The Rebound, page 7
“So,” she says, pausing to pull the noisy plastic cover off the cake, “why didn’t you tell me you played hockey? If you’d said that earlier, we would have been able to put two and two together much earlier on.”
“When I tell a woman that I play hockey for a living . . .” I pause when her eyebrows lift, then clear my throat to start again. “Usually, when people figure out who I am, they look me up and immediately know everything there is to know about me. It’s crazy what you can find online. My stats for the seasons, which teams I’ve played for. Where I was born. My height, my weight, my salary. It’s all people want to talk about. It’s all they care about. I didn’t want it to be like that with you. You’re new to the city and you didn’t know who I was. It was nice to have a fresh start with someone.”
Nodding, she gives me a soft look. “But eventually you were going to have to tell me.”
“Yeah, eventually. But I wanted to keep you away from the tabloids while I got my life in order.”
“Do the tabloids not like you?”
A little reluctantly, I chuckle. “No, they actually love me. I do a lot of stupid shit, which makes the team look bad. The tabloids have people who follow me around the city to clubs and bars and whatnot. That’s why I’ve been laying low for the past month or so. It’s part of the reason why your brother hates me so much.”
“What’s the other part?”
I shrug. “I’m prettier than he is.”
Kinley snorts out a giggle. “That you are.”
Her gaze lingers on mine, and I try to ignore the way my jeans grow tighter. Now is really not the time for an inappropriate boner.
“So, am I forgiven?” I do my best to sound casual, but a hint of desperation bleeds through.
I don’t know what I’d do if Kinley cut me out of her life for good. I haven’t had a connection with someone like this before, and I’m not about to lose it over some dumb hockey squabble.
“Of course. Cake heals all wounds.”
The tightness in my chest eases a little, and I give her a grateful grin. Sure enough, eating the bakery-bought cake is an experience that’s damn near spiritual.
I make the mistake of smearing a dollop of icing on Kinley’s nose, which very quickly escalates to nearly getting a face full of cake myself.
I catch her hand, now covered in buttercream frosting, and draw her fingers to my mouth one by one to lick them clean. Kinley’s giggles stop as she becomes breathless, her pupils wide. With a sexy little smirk, she smears some icing on her lips, an invitation I’d be a damn fool to reject.
We’re a little sticky from the sugar, but it doesn’t matter. There’s nothing sweeter than Kinley’s warm mouth. My tongue caresses hers, eliciting a heady moan that sends a wave of excitement down the back of my neck. My dick presses hungrily against my zipper as my hand wanders up the length of her leg, squeezing her thigh and pulling her close to me.
“I missed you today.” She sighs between languid kisses along my jaw, her hands wandering the expanse of my shoulders.
I want to tease her, remind her we weren’t separated for more than half a day, but her tongue must be laced with some sort of truth serum because I whisper, “I missed you too.”
With that, I’m tugging Kinley into my lap, pressing our bodies together in an electric embrace. She rocks her hips against me, grinding against my swollen shaft, which is still shoved unpleasantly against my zipper.
“Am I too heavy?” she asks a little nervously.
“You’re perfect.”
Pulling away the straps of her dress, I occupy myself with the taste of her collarbones, her breasts, her perky little nipples. Kinley knots her fingers in my hair, leaning back in her pleasure to give me full access to wherever my lips choose to venture next. My hands are the real explorers, though, sliding beneath the thin cotton of her panties to cup her ass and squeeze.
God, this woman has a good ass.
“Let’s move somewhere more comfortable,” I say softly.
Panting, she nods. “The bedroom.”
With one hand under her ass and the other around her waist, I stand and carry her toward her room.
Kinley’s mouth presses to the stubble on my throat. “I can walk, you know.”
I grunt out a reply, but I don’t release her.
The feel of her firm belly pressing into me should feel strange, foreign . . . but it doesn’t. I like the feel of her in my arms, and I appreciate all the parts of her body and what it can do.
When we reach the bed, I place her in the center of the mattress, and Kinley tugs me down with her. I chuckle and lie down with her in the center of the bed. We turn to our sides, facing each other.
I take her mouth in another searing kiss. Part of me knows I should put an end to this, but the other part of me wouldn’t stop what we’re doing for all the money in the world.
Her knees part, and I bring my hand beneath her dress to caress her over her panties.
Kinley gasps, her eyes glassy with desire. “Do you . . . have a condom?”
“No.” I sigh, dipping my head to nip at her neck. “I wasn’t sure how tonight would go, so I didn’t . . .” My words trail off into a strangled groan as Kinley dips her hand into the front of my pants and palms me firmly.
“That’s all right,” she murmurs. “There’s plenty we can do without one.”
Deftly, Kinley unzips me, and the first touch of her fingers to my cock sends a jolt of pleasure down my spine.
Half the pleasure is the feel of her soft fingers moving around me, barely able to encompass the full thickness of it. The other half is the way she looks getting me off, her dress pulled down low to reveal her flushed, naked chest.
