“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered. “Kins, this is ridiculous.”
“Get in!” Tears welled in her eyes. “Please?”
Tears were my downfall, especially when they came from a girl so strong, a girl who rarely let people see the tender side of her. I’d known her over a year and every day she impressed me with her strength. “Can’t believe I’m hiding in the bathroom from your brother,” I muttered, stepping in the tub and pulling the curtain across to shield myself. “If he comes in here for any reason other than taking a piss, I’m out!”
“Fine!” The door slammed after her as she ran out of the bathroom and said a bit too loudly, “Jax!”
“Why are you yelling my name?” He sounded amused. “I mean, the yelling I expected, but you seem genuinely excited to chat.”
“Well, I am.” She giggled.
Ah, hell, we were screwed. The worst liar in the history of liars was trying to bullshit a guy who read body language for a living. Great.
“You sure you’re okay?” Jax asked, concern laced in his voice. “Are you taking all your medication and getting enough sleep?”
Medication? The hell? What kind of medication was she taking? And why, after two weeks of basically living with her, had I not clued in on it? Angry, I clenched the curtain with my fingers, ready to jerk it off the damn rail.
“I’m not stupid,” she said in a harsh voice. “Okay, speak.”
“I’m sorry,” he blurted.
My eyebrows shot up—color me impressed, two apologies in one day. I released the curtain and hunkered down in the tub. I tried to get comfortable, but my body was so massive that I had to hug my knees to even fit, let alone sit in the small space without accidently hanging myself by the same curtain I’d just been mutilating.
“I know you are.” Her voice was sad. “I know you’ve been stressed. I just . . .” Another sigh. Damn it, I needed to get closer. “You can’t fix everything. You can’t save everyone.”
He was quiet.
“Jax, you know that, right? You aren’t Captain America.”
“But that’s just it. I’ve always been able to fix things. I’ve always been your hero, just like Dad, and I failed. I honestly thought getting you away from everything would help, that if you got sick you’d never forgive me.”
Sick?
Like the flu? A prickling sensation pinged the back of my neck as I waited for more information.
I kept listening. Even though something told me I shouldn’t.
“Let’s focus on Dad. On us. Not the past.”
The same damn thing she’d said to me.
What the hell was so horrible about her past? Other than Anderson?
“Just like that?” He didn’t sound convinced. Hell, I wasn’t convinced. Push her, man! Make her talk! Open up! You’re an NFL quarterback, for shit’s sake! Man up!
“Jax . . .”
“Right.” His voice softened, and maybe it was my imagination, but he sounded terrified. “I know we both have practice tomorrow so I’ll be around if Anderson gives you shit . . .” He sighed. “I noticed things are going great with Miller. Too great, if you ask me. Mind telling me why he keeps kissing you?”
“Because I’m irresistible.”
I smirked at her teasing tone. Damn right she was.
I barely held my laugh in when he cursed. God, just thinking about her writhing against me had me ready to turn on the cold water and let it hit me for a good ten minutes.
“You swore you’d never date a football player after Anderson.” Interesting. “You love football, hate the players.” Well, damn. “Anderson tried to break your spirit, Kins. I know Miller is different, but remember, this whole fake-dating scenario is to keep you safe. This isn’t . . . it’s not real, Kins.”
Cock-blocking son of a bitch.
“I know.” Her voice was small. I hated that defeated tone. “I know that, okay?”
“Miller’s a good guy.” That was better. “But he’s young.” The hell? I was of legal drinking age and had been forced to grow up more than pricks twice my age! “He’s still not over Em.”
I was going to kill him.
With my bare hands.
“Oh.” Her answer as she cleared her throat.
I was so tempted to launch myself out of that tub that my fingers went numb clenching the ceramic.
“They had a history, you know that.”
“I know.”
God, he was just making it worse.
“He’s a good actor.”
Maybe I’d just run him over with my car instead? The idea had merit. Bare hands, I needed hands to catch balls.
“Look, it’s best you know. The only reason I chose him is because I know that he won’t touch you when he’s still torn up over the past, and maybe he thinks he’s fine, but I truly don’t think he’s had closure in that relationship. And to bring you into the middle of it would be pretty shitty. So yeah, I trust him not to hurt you, because I don’t think he’s enough of an asshole to do something like sleep with you and then bail.”
She sucked in a breath.
Blood roared in my ears.
Pounded through my veins.
I squeezed my eyes shut and muttered a curse while a deafening silence spread out for what felt like an eternity.
“You’re right,” she whispered in a small voice. “I don’t know what I was thinking . . . I just . . . got caught up.” No! I was so damn tempted to run out of the bathroom, to explain everything to her, to him, to ask for her forgiveness even when I didn’t deserve it.
“You’re beautiful,” Jax said with a hint of agony in his voice. “Look, when the season’s in full swing and we know what kind of battle we’ll have with Anderson playing—we should maybe . . . I don’t know, find you a guy worth dating.”
I was that guy, damn it.
Me.
Not some faceless dick who wanted to taste what was mine. A primitive growl rose from my throat.
