Dirty Player: A Rough Riders Novel

by Stacey Lynn

  I had barely seen Oliver all week long, but the night before he’d stopped by Stamped, insisting I stop working after I’d been at the street fair all day and was still burning the midnight oil, making more jewelry to have a bigger selection to sell on the two following days.

  My fingers were blistered and sore, my hands cramped from the work.

  I was still smiling, handing out business cards, letting everyone who stopped by know of my new business that would have its grand opening in two weeks, just before the first home game of the real season.

  Melissa was flying out for it, and I couldn’t wait to see her, but I also couldn’t wait to show off my new home, my new life…my new man.

  I grinned at the thought as a small cluster of women slowed down and approached my table.

  They whispered their appreciation of the jewelry as one of the women picked up one of the leather braided cuff bracelets. Those had yet to sell. A part of me still didn’t like the way Oliver had mentioned that a friend of his would love them, and then dropped it without explaining who it was.

  Not that it should have mattered—in the past week he’d shown me that when he decided to go all in for a relationship, to see what happened without a timeline ending things, he was really good at it.

  It wasn’t just in bed, either. On the nights we didn’t see each other, he called and checked in. We didn’t talk long, but he still made the effort—something that surprised me. But he was showing me, slowly, that he was the guy I’d seen beneath the hard layer of arrogance he easily wore like a well-tailored coat.

  He was the guy I’d seen whispering to his horses, taking care of them, and being at ease on the farm.

  Not that I’d been back there. The week before we’d spent most of the time at his crash pad and not his home, needing to be out of the apartment when Beaux was around.

  Beaux might have been okay with me dating Oliver, but I certainly wasn’t going to force him to hear about it at all hours.

  “These are beautiful,” one of the women said, lifting a set of copper-colored bangles and inspecting the charms on each: love, faith, hope, peace, kindness… They sparkled from the sun hitting them before she placed them back down. “You make all of these?”

  “I do.” I slid a business card toward her. “Stamped is the name of my business. It opens officially in two weeks, just a few doors down on this side of the street.”

  I pointed toward the red brick building.

  She took the card and smiled at me. She wouldn’t buy today, but I knew, based on the smile on her face, that she’d remember me. The way she gently seemed to brush her finger along the copper told me she was being genuine.

  “These are impressive, truly. I love every single one of them.”

  “Serena,” another woman’s voice called to her. “You have to come here.”

  The woman jerked her head, and I frowned at the mention of her name. I’d heard it before, but couldn’t remember.

  “What is it?” she asked, turning her head. Her face paled as the crowd seemed to part behind her.

  My lips spread into a wide grin as Beaux and Oliver and three other men towered over most of the other patrons. Their bulk and their height made their presence noticeable to everyone around them.

  Beaux was grinning, laughing at something someone behind him had said, when Oliver’s eyes met mine before narrowing on the woman in front of me.

  “What in the fuck are you doing here?” He practically snarled, propping his hands on his hips as he walked straight up to her. “What shit are you pulling now, Serena?”

  She smiled sweetly, a different smile from the one she’d given me earlier. If I wasn’t mistaken, she also pushed her ample breasts forward and cocked her hip. “Oliver. So good to see you again. How are you?”

  “Cut the shit, Serena. What are you doing talking to Shannon?”

  Her head whipped back before she turned to me, that catty smile still in place. “How do you two know each other? You know Oliver? My husband?”

  My mouth opened and closed with no words escaping. I flashed wide eyes to Oliver.

  “Ex,” he growled and didn’t look at me. “And our meeting with the lawyers isn’t until Monday, so what are you doing here?”

  “Can’t a girl come to town to visit friends? I do have them, you know.”

  A muscle jumped in his cheek, making his lips twist. “Leave. Now.”

  She walked up to him, and I curled my hands into fists. I wanted to reach out and tell her to stop, but I was frozen solid.

