by Ciz, Alley
The layouts might be the same but Rocky, Becky and Gemma sure as hell made their home their own with hot pink acrylic barstools and a collection of white, pink, gray and animal print accents scattered throughout.
Like always, his eye went to the wall made up entirely of twinkle lights with pictures hanging from the strands. A few photos including him from the game the night before really drove home that he had found his tribe.
Gage James was officially no longer a loner.
He stood unmoving, staring at the wall while that realization sunk it. How did this happen? A lot of it was because of a certain raven-haired beauty.
“You’re going down, Madz. Here comes a blue shell,” Deck challenged, obviously in the middle of an epic Mario Kart battle.
“Keep dreaming, Deck. Stick to fighting—your Mario Kart game is weak,” Maddey clapped back.
Who knew Nintendo could be so serious?
“Boom!” Maddey cheered, raising both hands, including the wheel-shaped controller, overhead in celebration. “Don’t mess with the champ, boys.”
“I swear you cheat,” Deck complained.
“Whatever you say, pretty boy.”
“And I swear, you boys will never learn,” Rocky called out, drawing his gaze to where she stood in the kitchen. She looked adorable as hell in a shirt with “I’ve got a headache… Voldemort must be close” displayed across the generous swell of her chest.
He grinned when she moved from behind the island and he saw the loose pants with Harry Potter glasses and lightning bolts on them.
“Hey,” he said, stepping around the counter.
“Hey,” she returned, stretching up to give him a quick kiss on the lips.
He liked that she seemed to get less hesitant with him the more time they were around each other.
“So…I was wondering…” She glanced over her shoulder to the living room full of people. “Wanna go to dinner with me?”
He laughed in surprise as he had walked in the door with the same intention.
He pulled her closer. “When did you have in mind?”
“Tonight?”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously,” she said.
He matched her smirk with one of his own. “You don’t waste any time, do you?”
She moved in closer, though he doubted the others paid them any attention based on the trash talk going on.
“Well, it’s been a week since I almost took a shower with you. Aside from us breaking the massage table in my treatment room at the gym, all you’ve done is tease me, and to be honest, I’m over it.”
His smile was just this side of evil. He knew exactly what he’d done to her all week.
“That.” She pointed an accusing finger at his face. “That right there is why I’m not waiting for you to make a move.”
“Is that so?” He liked this feisty side.
“Yup.”
Her hands came to his chest as he crossed his arms behind her back, eliminating the last of the space between them. “So you’re saying you only want me for my body,” he teased.
“No.” She stretched up onto her toes to speak directly into his ear. “But I figured maybe we should go on a date first, before we fuck each other.”
A shiver ran down his spine. He wasn’t sure if it was from her lips brushing along the shell of his ear or from her direct words, but both worked for him. He moved in so his mouth brushed the rim of her ear.
“Sounds like a plan. But just so you know.” He paused to run his nose along the sensitive spot behind her ear, causing her to endure a shiver of her own. “The night will end with me buried deep inside you. Because I haven’t been able to think of anything else all week.”
“Promises, promises,” she taunted.
He let out a bark of laughter, drawing attention from the Mario Karters, but Rocky waved them off and turned back to him. “Anyway…it’s nothing fancy, jeans and a t-shirt are fine. I’ll meet you at your place in a few hours. I’m gonna go shower.”
He let out a growl at the thought of her in the shower. “Need a hand in there?”
Infuriatingly, she laughed at him. “Relax there, big guy.” She patted his chest. “Dinner first. Then…” She shrugged.
After watching her walk away, he headed for the living room, exchanging greetings with everyone as he settled into a spot at the end of the couch.
“Wanna play?” Vince held out a controller in his direction.
“Sure. Why not.” He accepted the white wheel.
For the next hour, he lost himself in the world of Mario Kart, trading insults, slinging shells and avoiding banana peels with the best of them. No matter how hard they tried, no one could beat Maddey. Nor was he able to get his mind off his first official date in longer than he could remember.
* * *
When Gage opened his door at Rocky's knock, he was momentarily struck speechless by the sight of her standing there in a simple blue and gray dress that touched the floor and leather jacket. She was easily becoming one of his favorite things to look at.
The drive to the restaurant was quick. Hand-in-hand, they followed the hostess through the crowded dining room to their table. He opted to sit to her left instead of across from her. They discussed the menu and what was good to eat, eventually ordering enough food for them to share to feed a small army.
Propping his elbow on the table, he rested his chin on his fist, once again taking in the vision in next of him. Rocky’s long, blue-black hair hung straight around her shoulders and tumbled down her back. Her mesmerizing gray eyes had a sprinkling of sparkly eye shadow and her cupid’s bow lips were adorned with a pale pink gloss.
“So how’d you get into fighting?" she asked, mirroring his pose. "I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say in an interview.”
“My mom.” He reached out to stroke the delicate skin on the inside of her wrist while he spoke.
“Really?”
“Yeah.” He couldn’t help but smile at the memory. “When Wyatt and I were younger, we were…rambunctious.”