“Sure.” Kinsey actually agreed? The hell! “Miller and I will just lay low until then.”
“It’s for the best,” Jax said in a hollow voice. “Especially if you’re developing feelings for him, Kins. That won’t end well.”
I was going to murder the son of a bitch with my bare hands. He didn’t know shit about me. He just thought he did. Micromanaging pain in my ass!
Even if he was right.
No.
I shoved the thought away.
I was completely over Em.
We’d had closure. The only reason she was still in my life was because we’d been best friends—still were, to an extent. But now that she had Sanchez, I’d done the only thing that made sense. I’d bowed out in order to give them time.
How the hell did that make me the bad guy?
“You look pale,” Kinsey pointed out. “Everything okay, Jax?”
“You mean other than the fact that Dad’s dying, Anderson’s a pain in my ass, and Miller had his tongue down your throat earlier? Nope, can’t think of a thing!”
“Well, when you put it that way . . .” She sighed. They both fell silent again. I strained to hear anything—even just her breathing would have been nice. Instead, nothing.
“Love you, sis.” Jax sighed. “You sure you don’t want to come back to the apartment?”
“Soon.” Like hell she was. “I have the room for a few more . . . days.”
“Love you.”
The door closed.
I kept sitting in the bathtub, thinking, wondering . . . when the curtain was jerked back I didn’t need to ask what Kinsey was thinking, it was written all over her face.
Hurt.
Sadness.
Anger.
“No.” It was the first word I was able to blurt.
She frowned, releasing the curtain and crossing her arms. “No? No, what?”
“You’re not going on some sick blind date with a sociopath.”
“Who says only sociopaths are attracted to me?”
I sneered.
She held up her hands. “Whatever, I’m tired.”
“Kins, hold up.” I nearly broke the towel rack in an effort to get out of the tub. By the time my massive body was freed, she was already out of the bathroom and back in the bedroom, turning on the TV and hugging a pillow on the bed.
With a sigh, I made my way over to her and sat.
She scooted over.
I followed.
With a huff she glared. “What do you want?”
“You,” I whispered. “Just you.”
She gulped, and looked down at the remote control, her fingers pale against the black and gray buttons. “No.”
“Yes.”
“No.” A smile formed across her lips. “Just friends.”
“Okay.”
Her head jerked to attention.
I cupped her face with my hands and whispered across her lips, “Just friends it is.”
The remote dropped from her hand onto the mattress and then she was straddling me, her small body writhing against mine like she’d been waiting years to taste my flavor on her tongue.
“I’m not sharing you,” I murmured down her neck. “Not now, not ever. Tell him no.”
She grinned, deepening the kiss. “You getting possessive?”
“Yes,” I growled, my blood heating to a painful degree. “I am, tell Jax no.”
“Or what?”
I spanked her on the ass with my right hand, a lingering sting slammed into my fingertips. “Sorry, I slipped.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Slipped, my ass.”
“It’s a nice ass.” I smacked it again.
She squealed and then tried to pin me to the bed. Amused, I gripped her hands in mine while she struggled for a good five minutes and then sagged against me.
“You tire yourself out, Kins?”
“You’re huge.”
“I know.”
She slugged my shoulder. “Stop taking everything sexually.”
I ground my hips against her. “Then stop encouraging me.”
Kins’s eyes dropped to my mouth. “Tell me something that’s true . . .”
“I hate hippos.”
“Something I can’t google.” She crossed her arms.
My eyes searched hers, they were always doing that, like they were trying to find reasons for my reaction to her. Because I had beautiful women surrounding me on a daily basis, but for some reason, this one, this off-limits little firecracker—had me. And I was powerless to stop my descent into hell, the fires licked my face, and still, I leaned forward, I stole kisses with the knowledge that it wouldn’t end well. How could it? When I didn’t know what the hell I was doing? How could it, when her brother would hate me forever?
“I can’t take it back.”
“Take what back?” She linked her fingers in mine, our palms pressed together while I drew another languid kiss from her mouth.
“Vegas,” I whispered. “I’m not sorry. I won’t take it back. I’d do it again, and again, and again. I can’t decide if that makes me selfish or just very addicted to something that I know will end up being very hard to quit.”
“My turn,” Kinsey announced. She lowered her mouth to my ear and whispered, “I don’t want you to quit me.”
“I should.”
“I know.”
“More truth . . .” I hugged her close to me. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then don’t.”
“You make it sound easy,” I whispered with a ragged breath. My heart squeezed. God, I would do anything for her. It was terrifying. “Like breathing.”
“Miller, that’s how it should be. Have you ever thought that maybe the person making it hard—is you?”
I gulped and then licked my lips. “I want to change my first answer.”
She frowned. “About the hippos?”
“I hate hippos, but my greatest fear is losing someone I care about, someone I love—having them one day and losing them the next. And it seems to be a thing with me, losing what’s most important—and being the only one left behind.”
There, I’d said it.
I’d never admitted that out loud.
I wasn’t sure I wanted the words floating between us. In fact, I was pretty damn sure I wanted to pull them all back, suck them into my mouth, and hold my breath until I turned blue.
