Twenty-Four
Jace
Thursday night football. Prime time, baby.
Tonight’s our first home game of the season, and energy buzzes through my body like never before, vibrating through my arms and legs.
I always experience some pregame nervous energy, especially before home games like these. There’s nothing better than playing in front of the Sin Valley crowd, in prime time, under the blinding gridiron lights.
But tonight’s different. Tonight, Sera will be here. Tonight, she’ll be here because I asked her to come watch.
It shouldn’t affect me like this, but damn if that doesn’t pump me up more than ever.
The woman has a magic power over me. I can’t get enough of her. No matter how many times I get hot and sweaty with her, the mere thought of my wife gets me hard all over again.
I’m starting to realize that I will never truly get my fill of Sera. I’ll always need more.
I think that deep down, I always knew she’d never be a one night stand for me. Maybe that’s why I waited so damn long to acknowledge my feelings for her. Maybe deep down, I always knew I had to be ready. And now I am. I’m ready for a future with her.
“What’s up with you, dumbass?” I glance back to find Jude all up in my space.
“What?” Why the fuck is he staring at me, while I’m standing here half-naked in just my game pants? “You see something you like?” I wiggle my brows provocatively.
Jude rolls his eyes so aggressively I’m shocked they don’t fall out and bounce across the floor. “I bet you’d love that. I’m just trying to see why you’re over here grinning like a goddamned idiot.”
I feel myself grin wider. I know what’s got me grinning—or rather, who—but these assholes don’t need to know all my business.
“Maybe I found a piece of candy in my pocket.” I shrug, before slipping my shoulder pads over my head and squeezing them into place.
Fletcher and Cora cackle, leaning on the lockers across from me.
“Or maybe you’re getting your dick wet,” Knox quips as he strides into my space to inspect my face. He lifts a brow knowingly as he examines me. “Yup, you’re definitely getting your dick wet.”
I shake my head as my teammates laugh and continue to psychoanalyze my better-than-usual pregame mood. Idiots. All of them.
“Keep speculating, assholes. My lips are sealed.” I turn away from their prying eyes and bury my head into my cubby.
The noise level in the locker room is at an all-time high right now, as my teammates bullshit while getting dressed and ready to hit the field. But I block out the hum around me as I lace up my cleats, lost in thought about these past few days.
Chasing Sera was definitely worth the effort. Because now she’s not trying to run from me anymore. Now, she’s falling asleep in my arms and waking up in my bed and making my house into her home.
I’ll do whatever it takes to make sure she stays there.
So if she needs good dick action to help her forget Rocky ever existed, I’m her man. If she needs someone to cuddle with her in bed and watch horrible chick flicks, I’m up for the task. If she needs to be kissed and licked from head to toe and everywhere in between, sign me up.
I’ll show her how a man is really supposed to treat his queen. And I’ll do it with a smile on my face.
I’d say that things have been good between us since we postponed the legal proceedings at the lawyer’s office. But that damn annulment deadline keeps lingering in my mind. It’s like a hangnail that’s too short to clip. A constant reminder that I could still screw this up. That I could still invest everything into this relationship with Sera only to have her decide in the end that it wasn’t good enough. The possibility of being let down makes me want to hold back, keep a little piece of my heart like an insurance policy instead of giving the whole thing to her, protect a tiny part of myself, just in case it doesn’t work out.
I’ve been thinking way too much. Going above and beyond. Because when our 60-day trial period is done, I want her to renew her subscription. Indefinitely. To infinity and beyond.
So I’ll do what I have to do to show her this is not surface level. Not just a fling. It means everything to me.
I slip my crisp, clean home jersey over my head then I check my cellphone one last time. The text from Sera has me grinning. It’s a photo of her, up in the stands surrounded by the excited crowd. She’s adorable, wearing an oversized Paragons jersey with my number—number eleven—on it. She’s got a cap on backward and she’s proudly waving a homemade poster with ‘Bellino’s #1 Babe’ written out in huge, block letters. I laugh heartily to myself, feeling infused with a fresh dose of motivation.
