Head in the Game (Game Day #1)

by Lily Cahill

  She laughs, shaking her head. I can almost see the moment when she decides to do it. “Hang on.”

  She scampers out of the studio for a moment, then comes back dragging a chair from the front balcony. “Over here, by the window. Just sit. Casually,” she says, arranging my limbs. “Good. Good. Tilt your head … there.”

  She steps back to admire me. She had posed me comfortably, with legs spread and one arm hooked on the back of the chair. “How’s that?” she asks, scrutinizing my position.

  “Fine. Just one thing,” I say, reaching out one arm and pulling her in for a kiss.

  We’re both turned on, so it doesn’t take much for the kiss to turn incendiary. But when she starts to straddle me, I push her back. “Draw me,” I say, my voice hoarse with need. “I want you to draw me first.”

  I’m not sure why the idea fascinates me so much. I’m proud of my body, though I’m not much of a show-off. But I want to see what Lilah looks like while she draws. I want to see what she looks like when she lets her guard down. I want to see what she sees in me.

  Even though I’ve talked with her, laughed with her, and fucked her in every way my dirty mind can imagine, it still isn’t enough. I still feel like she’s holding back. There are places in her where we don’t go. She won’t talk about her mom and barely talks about Natalie. When I talk about football, I can feel her attention wandering.

  I want to tell her that I feel like I’m entering a new phase in my football career, spurred by Coach Prescott and this new version of the Mustangs. I’m realizing all over again how much I love the game. We still aren’t playing perfectly, but I can feel the potential of our team simmering under the surface. The rape scandal is the past; now we have a chance to rewrite our future.

  But Lilah can’t, or won’t, understand that. She’s stuck in the past, so certain that nothing about the Mustangs has changed.

  But my body … that has her full attention. She is completely into my body, and how I can make hers feel. When we have sex, I love watching as her eyes darken with arousal, then go blind with pleasure. She is so responsive, as hungry and desperate as all my fantasies. It’s not enough, though—I want her in every part of my life, I want her in my future. But if sex is the way to get her there, then so be it.

  Sitting here now, I notice that her hands shake a bit as she picks up the pencil and approaches her sketchpad. I adjust slightly, tensing my ab muscles, but never take my eyes off of her. Over the next half-hour, I get an education.

  I sometimes use models or pictures when I’m carving, to make sure I get the details right. But I’ve never been as focused, as observant, as Lilah is in that thirty minutes. Her hand moves quickly, though she barely glances at the drawing. Instead, her eyes consume me. I can all but feel the heat of her gaze as she contours my muscles, absorbing every inch of my frame.

  Every part of me is subject to her gaze. I become aware of my ankles, my thighs, my ribs. I know she’s memorizing each part of me, making it part of her. And her eyes. They’re so intense, so focused. I thought I would see her without her guard up, but it was me who’s being stripped, heart laid bare.

  While she works, I watch her in turn. She’s wearing what I’m sure she considers casual work clothes—black leggings and a silky sleeveless blouse that’s already well-spattered with paint. She’s barefoot, but a pair of high-heeled sandals are sitting by the door. The more I get to know her body, the more I want it. I brought her roses because the petals remind me of her skin—smooth, fragrant, lush. My mouth is dry, my heart racing, my cock aching. But still, I only watch.

  Then, all too soon and yet not soon enough, she’s finished. I can see it in the way her shoulders settle, her eyes clear. She sets down her pencil, steps back. Then turns the easel toward me.

  She’s drawn me in quick lines, somehow infusing power and movement into my relaxed pose. Every muscle is lovingly detailed, but she put the most of her work into my face. My desire is there, but also a natural confidence that I don’t always feel.

  “What do you think?” she says, as I stand up from my chair.

  In answer, I haul her body against mine, kissing her with a desperate hunger. Knowing that she saw me like that—strong, sexy, certain—makes me mad with desire. She’s on her toes, plastered against me, but it’s not enough, not nearly close enough.

  I pick her up under her thighs, loving the way she moans, and take two staggering steps until I have her pressed against the wall. I grind my cock against her soft leggings, feeling the heat of her through layers of fabric, as she runs her hands and mouth over as much of my torso as she can reach. I find the waistband of her leggings and plunge my hands underneath her ample ass.

