Dating the Player, page 5
Now I had told Dak I was a virgin, he’d offered to deflower me, and for the sake of my sanity, I had to say no. Now he was annoyed with me.
Not a normal day in the life of Eloise.
I dug in my purse for a bottle of aspirin.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“I have a headache.” I found the bottle and unscrewed the cap and shook out two tablets.
“You did smash on that wine.”
Yes. Yes, I did. So glad he had noticed.
Not.
“Give me your phone,” I demanded.
“Why?”
“Because I’m going to close my eyes and take a nap.”
When I woke up I wanted my headache to be gone.
“Fine. It’s in the cup holder. Take it.”
“Thank you.” I picked it up and tucked it into my bra so I would know if he tried to take it back.
Sighing, I settled back into my seat. I wanted to forget that Dak had offered something more tempting than a million dollars and that I needed to resist him.
Sex with Dak.
How amazing would that be?
Even as I dropped my eyelids, I was already doubting myself that I would be able to stay strong, an image of his very large cock taunting me.
* * *
Dak
* * *
My mother was waiting on the front porch of the house I had bought as a thank-you gift my rookie year, rubbing her arms over her coat sleeves like it was twenty degrees instead of fifty-five.
“Get in here!” she urged. “It’s freezing outside. Lord almighty, I told Daddy to light a fire in the fireplace.”
I’d never been one to get cold, and whatever resistance to cold my Southern blood had once had, didn’t exist after four winters in New Jersey. Besides, once you’ve played in Green Bay in January, you can never be a pussy about a winter breeze ever again.
Going around to Eloise’s door, I opened it for her. She looked sleepy and cranky. She’d been sleeping for forty minutes and she had creases from her coat zipper on her cheek along with matted hair. She was sniffling, like the wine had made her congested, and whatever the fuck was wrong with me, I didn’t know, because I thought she was adorable.
“We’re here,” I said, holding my hand out to help her down from the SUV.
“I can see that.” Eloise blinked up at the house. “It’s beautiful here.”
“Yep.” When she made no move to get out, I took her hand and tugged. “Come on.”
“Sorry.” She slid down off of the seat. “My head is killing me. I’m never day drinking again.”
If that was what she deemed day drinking, she’d clearly never been to Mardi Gras. Or South Beach in February. Or my apartment in the off-season.
“That sucks. I’m sorry. Maybe you need to eat something. Or take a hot shower.”
I pictured Eloise naked, lips parted, head tilted back, water streaming down those very full tits.
Damn it. This trip home was shaping up to be torturous.
“I don’t want to be rude to your parents.” She stepped onto the driveway.
“It’s fine. Do whatever you need to do.” I opened the back and hauled out our bags. “Come on, Kitty.”
I gestured for her to go first and she went up the brick walkway. My mother wasn’t hiding her curiosity. She was eyeing Eloise up and down. I could see surprise and maybe a little confusion on her face. She hadn’t believed me when I said Eloise worked for the team but now she was doubting her conclusions. Eloise wasn’t like women I normally dated. Or had sex with.
“Hi,” Eloise said, as she started up the porch. “I’m Eloise. It’s so nice to meet you, Mrs. North.” She stuck her hand out.
My mother looked at it like it was a foreign object. “Oh, honey, I hug.” She pulled Eloise into her arms and gave her a squeeze. “And call me Freddie. Now y’all come inside before I freeze to this porch. I don’t look good in blue. It’s not my color.”
“Don’t I get a hug?” I asked her.
“In the house.”
The second I stepped over the threshold, I smelled pies baking for the next day. I sniffed the air. “Damn, Mama, that smells good.” Setting the bags down I pulled my mother into a hug. “It’s good to see you.”
“I missed you,” she said, and when she pulled away she had tears in her eyes, which she hid behind feigning irritation with me. “Now take Eloise’s coat, you ill-mannered oaf.”
“Sure thing.” I slipped Eloise’s coat down her arms while she glanced up at me over her shoulder.
