by Luis, Maria
More lockers to the right, thanks to the L shape of the hallway.
Her heels collide with the bottom row of lockers, and there’s a familiar, rattling metal sound that brings me straight back to my grade-school days.
“You’ve got nowhere to run, Coach,” I drawl, planting my hands against the cool metal locker on either side of her head. I lean forward, pressing the weight of my frame into hers. “You gonna put me in my place?”
Lowering my head, I graze her earlobe with my teeth. She told me she wasn’t anyone’s toy. That’s good. I’m not looking for a plaything. I’m not even sure what I’m looking for, but what I do know is this: I’m dying to taste that sweet, whip-smart mouth of hers. I want the fire that fuels her to belong to me, even if only for a single kiss.
I nudge the column of her throat with my nose. Rasp, “You gonna remind me that I’m your subordinate and I better heel before you punish me?”
A shudder wracks her body. “You called me a pain in the ass,” she mutters breathlessly.
“Correction: I said that you crawled up my ass and died.”
Slender fingers find the hem of my shirt, twining themselves up in the fabric. “I want to hate you.”
I kiss her neck. Because this is what I should have done the night that I met her. What I should have done the night of the parent/staff meeting at the Golden Fleece. What I should have done yesterday, when I sat in her courtyard and wondered what she might do if I slipped my hands over her naked thighs and pressed a kiss to her berry lips.
My mouth coasts down over her pulse. It quickens under my touch. Pulses to a rhythm I know all too well, one that races to the beat of: What are we doing here? This is crossing so many boundaries. We. Can’t. Do. This.
I obliterate every internal protest and husk out, “I want to understand why I can’t hate you.”
And then I capture her cheek with my palm, holding her in place, and slant my mouth over hers.
17
Aspen
The kiss is as rugged, as savage, as the man himself.
Blunt fingers curl toward the back of my skull while his thumbs crest my cheekbones, palms kissing the hollows of my cheeks. Dominic is big all over. I knew it when I met him but standing here now with my back pressed against a row of high school lockers and his muscular thigh wedged between my legs . . . it’s overwhelming.
He’s overwhelming.
And still I submit—to the sensations of his tongue driving into my mouth, reckless and aggressively intimate, and to the heat building within me.
When was the last time I felt like this? So needy, so damn desperate?
Years.
It’s been years, if ever.
Long before I found Rick sleeping with another woman.
Long before he stopped climbing into bed beside me at night.
Long before the comfort he offered felt shallow and—
A gasp breaks free from my throat.
Dominic swallows it with a husky laugh, his mouth parting and his teeth nipping down on my bottom lip. He pulls away long enough to growl, “Wherever you went in that pretty head of yours, remember that you’re with me right now. Only me,” and then the kiss is back on and I feel like I’m floating.
Scratch that.
I am floating.
Hands spreading under my butt like a human-based safety net, Dominic hauls me up and into his arms. My back slams against the lockers again, and oh, God, but the jangle of metal clanging against metal brings me right back to high school.
Only, when I roamed these halls twenty-plus years ago, it wasn’t in the arms of a mountain-sized Adonis.
Football practice, V-card status, homework—that was my M.O., back when I was seventeen and dreaming of playing in the big leagues. Can’t say I’m dying to turn back the clock, especially when I feel a very stiff part of Dominic drag against the very soft part of me.
Oh, God, that feels so good.
I snatch the sunglasses off the top of his head, hooking them over the collar of my shirt. Snag his beloved baseball hat, too, and settle that bad boy on my head. Backward. Like I’m some sort of badass instead of a thirty-seven-year old single mom with stretch marks on my belly that do not go away no matter how much lotion I slather on them.
“Kiss me again,” I beg, before clutching his shirt and using my grip to drag him forward. Our lips meet. Teeth clash. Tongues collide. And it feels glorious and messy, and is that him making that delicious growling noise in his throat?
It is.
I feel blessed to hear it.
