Touchdowns and Tiaras: The Complete Boxed Set

by Frost, Sosie

  Cole tucked himself into his pants. He didn’t look at me. “That what you wanted?”

  I nodded, breathless, but he didn’t stay. He said nothing else, only turned and stalked from the room, silent and…

  Angry?

  “Wait.” I smoothed my dress over my legs. “I mean…thank you.”

  His voice chilled. “Glad I could be of service.”

  I stiffened. “That’s not—”

  “If you want a nightcap before bed, you know where to look.”

  I didn’t like his tone. “No, thanks. I think you served me enough.”

  “Get your fill now. I have another away game this week. Won’t be around after Friday to fuck the shit out of you.”

  What was wrong with him? “You know, Cole, you’re not very good with this afterglow part.”

  “Never needed to be.” He shrugged. “You wanted to be fucked, you got it. Nothing else I can offer you.”

  “Cole—”

  “Night, Piper.”

  The door slammed behind him.

  What the hell just happened?

  My orgasm had shattered me, and I was too shaky to pick up the pieces without getting cut.

  The gentle Cole was gone, shoved back into the hole where his heart should have been.

  What had happened to our moment? I knew something good had happened, some breakthrough into his mind and soul.

  But I should have known better. Why was I trusting a man who deliberately hid the best parts of himself?

  It was a mistake to sleep with him. Both times.

  If Cole wanted to be a beast forever, fine.

  I wasn’t going to save him from himself.

  15

  Cole

  “How’s the MILF, Cole?”

  Tim Morgan was a dead man. His laugh cackled over the locker room.

  How hard was it to shower off the sweat and dirt in silence? Some men didn’t know when to shut their mouths. Others waited for me to do it for them.

  Tim buttoned up his suit and admired himself in the mirror. He paused only to wink at his offensive linemen. He spoke loud, for the benefit of the team. Real courteous.

  “I hope she’s treating her new sugar-daddy good,” Tim said. “But hell. I’d buy all the diapers and Legos in the world if it meant I got to fuck that sweet little cunt.”

  The locker room quieted. Surprised. The team didn’t know anything about me, let alone my taste in women. I intended to keep it that way.

  The anger management bullshit never worked before, but I had to try something. Counting to ten. Focusing on my breaths. Whispering a relaxing word that could calm me down.

  Piper. Rose. Piper. Rose.

  It wasn’t working. Not while Tim cackled, imagining all the filthy things he’d do to a woman he never should have imagined.

  I kept my voice low. “Shut your mouth. I hear you talking shit about Piper, I’m gonna put you through the damn wall. You get me?”

  “It was a compliment.”

  “She doesn’t need your approval.”

  Tim knotted his tie. He made a habit of looking nice and respectable, in case the media remembered what a shithead he was. The asshole had the nerve to hang a picture of his daughter in his locker, right next to the panties he swiped from the cluster of women watching the practice.

  “You know…” He shrugged. “I’m glad you got yourself a woman. Hope she loosens you up.”

  I buckled my jeans and shoved my feet into my shoes before I stuffed a football down his throat.

  “Is she hot?” Deion, our center, took one too many blows to the head and forgot his manners.

  “Yeah.” Tim grinned. “Piper Madison. Paul Madison’s daughter.”

  “Oh shit. That little piece of dark chocolate?” Deion hooted. “You hitting that, Cole? Didn’t take you for the romantic type.”

  Tim laughed. “Cole’s not winning any bitch over with that charming personality. He’s paying her to stay around—she’s his agent.”

  Deion chuckled. “Christ, my agent won’t even take my calls, let alone my dick.”

  “You’re missing the best part!” Tim wiggled his eyebrows. “Piper’s already had a kid, but there’s no baby-daddy in the picture. Know what that means?”

  “What?”

  “She’s not just hot as fuck, she’s easy.”

  I charged Tim before the team could stop me. I considered cracking his skull on the lockers, stuffing him through an electrical outlet in the wall, or breaking my knuckles on his nose.

  But if I hit Tim, my career was over.

  And right now the game was the only thing keeping my temper in check.

  He whined, but I was stronger. I tossed his worthless ass into the showers, pitching him into a stall. Tim shouted, but the freezing water must have shriveled his balls. He didn’t come after me, just whined like the little bitch that he was.

  “This is a three-thousand-dollar suit!”

  “The next time you insult Piper Madison, I’ll hold you under until you drown.”

  The silence wasn’t a good sign, but at least our quarterback was living. I shouldered my bag and strode out of the locker room, slamming my fist against the door to coax it open.

  Sometimes the pain helped. Sometimes it calmed me.

  Today pain made it worse.

  Much worse.

  How was I supposed to live with this kind of rage? A blinding, uncontrollable, painful anger squeezed my chest and tore through my veins. It hurt. It pissed me off. It exhausted me.

  And it endangered everyone who dared get close to me.

  I left the facility. That’d probably get me reamed out later, but at least I wouldn’t blackout rage in the safety of my own house.

  I hoped.

  I hid in my weight room for the afternoon. Most sane and rational people would have let me be, let me seethe around my machines and weights. Most normal women would have avoided me until I was too exhausted to care about anything but dragging my ass to bed.