Her eyes widened, like she wanted guidance on what the hell she was supposed to do.
I just gave her a smile.
She was a smart girl. She could figure it out.
“You have a beautiful home,” Eloise told my mother.
“Thank you. Dakota bought it for us.”
My mom told everyone she ever spoke to that. She told the cashier at the grocery, people at church who already knew, random airport employees when my parents traveled. It was damn embarrassing. It gave me a sheepish feeling. Because I mean, what dick doesn’t buy something nice for his parents when he’s fucking rolling in millions?
“That’s very generous of him,” Eloise said.
Then my mother did that thing that all mothers do. She had bragged about me, but now in her opinion, Eloise was giving me too much credit. “Well, it’s the least he can do after we raised him, busting our butts to pay for his sports equipment. Having a baby at eighteen isn’t easy,” she said.
“It’s really hard at sixteen,” I said, pointedly.
Mom gave me a frown. “What does that mean?”
I gave her a grin. “That you’re not fooling anyone. Where’s Dad and the kids?”
“The kids are at school. They’ll be off the bus in twenty minutes. Your dad is playing with his wood.”
I laughed. “He probably doesn’t want people to know that, Mama.”
She gasped. “Don’t be crass. His wood pile. He’s chopping wood for a fire for me.” She shook her head, like I disgusted her. “Eloise, I apologize for my son. I did not raise him to be a pervert. Must be all that testosterone in the locker room. Ridiculous.”
“It’s okay,” Eloise said. “I’m very familiar with his inability to think before he speaks.”
Hey. That was a little insulting.
But my mother let out a crack of laughter. “You’ve got that right, sweetie.”
Mom came over to me and said, “Take those bags upstairs and show Eloise her room so she can freshen up.” She leaned in and murmured, “I like this one. She’s not afraid to put you in your place.”
I wasn’t sure that was it exactly. Eloise just worried I would screw up and cost her her job. But my mother was used to girls fawning all over me, so I could see where she would like someone being more of an equal than an ass-kisser.
“Don’t get attached,” I told her. “She’s not very impressed with me.”
I had to admit, that had stung a little. Eloise didn’t think I was a good man and that bothered me. I may be a lot of things but I’ve never been an asshole to women. I make it very clear that I’m out for fun and nothing more. I’ve never promised someone something I didn’t deliver. You could tell she was the woman who always meant what she said. I wanted her to know the same was true about me.
Hell, I wanted Eloise to fucking like me. I hated the idea that she wouldn’t have sex with me because she thought I wouldn’t do right by her.
New plan.
I didn’t just want to be the guy who took Eloise’s virginity.
I wanted her to like me.
How hard could that be? I’m a natural-born leader. Guys listen to me. Girls adore me. I’m rich and charming as fuck.
Eloise just needed a little convincing that I wasn’t going to be an asshole who blew her off after one night of smoking hot sex.
That meant I needed to ease her into sex. Slowly. Woo her. With my tongue. Everywhere.
I love a challenge.
My mother gave me a look that I didn’t understand, but then she shooed me toward the stairs. “Let the poor girl freshen up.”
Fine by me.
I needed a minute alone with Eloise to snag my phone back. As far as I knew, it was still in her bra. Against her full, ripe tit. Her warm, soft flesh.
I cut my thoughts off before I got a massive erection in front of my mother.
“This way, Eloise.”
I gave her a smile and put my hand on the small of her back to guide her upstairs. “Which room, Mama?” I asked, glancing back over my shoulder. “My mother has her guest rooms themed,” I told Eloise.
“The Chip and Joanna.”
That was the one my mother deemed “farmhouse chic.” I couldn’t claim to know what the hell that actually meant but I did know it was the second room on the left. “Got it.”
When I opened the door for Eloise, the confusion on her face cleared. “Oh, now I get it. Definitely the Chip and Joanna. It’s beautiful.”
