His words slam through me like a wrecking ball, ratcheting up the need inside of me until it’s all I can think about, all I can feel. Even before he moves his hand lower, rubs his thumb over my lips.
“And your mouth. I love the color of your lips. Love this little dip right here.” He pauses at the deep bow in the center of my top lip. “You’d be shocked if you knew how much time I’ve spent these last few days fantasizing about your mouth wrapped around my cock. Even when you were on your knees in front of me, taking me deep, all I could think about was when I could do it again. And again. And again.”
I shudder then, my head thrashing back and forth against his chest as everything inside of me grows taut and trembly. I’m close, so close, just from the sound of his voice. Just from the sensual promise of his words.
“I love the way you mouth off to me. The way you always give as good as you get. Every time you call me on my shit my dick gets hard and all I can think about is burying myself deep inside of you.”
Fuck. I’m so close. So freaking close. My eyes drift closed as I start to drown in the pleasure, but Hunter isn’t having it. “Open your eyes,” he commands, a dark note in his voice that has me instinctively following his directions.
“I love your skin,” he continues. “How soft and sweet it is. It’s why I kiss you so much, because I love to taste you—all strawberries and cream and sweet, bubbling champagne.” He leans forward, trails his tongue over my shoulder. Plays connect the dots with the scattering of freckles there.
It tickles and I giggle a little despite the scorching heat that’s pulling me under. Drowning me in sensation. “I also love your laugh,” he tells me with a wicked grin. “Almost as much as I love these.”
He moves his right arm down so that it’s banding my breasts, plumping them up. He cups my left breast in his hand, strokes my paint-encrusted nipple for long, breathless seconds.
“And this.” His left hand slides over my stomach—and the exotic stems he’s painted there—to cup my sex, his middle finger sliding through my folds while his bent index finger circles round my clit.
Heat licks through me, makes my knees tremble and my skin ache with sensitivity. With desperation. Again, I start to turn in to him, and again he stops me with his voice. With his possessive hold, which is claiming every single piece of me.
“Look,” he urges again, his voice somehow, impossibly, deeper than before.
I do, and all I see is him. Hair tousled, jaw coated with a few days’ dark stubble, green eyes glowing like lasers as he looks me over. Bronze skin. Huge, strong, talented hands. He’s the most beautiful—the most perfect—thing I’ve ever seen.
Another time, the realization might have scared me. But right here, right now, it feels perfect. More, it feels right.
“Do you see?” His voice is pure gravel now.
I nod against his chest. My voice has deserted me.
“Say it. Tell me you understand.”
“I see you.” Each word is a razor blade slicing the inside of my tight, dry throat. “I see us.”
“Thank God.” He pushes in front of me, sinks to his knees. “Keep watching,” he urges as he spreads my legs and licks his way through my already drenched folds.
“Hunter,” I gasp, my hands clutching at his shoulders in an attempt to keep my already unsteady legs from buckling completely.
He must hear the desperation in my voice, because he braces his hands on my hips and lifts me onto the vanity. Then he brings my feet up to rest inches from my ass, urging me to let my knees fall open even as he does so. I’m wide open to him now, completely vulnerable, underscoring the fact that I trust him. Underscoring the fact that, somehow, after only a few times I am completely and totally his.
“Keep looking,” he growls, gesturing at the full length mirror hanging directly in front of me. Then, when he’s assured that my eyes are wide open, he pulls my clit into his mouth and sucks gently.
My head falls back on a moan, my eyes closing because I don’t have the strength to keep them open for one more second. But Hunter won’t be swayed that easily. “Look,” he says again, and I do, forcing my eyes open despite the near-blinding pleasure.
It’s the most shockingly intimate thing I’ve done, but I don’t stop him. And I don’t look away. Instead, I watch him going down on me. Watch him taking me with his hands and lips and tongue. My own hands clutch at his shoulders and hair, my hips arching into his mouth as my need for release grows more and more desperate.
“Hunter! Please! I need—I need—” His name is a high-pitched, keening cry as he climbs to his feet, fumbles his pants open, pulls out a condom.
“I’ve got you, baby,” he whispers as he thrusts two fingers inside me at just the right angle. “I’ve got you.”
And then he’s there, hot and hard and huge as he slides inside of me. As he sends me flying over the edge.
And still he’s not done as he continues thrusting inside of me. As he whispers wicked, wild things to me. As he takes me more completely than I’ve ever been taken. As he pulls from me more than I’ve ever been willing to give.
He takes me up and over again and only then—as his name breaks on my lips and my body clenches around his—only then does he come. And as he empties himself inside of me, I let myself go. Let myself trust. And slide deeply, irrevocably into love.
Chapter 21
Hunter
I wake up smiling.
The feel of it is alien to my face—it’s been so long since I’ve had something to smile about—so alien, in fact that it takes me a moment to recognize what I’m feeling. To realize that I’m happy.
It’s not that my fear and worry for Heather isn’t still here—of course it is. But as Emerson sighs, as she cuddles into my side and drapes an arm over my waist, I feel more at peace than I have since Heather was first diagnosed.
