He bent and started kissing me, powdered faces and all.  He didn’t pull back until I was clutching the front of his shirt in both hands, and Mona had long since moved on without him.

I still refused to go with him, but when he left, I trailed slowly, intending to watch the shoot from a distance.

All around me people were dancing and in general just having a blast, everyone so covered in paint powder that it was peppering the air with every movement.  A few people had even brought their children, and they seemed to be getting as big of a kick out of it all as the adults.

Only with Tristan would I find myself in a place like this and the second he was away from my side, I wanted to leave.

I stuck with it, though, watching the drawn-out photo op that involved him putting his arm around a lot of busty, paint colored women in half shirts.

I was about one second from saying to hell with it and catching a cab when a female voice spoke just to my right.

“I guess the bitch is back.”

It took me a minute, while I turned and studied the paint-colored, hostile woman that had taken up residence beside me.

Finally, I recognized the collagen injected, puffed up features under the powder.  Even under a pound of color, I could tell she wasn’t aging well.  She was going overboard with the surgery.

“Natalie,” I said, then turned away again.

I ignored her as much as I could.  I figured that was the nicest thing I could do.  And the mature thing to do.

Even she didn’t deserve the things I wanted to say to her.  The last six years of our mess wasn’t her fault.

“I saw you and Tristan during the race.  It’s so sweet that he was helping you out back there.  He’s such a nice guy, helping the disabled.”

“Disabled?” I said softly, giving her my full attention now.  Now she deserved it.

A part of me kind of lived for that moment when my claws could come out, and I didn’t have to feel bad about the consequences, because I felt I’d been properly provoked.  This was definitely one of those moments.

“If you ask me, those giant silicone filled balloons on your chest that have you nearly tipping over every time you try to stand upright, and those clown lips of yours have to make it hard to eat without drooling.  Now those are a disability.”

She made a disgusted noise, but had no comeback.

I smiled.  She moved away and that was that.  It was sad, but I actually preferred dealing with her to dealing with Mona.

I found a place to sit, on a picnic table that was set near what was turning out to be quite the dance floor.

Almost the second I sat down, I felt my phone vibrating on my arm.

It was Tristan.  I didn’t think I had a chance in hell of hearing him over all the noise, so I dropped the call and texted him my location.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

He was there in less than a minute.  Sitting down next to me, then pulling me unceremoniously onto his lap.

I turned until I was sideways, staring up at him.  “You can go dance if you want to.  I don’t mind.”

“Not without you,” he said, kissing my nose.

“I still have a few moves,” I told him, watching his face.

I loved to make him laugh.

I was flattered by the admiring look he gave me for that.  “Yes, you do.”

I laughed.  “I wasn’t talking about that.  I’m talking about dance moves.”

He looked intrigued.  “Yeah?”

“Yeah.  There’s the lasso.”  I showed him that classic, and he laughed.  “And the ‘make it rain,’”  I put my fingers to my palm and imitated flinging cash.  “And the slap that.’”  I put one palm down, and the other moved in a rapid spanking motion.  “And of course the ‘going down.’”  I pointed my palm down, cupped it to imitate it holding the back of a head, and pushed it down, to mimic him going down on me.

I’d just made that last one up.

He was laughing hard by the time I was done.  My whole chest went warm when he laughed like that.

And then we were kissing, making out like teenagers in public again.  I knew I should pull back, but I couldn’t seem to stop.  I gripped his shirt while he gripped my hair, and let our mouths just go at it.  It was a special kind of bliss to just let go like that, for a time.

He was laying me on the bench, his hands getting a touch indecent, when I found the will to pull back.

“We can’t.  Not here.  There are kids around, Tristan.  Not to mention other people.”

He pulled back and sat up.  “I’m going to go grab us something to eat.”

He disappeared into the crowd.

He was back maybe ten minutes later, his arms full of sodas and hotdogs.

I didn’t even complain, just ate the hotdog and drank the coke.  I was so hungry that even that was worth the calories.

We shared a smile as we finished eating, my mind on that ridiculous make out session earlier.

He had a bit of ketchup on the corner of his mouth, and I took a napkin, dabbing at it, smiling into his dear face.

He tilted my face up with his chin.  His expression was raw with things I couldn’t name or didn’t want to.  “Oh, no, you’ve done it now,” he whispered softly.

“Done what?”

“You’re giving me that look.  You know we can’t go back, if you’re looking at me like that again.  You get that, right?”