The Player

  And, of course, it’s Easton’s.

  “It is.” He nods his head, eyes intense, and I can’t figure out which thing I want to look at more: the field or him.

  “Is it true?”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “There’s really a personal batting cage and mini-field beneath the building that came with your place?”

  “There is.” He nods again, but his eyes say so much more. I’m drawn to look closer but am afraid of what I might see because deep down I already know it might be something I won’t be able to walk away from.

  “Why would you need that when you have this in your backyard? Your office?”

  He shrugs and diverts his eyes back to the stadium. It’s almost as if he’s embarrassed or uncertain of his answer. “Because that view, right there . . . the power of it, the strength I draw from it when I’m having that kind of game where you can feel the humming in your bones that tells you something indescribable is about to happen? This is the only place I get to have that alone. The only place where I can quiet my head and listen to what the humming is telling me without the fans or the front office or my teammates or the media watching me home in on it.” He scrubs a hand through his hair and snorts. “Never mind. That just sounded completely ridiculous.”

  “Not in the least.” I stare at him until my silence urges him to face me, meet my eyes, and see that I’m nowhere close to laughing at him. “Please. Finish what you were going to say.”

  “I don’t know. I guess some nights I like to sit here when the lights are out, with this ghost of a stadium below me, and go to church, if you will. Think about my game.” His exhale is audible and his discomfort with being so open is suddenly palpable.

  “See? I knew you loved to talk about your stats.”

  “You and your statistics.” He laughs with a shake of his head, but his discomfort is gone and his smile is genuine when he glances my way. “When they were building the new stadium, some eccentric billionaire bought this place while the building was still under construction. He was obsessed with the game and paid some stupid amount of money to build the field in the basement. The place went up for sale a few years back, and I bought it. How could I not? But I’ve tried to keep that it’s mine on the down low. It’s the one place I have that’s truly mine, that’s completely private and removed from everything that comes with this game.”

  “It’s perfect.”

  “You haven’t even seen the place with the lights on,” he teases.

  “These are all the lights this girl needs to know it’s a perfect fit for you,” I say, motioning to the ballpark’s towers.

  “Sometimes I’ll just stand here like this after a brutal game or bad home stand, staring, thinking, and I’ll suddenly get inspired to go work on what I did wrong. Sometimes I’ll gear up, other times I’ll head down in my pajama pants, and I’ll work on it until I can’t see straight and the clock reads four in the morning.”

  I shouldn’t be surprised by his dedication, and yet I find it so refreshing to know he actually has to work at something, when he seems to be such a damn natural at everything.

  “Plus, I’m super competitive so it’s nice to be able to put in the extra time without anyone else knowing. Never underestimate the element of surprise.”

  “Never,” I murmur. “And there’s never a rain delay, either.”

  “Lately, I feel like there’s been a permanent rain delay on my career.” His chuckle transitions to a heavy sigh. The resignation in it tempts me to ask him more about the toll this has taken on him, but I’m startled from the thought when, without a word, he reaches over and hooks my pinky with his.

  And just like I found comfort in the touch of his hand earlier, I wonder if maybe he needs the same from me right now. So I don’t interrupt the moment. Instead we settle into the silence, touching and watching and trying to figure out what we are doing here.

  “I’m doing my best to get you back out there,” I say after a bit, letting him know I heard the frustration and defeat in his previous statement. His permanent rain delay.

  “Is that the polite way to say you’re busting my ass?”

  And within seconds, we go from serious to playful, and I love that it’s so easy to do with him.

  “You ain’t seen nothing yet, Wylder.”

  “Oh really?” He tugs on my pinky so that I’m forced to face him. “You’ve got more moves up your sleeve, Dalton?”

  My smile is automatic when our eyes meet. The slow, sweet ache of want is, too. How can it not be when we’re standing in the dark, he’s framed by a halo of baseball stadium light, and that electric charge between us is snapping with an unfathomable current from just our pinkies touching?

  There’s something about Easton that makes me want when I shouldn’t, need when I needn’t, and desire when I know it’ll be disastrous.

  But damn the fallout to hell, because more than anything, I want to feel right now. Alive. Wanted. Desired. Like a woman.

  Is that such a bad thing?

  I’m sure it’s not. I’m sure it’s normal for most women, but not for me.

  And not like this.

  “I’ll show you what’s up my sleeve if you show me your secret baseball fort downstairs.”

  His laughter echoes off the glass beside us and back to my ears a second time. “Aha! So that’s what it takes to impress you.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “My big bat doesn’t do it for you, but my home plate downstairs does?” He shakes his head, but when our eyes meet, his laugh fades as the air between us shifts and charges with an unmistakable energy.

  “Scout.” All he says is my name, but in its timbre I hear so many things that I can’t comprehend over my head shouting that I need to step back.

  I step toward him.

  Time feels like it stops.

  His gasp is soft but audible.

  Then starts again in slow motion.

  A soft squeeze of his pinky around mine.

  Then slams into fast forward.

  Within a heartbeat, exactly what I both wanted and feared happens: his lips are on mine. The kiss is slow and breathtaking, with soft lips and gentle tongues and murmured sighs and guiding fingertips.