But my smile teeter-totters when I check the next message on my screen.
Wyatt: Have a good game, man. Kick some ass. Go Paragons! *football emoji*
Cue the sinking feeling in the pit of my gut.
Fuck. Here I am, practically building a life with my best friend’s little sister and he doesn’t even know it. That’s a shitty thing to do.
I tried. I really tried my hardest to be loyal to the bro code but a chance for the affection of a woman like Sera beats out the unspoken code of ethics each and every time.
My wife suggested that we hold off on talking to her brother for the time being. She wants to delay the potentially explosive conversation until after we decide what we’re going to do about our marriage. I see where she’s coming from. I agreed with her that there’s no use in blowing my friendship with Wyatt to kingdom come if she and I are only going to end up annulling our marriage anyway. What I didn’t tell her is I’ve already decided. I already know I want to keep her. I just need to give her time to catch up.
In any case, I’ll deal with Wyatt. I’ll make him understand about Sera and me, but now is not the time. Head in the game.
I push the guilt away as I join my teammates huddled around Maxwell in the middle of the room. Bouncing on my toes, I’m half listening to our captain give his usual word of inspiration before we hit the field.
The guys start hooting and hollering around me as the room brims with pre-game excitement. Jude gives me a pound on the shoulder and I retaliate by swiping him up the back of his head. It’s anxious laughter and optimism everywhere. Following my teammates, I burst out the door, with a goofy-ass smile taking over my face.
But for a whole different reason.
I can’t wait to get out on the field tonight, to streak across the turf, to hear the crowd hollering all around…knowing that Sera’s eyes are on me.
Twenty-Five
Sera
“Here ya go,” Desiree says, and I have to tear my eyes off the field to accept a mini whiskey bottle from her outstretched hand.
She digs around in the pocket of her puffy sleeveless vest and comes up with another palm full of tiny alcohol bottles. She sifts through her bounty for her favorite then dumps the rest into my hand.
“Wow. Thanks.” I grin at her like she’s the best friend I ever had, sharing her Halloween candy with me.
“What’d we miss?” Nadia asks, as she and Desiree drop into the padded seats on either side of me and get comfortable again.
“Everything.” I chuckle. “I don’t think you two have sat still long enough to watch even a minute of this game.” They keep wandering off to raid the exclusive refreshment buffets upstairs and coming back to share their bounty with me.
Nadia shrugs and lowers the zipper on the front of her fleece sweater. “What can I say? I’m just here to enjoy the fancy finger foods and ogle the sweaty, muscled-up boys running around in tight shiny pants on the football field.” She plucks something bite-sized and scrumptious-looking out of the styrofoam container in her hand and pops it into her mouth. Then she passes the container my way.
“And the booze, girl.” Desiree splashes whiskey from a mini bottle into her cardboard coffee cup. “Don’t forget the booze.”
My time off from work is effectively over. I returned to t
he office today, and although I’ve enjoyed existing in my secluded little Jace-bubble, I was giddy with excitement to get back into the real world. Now that the work day is over, I’m thrilled to be sitting here in the crowded stands of the Sin Valley Arena, watching my man and his teammates kick some ass.
I give the girls a quick recap of what happened in the game while they were gone. “We couldn’t connect on offense, so we kicked a field goal. Now, we’re back on defense.” Meaning, my man is on the field.
My attention is laser-focused on the game. I hop to my feet with my homemade poster when Jace flies through the air and tackles his opponent.
“Yeah! Go number eleven!” I squeal when the other team’s runner fumbles, rolls and loses control of the ball. Three of the Paragons pile on top of the football, recovering it from their opponent.
The home crowd goes wild as our defense runs off the field, so the offense can take their place.
I’m still clapping when I drop back into my seat, unable to wipe the silly grin from my face. How did I not notice how freaking good Jace was before? He’s everywhere. He might be just one guy, but somehow, he’s always near the ball, stopping the other team from making big plays and scoring.
