by Jamie Knight
“I did,” I tell him, shaking my head to snap myself back to this room. “Quite honestly, I’m flattered. But how would that work? Wouldn’t there be reporters lurking in bushes and…”
“Darling, it’s cute that you don’t know this, but I’m a billionaire and we don’t have to worry about staying local,” he says. “Maybe if we did, that would be true. But I have a private plane. We can go anywhere we want.”
My jaw drops and I blink my eyes several times, each time telling myself to stop, but not being able to.
“Yep,” he says, as if my eye-blinking was a question instead of an involuntary physical reaction to the bombshells he continues to drop on me. “I’ve invested my money well. There’s a guy who helps us set up accounts so we don’t blow it all. But I still like to blow a big portion of it. And I’d love to do that on you.”
Now it’s his turn to look shocked, at his own accidental double entendre. He raises his eyebrows playfully, as if he’d meant it to come out that way, but I really don’t think he had. For some reason, he was just being sweet and saying he’d like to spend money on having a good time with me.
I guess I’m not used to this. I keep wondering if it’s a trap. I wish I could get my mom’s voice out of my damn head.
“So, what do you say?” he asks. “We can fly anywhere you want. You have a passport, right?”
“Yeah,” I stammer, never so glad to have studied for a semester abroad and therefore to have everything I need in place to be jetsetter off in a whirlwind romance. “Somewhere.”
Despite my type A personality at work, I’m not the most organized person at home. Hopefully I can find it with my college books I’ve never bothered to unpack once I landed my journalism degree – I wasn’t a huge fan of school and was glad to be out hustling in the real world.
I didn’t think I’d have time for foreign vacations, but it turns out that I’m wrong. Apparently, that’s what’s considered a normal date to these football players.
“Okay, then, let’s do it,” he says. “And in exchange, I’ll give you that interview.”
He acts like only one of these things would be doing me a favor. Summoning the power of Monica, I decide to act as if that’s true.
“You’ve got yourself a deal,” I tell him.
“Let’s seal it with a kiss,” he declares triumphantly.
“We really shouldn’t…” I start to say, but he grabs me and pulls me closer to him.
His tongue is in my mouth before I can finish my sentence, but it’s clearly too late. I’m done with that train of thought and I don’t want to stop him.
Sure, someone could walk in any minute. But what’s one more minute, when we’ve already been sneaking around in here for so many of them by now?
I give in to pure passion and instinct as his tongue loops around mine. For a few seconds, it’s absolute bliss, until he breaks away, leaving my mouth feeling empty of the kiss he was just giving me while my pussy feels aching and wet for him.
“I know, I know, I should get out of here,” he says, as he goes towards the door. “Thanks for the nice talk though.”
He winks at me, and I say, “if that’s what you want to call it.”
Our lips were certainly talking to each other, that’s for sure, I think.
Almost as soon as he’s out the door, there’s another knock on it. Assuming it has to be him, and preparing myself to be stern and tell him we can’t possibly have one more kiss, yet already knowing I’m going to break that rule, I swing the door back open with a big smile on my face.
It’s a smile that quickly fades when I see Kirsten on the other side of the door.
“Stacy,” she says, the “t” sounding like a crisp staccato sound that makes me hate the sound of her voice even more than I normally do. “I was just stopping by to say congratulations on your big moment in the spotlight there.”
“Thank you,” I start to tell her, and I’m also about to tell her I was just on my way out.
But she’s inside the room in a flash, without even waiting for me to invite her and without asking if she can. Her arms are crossed over her chest and she’s looking all around. I’m sure she must have seen Elias in the hallway; this is almost the worst possible time ever.
At least she didn’t see him here in the room with me, though, although clearly she knows that he was, doesn’t she?
From the way she’s peering here and there in the prepping room, it’s as if she thinks he’s still in there.
“Hmmm,” she says, turning her head back around to face me. “Did you have a nice visit with Mr. Tucker in here?”
So, she does know he was in here. Maybe she’s looking for evidence of it, but for what? It’s almost like she’s a forensic analyst on a daytime TV drama. Perhaps she wants to snap a picture and sell it to rival presses, or blackmail me to leave my own. She always has wanted my job, and I know I’m stupid for providing myself with any opportunity to slip up. I should be able to resist Elias, but I’m not.
I can’t explain or even understand why, but the simple truth of the matter is that I’m simply not.
“I wondered why he would give you the starting question,” she says. “It’s beginning to make a little more sense now…”
“Is it?” I ask her, surprising myself with how bold my voice sounds.
I know she really has nothing on me, if all she saw was him walking down the hallway, away from the prepping room. These rooms are small and there are several others on either side of mine, so she might not even really know if he was here or not; she might just be bluffing.
Plus, even if she did see him come out, so what?
It’s not like we were kissing, or even hugging goodbye. Lots of players come give private interviews after the main press conference is over, or they might just drop by to say hello or provide much needed first hand confirmation to help fact check a proposed article, or even just to ask us to paint them in the best light when we showcase them, or try to persuade us not to run an unfavorable story.
