I cover my face. “Shit.”
He reaches for my hands and grins. “Don’t do that,” he says. “Don’t ever do that.”
My heart throbs, firing heat throughout and I can’t stop smiling. I put my hands down and I stare up at him. “Johnny…”
“Yeah?”
“Go kick some ass for me.”
He retrieves his helmet. “But that wouldn’t be fair…”
“I got my job back. You should get your championship, too.”
“Did you?” He smirks.
I study his sinister eyes. “What did you do?”
He shrugs his thick shoulders as he slides his helmet on. “Oh, I didn’t do anything…” he says. “But I may have heard about a professor receiving an anonymous email… with photos…”
“What did you do?”
John flashes a wink at me and jogs off to rejoin the team for the field goal kick.
“Wow…”
I look over my shoulder to find Daisy lingering behind me. “What?”
She crosses her arms. “And here I thought this game was going to be boring.”
Chapter 27
John
May
Bittersweet. I guess that’s the word.
Bitter because I spent four amazing years on this campus and I’m sad to leave it. Four years of playing college ball. Four years of feeling like a damn god among women. I have to leave it all behind in favor of starting the next stage of my life and who the hell knows how that will turn out.
Sweet because… well, you know.
Rose.
I step into the quad and there she is, waiting for me exactly where she said she’d be after the graduation ceremony. My heart thumps just looking at her and it pumps even faster when I see the cute baby in her arms.
Eliza stands beside her, each of them showering her daughter with some much-deserved attention while they wait for their men to show up.
Rose looks up, finally noticing me, and she smiles. “Hey.”
“Hey…”
For a moment, it’s like the world stops turning, and the nervous jitters I’ve felt all week about today just melt away as I look at her.
My Rose.
Eliza stares at me, her eyes trailing the honor cords hanging down my black robe. “You graduated with honors?” she asks.
“Hell yeah,” I say. “I’m honorable as fuck.”
Her head tilts, yet again trying to figure me out. I guess constantly confusing Eliza is yet another thing I’ll miss about this place. Finally, she shakes her head and turns her attention toward her husband as he walks up behind me.
“Congratulations, Junior,” she says, kissing his cheek.
“Thank you,” he says, sliding his cap off his head.
Rose takes a quick step toward him and extends the baby. “I believe this is yours.”
He grins and expertly takes his daughter in his hands. “Yes, she is…” he coos, raising her up high in the air as she giggles.
“Are you guys going to the party at Ty and Grant’s?” Eliza asks us.
Rose nods. “We wouldn’t miss it.”
“Good. It’s probably the last time we’ll all see each other for a while since everybody but me has graduated…”
Junior nudges her arm. “You only have one semester left, Ellie.”
“I know, but still…”
“I’ll still be here,” Rose points out. “I have about a year left on my graduate degree.”
“Good.” Eliza nods. “We can keep each other company while they toss a ball back and forth and have panties thrown at them.”
She gestures to me and Junior and we both smile.
It hasn’t quite sunk in yet. Pulling ahead in that final game, securing a spot in the championship, winning the championship. I’m honestly terrified that I’ll wake up at any moment and be back to square one again. All the hard work, all the ups and downs.
It all paid off on Draft Day.
I look at Junior and I can tell he’s thinking the same thing.
“Uh-oh,” Rose laughs. “You know you’re not supposed to feed the egos, Eliza.”
“Eh,” Eliza waves. “He’s nothing without us and he knows it.”
“That I do.” Junior grins and kisses his daughter’s head.
Eliza tosses a diaper bag over her shoulder. “Anyway, we’ll meet you two at the party. Grant demanded we stop for ice on the way.”
“See you there,” I tell them.
Junior and Eliza walk through the quad and I pause, expecting to feel that envious stab in my gut but, for the first time, I feel nothing.
“John…”
I look at Rose and I realize why. “Yes?”
She stands in front of me and wraps her arms around my waist. “I’m so proud of you,” she says, popping up on her toes to kiss my nose.
I kiss her back, embracing her tight. “I bet you never expected to date a real pro football player, did you?”
“Oh, it was a common fantasy, I won’t lie.” She chuckles.
“Oh, yeah?” I kiss her again. “What other fantasies did you have?”
Rose pulls away, smiling wide. “We can talk about those later. We should get going.”
She takes a quick step toward the parking lot, but I reach out to stop her.
“Wait…” I pull the black robe over my head and cradle it in one arm, happy to finally take it off. “Not yet.”
Her face tilts. “What?”
“Come with me.”
I grab her hand before she can say another word and lead her with me toward Prism Hall.
Chapter 28
Rose
“John, where are you taking me?”
“It’s a surprise.”
“John…”
He squeezes my hand a little tighter. “Patience, Rose.”
“The last time you said the words it’s a surprise, I found myself in the middle of the woods in a sex van,” I point out.
He pauses with his hand on the door to Prism Hall. “Well, when you put it that way, it’s a little creepy.”
I laugh as John holds the door open for me. The halls are completely deserted; not a single sign of student life as the spring semester has already met its end. Everyone down to the janitorial staff is on vacation, leaving the place oddly quiet.
John doesn’t drop my hand until we reach the Chemistry lecture hall. He spins around and walks backward down the stairs toward the front. “So, you remember this place?”
“Of course, I do.” I chuckle.
“For a whole semester, you taught General Chemistry in this room.”
“I did.”
“Monday-Wednesday-Friday,” he continues, tossing his robes over his seat back in the front row, “for thirteen weeks, I sat in this chair and I watched you teach.”
“You did.” I study his face, trying to predict his point.
“That’s almost forty hours, Rose.”