  Not Piper.

  The woman didn’t have an iron will, she had brass fucking balls.

  And she was pissed.

  This wasn’t going to be good. Piper tapped the baby monitor in her hand. The kid was napping. Christ only knew what would happen now. The best and worst moments of my life occurred the instant Rose fell asleep.

  “You’re the only man I know who gets angry after sex,” she said.

  “And you’re the only woman who’d confront me about it.”

  “After the first night we spent together…you took off without a word. Without even a goodbye before you left for the game.”

  “Okay?”

  “Then yesterday, out of nowhere, you fuck me, drop me, then insult me.”

  “I’m not a compassionate kind of guy after my balls are drained.”

  “Oh, but you’re very eloquent.”

  “I never made any promises about sweet nothings in your ear, did I, beautiful?”

  Mistake. Piper was a five-foot-tall firecracker, and I just lit the fuse.

  “I wasn’t looking for flowers or candy, thank you very much,” she said.

  “Just wanted to get off on the biggest cock you could find?”

  “No.” Piper stared me down. “I wanted to get off on your cock. And I did.”

  I didn’t want to think about what that meant. “Then unless you’re looking to make the third time the charm—”

  “I’m not here to fuck you.”

  “And I’m not in the mood for company.”

  I settled onto the bench and prepared to lift. Piper slammed the baby monitor on a rack of weights next to me. Great. Now my ears strained to hear. Was it static or was the kid crying?

  Just interference, but I couldn’t relax.

  “You’re making my life exceedingly hard, Cole.”

  “What did I do? I haven’t even seen you today.”

  “You got in a fight in the locker room.”

  I brushed the powder off my hands in preparation for the li
ft. “Come here to scold me? If you want to play mommy, go take care of your baby.”

  “You are such a jackass.” Piper fumed. “Do you want me to leave? Just say it. Believe me, Cole, you’re not giving me much of a reason to stick around—in your house or as your agent.”

  “Did I ask you to leave?”

  “No, but you’re acting like a jerk. Like you don’t care about anything, even your own career. Do you have any idea the problems a fight with Tim Morgan can cause you?”

  I wasn’t an idiot. “Tim ran his mouth.”

  “He’s the face of the Monarchs. He’s the one the team will protect, not you.”

  “Think I don’t know that?”

  “Stop this pissing contest with him. Measure your dick some other way.”

  And let that jackass dishonor her? Insinuate her baby was anything but a goddamned miracle of smiles and giggles?

  I should have knocked him out cold.

  I said nothing. Piper lost her patience.

  “Don’t you get it? The Monarchs only need a reason to cut you. It doesn’t have to be at the end of the season. They could call me right now.”

  “Don’t tell me you want a trade again.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re going to risk everything because Tim Morgan is an asshole.” Piper paced the room, ready to blow. “I had a sponsorship deal lined up for you—the cover of League 2017.”

  Oh. Fuck. Since when did she score endorsement deals?

  “Forget it,” she said. “It’s done. The fight was already mentioned on Twitter. Give it until seven o’clock when Ainsley Ruport picks up the story, and the game will drop you.”

  “Then I lose a sponsorship. So what?”

  “It’s a million-dollar deal!”

  “Do I look like I need another million dollars?” I sat up, loving how Piper couldn’t resist a glance at my abs. “There’s probably rooms in this house you haven’t even seen yet, beautiful. Why don’t you go get lost?”

  She seethed, but she wasn’t an idiot. She stared at me, beyond the muscles and sweat, headphones crackling with white noise, and my scowl meant to drive her away.

  “You’d do anything to avoid attention, wouldn’t you?” she asked. “You don’t want the deal. You don’t want to stay at the practice facility with the team. You hate interacting with people, and you’ll ruin every good opportunity just so you can stay hidden.”

  I didn’t answer.

  “You know, I always thought it was strange…why you came home so early every day. Out the door at dawn, but back mid-afternoon.”

  Christ. I didn’t have the patience or strength to deal with this.

  She forced me to listen.

  “The team practices in the mornings and has meetings in the early afternoon,” she said. “Then the players usually train in the weight room together. Not you though.”

  “Not me,” I agreed.

  “You come home as soon as you can leave.”

  I gestured to my state-of-the-art, quiet, private weight room. “Why would I stick around when I have this?”

  “It’s not the equipment, Cole.”

  I gritted my teeth. “What do you want from me? I’m a loner. You know that.”

  “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why are you a loner?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Cole, look at me.”

  Piper’s voice tore from her, a blend of anger and frustration. She should have stormed out of the weight room, cursing me for hurting her. Instead she confronted me.

  Why? What did she want? An answer? A reason why I couldn’t bring myself to look at her?

  Did she want me to admit it?

  It was because she was so beautiful and gentle and smart.

  And the longer I stayed in her presence, the more I hated myself.

  “You live in this big, fancy house all alone,” she said. “Why?”

  Were we really doing this? “I like it that way.”

  “You like this much property? The taxes? The estate upkeep?”

  “What’s a gardener or a maid matter to me?”

  “This is your parents’ house?”