Sure, that wouldn’t normally be happening right now, during a media blackout except for approved press conference such as the one that had just happened. But it’s not unheard of. There are plenty of innocent explanations for this, right?
Luckily it seems that Stacy has already moved onto something else.
“You always struck me as the innocent type,” Stacy says, tsking tsking her disapproval at me. “A virgin, even. You’ve never let anyone pop your cherry, just as you’ve never let anyone take the stick out of your ass.”
I bristle at this comment, but I guess I’ll let it slide, seeing how she did lose out big just a minute ago. I was the one who got to ask the question, no matter how much she bounced around and flirted, so I’m sure that didn’t go over well with her ego.
“Therefore, I don’t know how it is that you would go paling around with Elias Tucker. How exactly do you two know each other?” she demands.
It’s none of her business, but I’m afraid that if I say that to her, she’ll be suspicious.
I decide to punt, as the saying goes, and very appropriately, in this instance.
“I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I have to go,” I tell her, walking over to the desk that any of the reporters using this room share, and putting it into my purse. “It was nice chatting with you though, Kirsten.”
“Oh, don’t kid yourself into thinking I’m not going to expose you,” she says. “When I find out what’s up between you and Elias, it’ll be my main scoop that will propel me to journalism stardom.”
Wow, she sure has a huge ego, I think to myself, as I shrug and push past her on my out the door.
“Good night, Kirsten,” I say, telling myself to fake it ‘till I make it out the door.
My heart is racing and my palms are sweaty.
That was a close one. I need to stop being so stupid. I need to knock off this silly obsession I have with Elias Turner. But how?
But my pussy is still dripping wet and seems to be shou
ting out its own response.
No. Go on the date with him. Let him take your virginity, goddamn it.
For once in your life, do the thing you actually want to do!
Chapter 12
Elias
The next day, I’m poking around outside the Leviathans’ locker room, trying to find what I’d planned to come get, plus anything else I might happen to notice along the way. I’m not supposed to be here – we’re supposed to be resting up for the big game – but that’s why it was the best time to come.
I had promised Stacy I’d find out who tried to hurt her. And now I wanted to do that more than ever, so that I could smash that bastard’s head in.
I had always thought that Stacy Allen was not only a super smart rising reporter, but also that she was super hot. But now that I’ve held her in my arms and kissed her, I feel something else for her.
It’s not just my cock’s raging lust for her.
Or even my heart’s pathetic fucking fluttering for her.
It’s an overwhelming need to protect her.
Now that I’ve kissed her, she’s fucking mine, and there’s not anything she or I could say or do to change that fact. So we’d best start accepting it.
Step one will be starting to solve this mystery.
Step two will be fucking her brains out.
Step three will be winning the Superbowl and celebrating with my teammates and then with her.
I know that step twenty-seven or so ends up with her and I having a bunch of babies. And I’m not too concerned with the logicistics for any of the steps in the middle, other than the one in which the mystery of who Stacy’s attacker is actually gets solved.
I look at the door to the locker room, wondering how he had even gotten in here.
Just then, above the archway, I see the security camera.
That’s it.
It’s what I came here for, risking punishment so close to the Superbowl.
That’s what I have to get.
But how?
I hadn’t exactly figured that part out yet.
I consider climbing up the door frame so that I can reach the camera and move it. Or throwing a rock up there to knock it down to where I can pick it up.
But I know that all of these ideas are fucking stupid.
I’d only ruin the footage I so desperately need to see.
Let’s face it – I’m no crime scene investigator.
But I might know someone who is.
Just then, I hear a deep, familiar voice clear his throat behind me and say, “Elias. You so eager to win the game that you’re showing up to practice when I explicitly told you to stay home?”
Fuck.
What the hell is Coach Kramer doing here?
But I had a plan for this. Just in case.
It just means there’s no way I can get this security footage now, even if I could figure out a way to do it.
Leave it to Coach K to come foil my plans.
“Hey, Coach,” I say, nodding at him as if I’m not shocked and pissed to see him here, which I most certainly am. “I’d never disobey your orders. I just left something in my locker, is all.”
“Oh, yeah?” he asks. “That’s funny, because so did I. What’d you leave?”
“A book,” I tell him, without hesitation but with a very straight face, and he smirks.
“A book? Elias. You’re a jock. You don’t read.”
“Sometimes I do,” I tell him, shrugging again. “How about you? What’d you forget?”
“My running shoes.”
I’m pretty sure it’s a flimsy pretense he invented so that he could see whether his players were heeding his instructions or whether any of us would be here trying to get in some last-minute extra practice. But it’s not like I’m one to talk, when it comes to inventing flimsy pretenses to be somewhere I’m not supposed to be.
After we both head into the locker room, the coach goes to his office and I go to my locker. I hurry to send a text while the problem of the video footage is fresh on my mind. Then Coach Kramer walks out carrying his running shoes, just in time to see me retrieve the book I had mentioned from my locker.