  This is wrong, Scout. So wrong. But how can it be wrong when it feels like this and tastes like him?

  “Easton.” I tell myself to step back. To resist. To not want to kiss him.

  And then our tongues meet again in a soft dance of sighs and need.

  “I think we should go check out—”

  His lips smother the words on mine.

  “—your field—”

  He nips my bottom lip.

  “—your bases—”

  His tongue taunts again.

  “—your—”

  “Will you shut up, please?” He laughs against my lips. “You’ve been fighting this kiss all day long, and I practiced restraint like you told me to do . . . but right now? Right now, I’m going to kiss you senseless, Scout, and I want to fucking enjoy it. So, for the love of God, woman, use those lips of yours on me and not on words.”

  His sexy-as-hell reprimand evokes a flood of emotions within me, and yet there’s only one of them I can name: want.

  And God how I want.

  So I lean into him and take control of the kiss. I talk without sound this time. With lips and teeth and tongue, I let him know I want to enjoy the kiss just as much as he does.

  I throw my concerns out the window. Tell myself to worry about them later, be mad at myself later, but for now just enjoy this virile and attractive man who wants me just as much. I slide my fingers up his chest, touching him the same way I often have to when I stretch his shoulder, but now there is no thought of anything other than how much I want to feel his weight on top of me.

  He runs his hand down the line of my neck to the curve of my shoulder and then down until it rests on the small of my back, where he’d placed it earlier tonight. But this time when he pulls me in tighter against him, I don’t
resist. This time I welcome everything about it. The heat of his body. The flex of his hand against my back in tangible restraint. The bulge of his erection as it pushes against my lower belly.

  And damn if knowing he’s already hard for me doesn’t add fuel to my firestorm of want.

  “Scout.” It’s my name again, but this time I know exactly what he’s asking me.

  “Yes.” One word. It’s all I say, then that need and desire simmering between us ignites into a combustible wildfire where first-kiss-caution is consumed by unfettered lust and reckless abandon.

  That hand on my back slides under my V-neck and runs up the side of my torso, thumb rubbing ever so gently over the underside of my breast on its way to help unclasp my bra.

  My body burns with the expectation of his touch.

  And then it lights on fire when his fingers trace their way back—skin to skin—beneath my loosened bra and over my nipples. They harden instantly as his thumbs rub circles over them—they tease and pleasure—all the while his lips and tongue launch another assault with a renewed vigor that only makes me want more.

  And he gives me that more when he lifts my hands above my head, pulls my shirt off, and dips down and takes my nipple in his mouth. The warmth of his tongue mixed with the scrape of his stubble adds an element of contrast, soft versus rough, that twists my insides and leaves me wanting to know if he’s as slow and thorough with every other part of his sexual attention.

  My hands are in his hair as he teases one breast and then the other, and I’m not sure if I want him to stop and come back to kiss my lips, or if I want him to keep stoking that fire bright.

  Emitting the sexiest growl I’ve ever heard, Easton makes the decision for me when he puts his hands on my waist and lifts me like I’m a feather. There’s no hesitancy on my part, only need, when I wrap my legs around his waist, thread my fingers through his hair, and lose myself under the haze of desire his kisses are unleashing on that sensitive spot beneath my jaw.

  And then he begins to walk.

  His mouth is on my neck. His unshaven jaw tickles my collarbone. The cool air of the room slides over my breasts. His hips rest deliciously between my thighs.

  All of those things tempt and taunt me, but it’s when he lays me down on the bed, when I’m so desperate for more from him, that my own control snaps.

  We reach for the waist of each other’s jeans at the same time. Without any finesse, we fumble and bump hands, our laughter forcing us to come up for air, making us realize it would be so much quicker if we undress ourselves.

  So in a rush of movements we strip and shimmy and step out of our clothes until we are naked, laughing in panting breaths, hungry for more and eager to have it.

  But it’s when I look up from where I lie on the bed to where he stands at its edge, my laughter falls off. He’s watching me, wanting me, and everything about him, from his expression to his eyes to his body, is breathtaking. He’s hard lines and tanned skin. He’s confidence with a half-cocked grin, and he’s desire restrained with the tense set of his shoulders. His fingers flick, ready to conquer and claim, and his lips part, ready to lead the assault.

  But it’s his eyes that command my attention.

  They ask and demand and want as they slowly scrape their way up my legs, pausing at the apex of my thighs before continuing up my abdomen to my breasts. When they finally make their way back to mine, they are darkened by a desire I’m desperate to sink whole-heartedly into.

  So many things about him—the look in his eye, the set of his shoulders, his impressive dick standing hard and thick between his muscular thighs, and the sexual tension snapping in the air around us—has me craving more of him and willing to beg for what comes next. The push and the pull. The give and the take. The need and the greed. The wish and the want. The climb and the release.

  Lost in the haze of lust and expectation, my mouth waters. My body aches. My fingers beg to run over every dip and dent and curve of his body.

  “Easton.” It’s his name on my lips this time. My turn to ask, to demand, to beg.