I wasn’t looking at the room. I was looking at her. “Very beautiful.”
Eloise glanced over and saw what had to be naked lust on my face. Her cheeks turned pink. “Stop it.”
“No.” I set her suitcase down on the trunk at the foot of the bed.
“What are the other guest rooms?”
“A masculine one she calls ‘The Lodge’ and the ‘Teal Room.’ Originally she called it the ‘Red Room’ because of the paint color, but after Fifty Shades of Grey came out she got tired of my dad making jokes about it.” I reached out and brushed Eloise’s hair off of her shoulder, wanting to touch her. “Of course, even that backfired on him because he’s the one who ended up repainting it.”
“I see,” she said and she looked up at me, expectantly.
She wanted me to tell her what to do. How to proceed.
Well, what I wanted her to do was to kiss me. I wanted to taste her full lips and see if she would tremble or dive into the kiss with wild abandon.
I shifted in closer to her. I cupped her cheeks, studying the way she blinked up at me, eyes wide behind her glasses. I wasn’t sure I had ever kissed a girl wearing glasses. She was so damn cute. With a sexy-as-fuck body. Which was kind of a deadly combination. It was the full package.
“Hey, Kitty?” I said, stroking her soft cheeks with my calloused thumbs. My hands engulfed her entire face. I have big hands, and trust me, what they say about that is true.
“Yes?” Her hands were in the front pockets of her high-waisted jeans, which made her tits jut out to perfection.
“I’m going to kiss you.”
I expected her to protest. To say it wasn’t a good idea.
But she surprised me by nodding. “Okay. I’m accepting my fate. A kiss won’t kill me.”
That made me laugh softly. “Don’t flatter me.”
“You should be very flattered. It only took a few hours to break my convictions.”
That made my dick hard, I’m not going to lie. “I’ll make it worth it.”
I wasn’t sure if she was talking about us having sex or not, but I was going to take whatever I could get. I bent down and covered her lips with mine, giving her a hot, teasing kiss. She sighed beneath me, and I pulled back briefly to see her in that moment. To file it away in my memory banks—her beautiful face held between my hands, her hair tickling my arms, her deep brown eyes dark and glassy.
It felt important to remember this.
She may not like me. She might not respect me as a man. But she wanted me.
That was good enough for now.
Everyone needs a game plan. Mine was to run a steady ground game. Then when she least expected it, throw the long pass. Take a little bit, over and over, then in the end, go for as much yardage as I could.
So I kissed her again, a smooth, easy taking of her mouth, until she was leaning against me and willingly opening her lips for my tongue.
That’s when I undid the button on her blouse.
She gave a sharp inhalation of air.
I squeezed her gloriously full breast. Eloise gave a soft moan.
Then I pulled my phone out of her bra and stepped back.
Chapter Five
Eloise
* * *
I stared up at Dak in shock, breathing hard. My nipple was hard from that brief contact where he had palmed my breast like a football. My lips were swollen and moist from his kiss and I felt like there was no way to get enough air in my lungs.
He was grinning like a goddamn Cheshire cat, his phone in his hands. “It’s very warm,” he said, tossing the phone from hand to hand.
I was mortified. He had conned me, plain and simple.
And I had fallen for it. See, Will at work was completely wrong. I wasn’t better than other women. I fell for the lines too. After admitting I was willing to do whatever Dak wanted with me.
It made me stiffen my resolve. I had to stop being a pushover. I needed to be an active participant, not a passive bystander. If I was going to risk my job, it needed to be an actual decision to lose my virginity to Dak, not just me getting swept away on a moment.
“You could have just asked for the phone back,” I said dryly, despite feeling flushed and way too aroused for my liking.
“What’s the fun in that? I mean, I was going to kiss you either way.”
“Why?” I asked him, totally serious. I still didn’t understand what Dak wanted from me. Not really.
“Because you’re going to be mine.”