  He jerked away, pushing Rudolph back a step. He had the same scowl on his face Oliver and Beaux had.

  “Don’t touch me. You lost that right and you know it.”

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, but not so quiet I couldn’t still hear her. “I’m sorry for everything. For hurting you and leaving you. I’m sorry I was too young to be able to handle everything we went through. But if I’m honest, I’m glad I ran into you. Was going to call you before Monday. I’d like to get together and talk. See if we can maybe set some of this anger between us aside? I’ve missed you, Oliver.”

  Her voice softened further, almost pleading. It was gentle and sweet and sounded like a beautiful song—one that made me want to vomit.

  Oliver swallowed. The world seemed to shake beneath my feet when he looked at her, something in his eyes shining that I hadn’t seen before—not directed at me, anyway.

  This was his ex-wife. Essentially throwing herself at him. And he was standing there considering it.

  He stepped back then, looked over her shoulder, and avoided my gaze. “I’ll see you Monday.”

  She licked her lips and stepped back, turning to me as she did. The wounded expression in her light brown eyes evened out as she caught my gaze.

  “It was lovely to meet you, Shannon. How do you know Oliver?”

  “The new quarterback for the Rough Riders, Beaux, is my brother,” I explained, my mouth feeling parched and thick.

  Behind her, Oliver didn’t argue. He didn’t say a thing. He didn’t tell her that I was with him now, or that he’d moved on from her.

  It hurt more than it should have. More than it had the right to. When Serena’s gaze traveled over my face and then lower before she looked me back in the eyes, something like relief shined in them. “Oh. That makes sense then. Hopefully we’ll be seeing more of each other soon.”

  Still, Oliver said nothing. Did nothing. Didn’t tell her she was wrong, or that she was outside her ever-loving mind if he thought for one second I’d have anything to do with her and why.

  I couldn’t respond to her, and she didn’t wait for me to, anyway. Instead, she waved my card in the air before sliding it into her purse and telling me she’d see me soon.

  Oliver turned and watched her walk away.

  Conflict darkened his hazel eyes when he scrubbed a hand down his face. “We need to talk, Shannon.”

  An ice cold shiver rolled through me, making the hair on the back of my neck stand up. “I’m busy.”

  “Later then.” He dragged his eyes to mine then, as if he was forcing himself to look at me instead of watching his ex-wife walk away.

  Ex. The word seemed to grow louder inside my mind with every passing moment.

  My lips were too dry to speak, too cracked and chapped. I could only stare at him while Beaux pushed himself through the tent until he was next to me.

  I jumped when he put his hand on my shoulder, squeezing it.

  “I don’t know when I’ll be done, Oliver.”

  I didn’t want to talk to him. I didn’t want to hear any of it. Beaux stood next to me, radiating the need to protect me, but I didn’t want that either.

  I wanted to go back to this morning—or two weeks ago when Oliver and I had met, and I wanted to do everything different. The look he’d just given Serena wasn’t the look of a man who was over his wife, but a look that screamed he still loved her, still wanted her, and would take her if given the chance. The fact that Beaux seemed to
pick up on it as quick as I had made it more obvious. Not to mention humiliating.

  “Call me when you’re done here?”

  It wasn’t so much a question, but a demand.

  When I nodded, he lifted his gaze to Beaux’s and then looked at Rudolph. “I need to go,” he muttered, pushing past Rudolph.

  “Powell,” he called out, but Oliver didn’t turn around. He didn’t look back.

  He just followed the same path Serena had taken moments before, like a man trailing after the woman he’d lost once and refused to lose again.

  “Shit.” Rudolph groaned and ran a hand through his hair. “I gotta go get him. See you later?”

  He looked at Beaux, and I assumed he nodded, but I didn’t hear if he said anything. Blood rushed through my veins as I sat there, frozen, wondering what in the hell had just happened.

  Chapter SIXTEEN

  SHANNON

  I turned off the electric handsaw and rubbed my eyes, squeezing them closed. It was late and I knew I’d been in my workroom for hours, but I couldn’t stop working.