I wait for the guilt to come, the self-loathing that has plagued me for months because I’m healthy and she’s not. Because I can go to work, play with her kids, make love, live and she can’t.
For once it doesn’t come. Not with Emerson wrapped around me, her sweet body pressed so close to mine that I can feel her breathe. So close that her crazy, glorious hair is actually tickling my nose.
Moving as little as possible, I reach a hand out to her nightstand, where I dropped my phone last night when we finally went to bed—sometime after round three turned into a very enjoyable round four. I find it after about thirty seconds of searching and pull it in close to check my messages.
Nothing from Heather and nothing from Marta or the kids, either, which I take as a good sign. Still, I fire off a message to both Heather and Marta before rolling onto my side and pulling Emerson even closer.
She’s so lovely like this. So, so lovely that she literally takes my breath away. I want to lean forward, to press kisses to the star-shaped birthmark on her cheek that experience has taught me is as sexy as it looks. To slide down a little and take one of her gorgeous raspberry nipples into my mouth. To suck until she wraps her legs around my waist and begs me to slip inside of her, to make her come.
I’m about to do just that, to lean forward and kiss her awake in the hopes of getting to make her come again, when her big blue eyes blink open. And she smiles at me, all soft and sweet and warm. So warm it makes my heart melt and my dick stand at attention.
“Come here,” she whispers before I can say a thing. And then she’s pulling me close, wrapping herself around me just as I hoped. Kissing her way down my throat before pushing at my chest and rolling us over so that she’s straddling my hips.
Right here, right now, she might be the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Sleepy eyes, relaxed face, breasts begging for my hands—for my mouth. But when I reach for them, for her, she takes my hand in hers, presses hot, openmouthed kisses in a line across my palm. Then pulls my hand to her breast and holds it there even as she leans forward to snag a condom off her nightstand.
Seconds later, she’s lifting u
p on her knees and then lowering herself onto me, one slow inch at a time. It feels so good that I’m sweating before I’m halfway inside her, my whole body on fire for this tiny slip of a woman with her big mouth and even bigger talent.
Remnants of last night’s painting experiment are streaked across her, me, the sheets, but that only turns me on more. She looks a little debauched this morning, a little used—in a good way—and I love that I’m the man she let touch her like that. That she lets see her like this.
That she lets me inside of her.
And then she’s bracing her hands on my stomach as she moves up and down, taking me so slowly, so hotly, that it’s all I can do not to come right now.
It’s harder than it should be, considering I’m not a fourteen-year-old kid. But she looks so good with her head thrown back to reveal the elegant curve of her throat. With her fiery hair cascading over her shoulders and down her breasts. With her face open and vulnerable and aroused.
She’s moaning now, her high, full breasts jiggling just a little as she rides me harder. Faster. She’s close—I can see it in the way her pale skin flushes a rosy red. Can hear it in the way her breath breaks a little with each rise and fall of her body. Can feel it in the way her hands tighten into fists on my belly and her body clenches more and more tightly around mine.
“I’ve got you,” I whisper to her, slipping my thumb between her slick folds and circling her clit—once, twice, a third time.
And then she’s crying out, her voice breaking as her sex clamps down on my dick. She calls my name as our gazes lock, and then I’m coming, too. And that’s when it hits me. I’d be okay waking up just like this—with this particular woman—for a long, long time. Maybe even forever.
When it’s over—when she’s slumped against me and both of us can finally breathe again—I ask, “Will you come to the game on Sunday? My niece and nephew are coming and I’d love for you to meet them.”
Her startled eyes shoot to mine and I nearly curse at myself for jumping the gun. I know I’m moving fast, but right now it’s not like I have a choice. Parts of my life are spinning completely out of my control and there’s nothing I can do about them. I want to keep seeing Emerson, want to make her a part of my life. But to do that, she needs to know about what’s coming in the next few months. And, if we’re still together then, what will come after.
I open my mouth—start to explain though I don’t even like thinking the words—but before I can say anything, Emerson smiles. “Of course, I’d love to come to the game—and meet your niece and nephew. How old are they?”
“Lucy’s six and Brent is ten. They’re my twin sister’s, Heather’s, kids.”
“I didn’t know you were a twin. That’s so cool!”
It is cool. Very cool. Heather and I have been close since birth, so close that once our parents started putting us in separate cribs, we would rock our cribs across the room until we were close enough to reach through the bars and touch each other. So close that we were eight before we would even consider sleeping in separate rooms.
But as Emerson beams down at me, I don’t know how to tell her that. Any more than I know how to tell her that in a few months I won’t be a twin anymore. That I won’t even be a brother. I’m saved by the bell, though. Emerson’s alarm goes off as I’m still struggling to figure out what to say. Then we’re both rolling out of bed, heading for a much needed shower. The chance to tell her, to explain about Heather, slips away.
And I let it.
Chapter 22
Emerson
As one of the guards leads me through the stadium to the Lightning family box, I’m a little in awe. A little freaked out, too, considering I’m about to meet Hunter’s niece and nephew and God only knows who else.
When he invited me to the game, I was thinking he meant he’d get me good seats close to the field, where I could eat cotton candy with his niece and nephew. It never occurred to me that he had plans for me to sit in the family box with the wives and children of the other players.
