Текст книги "Sacked"
Автор книги: Jen Frederick
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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 21 страниц)
36 Ellie
After the vows, the hugging, the back slapping, Knox hustles me outside and half carries, half drags me toward his SUV. He nearly shoves me into the passenger seat and then races around to his side of the vehicle. Climbing in, he locks the doors, starts the engine and then turns to me.
His hand comes up to cradle my skull, tilting my head toward his. “I’ve missed you, baby.”
“I missed you too.” There’s no point in pretending I don’t still love him.
He inhales deeply, his eyes shuttering closed for a second before popping open again. A half smile appears on his lips. “Three weeks seems like three years, doesn’t it?”
“It’s been endless,” I admit.
“Baby, I am so sorry.”
“What are you sorry for?” I jerk back in surprise, but Knox pulls me toward him, only to have my progress stopped by the console between us.
He curses and turns to put the SUV in reverse. “I need to get you out of this car. These victories, the past weeks…” He takes his eyes off the road for a minute to glance at me, and I see real anguish there. “None of it will be right until you’ve forgiven me and I get to hold you again.”
A sob lodges in my throat. I swallow heavily to drive it away, but it makes my voice hoarse when I reply. “I’m so sorry I lied to you about Jack. I’m sorry I kissed your brother. I’m sorry that I placed your team in jeopardy with my actions.” I cover my eyes. “If anyone needs forgiveness, it’s me.”
Knox barks out an abrupt laugh. “And I didn’t put you through the ringer with my stupid fucking test?”
“It wasn’t stupid,” I cry.
He curses again. “I wish we weren’t in this fucking car, because I need to hold you right now.”
“Where are we going?” I use the veil to wipe my tears. I hope mascara comes off tulle.
“Hotel.” He grins. “Gift from my parents.”
“I can’t believe they let you get married.”
He drapes an arm across the back of my seat and tangles his fingers in my hair. “We’re adults. I’ve always known what I wanted since I came out of the womb. They knew better than to argue.”
I suppose that’s right. He’s a bulldozer, forging forward to take what he wants. And somehow he wants me. “I love you,” I whisper.
His hand tightens in my hair and he makes a sharp right into a parking lot of a strip mall that’s apparently closed for business on Sundays, because the lot is empty. In one swift movement, he has the parking brake on and my seatbelt is off. He hauls me over the console and into his lap. It’s a tight, uncomfortable fit. The steering wheel digs into my side. My legs dangle awkwardly over the console. Knox’s seat belt hadn’t fully retracted in his haste, and it pokes into my right butt cheek.
But I’ve never felt better.
I allow my hands to roam over his gorgeous face and into his hair. It’s getting long enough to brush the collar of his suit coat. I take one deep breath after the other, filling my lungs with his scent.
My tears start falling.
“No, no, please stop,” Knox says in a panic. “What can I do?”
His hands try to brush away my tears and the sweetness of the gesture only turns up the waterworks higher. I don't make any effort to stop them or him.
“These are happy tears,” I inform him gladly. “I didn’t think I’d ever have the chance to touch you again.” I take his hands, placing them over my sweater covered breasts. Instinctively, his palms curl around the round flesh. His thumbs graze my sensitive tips. “You feel so good,” I moan. “Never stop touching me.
“I won't,” he swears. “I won't ever stop.”
He curls forward, closing the small distance between us. His mouth meets mine with so much tender love I explode in bliss. He tastes minty and male and so wonderfully familiar. His tongue snakes inside to rub against the roof of my mouth, along the ridges, setting off a riot within my taste buds. He’s the best thing on the menu, the only flavor that will ever appease my growing hunger.
I run my hands freely underneath his suit coat. We have a mountain of clothes between us and I’m desperate to get them off. I want that the hair-roughened skin against my more delicate frame. I want to run my tongue over those hard muscles and take the hardest, velvety part of him into my mouth, into my body, into me.
“We need a bed,” I whisper throatily against his mouth.