365 Meditations for Athletes.
“I never knew you to be a particularly zen-like man,” he says, when he sees it. “You’ve always seemed a bit high strung for that eastern religious stuff.”
“All the more reason I need it, right?” I tell him. “Have a good night, Coach.”
“You too, Elias.”
As I walk back out to the parking lot, I can’t help but smile.
I’m not sure I can get the information I came for. I’ll feel a lot better when I know that I can. But for now, I’m still feeling buoyant, thinking about how good it’ll feel when I take Stacy on a date and also take her virginity.
I just know she’s a virgin.
The way she looks at me.
That shy smile.
The way she walks.
As if she’s trying to act more confident than she is.
The way she kisses me.
Like she wants me to take her in that way that no one has ever had her.
It’ll be my pleasure.
As soon as I can shake the coach off my trail.
I notice that he’s looking at me as he heads to his car.
I get into my own car and open up my book, which isn’t part of some elaborate scheme I’d planned out in advance, other than the fact that I’d told myself to say I’d forgotten that, if anyone walked in.
I really do like the book. It’s just that I usually read it before practice or games and keep it in my locker – taking it home is the part I don’t usually do, but I can always bring it back.
I might be a jock, but even jocks get nervous before big events – usually, I’d be referring to the Superbowl, but right now, I’m referring to my date with Stacy – and meditation calms the nerves.
Day 20, I read, opening the book to today’s date and to where I’d last left off.
May I be persistent in everything, striving to go after what I want with strength and focus and discipline.
I wave to Coach Kramer as I see him drive off.
Then I think about Stacy’s curvy body and innocent yet sexy eyes, and I smile.
Today’s meditation is an easy one to take to heart.
Chapter 13
Stacy
January may be one of New York’s coldest months, but just like they say it’s always five o’clock somewhere, it’s always summer, somewhere, too. And today, after managing to find my passport just in the nick of time – it was under the mattress of my bed, of all places – in order to go on my date with Elias, I find out that it’s summer in Tierra del Fuego, Argentina.
Yeah.
He actually brought me here for our date!
I want to text Clarice to tell her how beautiful this place is. But I don’t have cell phone service, which, apparently, is a good thing.
There are only so many places that Elias can take me that the press won’t hound us. On his plane on the way over here, he joked that he could keep me hidden here for his pleasure, for a long time until anyone ever found out. I joked back that I’d be a willing captive.
Our flirtation has gotten so obvious. We are no longer in the “hate” part of our hate-slash-love relationship anymore. I guess we haven’t exactly gotten to the “love” part yet, but we’re somewhere in that “slash” stage, which involves a whole lot of lust.
“Here you go, you wonderful people,” says the waiter at our restaurant, in a tone that says “I love rich American tourists,” as he puts some plates of tapas down in front of us.
“Mmmm,” I exclaim, as I look at the delicious array of colorful food.
I don’t know what to eat first, or even what all of it even is, but I’m famished after our long flight.
“Where to start?” I ask out loud.
“Try this,” Elias says, picking up some Argentine cheese from the plate and putting it into my mouth.
&nbs
p; “Yum!” I say, enjoying the feel of his fingers in my mouth almost as much as I enjoy the taste of the food.
I can’t help but think about what other body parts of his were down my throat right now. My head spins with anticipation more so than the wine as I realize that tonight’s the night for that to happen.
As soon as I’m done eating the bite of cheese, he’s feeding me salamis, tandil empanadas that are made with chicken, corn, and Argentinian beef, followed by some hot chorizos.
“Is this not the greatest food you have ever had?” he boasts. “I fucking love this little restaurant by the sea.”
“It really is delicious,” I tell him.
“Just wait until you have the main course!”
Sure enough, before we’ve even managed to make a dent in the appetizers, some Argentinian beef with a side of freshwater lobster is brought out. I’ve never dined like this in my entire life. My parents were frugal and lived simple lives. My mother would likely be ashamed at this display of wealth.
But there isn’t much she isn’t ever acting as if I shouldn’t be ashamed of, I remind myself.
I push thoughts of my life in the States behind so that I can enjoy this delicious meal and this date with Elias. I have to admit, I never knew he’d be such a casanova. I’ve tried to go on dates with other guys before, but they were always awkward or stilted. Elias is really pulling out all the stops.
“I’m so stuffed I can barely move!” I exclaim, after polishing off some traditional Argentinian dulce de leche.
“That’s a shame, then, since we need to dance soon,” Elias says, raising his eyebrows at me in that charming, sexy way I’ve come to know and love.
“Dance?” I repeat.
Now those eyebrows of his are wiggling in a devilish way.
“Dance.”
“I have two left feet!” I protest.
And that’s really downplaying the situation. I haven’t really tried to dance because my parents forbade me from doing it, as they considered it to be a sin, and I have no rhythm.