I shivered. He said it so matter-of-fact and why wouldn’t he? What the hell had he wanted that he hadn’t gotten? Nothing, other than he couldn’t eliminate cancer from his brother’s body. But other than that very traumatic loss, Dak got what he wanted, especially when it came to women.
I should have been offended. Outraged. Instead, I was just turned on and ready to just hand over my V card to him. If we weren’t in his parents’ house, it would have been really hard to resist.
Dak ran his thumb over my bottom lip. “Aren’t you going to say anything?” he asked.
I shook my head, pulling my hands out of my pockets. “I don’t have anything to say. Though there is something I want to do.” I reached out and placed my hand right on his cock. He had an easily defined outline in his jeans so that I landed right where I needed to be, completely catching him off guard. “I want to touch you,” I said, stroking him through the denim.
For once, I had shocked the hell out of him. He groaned. “Fuck, Kitty, what are you doing?”
His hands had gone slack. I moved my palm over his cock, feeling it harden beneath my touch. With my free hand, I snagged his phone right back and held it up. “Taking your phone back.”
I dropped my hand from his pants.
Dak growled. “Oh, you little dirty sneak. I am so fucking proud of you right now. And turned on.” He reached for me. “You’re going to pay for that.”
I laughed and tried to jump out of his touch but he was fast and big and strong. Obviously. He was paid millions for those skills. I shoved his phone in my pocket right as he got an arm wrapped around my waist. He lifted me off the ground. Startled, I shrieked. “Put me down!”
“Not a chance. You need to be punished.”
Dak only held me with one arm and yet he still managed to toss me higher and up onto his shoulder. I held on to his biceps for balance. I felt very small and feminine in his grip. He was broad and muscular and tossed me around like I was a size two, which I was not. Not even close. “Dak, if you don’t put me down I’m going to Venmo myself money out of your bank account on your phone.”
“You’re a liar.”
He was right. I would never do that, but it was a good threat. “Try me.”
“You don’t know my password.”
Then he shocked me silent by swatting my ass with one of his massive palms. It didn’t hurt but it was startling and intimate and… hot. I instantly got warm, nipples tightening and pussy going wet. “Dak!”
He spanked me again, harder, and this time the sting reverberated throughout my body and I gasped.
I was about to beg him to do that again when I glanced to the right, tossing my hair back, and saw his mother standing in the hallway. “Oh!”
“You like that?” Dak asked.
I smacked his arm. “Dak, your mother,” I whispered frantically, squirming to get down. I was horrified. Why the hell hadn’t we closed the door? I blamed the aftereffects of the plane wine.
He whirled around, still holding me over his shoulder. “Hi, Mama,” he said.
She gave us a look that burned faster and deeper than an acid peel. I felt like my skin was being seared off by that expression of total disapproval. My cheeks burned and I wiggled harder, wanting desperately to be on the floor instead of dangling in the air, Dak’s arm under my ass.
Dak didn’t seem to get the hint. He wasn’t letting me down even after I murmured, “Seriously, put me down.”
“Eloise likes the room,” he said to his mother.
“It’s very beautiful,” I said awkwardly. “Thank you.”
“I need y’all to go cut me down a Christmas tree,” Freddie said, her eyes narrowed. Dak’s mother was blonde and slim, very attractive. “And your brother and sister will be home any minute now so quit your fooling around.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Finally, Dak lowered me to the plush carpet. But he kept me firmly against his side, his arm around me, which confused me. I would have thought he would want whatever it was we were doing to be on the down low.
His mother was more than suspicious. She looked flat-out angry.
I was normally an innocuous houseguest. I brought wine for the hostess and made my bed. I felt naughty, something I wasn’t used to. But at the same time, I couldn’t regret it. That kiss… Dak knew how to make me weak in the knees.
“Where do we go to find a Christmas tree?” I asked, striving for polite. I pushed my hair back off my face and straightened my glasses. “I would love to help out.”
“We have ten acres,” Freddie said. “You just go off into the woods and find a good one and Dak will cut it down.”