Kinsey locked eyes with me, and then very slowly, peeled off her T-shirt and tossed it to the side of the bed.
My breath hitched, I wasn’t able to move, and it hurt like hell to breathe. “What are you doing?”
“Helping you conquer your fear,” she whispered gruffly before taking my mouth in hers, tangling her hands in my shirt and jerking it off my head.
“It may take more than once.” I flipped her onto her back.
She grinned up at me. “Good.”
Chapter Twenty
KINSEY
I was breathtakingly aware of the way he kissed me, with a mix of urgency and tenderness, as if he was afraid that I was going to pull away, when five minutes into Jax’s conversation with me I knew things were going to end this way.
It wasn’t good-bye.
Not really.
It was a risk.
A risk that I wanted to take, because I liked him, because I was falling for the man that I saw beneath all of the football bullshit. He was more than he let people see, and sometimes it’s easier to recognize hurt in other people when it reminds you of yourself.
I never told him about my ghosts.
My scars.
And I had to wonder, if he knew about them—would he be more willing to take a chance on what we could have—or would he push me away? Because the possibility was there, not in the scary way it had been before, but my health issues still lingered, and knowing Miller, the truth would be scarier than the lie I kept telling by way of omission.
I was his.
But for how long?
Until he found out about my past?
Until Jax found out about us?
Life is full of selfish choices.
Quinton Miller was mine.
And just like he said he wouldn’t regret Vegas, I couldn’t bring myself to regret kissing him, urging him on, begging for his friendship, his trust, his body, knowing full well that if he peeled back the layers of my soul he’d most likely tell me that it wasn’t worth the risk.
That the odds weren’t in my favor.
That he refused to hurt again.
I absorbed the feel of his rough hands as they roamed over my body, the taste of his plump lips as he moved his wicked mouth down my neck like his only goal was to taste every part of me in the most erotic way possible.
He closed his hands over my breasts then slid down the bra strap on my right shoulder, and his mouth kissed the expanse of skin. He did the same on the other side then locked eyes with me. He looked drunk, crazed.
“Tell me to stop.” His gravelly voice sent chills down my spine. “Otherwise, I won’t.”
I gulped.
He didn’t move.
I pulled my bra off all the way and tossed it to the side.
“Fuck.” His eyes rolled to the back of his head and then he pressed a kiss between my breasts, resting his head against my chest for several heartbeats before pulling away and finding my mouth again.
His powerful body was enough to give me chills as his agile fingers dug into my hair, giving it a forceful tug before rough kisses nipped at my mouth, bruising me, marking me as his.
A hitch caught in my throat as he pressed a finger to my lips then dragged that same finger down the crevice between my breasts. He rested his palm against my belly button and grinned wolfishly up at me before tucking his hand into the back of my leggings and slowly tugging them down to my feet.
They joined my bra on the floor.
He braced my hips with his hands then slowly crawled up me, his face menacing, beautiful, full of promises, full of pleasure.
I gulped. I was out of my league with
Quinton Miller.
A frisson of tension swept through my body as I gave him a come-hither grin.
He bit down on his lower lip, sucking it so hard it lost all color. “I can’t stop staring.”
“Then don’t.”
“You have goose bumps.” He pointed to my arms and then pressed a kiss to my ribs. “I’m going to dream of this ass.” He squeezed the skin with his fingers and then pressed an open-mouthed kiss to my stomach before biting down on my underwear and slowly peeling it down, his breath hot on my skin, making more goose bumps erupt all over my thighs.
I was completely bare to him.
Shivering.
And he was grinning like a wolf who’d just discovered an entire nest full of innocent little birds.
Hell, I was the bird.
I was Tweety Bird.
Did that make him a pussycat?
He licked his way down my thigh, making a trail of kisses that burned each time he breathed across my fevered skin.
“You’re going slow.” I gripped his shoulders with my hands. “Why?”
He stopped and blinked down at me. “Maybe because last time I didn’t get to see all of you. Maybe because right now I know you’re powerless to stop this thing that’s happening between us, almost as powerless as I am to stop staring. Maybe . . .” He pressed a rough kiss to the arch of my foot before massaging it with his fingers, digging into the sore muscles like he had a master’s degree in massage therapy. “Maybe I just want to savor you.”
Tears filled my eyes. “You say things like that, and I may just get attached to you, Quinton Miller.”
“That’s kind of the point, Kinsey Romonov.”
He’d never said my full name before.
Fear built up in my chest like a vise, squeezing it until I couldn’t breathe. The secrets of my past were going to tumble forward . . . not today, nope, not today.
Today. I was just a girl.
With a guy.
A very sexy guy.
Who somehow knew every pressure point in my body, and knew how to manipulate every single angle so that I felt him everywhere. I felt him in the air, I felt him in the tension swirling between our heated bodies.
“Take off your jeans,” I whispered.
“No.”
A wisp of disappointment threatened to deflate my mood. “No?”
“No.” He grinned. “I get naked, and this is all over before it even starts . . . Tell you what . . . you owe me two and then I’ll take off my jeans.”
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