  She arches into me, moaning, then arrows her hands straight down the center of my torso. Impatiently, she shoves my boxer briefs down, freeing my straining cock. The purring sound that whispers out of her is enough to make my muscles shake, even before she wraps both hands around me and begins to stroke.

  I press her against the wall, trapping her hands. “Why are you wearing so many clothes?” I pant, trying and failing to shove her leggings off. The heat of her pussy is so close to my fingertips. I don’t wait for an answer, just drop her to her feet and strip her pants to the ankles in one move.

  She’s not wearing underwear. I can smell her arousal—the sweetest scent I’ve ever encountered. Hungry for her, I don’t wait until she has her feet clear of the pants before I claim her with my mouth.

  Feeling her buck and clutch at my head has me smiling into her pussy. I settle on my knees and lift one of her legs over my shoulder. I want full access, so my tongue can reach the core of her. I look up to see her fondling her own breasts, half out of that silky shirt, as she throws back her head in ecstasy.

  I add fingers to what my tongue is doing and drive her, drive her, drive her, until her knees give out. She is almost incoherent as she collapses into me, her limbs boneless with pleasure. I know her now—I know I can make her come until she’s brainless, and still her body will stir for me. And I need her, need to be inside her. I need her to take me in, all of me.

  I leave her for only a moment, so I can find one of the condoms I’ve started carrying in bulk. When I turn back, she’s sitting up against the wall, still wearing her shirt, watching me as she teases her fingers over her wet, open pussy. She bites her lip as she watches me roll the condom down my length, circling her clit with the tip of one finger. Any blood that was left in my brain flows right to my cock. “Yes,” I say hoarsely. “Make yourself come for me.”

  She gasps, but doesn’t stop. I stand over her, stroking my throbbing cock, as I watch her pleasure herself. Her eyes never leave my face, and I revel in the desire she can so plainly see there. The fingers of one hand twirl and plunge while she pinches her nipple through her shirt. When she comes, her eyes flutter back in her head while she utters a soft moan. It’s the most erotic thing I’ve ever seen in my life.

  I fall to my knees and kiss her as I hurriedly strip the rest of her clothes off. When she’s naked, I lay back and pull her on top of me. It’s broad daylight. The sunlight sparkling through the window brings out the dark sheen of her skin, and I can’t help but take her generous breasts in my hands as she braces herself over me.

  She takes all of me in one long stroke, which makes me groan with feverish pleasure. So hot, so tight, so fucking wet. Instead of pumping against me, she leans back as if she’s posing and licks her fingertip. Then, her eyes on mine, she strokes her clit while I’m inside her until I feel her clench with orgasm.

  I’m beyond thought, beyond waiting. I’m always careful to be gentle with her, but she has driven me beyond reason. I flip her over, heedless of her back on the hard floor, and take one of her nipples between my teeth as I drive myself into her. She screams, but it’s not in pain—she locks her legs and arms around me, trying to drive my cock even deeper. I lift her hips higher, my hands tight as a vise as I angle her so I can thrust into her even harder.

  Her arms
fall to her sides, grasping desperately for purchase on the wood floor. Her eyes are wide, wild, her lips parted as she gasps and moans. I’m hammering into her now, no thought in my head other than the primal need to take us both over the edge into madness. When I can’t wait any longer, I kiss her, our mouths mating as closely as our bodies. Then the world goes white.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Lilah

  RILEY LIES ON TOP OF me, pressing me into the warm, wood floor. I welcome his weight. Who needs to breathe?

  He’s nuzzling his face into the side of my head, where a thick fuzz is starting to grow. I have been contemplating shaving it again, since I’m enjoying my mohawk. But with Riley rubbing his face against my stubble, I’m suddenly inspired to carve some geometric patterns into my hair instead. And why not? Riley likes my mohawk, my tattoos … my everything.

  I had assumed, because he’s a football player, that he would be a clean-cut guy into clean-cut girls. He not—he’s into me. Maybe, if he gets more of a taste of my artistic world, he’ll be into that too. He’s so talented, and he’s wasting it for that stupid game. If I could only prove to him that art is an option too ….