He’s on fire tonight, at the top of his game, and I find myself smiling every time I recall him joking this morning that he’ll be showing off for me. He looks so concentrated on the field right now. I can’t help but wonder if I’ve crossed his mind since the start of the game. At least once? For a half a second? Maybe?
Offense is on the field for a while, so I know I can breathe easily for a few minutes. I turn to Nadia and Desiree, now that I can take a break from the game since Jace is now on the sidelines. We try to keep up a conversation but the loud, jostling crowd is so boisterous that I practically have to yell to be heard.
“Y’know, you guys really don’t have to stay down here in the nose-bleeds with me when you could be up in Liam’s fancy, air-conditioned skybox.
As owner of the Paragons, Liam Kline has his own luxury suite seating on the stadium’s top level, overlooking the field. The suite is strictly reserved for executives from Kline-Simmons Realty Developments and potential business partners Liam is trying to woo. Desiree is one of the firm’s top level executives and Nadia is in-house counsel so both ladies have an unrestricted pass to access the suite. For them, it’s one of the perks of the job. They don’t have to be slumming it here in the regular seats with little ol’ me.
Desiree makes a pitying face at me. I can tell she feels bad that I don’t have access to the benefits she does. “Psht. Who wants to watch football from a fancy air-conditioned room, surrounded by lobster canapés and goat cheese truffles? That’s not football.” She drapes her free arm around my shoulder and gives me a quick squeeze. “Ear-piercing whistles. Trash-talking fans. Cheesy nachos. Beer in those plastic souvenir cups. Now, that is football.”
I drag the back of my hand across my sweaty forehead. “Don’t get me wrong—I’m grateful to be able to score free tickets from work any time I want but these seats aren’t the best. Air-conditioning sounds pretty amazing right about now.” I grab another ridiculously delicious hors d’ouevre from Nadia’s container. “And the lobster canapés are so good, though.”
Nadia gives me the side-eye. “They’re good but not good enough to go to jail over. I swear, I was about to throttle the next sleazy old rich guy who tried to make a pass at me.”
It irked me in the beginning—not being invited to mingle with the higher-ups—but realistically, I know I haven’t earned my place yet. I’ll get there, though. I won’t quit putting in the work until my grumpy boss notices me. It may take me a couple of years but I’m determined to earn my spot at the top echelons of Kline-Simmons.
In the meantime, Jace did text to offer to get me access to the upscale family suite where the Paragons players’ wives and children are watching the game but I felt weird about going in there since I don’t know any of the players’ families. So, I decided to stick to the stands where I’m more comfortable.
At the mere thought of Jace, I feel a smile tugging on my lips and a new wave of heat sweeping up my neck.
“So, you have something juicy to tell us?” Nadia’s brow is in her hair as she eyes me expectantly.
“Uh. What do you mean?” I glance at Desiree on the other side of me. Her look practically mirrors Nadia’s.
Oh my gosh. Am I really that transparent?
Stifling a grin, I stare back across the field just in time to see Jace squeeze a water bottle over his face. Jesus—every time I think the man can’t get sexier, he takes it up a notch.
“Jace and I are…giving our marriage a shot.” I feel bats flutter around inside me, all over again. Saying ‘Jace’ and ‘marriage’ in the same sentence still feels so weird.
“That means you’ve been getting down and dirty, doesn’t it?” Desiree shrieks next to me.
“On the regular?” Nadia’s eyes glitter and bulge like she just uncovered the most delicious scandal.
I glance around self-consciously. Even though it’s unlikely that this conversation will rise above the noise of the stadium and attract the attention of the crowd around us.
“Shh,” I beg, eyes wide as my head swivels back and forth. “Keep it down.” I smack both girls on the legs. “You never know who might hear us.” A blogger could be lurking anywhere or this conversation could somehow end up on social media.
“Damn, girl.” Nadia lowers her voice, fanning herself. “Oh, give me all the details, woman. When we were at the club that night, I told you he wanted in your pants. I have a way of being right about these things, you know.”
