Alejandro started physical therapy in the training room at the center, and he must have been sore too, but he never complained. He’d just told me how well I was doing, and massaged my legs with his good arm while he quizzed me on p-chem. I knew how tough it was to come back from injury, and I asked him how he kept such an upbeat attitude. He’d just said he was motivated to heal as quickly as possible. His response had puzzled me—what was the sense of urgency?
Now that it was May, I had come to visit Alejandro in DC before my next trip to Colorado for the second round of tryouts. I giggled as he pulled me into a third-floor bedroom and closed the door in Brad’s face.
“Wow, this room’s huge,” I remarked.
“Bedroom three-oh-three, madam.” He extended his right arm with a flourish and no hint of a wince. He’d gotten out of the sling a month ago, and I was pleased to see how swiftly he’d healed from surgery. “My home for the past two months.”
“Nice.” I noted the masculine décor. Late-spring sunlight filtered in through the two windows. “But not as impressive as the Lincoln Room.”
“I told my mother if they were making me stay at the White House, I wouldn’t live in the Lincoln Room, of all places. That’s for dignitaries, people more important than me. Besides, here I’m next to the gym for my PT, and on a different floor from my parents and brother.”
“You forgot the most important reason for staying clear of that room.”
He cocked his head at me. “Hmm?”
“When they shot Lincoln, they killed him.” A flutter of fear kicked up my heartbeat, and I stepped forward to lace my fingers through his. “You lived, thank God. You don’t belong there.”
“I lived for a very important reason.” He drew up our enjoined hands and pressed a warm kiss to my knuckles. “I plan to make good on my hospital bed promise.”
My heart now full-on galloped as his dark eyes seared into me. “You sure you’re ready?”
“Absolutely sure. I’ve been pushing hard in PT, waiting for this moment.”
I smirked. So that was his motivation.
“And after today, we won’t get to see each other much while you travel the world, Ms. USA Volleyball.”
“I made the first cut, but I still have another selection camp to go before I make the traveling team.”
“Please,” he scoffed. “You’re ten times better than those other middle blockers.”
I grinned. His presence at the first camp had helped my confidence soar. And now I wanted to help with his confidence. I knew his performance our first time sleeping together would be important to him—he performed so damn well at everything else in his life. He’d also shown such eagerness during the stolen moments the past month when I’d shown him how to pleasure me. As I looked up at him, awash with anticipation, I nibbled my lower lip.
“You have the sexiest mouth, Arroyos.” He nudged in to kiss me, spicy and sweet. I tasted cinnamon from the Mexican dessert we’d just shared in the Palm Room. He let go of my hands and clutched my head as he deepened the kiss. My fingers darted down his chest, unbuttoning his shirt.
When my fingertips made contact with the hard planes of his chest, he shivered. “Are my hands cold?” I asked.
His headshake was instant. “You’re hot. So hot.”
“Why thank you, Hotajandro,” I giggled. I ripped his unbuttoned shirt off his shoulders and delighted in his lean, sculpted chest. My gaze glided over the puckered, round scar near his shoulder and up to his face. “You can undress me, too, you know.”
He had my shirt up over my head before the words left my mouth. I stood before him in my bra, blue miniskirt, and flats. My hands perched on my hips, waiting for him to make his next move. He stared at me, reading the challenge in my eyes, before pitching forward to nuzzle kisses between my breasts. When he unhooked my bra while keeping his face buried in my cleavage, I inhaled a staccato breath. Wetness gathered between my thighs, zinging a line of pleasure straight to my brain. I stood on my tiptoes, bringing me closer to his touch.
I fumbled for his belt as his mouth kissed hotness down my belly. His clever fingers kept kneading my breasts. When he straightened to kiss my collarbone, I shucked down his pants in one swift move, leaving him in black briefs with his pants around his ankles. His mouth lifted from my skin, and his eyes, bright and deep, met mine.
He smirked as he stepped out of his pants and kicked them to the side. His briefs tented with his arousal. “Let’s see what’s under your skirt, shall we?”