  With a groan, he rolls off of me, but pulls me with him until I’m sprawled across his chest. I bury my nose in his neck, loving the way he smells. I love his body, and his sweetness, and his sense of humor. I know myself well enough to be sure I’m falling for him hard, and I’ve almost given up trying to stop it.

  “Somebody’s honking,” he says, his voice thick.

  I jerk my head up so fast I nearly get whiplash. “Gamma!” I say, scrambling to my feet and beginning the hunt for my clothes. “She’s back from the store. I told her to honk so I could help her with the groceries.”

  “Cool. Can I meet her?”

  I look at him, sprawled naked on the floor of my tiny studio, his cock still huge even though it’s limp. “Not like that.”

  He grins, his dimple popping, as he levers himself off the floor. He gets rid of the condom and somehow manages to dress himself before I do. Just a moment ago, I was luxuriating in post-coital satisfaction; now I feel hot and harried and nervous. “Where the hell is my bra?”

  Riley dangles it from one finger. “Come and get it.”

  “This isn’t funny,” I huff, grabbing it from his hand. My fingers fumble with the bra, like I haven’t been wearing one for a decade.

  “You don’t have my view,” he says, watching me wrestle my boobs into the cups.

  “My grandma is waiting,” I say, just as my words are punctuated by two quick beeps.

  I throw on my shirt and am still buttoning it as I run for the door, when Riley stops me.

  “Hang on, you have something on your face.”

  “What?” I ask, patting my cheeks.

  He approaches, then bends down to give me a quick kiss. “There. Got it.”

  My heart swells even as I roll my eyes. “Try not to look so … satisfied.”

  “Oh, but I am,” Riley says as he follows me out of the studio. “At least, for now.”

  The promise in his words sends a shudder through me. The man is turning me into a sex addict.

  I clatter down the outside stairs and wave to Gamma, who has apparently decided not to wait for me. “I’ll get it, I’ll get it,” I call, worried I’ll see strain on my grandmother’s face.

  “I got it already,” Gamma says, hoisting a recyclable bag out of the trunk of her car.

  “You should have waited for me,” I scold, taking the bag from her. She’s a little red—is she overheated? “Go on in the house, I’ll take care of this.”

  She tugs the bag back from me. “I’m not an invalid, Lilah. I can carry some groceries twenty feet to the kitchen.”

  “Yeah, but you don’t have to.” The memory of her heart attack tugs at my conscious, all the fear of that moment coming back.

  “I want to.”

  “Let me do it,” I implore.

  “No,” says a deep voice beside me. “Let me do it.”

  In my panic, I have somehow forgotten Riley. And also somehow forgotten that this is the first time he’s meeting my grandmother. Belatedly, I remember my manners. “Gamma, this is Riley Brulotte. Riley, this is my grandmother.”

  “Pleasure to meet you, ma’am,” Riley says, and I can almost hear his dimple winking. “I’m a friend of Lilah’s. And, an expert grocery carrier,” he says, graciously slipping the bag from her grip.

  My grandmother looks back and forth between us. “A friend of Lilah’s?”

  “Actually, ma’am, she was my teacher this past semester. I was so impressed with her talent and natural teaching ability, I basically begged her to start hanging out with me.”

  “Cool it, suck-up,” I mutter. But my grandmother is already puffing up with the chance to talk about her favorite subject—me.

  “Did you know she was painting when she was five? I mean, all kids are painting at that age, but Lilah’s talent was always above and beyond.”

  “Is that so?” Riley asks, reaching into the trunk for more groceries. “That’s about the time I started playing football.”

  “I was going to say, a big boy like you—you must be a Mustang.” She shoots me an odd look—she’s heard me rant about football players more times in the last six months than I can count. “You boys going to make us proud this year?”

  “I sure hope so,” Riley says, darkness flickering over his face for a moment. “It’s been a long climb, but we’re giving it everything we’ve got.”

  Gamma arches an eyebrow. “The way the girls were talking in the salon this morning, it doesn’t seem as though that’s going to be enough.”