  I had to stay busy. After the festival had ended, I’d packed everything up and closed down. I should have been grateful for the amount of sales and new contacts I’d made, and I was, but I was also still thinking of the moment Oliver had turned to me, a distance in eyes like he didn’t really see me, and then walked away. He’d hurried after his ex-wife, followed her like he still wanted her.

  It stung more than it should have. I was trying to trust a man who not only had a reputation of being a huge player, a man who tossed aside women after only one night, but after I’d been cheated on.

  My trust in men was shaky at best.

  I had turned off my phone hours earlier, choosing to avoid the possibility of a reality that I didn’t want to face.

  Immature? Yes.

  Necessary to my mental health? Most definitely.

  I had a pair of pliers in my hand, twisting a braided copper design around another wide, dark-chocolate-colored leather band, when a loud bang sounded from the front of my building.

  I jumped and turned toward my closed office door, dropping the pliers, before I moved to the counter and grabbed my phone.

  As I turned it on, another thump hit the door, quickly followed by another.

  I cursed and stared at my phone, willing it to restart faster in case I needed it, only to have it begin blowing up with texts and missed calls.

  Almost all of them from Oliver. Three voicemails. Four missed calls. Seven text messages, each one becoming increasingly irritated.

  Want to talk. Call me when you can.

  Where are you? Tried calling. Call me back.

  Damn it, Shan. Call me.

  Then there was one from Beaux.

  Hey, fucking call Oliver. He’s trying to reach you and now I’m worried. Where are you?

  Dread sank into my gut as the pounding increased. I opened the door to my office only to hear my name being bellowed.

  The sight of Oliver forced my breath to stall in my chest like it always did. His one hand fisted and pounded on my front door while he shouted my name, looking into my building.

  It wasn’t his rage that I caught in his eyes first. That came after I couldn’t help but notice the way he was dressed so casually. Khaki gray shorts hung fitted on trim hips and curved around his muscled thighs. Leather flip-flop sandals showed off perfect calves and feet, and a red-and-blue Captain America T-shirt, faded with that vintage look, stretched across rolling pecs and abs. A frayed black hat pulled down low over his eyes so I could just barely see the wisps of his dirty blond hair peeking out from beneath it as he pounded on my building window beneath the street light.

  “Where the hell have you been?” he shouted as he saw me frozen in my spot in the hallway.

  Two perfectly arched brows disappeared beneath the bill of his hat.

  Adrenaline buzzed in my ears as I became unstuck and hurried to the front door, unlocking it.

  “What do you want?” It was snippier than intended, less rude than it could have been. Irritation couldn’t be hidden at the way he’d lit up my phone, angry that I would have the nerve to avoid him after the crap he’d pulled earlier.

  “You didn’t answer your phone.”

  “I didn’t want to talk to you.”

  “Why?” A small head tilt, a very brief look of confusion flashed through his eyes. “I said we’d talk later. That I wanted to see you.”

  My eyes went wide. The urge to slam the door in his face was strong. I withheld it, barely. “How was Serena?”

  “Shit.” His face scrunched up, and with one hand he removed his hat, smoothed back his hair unnecessarily, and flopped the cap back on his head. “I’d like to talk to you. But don’t avoid me like that. It made me worried.”

  His eyes narrowed, as if the admission came before he meant it to, as if he wasn’t used to giving a crap about people.

  Perhaps he wasn’t. He was great in bed. Fun to talk to. He was also strung tight and intense and not what anyone would ever call laid back, despite his current appearance.

  “I would think by the way I didn’t answer calls or texts earlier, you’d get the hint I didn’t want that to happen. That doesn’t give you the right to come down here and bang on my door.”

  His jaw tightened. “I was worried. When Beaux didn’t know where you were…” Another hat-removal-hand-swipe.