He groans and tightens his hands around my breasts one more time before lifting me back onto my side of the vehicle. With exquisite care, he reaches over and buckles me in. Satisfied that I’m secured, he reaches a hand up to my face and brushes my hair back. “I love you, Eliot Masters. I still love you.”
Water drips down my face. “If you want me to stop crying, you can’t say those things to me.” I clutch at his hand and presses waterlogged kisses into his palm.
He releases a small huff of laughter. “I guess you’ll cry a lot then.”
“Will you cry if I tell you I love you back?” I nuzzle my cheek into his hand.
“Maybe. Why don’t you give it a try?” The evenness of his voice is an effort.
“I love you.”
He doesn’t cry, but his eyes soften toward me and love shines through; better than tears in my opinion.
Knox puts the vehicle in gear and heads downtown to the hotel. We get there, but I don’t remember the trip. All I know is that I can touch him again, feel him, breathe him in.
That he’s mine again…and forever.
•••
“I feel…discombobulated,” I admit as we wait for the hotel elevator. People stare at us. I suppose we do look a sight. My veil is askew and Knox’s jacket drapes over my shoulders.
“I told Matty that’s how I felt. Thick headed and muddled. We concluded it’s how quarterbacks must feel when they’re sacked.” He ushers me onto the elevator.
“So we’ve gotten sacked by love?” I snort. It’s corny but sweet, and totally Knox. At the core, he’s a romantic. The man saved himself for the right girl and somehow, I’m her. All my life, I’ve never been anything but Jack’s sister. To Knox, I’m the person he waited for his entire life.
“Yeah, but we’re never saying that shit again.”
I hide a smile. At least now I have something to torment him, and Matty, with. Sacked by love! How hilarious. The elevator stops at the fourth floor and Knox leads me to our room.
My humor turns quickly to something else, because the minute the door of the hotel room closes, Knox has me up against the door. His hands shove my jacket off. His mouth fastens to mine. We each toe our shoes off and leave them haphazardly in the entryway. His jacket gets tossed onto the sofa as we pass by it.
He pulls me toward the bedroom, not once lifting his head. We kiss like the world will end tomorrow. Like we haven’t seen each other in years. Like he’s a soldier returning from an endless deployment.
We kiss like we love each other and don’t know how to express it in words, only in touch. His tongue works against mine in ways both fevered and reverent. I can’t imagine kissing another man. I don’t want to. This taste, this touch, this tenderness is all I will ever want or need.
In the bedroom, we tug at each other’s clothes. Our mouths separate so we can get rid of his suit coat.
“Nice.” Knox waggles his eyebrows as my skirt comes off with one tug of the bow. We both pull off my sweater and bra until I’m in nothing but a pair of pink panties.
He pushes me onto the bed. “I’ve missed your hot body,” he says before lowering his head to pay homage to one very erect nipple. The other nipple gets plucked and tugged by his left hand while his right makes quick work of the buttons on his shirt.
We both groan when his hand finds its way between my legs.
“I love how wet you get for me,” he mutters against my breast. “Wet and hot.” He sinks one finger inside me and I nearly expire right there. “Wet and hot and tight.”
“It’s been so long.” Three weeks has been three years, he’d said; right on the money.
“Yes,” he starts to dip lower, but I grab his shoulders.
“What is it? That time of month?” He looks anguished and I have to stifle a laugh.
“No. I need you inside me. Now. Because it’s been so long.”
He understands. I see it in his eyes, the way they darken and become hungry. Well, hungrier.
He pushes to his feet. As his hands go to his waist, I suck in my lower lip in excitement. He's so beautiful and I pause to take it in. Everything about his frame speaks of power and strength, from the width of his shoulders to the massive span of his arms. But there’s vulnerability, too, in the surprisingly narrow waist, accented by the hard obliques, and centered by the slabs of rectangular muscles outlining the dark hair arrowing down to the heavy shaft that bobs eagerly in the air as Knox steps out of his pants. He shrugs off his shirt, removes his socks, and then stands motionless before me.