  My knees fall apart in invitation.

  His breath hitches.

  My body hums, and chills chase over my skin.

  He licks his lips. Steps. Stares. Admires.

  And then he’s on the bed, crawling over me and dipping down to take my nipple in his mouth again.

  “Oh, that feels good,” I murmur as my back arches and offers.

  His chuckle vibrates the sensitized flesh. “I’m about to make it feel a whole lot better. Time to fuck your pretty kitty, Kitty.”

  I manage to laugh through the sensations his skilled tongue is evoking, but it turns into a gasp of welcome pleasure when his hand slides between by thighs. His fingertips dance over my seam, taunting with a feather-light touch before slowly parting me to brush ever so slightly over my clit. Warmth. Heat. Electricity. The current of desire jolts my system, and my hips buck into his hand and beg for more.

  “You like that?”

  “God, yes.”

  “I don’t think God has anything to do with this, but feel free to call his name.” He chuckles and looks up at me over the rise of my breasts, his eyes sharp with desire and contradicted by a cocky flash of a grin. “’Cause we’re about to get biblical.”

  “Oh, please.” I laugh, but it’s lost to him as his lips claim mine and his fingers rub and tease and work my clit into a frenzy of overwhelming sensations. I writhe and lift and tense, wanting to prolong this onslaught of ecstasy and reach my climax all at the same time.

  “Greedy girl,” he murmurs, kissing his way down the line of my neck and up to my ear where he nips on my earlobe. “I kind of like that.”

  His simple praise and the soft chuckle that follows only adds to the riot of hormones racing to my every nerve as his fingers continue to work me to my brink.

  “East . . .” A pant of his name is all I can manage as my hands grip tighter onto his forearms, my body edging that fine line before climax. “East.” Another pant. Another warning that I’m going to come.

  My nails score his skin. My body vibrates with tension.

  And then nothing.

  His fingers stop. His hand stills. My head snaps up so I can look him in the eyes. And once our eyes meet, once he knows he has my attention, he takes the pads of two fingers and slides them ever-so-tauntingly-slowly down the line of my sex. He teases me, wetting them with my arousal before just as leisurely sliding them into me.

  My exhale is unsteady, nerves already strung tight and primed to snap. But it’s his eyes on mine—unwavering and intense—that dare me more than anything. To come for him. To please him.

  He hears every hitch of my breath. He watches the arch of my neck. He notices when I bite into my bottom lip. He feels each clench of my muscles around his finger. And it’s this complete attention that creates an unexpected intimacy and encourages me to slip under that veil of pleasure.

  The orgasm slams into me, hijacking my breath as the explosion of desire morphs into a flash of white-hot heat.

  My hands grab the sheets. My hips buck into his hand. My lips part, but no sound escapes. My body is seared by the sensations he’s just brought to life.

  The bed dips as he moves, and I can just barely hear the telltale rip of foil over the thunder of my pulse in my ears. And before I have any chance to recover from the orgasm still pulsing through me, Easton’s hands are on the back of my knees, pulling me toward the edge of the bed.

  He meets my eyes as he steps between my legs and wastes no time making that first carnal connection when he runs the crest of his dick up and down my slit to prepare both of us for what comes next.

  And oh, how I want it to come next. Especially if it feels this incredible already and we haven’t even gotten to the good part yet.

  He groans, his struggle to take this slow written all over his face. But I don’t want slow. I want him. Now. And I’m desperate to have him, so in an attempt to snap that control of his and get what I want,
I spread my thighs as wide as possible in invitation.

  His eyes flash up to mine, a ghost of a smile on his lips that tells me he knows what I’m doing, but he holds on. Resists. And then he taunts me right back by pushing just the tip of his cock inside me so I can feel that burn that is oh so good before he slowly pulls back out.

  I lift my hips to try and prevent him from withdrawing completely but he just steps a foot back with his cock in his hand, and smiles at me.

  Smug bastard.

  We wage a visual war of wills, but when he looks back down to where I’m wet and waiting for him, he caves.

  But if I thought this time the wait would be over, that he was going to give me what I want—all of him—I was wrong. Because he continues to toy with me, tease me, arouse me by rubbing his tip just inside of me until I moan with want, before pulling back out.

  And the best part is his expression. Not just the taut lines in his neck telling me he’s struggling through the denied pleasure like I am, but the widening of his eyes and how his lips fall lax in pleasure each time he enters me.

  The next time he pushes his hips forward, I prop myself up on my elbows so I can look between my thighs and see what he sees. How my arousal—visual proof of what he does to me—glistens on his shaft. How each time he pulls out, he slides a little deeper into me the next time, uses his hand to guide his cock so it rubs expertly around all of the nerves within me, and then withdraws.

  Before starting the process all over again.

  It’s arousing. Heady. Intoxicating. To see my body accept his hard girth. To watch how I stretch around him, adjust to him, and then take him in a little more. To see how when he pulls back out, my pink flesh clings tight like I don’t want him to part from me just yet. To know that, even after coming once, my body is more than willing to go again with him.