I closed my eyes as he smoothed his hands down my ribcage. He tucked his thumbs into my waistband and pushed the skirt down my legs, my skin on fire from the trail of his touch. As I opened my eyes, he stepped back. His gaze roved from my feet, over my panties, up my naked chest, to my face. “Hermosa,” he murmured. “So beautiful.” His eyes burned.
And I couldn’t get enough of his powerful, lean body. His skin was the perfect shade of brown, an olive tone that highlighted the cut of his muscles. I loved his dark features—the black of his hair, the faint shadow where he’d shaved, and the depth of his eyes. His intense, intelligent eyes.
His Adam’s apple bobbed with what looked like a nervous swallow as we stared at each other. I needed him to relax. “You’re quite the fine specimen, Alex. You put the sexy in the XY chromosome.”
He tossed his head back as he laughed. “Sexy science humor?” His eyes danced. “You’re such a nerd.”
“C’mon, you love it.”
“Yeah?” He stroked his chin. “Well, you put the XX in exxcstasy, woman.”
With a grin, I shook my head. “That was so dumb.”
“You started it!”
We laughed into each other’s mouths as we resumed kissing. My hands were everywhere—the sharp curve of his shoulder blades, the raised line of scars on his elbow, the firm muscle of his butt. He sucked in a breath as I reached beneath the elastic of his briefs to cup his bottom.
I unlatched my lips from his and looked up at him. “Let me see you?”
He looked down at me with a half-lidded gaze, and nodded.
I peeled his briefs over his springy erection and stepped back to admire him.
How could he have kept himself under wraps for so long? It was a crime against women everywhere. As I gazed at him, he grew bigger. I tried to remember the words I’d rehearsed.
“Estás como un caballo,” I said sweetly.
His mouth dropped open as his eyes blazed.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I WASN’T SURE WHICH was the bigger turn-on: Maddie telling me I was hung like a horse, or her saying those words in Spanish. Before I met her, I’d believed in waiting until marriage for sex. Ironically, meeting the woman I wanted to marry had challenged that belief. And I knew I needed her. Now.
I scooped under her arms to lift her and carry her to bed.
“Your shoulder!” she cried.
But I didn’t feel any pain. I was done with injuries stopping me from achieving my dreams. When she figured out I wasn’t putting her down, she wrapped her legs around me, and the exquisite brush of her panties against my erection almost made me come right then. She smelled so good, so enticing.
I lowered her to the sheets like the precious jewel she was, her gorgeous legs lengthening to the foot of the bed. I’d never seen a woman with such taut abs, practically a six-pack. Her curls fanned out on the pillow as she stared up at me. Her chest rose and fell with each panted breath, and I realized my breath had quickened as well. I swung my leg over to straddle her, and she grinned as her eyes traveled down my torso. My penis twitched from the heat of her gaze.
When she reached for me, my body seized. She took me in her grasp and gently tugged the base of my shaft while stroking her fist up and down my length. Her touch on the underside of my shaft was particularly mind-blowing. “W-W-Won’t last,” I stuttered.
“That’s quite okay,” Her grin took on an evil glint. “We’ve got plenty of time for more.”
Dios, the pressur
e rocketed through me. The fire kept building, and I couldn’t quench it. Nor did I want to. Her strokes were molten bursts, stoking the fire higher, more pressure, higher even still…in a second I released all over her panties.
My eyes rolled back into their sockets. Maddie stimulating me like that was a thousand times better than doing it on my own.
“Bet you wish you hadn’t waited so long.”
Understatement of the year. I nodded feebly as I opened my eyes. “I made a mess.”
“Not at all.” She grinned and lifted her hips beneath me. “Help clean up by taking these off, though.”
I slid off her panties and tossed them to the floor. When I looked down at her neat patch of hair, I inhaled. My eyes feasted on her perfection…grooves of soft brown skin tapering into exciting territory down below. This was happening.
“I loved watching you come,” she said.
I grinned, and she gazed up at me, her brown eyes intense.
“I love you,” she added.
¡Cielos! Heaven. Having made the decision to have sex, I only felt more ready after she said that. I knew my love for Maddie was good and strong. My feelings for her didn’t diminish my faith—they deepened it. God had given her to me, and I wanted her to feel my love and gratitude. I zoomed down to kiss her. “I love you, Maddie.” Our tongues touched and played. “And I’ll enjoy watching you even more than you liked watching me.”