With one hand still locked under my ass, he brings the other up to cup the back of my head. Pressure cranes my neck back, and it takes a moment for realization to kick in that he’s tugging on the brim of the hat to put me where he wants me.
Vulnerable.
Neck exposed.
Prickly stubble grazes my cheek before his lips find the delicate line of my throat. A kiss. Hot breath dampens my skin, shooting shivers down my spine. Another kiss. This one lower, directly over my fluttering pulse. Again, another. Over the sweet, sensitive place where my neck and shoulder meet. A tongue flits out, tracing my flesh just before he nips the same spot, and I’m a goner.
Game over.
I jack my hips forward, seeking more of that hard pressure at the apex of my thighs, only to feel a plastic dial dig into my spine.
Lockers, right. High school, right.
Do I care?
Not in this moment. Not when Dominic DaSilva, of all people, is driving me off the cliff of insanity-induced lust.
Rolling my hips once more, I relish the curse that bursts from his mouth: “Fuck, not here. Classroom.”
The lockers shimmy into silence as he spins us around, my legs locked around his lean waist. I kiss the underside of his chin, hearing the telltale click of a door opening. I lick the corner seam of his mouth when his ass hits a desk and he anchors me on top of him, so I’m straddling his lap. I tangle my fingers through his hair, marveling at its thickness, then release a moan when he grips my hips and roughly drags me flush against the length of his hard-on.
Dominic DaSilva is truly Hulk-sized all over.
God bless.
Inhaling sharply, my forehead drops to the hard plane of his shoulder.
There’s the scent of grass and detergent and sweat, and something that’s so uniquely Dominic that I wish I could bottle it up and keep it with me forever. For when this moment is over and locked away in a box of Feel Good Memories Never To Be Repeated Again.
“We’re going to break the desk,” I utter, raggedly.
“Does it look like I give a shit?” His hand frames my face, a wordless demand for me to lift my head and look him in the eye, and oh boy, but no, it does not actually look like he cares. Not about anything besides how our bodies feel moving against one another.
And it feels good, so inexplicably good.
Is this the way true desire is supposed to feel? Reckless and addicting, like at any given moment I’ll shatter into a million little pieces? It didn’t feel this way with Rick, not even once. I was young; he was much older. I listened when he said, “bend over,” and I obeyed, awed that a man like him would ever pay a small-town girl like me any bit of attention, when he ordered, “get down on your knees.”
I didn’t own my sexuality with my ex-husband. I didn’t force him to take my likes and needs into consideration, and I certainly never took control in the bedroom. First because I was too nervous and scared to make any sort of wrong move that he might find offensive, and then, later, because it was simply easier to do as he said, so it could all be done and over with that much sooner.
It was never like this. I was never like this.
Assertively, my hips grind down against Dominic to a sensual rhythm that feels both foreign and natural all at once. I feel my core clench when I tear my gaze away from Dominic’s feverish expression to look south.
Obscene.
Everything about this illicit moment is one for the books
.
My hands paw at his shirt, lifting the fabric so I can scour his rock-hard abs with my short, unpainted nails. His fingers have tugged down the waistband of my sweatpants—along with my underwear—and each time my hips rise up, riding the length of his erection that’s still tucked away behind his shorts, my sweats lower another inch. Exposing the narrow landing strip of hair. Narrowly exposing even more. Another inch, and he’ll see it all.
“You’re the devil,” I hear myself whimper, all too aware of where we are but unable to stop. “I went to school here.”
Gently, he bites down on my earlobe. “And now you work here.”
“You’re ruining me.”
His cock twitches against my core, like he enjoys our banter just as much as I do. “Nah,” he grinds out, his mouth hovering deliciously over mine, “the way I look at it, you’re the boss. And I’m just following your lead.”
His statement is so absurd, so utterly out-of-left-field, that I laugh even as I moan because if he keeps doing that I’m gonna come. Right here, right now. And it will be gloriously—
“I’m blue da ba dee da ba die . . .”