I run my eyes over every inch of him once, and then do it again. It’s hard to believe that all this goodness is mine.
“Like what you see?” he mocks gently.
“Yes, very much so.”
“My turn,” he says and reaches for me. I lie back and let him remove my panties. He reaches between my legs and strokes me lightly, teasing me even after I told him I could not wait. “You’re fucking gorgeous, Ellie. Fucking gorgeous.”
He lowers himself between my legs and runs his big hands along my ankles to my knees, then to my inner thighs, until his thumbs meet at my sex.
“You’re so pretty down here. Pink and wet.” He leans forward and runs the flat of his tongue from my clit to my pucker and back again. “And you taste like a fucking dream.”
“Please, Knox.” I’m not too proud to beg. “I need you.”
His fingers tangle in my curls as he continues to lap between my legs as if I’m not almost dying for the want of him. I dig my fingers into his hair and tug. He pushes his shoulders between my legs, spreading me out in an intensely vulnerable way.
“I want you to come on my tongue, Ellie.” His lips move against my skin and even that contact is so erotic I lift my hips to seek out more. “Every night we’ve been apart, I dreamt of you. I had your taste in my mouth and your scent in my lungs, but it would disappear when I woke. Now that I have you…” He pauses to curl his tongue around that throbbing bit of flesh at the top of my sex. “I want to eat you until I coat my throat with you.”
Above him, I shudder in full surrender. His words are nearly as erotic as his touch. I give myself to him, to his clever fingers and his adventurous tongue. He works me over for what seems like hours, one languorous caress after another, until I come in a flood, my toes curling into the air and my thighs trembling against his shoulders.
He surges upward then, his mouth glistening with the evidence of my orgasm. Between his legs his shaft hangs heavy, and the tip of it is wet with his own excitement.
I reach for him and wrap my fingers around that stiff cock. He allows me to guide him to my center. My release has left me swollen, and despite the wetness he coaxed from me, I’m tight against his generous girth.
His lips pull back in a hiss as I suck him in slowly. He lets me set the pace this time, and I treat him with the same studied deliberateness he inflicted on me.
“Aww, fuck, baby,” he rasps out. “You feel so good. So good.”
He falls forward, bracing both arms next to my head. The languid slide of his body against mine is exquisite. And because I'm not afraid this is the last time I'll ever have him, I take my time reacquainting myself with his very perfect physique.
Each push forward and each retreat is slow and deliberate so that every tiny movement of his shaft inside me registers. The head drags against the softest, most sensitive tissue, eking out more pleasure than I think possible.
I rub heels against his calves, the wiry hair scratching against the soles of my feet. His shoulders tense under my hands and his biceps flex with each measured thrust inside my body.
“I love you.” I turn and press my mouth against one of those flexing muscles. “I love you,” I repeat. I say the words again and again, punctuated by kisses. He growls above me, the cage of his arms shaking with his effort to stave off his own orgasm.
But he’s a world-class athlete, and he uses whatever mind over matter voodoo lets him forget pain during a game to hold off the fire that licks over his body. He employs his strength and unmatchable endurance to work me into an utterly mindless frenzy, where all I know is sensation, pleasure, and never-ending joy.
His head dips to sip at my mouth. His tongue tastes my happiness and swallows my moans of delight. With hardly a break in rhythm, he pulls out and turns me over until I rest on my knees.
When he slides back in, a harsh groan breaks into the silence, punctuated only by our wracked and uneven breathing.
His hand curves over my bottom, lifting me off my knees until all my weight rests on my elbows. He takes me then, with furious strokes. His need has overwhelmed him, to my great enjoyment. I push back with whatever strength I have in me, but his hands clamp on my hips, holding me still as he hammers inside me.
I give myself over to his dominance. His wildness feeds my own until I barely know where he ends and I begin. We are one, infused with the same euphoria, possessed by the same need, bound together by the same love.
He releases one hip and dips between my legs to pluck at my clit until I explode around him.