  Good. A history lesson. “And my father’s father’s. And his father’s before him.”

  “Where are your parents?”

  “Dead.”

  “You don’t mourn them.”

  “Hard to mourn someone I don’t miss. My mother died when I was young, my father took his sweet time following.”

  Piper nodded, like she figured me all out, like it was that easy. “You didn’t get along with your father?”

  “What’s that got to do with the house?”

  “You said before that he hit you.”

  “Everyone gets beat by their father.”

  Piper raised an eyebrow. “Not me.”

  “Right…yours just fires you and leaves you homeless without any alternative.”

  “I had an alternative.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Marry Rose’s father.”

  The thought set fire to my blood, and I didn’t even know the man. “But you didn’t.”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “Because Jasper isn’t a good father to my child.”

  And so she talked with me? Fucked me?

  My guts churned with ice.

  That made sense. Piper wanted to use me for a quick fuck. Nothing more.

  Hell, I had no idea what else I could offer her.

  “At least you took your comfort in my bed,” I said.

  “Yeah. I took a nice tumble in those sheets.” She stepped closer. “And I don’t regret it.”

  “You will.”

  “Do you want me to?”

  No, but it was inevitable. A woman like her needed a prince charming, someone responsible and safe. Someone she could trust with her baby.

  “I did what you asked of me,” I said. “You wanted to be fucked. I fucked you.”

  “Yeah, you’re real magnanimous that way.”

  “Aim to please.”

  “And you did, even if you don’t believe me.”

  “You’re not very subtle, beautiful. You came and nearly wrenched my cock off.”

  “So what’s the problem?” she asked. “You’ve been trying to get in my pants since the moment we met. Now that you’ve been down and back twice, you won’t even look at me while I’m talking to you. What happened? Wasn’t I any good at it?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Not experienced enough for you?”

  I heaved a breath. It didn’t extinguish the burn in my chest. “You were perfect, beautiful.”

  “Do you think I’m…easy now?” Her voice edged in a hidden pain, like she actually thought I find something wrong with her. “Am I damaged? You fucked me. Am I now repulsive to you?”

  “Jesus Fuck, Piper. You think I’m repulsed by you?”

  “What am I supposed to think? I don’t know if you like me. I don’t even know if we’re friends. I have no fucking idea if you actually want me here.”

  “Fuck me, Piper. You don’t understand.”

  “Then help me understand.”

  She wanted the truth? The ugly, horrible, heart-breaking truth?

  Fine.

  My voice lowered, harsh and unbreaking. “I asked you to move to the estate because when you and the baby are around, I feel like less of a monster.” I stared, willing my gaze to punish her for summoning the beast. “I’m not repulsed by you, beautiful. I’m repulsed by me.”

  Piper stepped back, but she wasn’t getting away this easy, not now.

  “Why?” Her voice quivered. “Why do you hate yourself so much?”

  “What’s there to love? I have to hate myself. If I didn’t…if I let myself be that monster…”

  The words didn’t come. Piper reached for me, and I batted her away. No touching. No speaking. No nothing. My heart shredded itself in my chest. Didn’t need it anyway.

  “Do you have any ide
a what it’s like living in a constant state of rage?” I whispered.

  Piper exhaled, trembling so near to me. Fear?

  No.

  She listened. Eagerly. Desperately.

  “I battle it every damn day,” I said. “I work hard to contain that hate. I wake up angry. I fall asleep angry. I do my job angry. And usually I can control it.”

  “Usually?”

  “Lately, it’s been staying in my head. Festering. Twisting me up. Do you understand? I can’t get rid of this rage. It’s just…growing.”

  Piper didn’t run.

  Why didn’t she run?

  Why did she stay and listen and act as if she cared?

  “You have no idea how hard it is. Every minute of every day is a fight with myself, denying the dark and terrible parts of me. You asked why I work-out here? Alone? It’s not about the solitude. This is the only place where I can push myself to the breaking point every day.”

  “Is it a punishment?”

  “No. It’s the only way I can exhaust myself. I pour everything, every last ounce of strength, into my work-out, praying it’s enough to make me so tired I can’t give a fuck about anything.”

  “Cole—”

  She still didn’t understand. How the hell was I supposed to describe how broken I was to someone so perfect?

  “I live every day in fear.” It didn’t relieve me to admit it. Just made the shame worse. “I’m bigger than everyone. I’m stronger. I’m the goddamned beast. I can’t even play this game anymore without breaking a man’s back. I’m too dangerous. I can’t…”

  I looked away. Walked away. Tried to get away.

  Piper didn’t let me.

  She held a hand to my chest and a second to my cheek. I fought her, but her touch warmed through me. Gentle. Fucking gentle.

  “Stop punishing yourself,” she said. “You’ve no reason to be afraid.”

  “Of course I do. You scare me, beautiful.”

  Piper stilled, her voice low. “Have you ever thought about hurting me?”

  I took her hand, answering immediately, fervently. “No.”

  “Have you ever thought about hurting Rosie?”

  The idea physically sickened me. I pushed her away, trying to forget the baby’s smile and her laugh and how she shared her banana with me every morning.

  “God, no.”