The feeling is overwhelming, beyond temptation, so I let my hands do exactly what they want, one coming up to massage her breast and pinch her nipple, and the other sneaking beneath her dress to the warmth between her legs. With a gasp, Kinley opens her legs wider, allowing two of my curious fingers to plunge deep inside her.
“Oh wow . . .” She groans, her free hand clawing at the back of my neck for purchase.
As pleasure overtakes her, her hand’s pace on my cock falters, but I don’t care. If she keeps making noises like that, I’m going to lose a handle on my careful control.
At Kinley’s trembling request, I thrust my fingers deeper and faster, crooking them just so. She’s so warm, and I can’t help but imagine what it’ll feel like once I’m actually inside her, buried deep.
We lock eyes, and as if we’re both thinking the same thing, Kinley shudders in my arms, her orgasm hitting her hard and relentless. Just the sight is enough to take me over the edge, and soon I’m coming into her hand with a rush of pleasure that makes me dizzy.
She crumples against me, resting her head on my shoulder while she catches her breath. Instinctually, I pull her into me, locking my arms around her waist. For a long time, there’s nothing but the sound of our breathing filling the silence.
But these feelings welling up inside me? They’re louder than any concerns knocking around in my head. So what if her crazy brother beats me bloody when he finds out we’re still seeing each other?
For this woman, it might just be worth it.
9
* * *
KINLEY
I wake up to the sound of my phone buzzing faintly under my pillow. Through groggy eyes, I see the caller ID reads WALKER. I cringe, debating whether to pick up. It’s barely nine in the morning, the psycho.
The call goes to voice mail before I can decide to answer it, my screen lighting up with not one but three missed calls and about a dozen text messages to boot.
What the hell is going on?
Bewildered, I reach across the sheets for Saint but find the other side of my bed empty. Down the hall, the pipes creak and the shower turns on. He’s still here, at least.
Reluctantly, I pull myself upright to absorb Walker’s messages before I accidentally drift off again. They start from last night, around the time when Saint brought me dinner. The voice mails make me nervous, so I scroll through the texts first.
Hey Kin, wondering if you have any dinner plans. I’m thinking about making lasagna. I’ll have lots of leftovers.
And about an hour later—
You okay?
I guess you fell asleep early. Give me a call when you wake up.
And then this morning—
Hey Kin. I knocked on Saint’s door last night to talk to him, man to man. He didn’t answer.
I checked this morning too.
Is he with you?
Kin the guy is bad news. You don’t know his history.
My stomach sinks as I continue to read.
I could tell you myself but if you’ve googled him even once you should have a pretty good idea what he’s really like.
Saint is already close to being suspended. I’m obligated to keep an eye on him, but I don’t want to have to tell Coach he’s fooling around with my little sister.
I’ve worked with him for years. If he is ultimately suspended, he’ll spiral and you will get caught up in his shitstorm.
It’s not worth it.
Kin, call me.
That’s the end of the texts, and despite waking up in a happy mood, I press a hand to my stomach, which is starting to churn. I put my phone facedown on my lap and take a few deep breaths.
I want to cry. Or throw my phone against the wall. This is too much. Against my better judgment, I listen to the voice mails too.
“Hey, Kinley, I know it’s early but I need you to call me back.”
“Kin, I’m really worried about you. I didn’t hear back from you last night. I thought about busting down your door, but I obviously didn’t want to do that because that’s crazy, for one, and also because I want to give you space to make your own decisions and live your own life. I just . . . call me back, okay? I feel like I’m losing my mind.”
“Okay, officially starting to feel like a lunatic. Saint isn’t home, so I have to assume the two of you are together. You said yourself that you’ve been spending every waking moment with him. I didn’t think it through when I moved you in this building. I should have known. I’m really worried he’s doing this to get some sort of revenge on me . . . I’ve always given the guy a hard time, and I may have taken it too far lately with his suspension on the table. I just don’t want you to be sucked in when he goes off the deep end. Just call me so we can talk it out.”
I don’t know how long I’ve been staring at the wall when Saint walks back into the bedroom. He’s bare-chested with a white towel wrapped low around his hips. A thick trail of steam follows him from the hall, fogging up my mirror.
“Good morning, sunshine,” he says before seeing my expression. “Hey . . . what’s going on? Are you okay?”
I meet his wide-eyed expression with an empty sigh. “Not really.”
He kneels in front of me, droplets still clinging to his wet hair. “What is it? The baby?”
“No,” I choke out. “I just can’t do this anymore.”
“Do what, sweetheart?”
“This was the last time. I’m so sorry.”
“The last—”
“We can’t see each other anymore.”
“Kinley, if this is about your brother, I can talk to him. I can—”
I lean in and press a chaste kiss to Saint’s full lips, savoring the way he automatically kisses me back. It’s all too sudden, too dramatic. But this is the way it has to be, right?
Boundaries and all that. Doctor’s orders.
Without another word, I climb out of bed and beeline toward the bathroom, closing the door behind me.
First, I pee for like forty-three years because that’s just my life now. Then I crank the shower knob, letting the hot water steam up the room to sauna-like levels. I take a long shower—the kind you spend contemplating your life choices and where they’ve led you up to this point.
When I’m finally done, Saint is gone.