“Yes, that’s it.” His voice cracks, loaded down by his hunger. “Come for me.”
I do. I convulse around him, hugging his shaft with tiny tremors until I feel him release inside me, filling me, completing me. I give myself to feeling and let it carry me away until all I know is him.
I barely register him pulling out, the warm wet of him on my thighs. He covers me with a blanket and then pads lightly to the bathroom. I hear a toilet flushing and then running water. I should clean up, but I’m too exhausted, too replete.
He returns and does it for me. My eyes flick open to see him running a dampened towel between my legs. He gives me a tender smile and leans down to kiss the freshly washed skin. From a suitcase that I didn’t notice before resting against the wall, he pulls out a new pair of panties and slides it up my legs. I raise my butt.
“You kept all my T-shirts?” he asks with a sly grin. He must have helped pack my things.
“Of course.” If I had energy, I’d roll my eyes.
He chuckles low and I hug myself at the happy sound. Knox pulls back the covers and climbs in, taking up the position against the wall. I burrow into him, pushing my butt into his groin and laying my head on his biceps.
“Hammer’s submitting an article to an online woman’s magazine about how sperm is good for a woman’s body. Think it’ll be accepted?” His hand strokes leisurely down my side.
“I’m scared for womankind,” I answer sleepily.
“But kind of curious?” He presses a kiss against the crown of my head.
“Scared.” But yeah, kind of curious. I drift off to sleep, full of contentment.
37 Knox
Game Day: Warriors 11-1
The atmosphere in the locker room consists of subdued hope. We’re one game away from ending the season with only one loss. We win today and we’re in the conference championships which is one step closer to our goal of a National Championship.
Coach has called reporters, analysts, and other coaches, making the case that we belong in the playoffs. The selection committee isn’t bound by the polls that have us ranked seven. They make their own decisions. Today we give the selection committee every reason to place us in the top four.
Beneath the dry fit T-shirt, the pads, and the jersey, my heart beats double time.
I get up on a bench and wait for Matty to pull his headphones out. For Hammer to stop texting. For Ace to gather up the offense.
When the room falls silent, I raise my helmet above my head. “We started this season with one goal—for a chance to play for a title. That goal still exists. For some, this is the last home game we play.”
Somewhere in the crowd I hear a gasp. Not everyone knows I planned to declare. It’ll be out there soon enough, but what’s said in the locker room stays here.
“We’ll never step foot on Union Field wearing the Warrior’s uniform. Our locker will hold someone else’s uniform. Our time here will become a memory.” I tap my helmet against my head.
The team looks at me with rapt attention.
I don’t say anything for a few moments because I need to take one—one last time. Even if we win today, this might be the last time I wear the gold and blue. It’s been a crazy, exhilarating, mind blowing, heart aching, unforgettable three years. I’m not leaving without a fight. I’m ready to lay everything I have out on that field.
“Every second on that field, we have a choice. We can play together as one unit, one machine, one heart. If we do that, no matter the outcome, we will have met our goal. Today I plan to play as if I will never get to play again. If I am still standing at the end of the game, I have not tried hard enough. Men!” I call sharply. “This is my heart. My will. My desire.”
I thump my hand across my chest twice in rapid succession. Matty follows. So does Hammer, then Ace, and then the entire locker room fills with the percussive beat of joined will. To that beat, I shout: “No one can defeat us if we believe. You have the heart of a Warrior?”
“Yes!”
“The pride of a Warrior?”
“Yes!”
Matty quickens the pace. The rest follow.
“The will of a Warrior?”
“Yes!”
The din of our fists against our hearts is overwhelming. I have to scream to be heard. “Then we will fight as Warriors. We will bleed as Warriors. We will win as Warriors.”
I jump down and grab Ace. We put our heads together and the team of ninety plus men gather at our backs. We move as one. One giant mass of flesh, muscle, and desire.
“Fight! Bleed! Win! Fight! Bleed! Win! Fight! Bleed! Win!” The team roars its promise. Someone opens the doors to the tunnel and we burst out, running like we’re chased by bulls. No, we’re chasing the bulls. We’re the meanest, nastiest, toughest fucks on the planet, and today is our time.