“He and I are still trying to figure things out. I really don’t want our ‘situation’ to mess up his friendships...or my career opportunities. Don’t forget that Liam is friends with Jace and Wyatt.”
“I get it, girl. Your secret’s safe with us.” Desiree yawns into her coffee cup. “But please, please, please give me something good. My gang of vibrators isn’t cutting it anymore.”
“Desiree!” I chastise as Nadia throws her head back and roars with laughter.
My cheeks flush some more, and I can feel the heat creeping up to my ears. Good god. I feel like a teenager again, getting all tied up in knots over holding a boy’s hand. Every time I think about Jace, my stomach dips and rocks.
“Come on,” Desiree groans. “It has literally been years since my last date. Let me live vicariously through you and your hot football player.”
Just thinking about the explosive connection I share with Jace has me all hot and bothered. Now, I’m breaking out into a sweat. I fan myself with my poster board. “Let’s just say, no other man can ever hold a candle to the way number eleven makes me feel.”
The girls hoot and holler and bump their shoulders into mine and I grin. Because I’m the lucky girl who scored Jason Bellino.
He may be the one running up and down the field tonight but every time I think of him, I feel like I’ve scored a touchdown.
Twenty-Six
Sera
My heart is pounding as we walk up the large flagstone paver tiles cutting through the expansive, manicured front lawn. The sprawling home boasts dark wooden beams and sleek lines towering against the starlit sky.
Warm light pours out of the tall, wide front windows, revealing the gathering of happy, beautiful people inside, crowding the living room to celebrate tonight’s spectacular Paragons’ win.
Jace puts his hand on the small of my back, igniting a hormonal surge at the base of my spine. “You okay?” he leans close and whispers, his stubble grazing the shell of my ear.
God—his smell is knee-buckling. His manly fragrance goes to my head. Now, I’m dizzy on top of the nervousness I was already feeling.
“Yeah, I’m great. Aside from the fact that I’ve got stress-sweat pooling in my cleavage and Thor’s hammer is trying to smash its way out of my chest.” I lay a clammy hand over my heart.
Jace chuckles.
His arm moves across my back to wind around my waist. “Don’t be nervous. They’re all good people. Mostly. And they’ll know not to mess with you. Because anyone who’s mean to you will have to deal with me.” His strong fingers squeeze my hip protectively. He presses a hard, stubbly kiss to my temple.
And I ruin my panties.
Right there on the doorstep of Maxwell and Faith Masters’s modern ranch-style mini-mansion.
We haven’t even stepped inside yet and I’m already fantasizing about leaving this party and getting Jace back to his bed.
Did I mention how sexy he looks right now? Tall, confident and important in his black button down and dark jeans. Victory looks good on this man.
Somebody give him another endorsement deal already. Because I would buy whatever the hell he’s selling. Sneakers. Toothpaste. Winter tires. Alien abduction insurance.
Take…my…money.
I get a tight feeling in my chest at how utterly out of my league he is. The man is breathtaking, inside and out.
Luckily for me, we were able to swing by his condo real quick after the game so I could change into some fresh jeans and a cute ruffle-y top. Now, at least I don’t have to look like a rumpled fan-girl who followed him home from the stadium parking lot in my number eleven Paragons jersey.
Three burly professional football players are gathered right outside the door, sipping on sports drinks and arguing about…something. I think they’re debating who should be on the next season of The Bachelor but honestly, I’m not sure.
Jace’s teammates greet him with manly back-claps and fist-bumps. My man manages to smoothly maneuver through it without ever taking his hand off of me.
Knox greets me with a friendly smile and a quick half-hug as always. Jace makes sure to introduce me to the other guys. Fletcher gives me a creepy once-over and Cora does a weird eyebrow-bouncing thing as he tells me he’s heard all about me. Eww—what does that mean?
Playing House: A Small Town Brother’s Best Friend Romance (The Playboys of Sin Valley Book 1) Page 18