  A sense of disgust rolled through me. Immaturity wasn’t the way I wanted to deal with obstacles. Neither was running. But staying had never worked out so great for me in the past, either. In all honesty, I didn’t think I’d hear from him at all.

  “Come on in.” I relented and moved back, allowing him access to Stamped. Like the first time, he wandered to the display cases, most of them empty since I’d sold so much. The more expensive pieces were on display because I didn’t think they would do well at a street fair. People tended to like less expensive things they could pick up while they wandered, so I’d left the larger, more elegant and intricate designs in their cases, showing them in photographs in a display book.

  I was taking them the next day—the last day of the show. I’d had too much interest.

  “Have you been working all night?” he asked, dragging his eyes to mine. They lacked the anger he had carried in them earlier, and now he looked tired.

  Dark circles under his eyes, a slight slump to his shoulders. The man looked like he needed to go to sleep at least four hours ago.

  Remorse for my behavior flickered down my spine.

  “I can’t get over how talented you are.”

  His praise washed over me like a gentle caress. “I’m sorry about my phone. I turned it off, but I shouldn’t have done that.” I waved it in the air. “At the very least, it’s not safe.”

  “And you were pissed because I took off after Serena.”

  He laid it out there straight, no hesitancy, like he had nothing to hide.

  “We’d been talking before you came up. You hadn’t ever mentioned her, although Beaux told me some. I was waiting for you to bring her up, though. It seemed like something you’d share with someone...”

  My voice trailed. I had no idea how to finish that thought. Three weeks before, we were strangers; a week before, we’d ended a ridiculous timeline. Now…I had no idea what we were except great fuck-buddies and maybe friends.

  “Someone I’m in a relationship with?”

  He took a step toward me, but my eyes stayed fixed on where he’d just been. If he was expecting me to put that out there, I was too vulnerable. Too afraid.

  “Shannon.”

  It was just a word, rolling off luscious lips that could be firm and sweet, soft and gentle, and hard and demanding. It sounded like a song.

  “What?”

  “I was going to tell you about her. I didn’t know how. She’s not someone I talk about—like to think about, for that matter.”

  He tugged off his hat again, another swipe of his hair. Unable to help myself, I hi
d a smile. Apparently, he wasn’t the only one who played with their hair when they were nervous.

  I made it easier for him, stepping aside like I always did. “You don’t owe me anything, or any explanations. It’s not your fault it hurt me when you walked away like that.”

  Looking so lost, like he just had to be with her.

  “That’s not it. It’s not at all, but the story is long and twisted. Are you done here?”

  “Yeah.” I wanted to know. I had to know before anything could move forward, if that was the direction we were heading.

  Plus, I’d been killing time in my determination to avoid him.

  My phone buzzed in my hand and I glanced down. It was Beaux.

  You don’t fucking tell me you’re not battered and beaten behind the alley in two minutes and I’m calling the cops or kicking your ass.

  I’m alive.

  I quickly texted back.

  Oliver is here. Stand down, cowboy.

  Don’t do that to me again. Was worried sick about you, Sis.

  I glanced up at Oliver. His eyes still on mine. “Sorry. That was Beaux. You made him worried.”

  “Glad someone else was.”

  It was sick and twisted. I liked knowing he cared enough to worry. When I went out with girlfriends, I would always text Patrick to let him know when I was coming home. He’d go out with friends and I’d never hear from him.

  Some nights he wouldn’t come home at all. But had he been alone those nights?

  I shook the errant thought away and sighed.

  “Sorry. Again. It was immature and not me—I was just angry. And confused that I didn’t have the right to be.”

  “Of course you do.” His voice tightened and his words clipped staccato sounds. “Fucking hell, Shannon. I’ve been fucking you for weeks. Don’t you think that entitles you to at least some honesty?”

  I would figure. I was also new to the fuck-buddy, dating-rebound stage.

  “Fine. Serena then.”

  He glanced around the building and cringed. “You might need to sit for this.”