The Lions win the coin toss and elect to receive. They want their number-two-ranked offense in the country on the field first. Fine. I jam my helmet down. I want to introduce Mr. Heisman to the turf as soon as possible. He’ll learn the only thing he’ll see today will be my number in his face.
It goes our way from the beginning. We win the snap and defer. The Lions start off on the twenty. I line up across from the left guard.
“You might want to kneel down now, because you’re about to spend a lot of time on your back,” I inform the NFL-bound offensive lineman.
He snorts. “Sure, I am, jack wagon. You’ll be using your towel to dry those tears after we light you up.”
“Not this year.”
I hit him hard, pushing him aside, and run hard after the quarterback. He must feel my footsteps because he releases early and the pass is incomplete. I slap him lightly on the helmet before helping him to his feet.
“I hope you ate your Wheaties today, because you’re about to have a workout.”
The Heisman trophy candidate glares at me as I run back to my side of the field.
I jaw all day. To the nose tackle, I ask, “Did you dress more than three deep at the tackle position? Because I’m going to wear you and your backup down to nubs by the end of the first quarter.”
“You should stay down, Marshall,” I tell the strong side linebacker. “It’ll save you some pain.”
In the fourth quarter, I feel like I haven’t played a down. I slap Hammer’s ass hard. “We making good television today, Hammer?”
He laughs like a hyena.
At the end of the game, after the press has left, I’m drenched in Gatorade and sweat, standing on top of the bench. The faces around me are wreathed with unadulterated joy.
It wasn't perfect, but it was enough. We'd beaten the number five ranked team in the country. That means we should take their place in the rankings tomorrow. One short of what we’d need to make the playoffs.
I stand for a moment and look into the stands shrouded in royal blue Warrior gear. Others do the same—seniors who won’t go to the next level. Guys who played for four years, but will move on to be businessmen, doctors, lawyers. No matter where they go in their lives, they’ll always be able to say that they played for one of the best college teams in the country. I have no doubt that if you asked every one of them if their broken fingers, black eyes, bruised bodies were worth it, they’d snap out a yes faster than you could blink.
Because there is nothing like this game. What had Ellie said? The temple built to the reverence of physical perfection? She’s right and she’s wrong. It’s a place that celebrates sacrifice as much as it celebrates winning.
Ellie’s sacrificed so much for the game. For her brother. For us. I wish she could be here. I tilt my head and pretend she’s sitting in the very top.
Best seats in the house.
“Miss you, baby,” I say into the cool afternoon air. I kiss my helmet and raise it up for her. And then turn to walk toward the tunnel.
A print journalist from the local paper catches me before I can make my way off the field. “There are rumors that you plan to declare. Is this your last home game?”
Behind the journalist stands the team PR lady. She glares at me as if she knows I’d rather run away than do this.
I muster up a smile and bend down to reach the microphone. “This is the last home game this year,” I answer carefully, not letting on that this is a bittersweet win. “Being a Warrior is a special opportunity and I’m grateful to be part of the team.”
“Do you deserve the playoffs despite the one loss earlier in the season?”
“Yes, we deserve the playoffs.” That’s reckless, shit talking, bulletin board type of language, that will probably get mangled into something like Knox Masters guarantees a win and be blasted all over social media. But I believe it 100%.
“Are you saying you’re better than the five other teams in front of you?”
“I’m saying we belong in the playoffs. That’s all.”
“There are rumors of locker room problems. Did that distract you?”
“Did it look like I was distracted today?” I look over her head at Coach, who gives me a nod that I can go. I trot out the lines that we players practice as a joke. “I’m glad I can be part of the Warriors and have the opportunity to play for a national title with the best guys in the world.”
I raise my helmet in the air and holler. The guys holler back, and soon it’s too loud for questions.
We run off the field, into the locker room where there’s more press, more boosters, family members. I hug everyone. Slap a dozen asses. Take a bath in even more Gatorade.
