mine when we were adults." She sobbed. "Is that how childhood promises are? Are they meant to be broken?" She stared into the space ahead. Cady's eyes were blurring, her ears kept ringing, her head was light headed, hands lost their fine motor skills, and her speech slurred. Another round of wine and she was out.
She suddenly stood up and made her way upstairs towards their room. "I must keep an eye on Lavender in case she talks bad about me to him." She decided, without thinking about entering someone's room. Cady flung the door open, only to find the room empty. "Huh? Where did she take him?" She panicked delusionally . She looked through the windows and out in the darkness.
Spinning around, she found Tristen's revolver on the table. "Oh, they're here." She sighed out of relief. Cady heard soft giggles coming out of the bathroom, which increased her curiosity. She slowly leaned herself on the wall beside the door, slightly opening it.
"How can you even think of naming our child Bullet?" Lavender laughed her head off. She was sitting on the bathroom counter. Tristen was standing between her legs, all pressed up on her centre. He stood with just a towel wrapped around his waist while Lavender was wearing a white bathrobe. "Our kid's going to have my last name. It should sound a little intimidating." Tristen smiled, ruffling Lavender's hair with a towel to dry them. "Bullet Killings? That's so ridiculous. You don't even know if it's a boy or a girl." She said. "It's gender neutral." He proudly replied.
"I'm not naming our child Bullet!" She laughed, resting her head on his shoulders. "How about Ash?" He asked. "Are you serious? Ash? CIGAR ASH?" Lavender raised her brows. "Yeah, because I assumed you won't like the name Gunpowder." He smirked, with an obvious intention of messing around. "NO WAY!" Lavender burst out into clustered giggles, holding his shoulders tight while slapping his chest in short intervals.
His skin turned red.
Everything's better when she laughs, He thought with a smile. "Fine, we'll go with your choice of names." Tristen said, keeping the towel away to fix her hand using his fingers as a comb. "What were our choices, again?" He asked. "Juvian, if it's a boy. And you can have the divine opportunity to name if it's a girl. This was not a very easy decision for me after hearing your choices of names, but I'm entrusting you with this one." She smirked.
"Jane." Tristen smiled. "Jane? I didn't think you'd settle for a simple name." She smiled. "Don't you like it? I thought it was very fairy like, according to your books." He pressed his palms on the counter to lean in. "It has a biblical meaning that God is gracious." He answered, shocking Lavender.
"I never took you to be a theist." She teased him by flashing her eyebrows. "That's because I'm not. But I'm starting to believe in his existence now. Because not even the devil would want a person like you to walk into my mafia world. It's miraculous that you're still here with me." He said, hugging her close. "Awh, you're going to make me cry now." Lavender made a pout.
"Not yet." He whispered, smirking naughtily. "For the love of God, Tristen..." Lavender blushed, making him smile proudly.
That little bitch, Cady tensed up her muscles. I should've been in her place, I should be sitting there, not her. I should be kissing him, Cady balled up her palms into fists.
"Don't you dare do what you're thinking." Granna said, causing her to startle. "Geez, what're you doing here?" Cady snapped. "Exactly what you're doing. Get out." Granna scolded, forcing her to leave the room. She closed the door after leaving the room herself and faced Cady. "You have to learn to let go. This is getting too serious now. You're becoming a risk to everyone living here.
"Everything will be alright once she leaves." She rolled her eyes. "Lavender is pregnant with Tristen's child. They are already engaged to each other. Let go of it, you're not living in your childhood. Good night." Granna patted Cady's shoulder before taking her leave.
Cady stood there alone in the middle of the hallway, lost in her thoughts. Am I really being that annoying? To everyone? Just because of that bitch? She wondered.
"No, I can't give up. I've got only one option left now." Cady smiled through her red teary eyes, gazing in the direction of room like a villain.