Considering we’ve only known each other a week, it feels like a really big step.
Or it could be nothing, I remind myself as we wind our way through the stadium. For all I know, he invites all the women he dates during the season to the family box. Maybe that’s how all the players do it.
I’m not sure which would be worse—that he’s singling me out for special treatment because this thing between us means something to him or if this is just his regular MO. In the space of a week I managed to go from disdain to interest to falling in love with the man—which is absurd, I know. But that doesn’t mean it’s any less true. Any more than it means he feels the same way about me.
I mean, yes, he’s made a point of seeing me every day this week. Of taking me out to dinner on Friday night, after we both got off work. He didn’t spend the night Friday—he had family stuff with Heather planned for Saturday morning—but he showed up at noon to take me for lunch and window shopping at Seaport Village.
It was kind of a disaster as the hoodie and sunglasses he wore only fooled people who really didn’t care about sports. Those who knew who he was saw through the disguise in seconds and he ended up spending over an hour signing autographs and taking selfies.
He apologized to me before, during and after, but I noticed he made sure every fan who wanted one got a selfie and a chance to talk to him. He kept checking on me throughout, making sure I was okay, but he also took care of every fan there—from the six-year-old who was so excited he burst into tears to the nearly eighty-year-old retired high school football coach.
It only made me fall harder for him, this man who could have taken a couple cursory selfies and then disappeared into a restaurant. He didn’t because it was obvious that he values his fans as much as they value him, and I couldn’t be more impressed.
“It’s just a little farther,” says Mike, the security guard assigned to show me the way.
“Thanks, I appreciate it. It’s my first time.”
He grins hugely. “I know.”
I want to ask him how he knows and why he’s smiling so much, but we make it to the family box before I can figure out what to say. He pulls a card from his pocket, swipes it at the door, then hands it to me as he pushes the door open.
I look from the card to him. “What—”
“Hunter asked me to have one made for you, for the other home games,” Mike says with another big grin. He nods for me to go inside, then with a wave heads back the way we came. And I’m left staring after him wondering what exactly is happening here. Because, star quarterback or not, I’m pretty sure Hunter doesn’t get a key card to the family suite for every woman he dates.
The butterflies in my stomach get worse as the knowledge sinks in, and that’s before I actually step into the suite and see an array of pretty, polished people, all dressed up. I feel completely out of place in my jeans and old Lightning jersey, even before several of the women turn to stare at me consideringly. And condescendingly.
Shit. This was a really bad idea.
I think about backing out, about leaving the suite and finding some empty seat in the nosebleed section. But Hunter’s niece and nephew are supposed to be here and I know he wants us to meet.
There are several children here of varying ages, playing on tablets, watching TV, or just hanging out around an Xbox in the far back corner of the suite. The only problem is I have no idea which two, if any, are related to Hunter.
Fantastic. Nothing like dropping me in the deep end of the ocean to see if I can swim. And since the answer is no, I can’t swim, I’m not exactly feeling good about all this.
Fuck my life.
I’m already dressed like a dork, the last thing I want to do is stand around here gaping like one, too. So I paste a smile on my face and wander a little deeper into the suite.
There’s a huge buffet set up along one wall, filled with everything from typical game food like hot dogs and nachos to more high-end food like seafood and roast be
ef and caviar with toast points. A bar is set up in the corner and, from what I can see, it’s doing a brisk business in white wine and lemon drop martinis.
Figuring a drink will loosen me up some, I head that way. Then stop when the door to the suite bursts open and Hunter walks in, scanning the room.
It only takes him a moment to find me, and when our eyes meet a huge smile takes over his face. One of the women behind me sighs, and it only takes a moment for me to realize that I’m not the only one transfixed by the sight of Hunter Browning. He’s in workout clothes and it’s obvious he’s been putting them to good use as his shirt clings damply to his chest and stomach.
Somehow it only makes him more attractive. I take a step toward him, but before I can do more than that, a little girl comes barreling across the suite and launches herself at his legs.
“Uncle Hunter! Uncle Hunter!”
He crouches down and gets her right before she slams into him, swinging her up into his arms so she can wrap her arms around his neck. Her little nose is wrinkled—I’m guessing because of the sweat—but she holds on anyway. Seconds later, an older boy comes up beside Hunter and he ruffles his hair before wrapping an arm around the boy’s shoulders and guiding him over to me.
Suddenly a lot more eyes are on me, and I can’t help shifting uncomfortably as I wait for Hunter and his family to make their way to me.
“Hey,” he says, setting Lucy on her feet as they finally come to a stop in front of me.
“Hey.” I smile at the kids, start to hold my hand out to meet Brent, but Hunter steps between us. He slides one hand around my waist and another into my hair as he pulls me close and kisses me.
It’s not just a peck, either. No, Hunter Browning gives me a full-blown kiss in the middle of the Lightning family suite, in front of his niece, his nephew and at least fifty close family members of other Lightning players.
I start to pull away, but Hunter holds tight and—truth be told—I’d rather be kissing him than doing just about anything. So I stay where I am, body and mouth pressed tight to his, until someone whistles from behind us.