When my mouth moved south to suckle her breast, her chest rose with a gasp of air. I teased her nipple with my tongue and skimmed my fingers down the firm ridges of her abdomen. Her muscles tensed when my fingers feathered lower and touched her wetness. Her small cry egged me on, and I slid one finger into her soft folds. I lifted my mouth from her breast to watch her writhe below me. She squeezed her legs together, then opened for me, and her head tilted back with a long moan as I continued stroking her, now with two fingers. “Yes,” she murmured, her husky voice accelerating the surprising return of my hardness.
“Keep going,” she demanded as her bottom grinded into the sheets. I knew the moment I’d found her sweet spot—she gasped and her back arched. I planned to love the hell out of that spot. My fingers swirled, causing her breaths to come even faster. Her palms pressed against the sheets, and I swept her right hand into my left to draw it to my mouth. I pushed wet kisses to the pads of her fingers as my fingers pulsed into her swelling wetness below. She locked her eyes onto mine as her chest rode up and down. “Oh,” she cried. “Alex.”
Her eyes clamped shut, her mouth opened wide, and her hips bucked off the bed. Her pleasure tightened around me, flooding my fingers with heat. She shuddered with a breathy moan, and I grinned broadly as I watched her come. I did that. I made her feel that way. My pride was a mountain, higher than any stupid athletic or academic achievement. Jake had given me some good tips.
I lifted her arm over her head as I climbed back up her body to swallow her moans with my kisses. Dios, I loved her mouth. A musky scent now mingled with her usual calming aura. Her eyes opened, gazing up at me with what looked like reverence. I certainly revered her.
“Bet you wish I hadn’t waited so long,” I teased.
She giggled. “Jerk.” Her eyes twinkled. “But we’re not done yet.”
Her words sparked more heat inside of me. “I was hoping you’d say that.” I reached for the bedside table and extracted a condom from the drawer.
“Way to be prepared,” she said as she sat up.
Brad had slipped me the condoms when I left the hospital. It wouldn’t exactly look right if the press caught me buying them.
“Let’s get this on you.” She ripped the condom open, and I forced a long exhale as she rolled it on. You have excellent self-control, she’d told me once. That control was definitely getting tested today. Her touch was like striking a match against my trembling skin, lighting a fire within.
She stroked me as she kissed my chest. Her tongue darted out and licked my sternum. My hands wove through her curly hair, and I lowered us to the mattress, hovering above her. “Yes,” she breathed. I felt the building force of my insane attraction to her. When she guided me inside, I stopped breathing for a second. She surrounded me, compressed me, squeezed me, owned me. The fire blazed, and my body went completely stiff. I rode the high and rocked into her, matching her rapid breathing. Moments later, her body lifted, almost floated off the mattress. She clung to me, cried out, then sank back down with a long sigh.
I rolled to the side and pressed her to me, our skin slick with sweat. My eyes were closed, and I focused only on the feel of her in my arms. I was still buried inside her, and it wasn’t a bad place to be. My pounding heartbeat made it feel like I’d just run a 5K.
“We have explosive chemistry, Dr. Ramirez,” she said.
I opened my eyes to see her grinning at me. “Another science joke, Arroyos?” But I was feigning annoyance. I loved our chemistry—physical, emotional, and intellectual. I couldn’t wait to conduct more bonding experiments with her.
Bounce, bounce, bounce. It felt amazing to have a basketball in my hand again, like the ball was an extension of my arm. And playing three-on-three on an outdoor court on the White House lawn? That was special, too. Maddie, Braxton, and I faced off against Lucia, Dad, and Dane, and I was excited to have a Maddie-caliber athlete on my side. As I’d predicted, she had qualified for the national travel team. We were celebrating with one last June weekend together before she traveled to tournaments in Europe, and I started med school rotations.
