by Amy Andrews
“A…slip.”
Val almost laughed. “As in, you tripped, and your dick slipped into me?”
He did laugh, but sobered quickly. “No. That was a hundred percent deliberate.”
Her heart leapt at the admission, but her more pragmatic angels prevailed. “But not what you came here for.”
He sighed. “No. I really did just come here to check on you. To talk about the night we met.”
“And we did. We agreed that I was all right and that night was great, but shouldn’t happen again because of your career, and then we blew it. We…slipped.” She smiled at the euphemism.
She’d slipped up a lot in life. Never had it resulted in a mind-blowing orgasm. Clearly she’d been doing it all wrong.
“But we really, really, really can’t let it happen again. I’ve seen my father bench players for far less provocation than you’ve just given him. He doesn’t believe in idle threats, Kyle.”
“Yeah.” He gave a half laugh. “I figured that one out already.”
“So this is it. Finito.” Val chopped her hand through the air to underscore her point. “The last time. We can’t do this again.”
He nodded. “Agreed.”
But it was as reluctant as hell. He didn’t look that certain, and they both needed to be on the same page with this or it was never going to work. “Why do I sense a but there somewhere?”
His sigh whispered to all the parts of her that were still excitable from their last encounter. “I just wish I’d known it was going to be it, you know? I could have prepared mentally. Plus—” He took a step toward her, and Val’s senses, still in a state of alert, sizzled with awareness. “I could have made it really good for you.”
Really good? Christ, if he could do better than that, she was a bloody goner. “Did you hear me complaining?”
“No.”
Of course he didn’t. Because he’d rendered her speechless. “Then you can rest easy, big guy.” She patted him on the shoulder, an impulsive, affectionate gesture. Immediately she wished she hadn’t. They didn’t have that kind of relationship, as evidenced by the itch in her fingers. An itch demanding she curl said fingers into his shirt and drag him close.
She snatched her hand back. He noticed, but thankfully ignored it. “So we just carry on as normal? Like nothing ever happened between us?”
“Yep. It’s not like we’ll see each other that much, is it? The odd home game get-together at Tanner’s. The occasional official rugby function. Easy.”
His cocked eyebrow mocked her attempts at downplaying their crazy chemistry. “Easy?”
“Yes.” She doubled down, clinging desperately to her conviction. “I think perhaps it would be advisable for us not to ever be alone together, if it can be avoided.”
He chuckled. “You think?”
The chemistry flared between them, so did her temper. For the love of all that was holy, she was doing this for him. If he wasn’t Kyle-hotshot-Leighton, she’d be fucking him and flaunting it at every opportunity. And screw what her father said. “I’m trying to look out for your career, Kyle. Remember that?”
“What if I could have both? What if I told you I could handle my career and your father just fine without dancing around and pretending I’m not totally hot for his daughter?”
Val’s stomach did a three-sixty turn in her belly. Her heart did the same in her chest. “You’ve known me for two weeks.”
The whole thing was bloody preposterous.
“I was hot for you the moment I saw you sitting on that barstool all alone, murdering olives with a toothpick.”
God. She wished Kyle would stop saying all the right things. It made him very hard to resist. But she’d known her father for much longer than Kyle had. She knew how bloody minded he was, and Kyle damaging his career like this over some chick he picked up in a bar was monumentally stupid.
Nobody gave up the chance of a lifetime for a bit of tail.
She appreciated Kyle’s bravado, but her father couldn’t be handled. The only person who could really do that was Eve, and there were times when he sorely tested her calm, unflappable demeanour.
Val knew she’d never forgive herself for getting between Kyle and her father. The sex was good—incredibly good—but some things were bigger.
“Trust me, you’ll thank me for this one day.” He eyed her dubiously. “Rugby glory, Kyle. My dad can make that happen.”
His tawny gaze glittered at her, obviously torn between the temptation of the flesh and the temptation of the pitch. Of achieving his lifelong goal. No matter how much he wanted her, she knew he wanted that more.