There’s no Ellie, but I call her. I pick up my phone and head straight for the showers.
“You played so great, babe!” she squeals. “I particularly liked the first quarter sack. You stood over the quarterback for a while. What did you say?”
I told him he should get used to the turf. “I complimented him on how pretty he looked lying down.”
She snorts. “Jesus. You’re asking for it.”
“I can’t wait to come home, wife.”
She giggles. “I can’t wait to celebrate.”
Well, hot damn.
I make her do all the work because my poor body feels sore even after the ice bath. Then we get up and watch the rest of the games. Jack, Riley, me, and Ellie sit in her living room, glued to the television.
We watch in growing elation as the number-two-ranked team in the country falls apart before our eyes. The quarterback loses a fumble on the twenty. On the ensuing punt, the tight end gets a personal foul and the opposing team starts on the forty five.
The twenty point underdogs march down the field, punch the ball in, and the score is fourteen-zero. The phone rings.
“You watching this?” Matty yells. I can hear cheers of jubilation in the background.
“It's the first quarter, bro.” I try to play the voice of reason. Jack and I exchange guardedly hopeful looks. Neither of us say anything out loud because we don’t want to jinx it.
The second quarter goes about as well for the favored team as the first quarter, and they go in losing twenty-one zero at the half. By the fourth quarter, the team tries to make a run, but it's too little, too late.
“What does it mean?” Riley cries. My phone is blowing up, but Ellie answers for me.
“A selection committee of sorts decides who is in the playoffs. Ever since the loss four weeks ago, the Warriors have dominated. Today, the top ranked team lost to an unranked one, and by a big margin.” She gestures toward the television. “The rest of top-rated teams looked hamstrung and confused today.”
“When will we know?” Riley leans forward eagerly.
“Tomorrow,” Ellie answers. “The slate will be set tomorrow.”
I’m glad that this is the one day of the season they don’t make us wait until Tuesday for the rankings. Ellie’s correct. The final four BCS teams will be announced on Sunday, just one day away.
I don’t know if Riley or Jack sleep at all. I can’t. I keep waking Ellie for sex because I’ve got so much nervous energy. Around dawn, she kicks me out.
“Go run. I cannot have your dick inside me one more time.”
“I could lick you,” I say hopefully.
She slams a pillow over her head. “Seriously, I think another orgasm would feel painful.”
Reluctantly, I leave her and go run. I’m not even tired after ten miles, so I go to the weight room. I’m not the only one there. Matty’s doing deadlifts. I go over to spot him.
“The wait is fucking excruciating.”
“I know it.”
Grimly, he gestures for me to put another plate on the bar. “I’m hoping to lift myself into a stupor. Don’t stop me until the news comes out.”
I go to the bench press and hope I can do the same. After a couple of hours, the strength coach makes us leave. Matty and I go back to the house and play Madden with the boys. If I go home to Ellie, I’m afraid I’ll attack her, and then I’ll be divorced before the playoffs start.
Around supper time, the phone rings again.
“You gonna answer it?” Matty demands.
Part of me doesn’t want to. As long as I don't know there's still hope. But then I give myself a head slap and pick up my phone.
“I sent you a text. Read it,” Coach says and hangs up.
I pull up the messages. It’s a message from the BCS committee. I scan it. Then read it again. Then read it for a third time. I get up, walk into the kitchen, and put my phone in the far corner. Everyone goes silent. Matty’s hand freezes halfway between the Dorito bag and his mouth.
“You have to stop eating that shit food, Matty boy, because the Western State Warriors are fucking fourth seed.”
His hand opens and chips spill onto the floor. I couldn’t care less.
“You're shitting me?”
“No.”
“Fuck, yes!” He punches the air. Someone else flips the coffee table over. In less than five minutes, chips, beer, soda, and furniture are all strewn about the apartment as the guys hug, back slap, and throw shit around in unrestrained rapture. My smile stretches wide as a football field.
We are in.