  Riley pauses, then says smoothly, “We’re a lot more than we look on the field, ma’am. We just need a little more time to prove it.”

  My grandmother eyes him for a long moment. Whatever she sees in Riley must satisfy her, because her face relaxes into a smile. “Come on inside, and I’ll get you something cold to drink.”

  “I’d love some milk,” Riley says, gathering the rest of the groceries in his huge hands.

  And just like that, they’re fast friends. Gamma starts teasing him about putting him to work, and Riley replies with a story about carrying some farm animal that has her laughing in minutes. I follow them inside, feeling oddly excluded. Why hasn’t Riley told me that story? He’s hardly mentioned his life back home. Does he think I won’t care about where he came from?

  Does he care about where I came from?

  I push that thought aside. I came from right here, I remind myself. My good-for-nothing mother may have birthed me, but my grandmother created me. She’s the one person on earth I can count on, no matter what.

  And she is currently showing Riley through the house. Honestly, it’s freaking me out to have him here. It feels too real, like suddenly my life is in acrylics when I’d gotten used to watercolors. There’s a football player in my house. Riley “Lotto” Brulotte … in my house … charming my grandmother. How did my life get here?

  I’ve always introduced Gamma to the guys I’m seeing. But Riley, I haven’t even mentioned. Until today, I haven’t even let him into the house. And that’s because he’s a football player.

  The thought makes me feel sick with shame. If he were just any student, or a fellow artist, or basically anyone else, I would feel much more comfortable bringing him into my life. Then there wouldn’t be all this baggage—Natalie, the team, our different lifestyles.

  “Here’s the picture I wanted to show you,” Gamma says, pulling me from my increasingly sour reverie. I can only watch in horror as she pushes open my bedroom door and ushers Riley into my cluttered room. She plucks a framed photo from amidst the chaos of my vanity table. “Isn’t that just the cutest thing?”

  Riley holds the photo, smiling. I know what it is without looking. Gamma kneeling next to a ten-year-old me, her arm around my shoulder as I brace a canvas almost as big as I am. My gap-toothed grin is just as bright as the third-place ribbon fro
m a local contest affixed to the painting.

  “This is great,” he says, his words warm. “Is this painting around somewhere?”

  “I sold it,” I say abruptly. Riley looks up and met my eyes.

  “Lilah insists on selling everything,” my grandmother says, her disapproval clear. “Of course I’m glad that pretty much any gallery in the state will sell her work, but I’d like to keep some of it with us.”

  “That’s all well and good, but we’ve got bills to pay,” I remind her. “I’m not so precious about my work that I won’t make a living.”

  Riley’s eyes are still on mine. “You’ve sold every painting you’ve ever done?”

  I shrug. “Once I’m finished, that’s it. Keeping it around won’t make the work any better.”

  Riley’s eye is drawn to his sculpture, displayed on a shelf in the corner. “But you’ll keep a piece someone else made?”

  “Inspiration,” I say, catching a pleased flush running up his neck.

  My grandmother notices the rough wooden carving of the reaching arm for the first time. “Lilah, this is wonderful. Where did it come from?”

  “Riley made it.” If he were an artist, I realize, I would be telling anyone who would listen all about him. About his talent—about our relationship. It would be so much easier to explain. Instead, I’m falling in love with a football player, and I can barely explain it to myself.

  “Riley! Well. I didn’t realize you were so multi-talented. What a wonderful thing for the two of you to have in common.” Gamma, who obviously hasn’t bought the whole “friend” thing, beams at me. “Aren’t you a catch. Polite, charming …,” Gamma grins wickedly and glances at me. “And so strong.”

  Oh, Christ. I can tell from the look on Gamma’s face that she is all but planning our wedding. I jump in. “I believe you promised this polite, charming, strong man some milk,” I say, arching a look at Riley.

  “Oh, yes, of course. I baked some chai spice cake last night, as well,” she says, pulling the picture from his hand and setting it back on my vanity. She pauses, waiting for Riley to offer his arm, which he does. I swear, I don’t know who’s buttering up whom right now. Gamma smiles so wide she’s nearly glowing. “And I want you to tell me all about that new coach. The pictures in the paper make him look just like Denzel Washington.”