Dominic’s hand flexes against my butt. “What the hell is that?”
No.
No, no, no.
I clutch his face between my hands, planting my mouth on his for another heated, halfway-to-orgasm kiss.
Except that I move too fast.
Too abruptly.
There’s a moment of pure panic when I know we’re about to fall ass-to-the-ground, but I’m too wound up to think of anything but Dominic, lips, huge erection, sex, now. In that order. Then the dratted panic ensues as gravity proves almighty.
My arms pinwheel and the desk tips backward, and we land in a tangle of legs and elbows and sunglasses gone rogue.
“Ooomf.”
Dominic’s arms wrap around me, catching the brunt of my fall like a true gentleman in disguise. We’re poised at an awkward angle, his calves trussed up on the side of the metal desk like he’s on the verge of being strung up on a rotating spit above a fire. I breathe in his London High polo, my legs sprawled out behind me. For the record, his chest is marvelous. Hard, no cushiony spring in sight. The stony muscle under my cheek is the stuff of legend.
“I’m blue da ba dee da ba die!”
The massive chest beneath me deflates as he grunts, “Your ass is singing Blue by Eiffel 65.”
I fumble, arm behind my back, to grab my cell phone from my shorts pocket. Already knowing who it is, I say to Dominic, “I’m surprised you know the song.”
“Who doesn’t remember this song? It might as well have been the Baby Shark of the 90s.”
Quirking a smile at his bad joke, I stare at the lit-up screen for only a second before pressing the little green telephone and letting my head droop like a wilted flower back onto Dominic’s chest. Hello there, Bad Decisions, so nice to be reacquainted. “We’re on our way.”
“Do I even want to fucking know where the two of you went off to?” Adam shouts, loud enough to be heard halfway to Pittsburgh. “Is DaSilva dead? Is that what happened?”
Nothing about Dominic is remotely dead. No, sirree. His breathing is still ragged and his head is thrown back like he’s desperate to finish what we started and one peek down at his shorts is all I need to know that he is very much alive. And hard. So very, very hard.
“Is this not the time to fill you in that I disposed of his body?” Regretfully, I hoist myself up onto my knees. “He’s in the back garden that Principal Moyer loved so much two decades ago.”
“Levi.”
“We’re going,” I assure my boss, watching avidly as Dominic rearranges his more-than-obvious erection before standing the desk back up on its four spindly legs. I’m surprised it lasted as long as it did. They sure do make them stronger now than they did back in my day. “I promise.”
“Now, before I demote you and promote DaSilva just to see you both suffer.”
The line goes dead.
I swallow, then tuck my phone back into my pocket. Swallow again because while the nerves took a hike during our heavy-duty make-out session, they’re already back in full force.
Holy crap.
We just did that.
I just did that.
“How would you get rid of my body?” Dominic asks after a small pause, his voice gruff.
My gaze snaps up to meet his. Relief grips my shoulders when I see the humor flaring to life beneath his usual stoic expression. “Lye.” I slip his hat off my head and, indicating for him to help a girl out a little and bend down some, I settle it on top of his. “Give it a few months and no one will ever know you were there.”
He whistles low. “Savage.”
I fake a hair-toss, keenly aware of my wobbling top knot. “I don’t leave room for error.”
“What would you make of the last fifteen minutes?” Dark eyes home in on my face, laser-focused as though he’s trying to get a script for my brain. “Bad call in judgment?”
I lick my lips. Scoop up his sunglasses from the tile floor and hold them out for him to take. “In every which way,” I answer with full honesty.
My personal bubble goes pop! as he steps in close. Lowers his head to kiss the line of my jaw. “You gonna let me finish what we started?”
Like my body has a mind of its own, I feel my head tip to the side, giving him more room to play. “Give me a good reason to say yes and I’ll consider it.”
Masculine fingers loop around the hem of my shirt, knotting the fabric and drawing me in sharply against his chest. “I can think of at least three off the cuff.”
“So sure of yourself, are you?”