She didn’t know Kyle very well, but she knew guys just like him. Driven. Focused. Ambitious. Every Smoke player, every pro rugby player was the same. They wanted to be the best. The top of their game. They wanted the glory. And they worked their asses off to get it.
She knew without having to even ask him that Kyle would have been working toward the glory all his life. He wouldn’t give it up. And she wouldn’t let him.
“Is this your way of wriggling out of your offer of free Chelsea buns for all eternity?”
Val laughed, a burst of noise to relieve the tension. He was finally thinking with his big head again. “Absolutely not.”
“I’m not going to stop coming here every morning to collect.”
Her stomach squirmed deliciously at his choice of words. Just as he’d no doubt intended. “As long as you stay out there”—she hooked her thumb over her shoulder—“we should be fine.”
“I don’t think you and I will ever be fine.”
Val nodded slightly, conceding his point. Maybe so. But that wasn’t important, and she was done talking about this.
Calling it quits was the right thing to do, and once he had some time and space that wasn’t soaked in hormones or vanilla, he’d see it, too.
He was twenty-four and a brilliant rugby player with a stellar future. He wasn’t some guy who was young and dumb and full of come. He just needed to start thinking with his balls—the rugby variety—not the ones dangling between his legs.
And in the meantime, she’d protect him from himself and the consequences of his baser urges.
“Time to go now. I have some more biscuits to bake.”
He took a step back. Resigned more than enthusiastic. “Fine. But I’ll see you in the morning.”
Val shook her head. “No. I’ll be in here, as always. And you’ll be out there. Neither of us will have time to chat. But I’ll probably see you at Tanner’s after the game in a fortnight if you’re going to be there.”
Tanner and Matilda always had a post-match pizza and beer night after every home game at their gorgeous harbourside apartment at Woolloomooloo.
“I’ll be there.”
Goose bumps pricked her skin at the illicit promise in his deep, growly voice. Her nipples stung as they tightened and rubbed again against her bra. At least they wouldn’t be alone, and she clung to that as Kyle left.
There was safety and sanity in numbers.
…
Kyle called into Sticky Fingers the next morning at his usual quarter to six. The sky had just started to lighten in what promised to be another beautiful, sunny, Sydney winter morning. It was nippy for now, though. Cool enough for track pants, but not enough to zip up his hoodie, and Griff would have them all sweating bullets soon enough.
A waft of sugar and spice and all things nice hit him as he opened the door to the bakery, and he was practically flattened by the potent memory of Val’s mouthwatering vanilla aroma. So potent his cock jumped to swift attention.
Kyle couldn’t recall ever having a stiffy in a bakery before, but he had a feeling it was about to become a regular thing. Considering how busy it was inside, including the presence of three old ladies and two senior girls from a posh city high school, that could be a problem.
He zipped up his hoodie and waited his turn, trying not to peer through the slats of the swing doors and failing miserably. Not that he cou
ld see a thing. Not above or below, either. Not even a glimpse. One lousy glimpse. Something to put a lift in his step and a smile on his face when Griff was pushing him to breaking point and all he wanted to do was die.
He knew what she said yesterday was right. That they needed to stop, draw a line. That he’d be throwing away years of hard work for sex. Really fucking good sex, but something ultimately frivolous, nonetheless. Something he could get elsewhere. Get anywhere. If he really wanted.
Except he didn’t. And sex had never felt less frivolous.
Suddenly it felt very fucking vital. Like oxygen.
And rugby.
Since yesterday, he’d gone over and over the arguments for leaving Val the fuck alone. Incessantly. He’d hardly thought of anything else, so he understood all the reasons he needed to stay away. But his body—the one he relied on, that had never let him down, that had never led him astray—just wasn’t on board.
And the funny little grip on his heart, the catch in his breath when he thought about her? That was even more worrying.