• • •
“It’s too expensive,” I say, holding up the price tag so Walker can take a better look. “Honestly, this is highway robbery.”
After I met him at the coffee shop, my brother kindly offered to take me to the local baby supply store to pick out a car seat. I initially objected, reminding him that I don’t even own a car. But then he reminded me that he has a car, adding that he’s also going to get me my own car for my birthday, which is . . . just too much.
But if I know anything about my brother, it’s that resistance is futile. You can’t argue with the man. Unless you have the energy of a thousand suns, and I’m feeling pretty burned out as it is.
Walker blinks at the price, utterly unfazed. “That’s not even remotely too much.”
“Stop bragging,” I grumble, dropping the price tag to cross my arms.
But that doesn’t stop Walker from buying the dang thing because, as he says, “It’s got the best online rating.” Minutes later, he’s loading it into his car.
I can tell he feels bad about the whole Saint thing, as relieved as he must be that I finally listened to him. When I told him it was over, he saw my red-rimmed eyes and wrapped me in a hug, asking no further questions. I couldn’t help but appreciate that.
Later, when Walker is driving us back to the complex, he turns to me with a serious expression. Even more so than usual.
“You know I’m here for you, right? I’m on your team, Kin.”
The persistent ache in my chest that began this morning subsides a little. Walker is here for the long haul. If anyone is going to look out for me and my kid, it’ll be him.
“I know. Thanks, Walker.”
And maybe it’s selfish—short-sighted, even—but I can’t help but wish that I could have just one more Boston Titan on my team. Specifically, the one with the sweet words and even sweeter kisses. But I know for all parties involved, it’s better off this way.
For the baby, it has to be.
10
* * *
SAINT
Whoever invented running was a complete and utter sadist. Don’t get me wrong—it’s an excellent way to stay in shape during a long off-season. But at the same time . . . fuck this.
No, seriously. Fuck it.
After I sprint through the final stretch of my hour-long route, my worn Nikes slow to a regular walking pace at the park across the street from my building complex. I flop down on an empty bench to catch my breath, stretching my legs in front of me with a groan. I’m gonna feel this one for at least a week.
I pull my phone out of my running armband and pause the playlist, now on its second play-through. Not that I actually heard any of it. A morning run was meant to clear my head, but instead it just made it impossible to ignore my thoughts. Thoughts of Kinley, to no one’s surprise, played on a constant loop.
It’s like my brain is jammed in place, stuck on the expression on her soft face the last time we were in the same room together. She was so pale, as if all the warmth we’d shared the night before had been sucked right out of her. And then when she said we couldn’t be together again . . . I don’t know. It just didn’t seem like her. She’s usually so present, but this time she was a million miles away with a faraway, almost sad look in her normally bright eyes. A painful pinch had stabbed through my chest at her words.
My phone vibrates with an incoming text. It takes me a second to realize who the number belongs to, but when I do, I frown. It’s the girl I was supposed to hook up with before I met Kinley.
Hey hottie. You up for any fun tonight?
Is it weird that I have zero interest in getting horizontal with some stranger? The old me would have jumped all over that. Now, though? I’m honestly just confused. All I want is for Kinley to talk to me and tell me where we stand.
A nagging sensation pulls at my gut. Is this really the end of us? I don’t know if I can accept that. My phone stares back at me from where it sits in my hand like I’m supposed to know what to do about it.
This is so unlike me. I’m not a thinker . . . I’m a doer. So I need to do something.
With adrenaline and endorphins still flooding my veins, I pound out a message I’ll probably regret later.
I’m at the park if you want to talk.
It’s a simple invitation, one that I hope won’t scare Kinley away more than I already have. I just need her to talk to me. I need her to trust me. Whatever the hell is going on, I know we can figure it out.
We’ve developed such an easy rapport, right from the moment we met. Surely, talking is what we need to do. Swapping sentences and words and truths with each other. And while these aren’t sentiments I’ve felt, like ever, for a woman, I know it’s what we need to do. Maybe then I’ll stop obsessing like a heartbroken teenager.
Sighing, I drop my phone on my lap and lean my head back to stare at the treetops. This is probably pointless. She hasn’t responded to any of my other texts recently, so why would she reply to this one?
I’ve been racking my brain trying to figure out what I did, where I went wrong. But for once in my life, I don’t think I’m the problem. I’m willing to bet my left nut on the probability that it has something to do with Reeves.
Son of a bitch. Why did I have to fuck around with the sister of the dude who hates me the most?
But it isn’t just “fucking around” to me. It’s been a lot more than that. Hell, we haven’t even had sex yet. Sure, we’ve made out on more than one occasion. I guess we swapped oral that one time. And I did finger-fuck Kinley to nirvana and back while she jerked me off the face of the earth.
Even though my heart rate responds by escalating to those very pleasant memories, my time with her wasn’t about getting in her pants.
What I’m trying to say is that this hasn’t just been about hooking up. We’ve been taking it slow in our own way, like we’re building up to something important. And that’s the thing. Kinley is important to me. I’m not sure what that means yet, but it’s definitely not what the captain—