I watched Maddie dart around Lucia in an attempt to get open, but my sister moved in place to guard her. When Dane reached his long arm in to steal the ball from me, I evaded him easily. But it wasn’t so easy to see around his gargantuan frame. After a couple of dribbles, I looked to Braxton, who broke away from Dad and hustled to the basket. I lobbed my pass above the rim, and he leaped to dunk it. The timing was perfect, and the ball slammed through the basket with a satisfying swoosh.
“Yes!” I pumped my fist. Sweat slid down my back in the June sunshine.
After high-fiving her brother, Maddie panted with her hands on her hips. “That was a thing of beauty.”
Dad wheezed as he retrieved the ball, then glared at Maddie. “I thought you said your brother hadn’t played in eight years.”
“He hasn’t!” Maddie’s grin was cunning. “I just forgot to mention he turned down several basketball scholarships.”
“You turned down money for college?” Dad turned to look at Braxton.
Braxton shrugged. He did look like a natural in low-hanging basketball shorts. “Schools make too much money off their athletes. They should pay them.”
“Universities do pay their athletes, with a full scholarship,” Dad replied.
I exchanged a nervous look with Maddie. We’d wondered about the wisdom of passing along Dad’s White House invitation to her brother.
Braxton shook his head. “The NCAA makes millions off their slaves. A scholarship’s a drop in the bucket.”
“For places like Highbanks, maybe,” Dad said. “But so many schools lose money off their revenue sports. How could they afford to pay their athletes?”
“Are we playing, or what?” Lucia asked. “’Cause Maddie’s going down.”
“You wish, freshman.” Maddie’s eyes blazed.
Lucia stuck up her nose. “I’m a sophomore now!” Her T-shirt featured a player jump serving, with the words Kiss My Ace.
“Just be careful, everyone,” Mom piped in from the sideline. “Don’t get injured. Especially you, Maddie—your national coach would kill us.” She sat under an umbrella next to Mateo and China, with other Secret Service agents standing nearby. “You too, Adolfo. You’re too old to play with these kids!”
Dad grunted.
Mateo strummed his guitar and sang, “He’s over the hill, he drives a Seville…” He played a lively bridge, and Dane nodded his head to the beat.
“Sing it, brothah!” he hollered.
“But he’s got
a strong will, he won’t stop until, his heart will stand still, they’ll have to defill…” His fingers flew over the strings. “…ibrate.”
Dad glowered. “I bought you that guitar, traitor!”
When Mom smacked Mateo, Lucia and I laughed. “Don’t sing about your father having a heart attack!” she chided.
“It’s defibrillate, Matty, not defillibrate,” I said.
“But that doesn’t rhyme.”
China shook her head, and I looked across the court to see Allison and Frank smiling at her. Though she wasn’t ready to return to duty, she’d made good progress recovering from her injuries.
“Enough of this.” Dad took the ball and dribbled it down the court with the rest of us flying behind him, trying to catch up. Dane’s loping stride reached the paint first, and he caught Dad’s pass to make an easy lay-up. Dad fist-bumped Dane as I took the ball behind the baseline. I passed it to Braxton and jogged toward the opposite basket.
Braxton executed a spin move that left Dad in the dust, and he shoveled a clean pass to Maddie, who drove for the basket. Lucia was on her like beans on rice, but Maddie pivoted and made a jump shot that found the basket.
That’s my girl. I winked at her.
Dane received Dad’s inbound pass, and blew by me as I contemplated kissing Maddie. ¡Chin! I was supposed to guard Dane. I sprinted behind him and was able to reach around to wave an arm in his face as he shot a three. The ball bounced on the rim but careened to the side. “Damn!” Dane said.
Braxton nabbed the rebound, and I backpedaled toward the other basket. He sailed a pass to me over Dane’s head, and I snagged the ball. Dane was on me right away, and I dribbled behind my back to avoid his big paw. Lucia stuck to Maddie too tightly for me to pass to her, and Braxton wasn’t in position yet. However, I saw a sweet lane to the basket. When I drove in for the shot, Dane jumped with me and collided with my right elbow.
Needles of pain shot up my arm but I managed to follow through with the shot, and the ball found net. When I came down, my hand cradled my elbow.
Aced (Blocked Book 2) Page 26