“You mean you were hella crazy and your moms didn’t know what to do with you?” she asked knowingly.
He touched the tip of his nose with his finger. “Exactly.”
“Vince and Deck were the same way.” Her lips took on a devilish curl. “Though I can’t say the girls and I were much better. Beck was always convincing us to do all kinds of crazy things. It’s how she earned her text handle.”
He'd learned all about the group’s crazy text handles last night when Jase and Vince went through his phone updating his contacts. He was still coming to terms with the fact the guy he spent the day being jealous over was inserting himself as a friend, but he was also learning that you didn’t have much choice when it came to Rocky and her friends.
“But that’s not important here. You get to hear about my crazy every day at the gym. I want to hear about you for a change. So come on, tell me.”
“Okay.” He dropped an arm around the back of her chair, scooting in closer. “So sometime in middle school, our moms were looking for anything that could help burn off some of the excess energy we had.”
“What did they find?”
“First, it was karate. Then for me it evolved into Muay Thai and jiu-jitsu. And for Wyatt, it was parkour.”
“Parkour?” Her eyes sparkled. “Like Jackie Chan scaling buildings and stuff?”
“Yup.” He couldn’t help but laugh remembering how often Wyatt got screamed at for demonstrating what he learned in class at home. He was pretty sure his aunt had regretted ever enrolling him in the class.
“I have a feeling the class was one of the reasons he became a firefighter.”
“That’s amazing. But what about you? How’d you hook up with Tony? You’ve been with him your whole career, right?”
He nodded, liking how easy it was to talk to her. Thanks to her own background, it made it feel like he was talking to a peer. Her firsthand knowledge of the sport and what the training
entailed was a refreshing change from being around girls who either pretended to know what he was talking about or were only able to spout off his stats because they were groupies.
“One of my BJJ instructors saw how promising I was and brought up the whole mixed martial arts thing to my mom. She was hesitant at first—as I would assume most moms would be—but eventually, we met with Tony, and the rest is history.”
He had her laughing when he told her about some of his wilder antics with Wyatt growing up. She paused to take a breath, then leaned over for a sip of her mango margarita. When she wrapped her lips around the straw, he imagined what those same lips would look like wrapped around his cock.
If he was lucky, he would get to experience it later tonight.
He really needed to look away as she drank. His mind was firmly in the gutter, because watching her throat work as she swallowed, all he could think of was watching it contract as she swallowed every drop of cum he wanted to give her.
Fuck.
Sucking on that straw, Rocky tilted her head at him when he wasn’t able to hold back a groan.
“You okay over there, stud?” A knowing smirk pulled up the corners of her lips.
“Stud?” He laughed as the tension between them broke.
All the little tease did was shrug, causing him to growl in response.
“I’ll show you how much of a stud I am later.”
“Promise?” She bit the corner of her lower lip.
Seeing her teeth sink into the plump flesh snapped the last of his control. With another growl, he placed his hand on the back of her neck and pulled her in to devour her mouth. She didn’t hesitate to return the kiss.
The temperature at their table heated as they continued to kiss. He spread his fingers and twisted them between the strands of her hair, giving a slight tug.
Her answering moan was almost enough to make him say screw dinner and drag her out of the restaurant. Luckily, the server arrived with their food before he could give in to his baser urges.
ROCKY JUMPED BACK at the sound of their server behind them, her cheeks heating in embarrassment. She didn’t even look up when he asked if they needed anything else after he set down their plates.
They ate in silence for a few moments while they got their hormones under control.
“God, this food is incredible,” Gage said around a bite of enchiladas.
“I know. We love it.” Jose Tejas was one of her favorite Tex-Mex restaurants. “Vince is going to be so jealous when he hears I brought you here.”
“I take it Gem would have his balls if he cheated on his diet right now?”
“You would be correct.” She took a sip of her margarita, happy that he was finally starting to be more comfortable with their group’s dynamics.
“But I can almost guarantee this is the first place we will come to the day after his fight.”
“Well, I’ll happily keep him company.”
She let out a laugh. “You’re not the only one. It’ll be like a class field trip—everyone will be in for that meal.” She paused. “We’ll have to come for lunch to have any hope of not having to wait forever.”
“Did you guys all grow up together?”
She explained how each of the guys were connected—Deck a childhood friend, Griff one of Vince’s wrestling rivals from a high school a few towns over, and Ray falling in with them after taking a few classes with Vince.
“So your brother is the common denominator?”
She swallowed her bite of shrimp and crawfish quesadilla. “All except Nick and Damon. They played for the Titans and learned about the gym from when I was their trainer.”
“And it all comes back to hockey.”
Unlike when the subject came up with her father, she didn’t hear any judgment in his voice. The biggest fight she’d ever had with her father happened when she tried to leave The Steele Maker to accept the job offer from the Blizzards.
“Are you unhappy at the gym?”
She stilled, unsure how to answer. He was the first person to ask her that.