“Hi, Kyle.” The woman behind the counter smiled at him familiarly, the same way she’d been doing every morning since she started here about six months ago.
“Hey, Sandy.”
Val’s front woman was a pretty blonde in her thirties. She had a wedding ring, but she liked to flirt with her eyes a little. Not because she had any clue who he was, but because she did it with all the customers, young or old, male or female. She liked her job and she liked her customers, and the customers loved her. A great asset to any business. Val had chosen well.
“You’re in someone’s good books, I hear,” she said, her eyes dancing at him.
Kyle cocked an eyebrow, wondering just how much Sandy knew about what had gone down here yesterday. “Oh?”
“Val tells me you can have your heart’s—or should I say your stomach’s—desire for free from now until eternity.”
He grinned. “Lucky me.”
“I wasn’t aware you two were acquainted.”
“We recently…” Hooked up. And had hot sex. On two different occasions. And now I can’t think of anything else and I’m destined to get a hard-on every time I pass within one city block of a bakery. “Met.”
She raised an eyebrow, clearly amused at his stumbling response. “Are you going to tell me what you did to warrant such special treatment, because Val wouldn’t say, which is rather mean of her, I think.”
He chuckled. Not mean—smart. He’d been with women who couldn’t wait to Facebook, tweet, or Instagram all about their apparent shenanigans. “Can she hear us back there?” The swing doors were directly behind Sandy’s head.
Sandy grinned. “I bloody hope so.” She folded her arms, obviously unconcerned by the waiting customers. As most of them seemed to be unashamedly listening into the conversation, he didn’t think any were going to complain. “Well?”
“It’s top secret, I’m afraid.” Kyle remembered how Val had pulled that one on him the night they met, and he smiled. He hoped like hell she was listening, too. “I could tell you, but I’d have to kill you.”
Sandy rolled her eyes good-naturedly, but didn’t push. She grabbed a pair of tongs with a flourish. “The usual?”
“You know it.”
She crossed to the section of the cabinet that housed the sweet buns. The croissants were next door and they were, as usual, rapidly dwindling.
“Actually. I’ll have two, thanks.”
“Of course you will,” Sandy said, shooting him a sassy smile as she grabbed another bun with some tongs. “They’re free, right? And you’re carb loading? Or something?” Her frank gaze swept over him, leaving him in no doubt she liked what she saw, but in that abstract way people admired movie stars or celebrities, enjoying the eye candy, happy and secure in the knowledge it could never be.
Kyle chuckled. “No. I owe somebody one.”
She arched an eyebrow. “Would this someone be of the female variety?”
“You think I’m going to get a dude a bun with pink icing on it?”
“I think it’s a little late for you to be worrying about manly buns,” she replied with a cheeky smile as she handed over the paper bags with the goods.
Kyle took them, his gaze flicking sideways to the swinging doors. “Could you give Val a message for me?”
“I can get her for you, if you like?”
“Nah.” He shook his head. Val was right—best she stay on one side of the door, and he firmly on the other. “Just tell her…nice buns.”
Sandy threw back her head and laughed, and, with one last look at the slatted doors, he ceded his place at the counter and went out into the cold.
Thirty minutes later he was at Henley, detouring to Eve’s office on his way to the locker room. She didn’t usually get in ’til after eight, but it wasn’t like Chelsea buns went off. He placed it in the middle of her spotless desk, still in its Sticky Fingers paper bag.
He owed her for the tip-off. He and Val had talked, cleared the air, and redrawn their boundaries. The fact they hadn’t been able to keep their hands off each other and gone for it on her kitchen bench had all been part of the process.
It was the end result that was the important thing.
It’d certainly been worth a Chelsea bun or two.
Chapter Eight
Val was nervous. She was never nervous in the corporate box at Henley stadium. If anything, apart from the bakery, it was where she felt most at home, watching her beloved Smoke play the game that had been bred into her DNA.