“Always.” A small pause as we leave the scene of the crime. “You gonna tell me why your ringtone is Blue?”
I flash him a small grin. “Oh, that’s just for Adam. Isn’t he a cranky old bastard? Not that he’s old, obviously, but you know what I mean. He’s just a little—dare I say it—blue at heart.”
“Surprisin’ me once again, Coach. I like it.” Dark, masculine laughter echoes off the lockered walls. “Have you picked out a ringtone for me?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”
“Give me a clue.”
“Call me and find out for yourself.”
Moments later, Bad Company from Five Finger Death Punch erupts from my butt pocket, and I laugh. I laugh so hard that I barely hear Dominic grumble “Low blow” from behind me, and I laugh so hard that my sides hurt and my cheeks pinch and I feel good.
Crazy what an insanely good kiss from a hot guy can do for your mood.
And Dominic’s kiss? It was . . . magic. Dark and erotic and raw but magic all the same.
I’ve never had one like it—and though I’m loathe to admit it, something tells me I’ll never have one like it again.
18
Celebrity Tea Presents:
Put A Ring On It Contestant Dominic DaSilva Pops Up in Maine! Why We Believe He’s Nursing a Broken Heart
Well, well, well, Dear Reader, how much can really change in a week’s time, you ask? In the world of reality TV, the answer is everything. We last left off with ex-NFL player Dominic DaSilva getting fired from his job. (Ensue pitiful crying soundtrack). Based on a new article I discovered online last night . . . it seems Savannah Rose’s heartbroken contestant is now living in Maine.
Yes, I said it. Maine.
The land of Red Lobster, quaint seaside towns, and rabid Red Sox fans.
Deegan Homer, a reporter for the New England Sports Advocate, had the luxury of interviewing DaSilva. In his words, the infamous former NFL tight end was, “Uncomfortable with the questions I asked, which were nothing out of the ordinary.” At another point in the article, Homer describes DaSilva as, “tight-lipped and woefully distracted. He continued to allow Levi, the head coach of the London High Wildcats, to smooth over his rough answers and awkward transitions.”
Now, Dear Reader, you might be thinking . . . Maybe DaSilva just had a bad day. We all
have them—me less often than most, I must admit. (#HumbleBrag)
But I’m keen to argue against the whole “bad day” theory.
A source close to Savannah Rose recently revealed that, after word spread of DaSilva being dumped on proposal day, he then tracked down Savannah to win her back. Word is, of course, that she rejected his offer.
If I were in his position—thank God, I’m not—Maine would also look incredibly enticing.
Which brings us to my point exactly: despite some bad and reckless behavior on the show, DaSilva has always maintained a charming, devil-may-care air. He smiles and flirts and, Dear Reader, every time he lifts his shirt I once again find my reason for breathing.
Tight-lipped. Woefully distracted. Uncomfortable with the spotlight.
This isn’t the Dominic DaSilva we’ve grown to love and adore over the last six weeks that Put A Ring On It has aired on TV.
So, I say to you, why else would DaSilva flee the state, if not to give his heart time to heal from Savannah’s stinging rejection?
As always, Dear Reader, I’ll be back next week with all the tea. Have an opinion about this whole dilemma? Drop it in the comments. Do you live in Maine and want to stalk the little town of London for the good of the cause? Drop me a line via email. Celebrity stalking is a joint effort, my friends, and when the celebrity involved is caught in a scandal . . . Well, you know what they say.
I’ll sleep when I’m dead.
19
Dominic
“It’s fucking bullshit.”
“You know what’s bullshit?” my good friend Nick Stamos retorts from my iPad, which I’ve got propped up on a tier of cardboard boxes for our video chat session. “That carpet. Jesus, my soul just withered and died on sight.”
The glare I send his way—or the iPad’s way, rather—goes unnoticed as he looks at something off camera. “Not the carpet.” Although the carpet is hideous in every way possible, too. “That Celebrity Tea Presents asshole. He’s bullshit.”