“No. I grew up there. I just…ya know.” What could she say that didn't sound petulant?
“Well…” He continued to hold her hand as he’d been doing all night and a part of her swooned anytime he initiated contact between them. “I guess selfishly I’m glad you didn’t take it because now I get to see you all the time.” He stroked a finger down the side of her face.
There was something about him that always managed to get her out of her head and away from the negative thoughts she had about her position at the gym. It was like he was the missing puzzle piece to her feeling truly secure in her role.
The server saw their empty plates and came by to see if they wanted anything else. They both declined and asked for the check. When he came back with the tray, Gage reached for it but she was faster.
“I don’t think so.” She wagged her finger at him.
“Hey! What kind of gentleman would I be if I didn’t pay for dinner?” He tried to snag the check again.
But she was too quick and held it out of his reach. “And while I appreciate the sentiment, I was the one who asked you out to eat. So I’m paying, end of story.”
He smiled at her, not put off by her sass. “Fine, but I’m paying next time.”
“There’s going to be a next time?” She raised an eyebrow.
“There’s going to be many more next times,” he stated with a wink.
Chapter Twenty-One
Gage held Rocky’s hand the entire walk from the car, not even letting go when he had to unlock his apartment door, grateful for being a lefty. Before leaving earlier, he'd turned the pendant lights over the kitchen island on, giving them enough light to navigate by.
Once inside, he pressed her to the same wall he had her against the week before. He tilted her chin up with one hand, while using the pressure of his other thumb to open her mouth for his assault. He already knew how amazing it felt to kiss her and didn’t waste any time getting reacquainted with it.
She groaned as his tongue painted the inside of her mouth. He loved that she wasn’t passive, meeting his passion head on. She tangled her tongue with his as she locked her hands behind his head.
Her height made it easy for him to align their bodies when they were pressed against each other. But she must not have been satisfied, because he felt her rise onto her tiptoes, molding her body against his like cling wrap. He tugged on her long hair as she scratched her fingers through the short hair of his scalp.
Breaking the kiss, he rested his forehead against hers, his lungs heaving as he tried to calm the situation he felt going on in his pants. “I’m never going to be able to look at my door and not get hard.”
“That’ll make for some interesting greetings. Have fun explaining all that to the guys when they come over,” she said with a laugh as she gestured to his pants.
God, he loved her sense of humor. “How about we move this to a more appropriate setting for my boner?”
“Lead the way, hot stuff.”
Grabbing her hand, he walked them back to his bedroom, pleased that there was enough ambient light streaming through the windows to be able to see. Her standing in his room felt as right to him as him standing inside the octagon for a fight.
ROCKY COULDN’T BELIEVE she and Gage were finally going to have sex. She felt like they’d been working toward this moment forever. She knew her long-standing crush on him hadn’t helped in that regard. Seeing him at the gym every day for weeks also didn’t.
Then he went and moved in down the hall from her.
Each day he did or said something that chipped away at the wall she'd built around herself when it came to fighters. Question by question, another brick fell. Comment by comment, he built up a platform to help him scale the wall.
Gage James was a hit combination she had no chance of defending herself against.
Then after her defenses were lowered, there was the hottest kiss of her entire life, plus the almost
shower sex that followed it.
“Please tell me you locked your front door behind us,” she pleaded.
“I did,” he assured her.
“Thank god.” She blew out a breath of relief. “Because I swear to god, if one more thing cock blocks us, I might literally explode from sexual frustration.”
His answering chuckle was sexy as hell. Too bad she wasn’t joking.
Emboldened by his gaze, she slipped off her shoes, then reached for the bottom of her maxi dress and pulled it up and off her body, leaving herself clad in only her black lace demi bra and lacy boy shorts.
She heard a growl from by the door.
That was exactly what she needed. She unclasped her bra and dropped it to the floor. His gaze never wavered. Next, she hooked her thumbs in her panties and drew them down her legs. Standing up, she kicked them away and stood before him in all her naked glory.
Then she quirked an eyebrow at him. “Your move.”
“DAMN,” GAGE WHISPERED reverently as he got his first look at Rocky naked. “You are a vision.”
She was all long, muscular limbs and soft curves. Her blue-black hair curled around full, perky breasts, topped with toffee-colored nipples begging to be sucked. Her waist indented in the perfect hourglass shape and was small enough he was sure his hands could encase it entirely.
He watched the defined muscles of her stomach contract as she took a deep breath and smiled at the jeweled ring decorating her tiny belly button. Her hips flared out, beckoning for him to hold on while he drove himself into her over and over.
The vibrant rainbow colors of a tattoo extended on her left side from the bottom of her left breast to underneath the bump of her hip bone. He was finally going to get the chance to get an up close and personal view of the artwork she chose to decorate her body with.
Down the miles of toned perfection that were her legs, he spotted bright blue nail polish on her toes. Raking his gaze back up her legs, he locked in on the luscious thighs he couldn’t wait to bury his face between and sucked in a breath when he saw she was waxed bare.