But she’d never screwed one of the players before, either. Sure, last time she was here a couple of weeks ago, she’d already transgressed with Kyle, but nobody had known. No one except the two of them. In fact, not even Kyle had known. Not really. Not who he’d slept with or the extent of the crap he’d stepped in.
Since then, everyone knew. Kyle, the entire team, and all the support staff. And the WAGs. A handful of them had been in touch in the days following that very public kiss and its fallout to check on her.
Having carnal knowledge of Kyle Leighton was one thing. Everyone knowing about it was something else entirely.
Frankly, it was freaking her out.
Like tonight, standing all alone at the window of the glass box, with women she was usually so at ease with treating her differently. With kid gloves. Like she might shatter at any second.
Val wasn’t used to being the subject of sympathetic smiles or random hugs. Sure, they were all well aware of her strained relationship with her father, but Val’s stiff upper lip where he was concerned had made it a nonissue, and the WAGs always took their cues from her. Suddenly, though, it was like they didn’t know what to say to her, and she knew none of them wanted to do or say anything that might make it worse.
It was a relief to see the men run out onto the field and feel the women join her, standing shoulder to shoulder with her. Their silent presence was the kind of calm solidarity she needed right now. They might not know what to say, but Val got the message.
We’re here for you.
It took Val about ten seconds to spot Kyle, bouncing on his feet a little, shaking his hands out, obviously limbering up, and, for a moment, all her anxiety and tension drained away. The man was a pure pleasure to look at in blue and silver, the uniform fitting him like a glove, tight against shoulders and abs and thighs, exposing his strong forearms and powerful legs. And that face. Sexy despite his crooked nose messing with the symmetry.
But it was more than that. It was his self-possession. He was carelessly, effortlessly confident. He wasn’t strutting, but every taut, honed line of him reflected his unshakeable faith in himself and his body and what it could do on a rugby field.
It was a testament to his training and focus and, yes, god-given talent, that he’d been elevated so quickly through the ranks. And he knew it. The fact he could walk on the field surrounded by the titans of the game and yet still hold his own was monumental.
And it was utterly ar
ousing.
Val’s skin flushed, her nipples tightened, and muscles low and deep shifted as her body flooded with something hot and totally new to her. She’d been attracted to men before, aroused by their touch and their kisses. But not as potently as this. Not just from looking at them.
Christ, the man was an entire football field and a couple dozen rows of stadium seating away, and her body was on fire.
This was more than mere arousal. This was lust.
Pure, undiluted, primal.
She glanced at Eleanor to her left. She was Ryder Davis’s sister and the latest addition to the WAGs, having recently succumbed to the charms of Bodie Webb. Eleanor was staring at her man with rapt attention, her lips parted, and Val wondered for the first time how many of these women who stood beside her every home game were as revved up as she was.
What kind of black magic was it about these guys—small figures down on the field—that could reach all the way up here and strike a bunch of strong, independent women dumb? Was it the pure physicality of them, was it some kind of primal, gladiatorial sense of the event, or some deadly mushroom cloud of testosterone that caused mass arousal in women?
It had to be something. How else could Kyle Leighton make her slick and needy from so bloody far away?
Of course, she had been in a state of high sexual alert for two weeks now, so maybe that was it. Since their quick and dirty kitchen sex, she’d become so attuned to the clock turning five forty-five every morning, she practically came when she heard Kyle walk into the shop.
And she knew it was him even before he said a word. She knew. Her body knew. It was in the hitch of her breath and the skip of her heart and the bloom of heat in her pelvis when he greeted Sandy, all warm and cheerful. It was in the way the sweet smell of vanilla seemed to intensify in her nostrils and the sudden rush of saliva to her mouth.
And, as he pranced around on the field, doing his thing, it was happening again, the blooming and the hitching and the salivating. It was bloody hard to ignore. He was bloody hard to ignore, and she suddenly wondered about the wisdom of going to Tanner and Matilda’s after the game tonight.