I sigh. “Okay…”
He takes my hand again and walks me to the desk. “I spent forty hours in this room, doing everything in my power to resist the temptation to bend you over this desk.”
I raise a brow. “Well, when you put it that way, I’m surprised you even passed the class.”
He leans in and guides me back against the desk. “Oh, it was hard.” He nods. “In more ways than one.”
I chuckle as his lips graze mine. “So, why exactly are we here now?”
“Simply put...” He crushes his lips on mine, planting a hard kiss on me that ignites my core. “I’m not leaving this school until I fuck your brains out on this desk.”
I kiss him back and his hands crawl down my body toward my skirt. “Oh, really?”
“Come on, Rose…” he whispers in my ear. “Don’t tell me you never thought about it just once.”
“Maybe,” I say, biting my lip as he kisses beneath my ear.
“There I was,” he says, raising my skirt. “Sitting in the front row, watching you, listening to you. You wanted
me to stand up and walk over here, didn’t you?”
He reaches between my thighs and I breathe deep.
“You wanted me to fill that sweet, tight pussy—”
“Somebody could walk in here…” I say.
“I better fuck you fast, Ms. Hawthorne.”
I reach for his belt, overwhelmed with pulsing desire as he hooks his fingers into my panties beneath my skirt.
It’s been months since we’ve stood in this room together. I’ve almost forgotten what that urge felt like; watching him sitting there, staring at me, feeling the wetness pooling in my panties as I thought about us later in the TA office. That forbidden, taboo rush has long since left our relationship, but I feel it taking me over again.
And I like it.
“John,” I sigh, pushing his zipper down, “did you bring a calculator?”
He chuckles against my lips. “Back pocket.”
I reach around him and slide my fingers into his pants pocket, feeling the square, velvet box hidden inside.
I freeze in place. “Uhh…”
John stands tall and reaches behind him to take the box from my trembling fingers. “Rose…”
“John…”
“I love you,” he says, staring into me with unblinking eyes. “I didn’t know it at the time, but I loved you the moment I saw you in this room.”
I gasp as he opens the box and the diamond ring shines inside. “Oh, my…”
“I made some mistakes,” he says. “But I’m happy I did because they not only made me realize who I really was but also who I needed to be for you. I needed to be more. I’m going to spend the rest of my life making sure you get everything you deserve.”
“Man, you word so good,” I sigh, my pulse racing.
He laughs and takes the ring from the box. “And I lied to you before.”
“About what?”
“I didn’t spend all forty hours thinking about this.” He gestures to the desk. “I spent some of them imagining you walking toward me in a white dress.”
I smile as he slides the ring on my finger.
“Rose Hawthorne, will you marry me?”
The diamond glistens between us. It drifts in and out of focus for me as tears build between my eyelashes.
“Rose?”
I look up at him, swallowing the happy lump down my throat. “Yes,” I answer. “Yes, I will marry you, John.”
He cups my face and kisses me. I throw my arms around him, never wanting to let him go again and he returns the tight embrace.
“I love you,” he says, kissing me again.
“I love you, too,” I breathe, passions building inside as my hands crawl down his body. “Okay, we are really going to need a calculator here…”
He takes a condom from his other back pocket before fishing beneath my skirt again to pull my panties down to my ankles.
I laugh, losing myself in total ecstasy. He’s just as floored as I am, kissing and touching me as I spread my knees wider for him.
“Johnny,” I moan, feeling his cock press against me.
His lips curl and I sense the pleasure on his breath as he lays his hands on my hips and thrusts deep.
He fucks me slowly, taking his time penetrating me with every inch of him and I’m practically mewling on him by the time he’s all the way inside. My toes curl, my spine twitches. My body delights in his and I wrap my legs around his waist to keep him.
I lie down on the desk and John takes me harder, pounding and grinding me until I want to scream. He reaches down to cup my breasts; his fingers gliding down my curves and every piece of me he touches catches fire.
“Ms. Hawthorne…” he whispers, grinning at me.
I laugh. “I loved it when you called me that.”
“I know.” His eyes flick around the lecture hall. “I suppose it’d be Mrs. Kirby now.”
My back arches. “Say it again.”
He leans forward. “Mrs. Kirby.”
“Oh, take me now,” I tease.
“Turn around.”
I sit up and he takes a quick kiss from me before I spin around and bend over. He’s back in me in seconds, grinding me harder than before from behind as he whispers in my ear.
“I’ve wanted this for so long, Rose…”
I moan, unable to speak.
“Your body, your mind.” He digs his teeth into the flesh of my neck, biting down as his primal urges overwhelm him. “Be my wife.”
“Yes.”
“My everything.”
Tensions break in me and I tumble toward climax as he tilts my face back to kiss me.
“I love you, Rose.”
I come hard, biting my tongue to keep my screams from echoing throughout the damn building.
John thrusts me one more time and stops, gripping my body as he lets himself go. I feel him surging inside of me, groaning softly into my ear.
“I love you, John,” I say against his lips.
He laughs, his hands still roaming my body.
The door at the back of the lecture hall swings open. “Hey! Who’s down there?”
“Shit!” John whispers.
I slip off the desk, quickly bending down to grab my panties off the floor while John rushes to zip up his pants.
“Hey! You two!”
John snatches his robe off the chair and grabs my hand as we rush for the side exit.
“Oh, god…” I mutter.
We sprint down the hall hand-in-hand until we make it outside, and we keep running through the quad.
John looks back at me and winks. “It was worth it.”
I laugh so hard, I can’t speak.
Epilogue
Rose
Four Years Later
“You will be expected to know the difference between cations and anions. Many of you mixed those up on the last quiz, so make sure you get that straight for the exam on Monday.”
My students stare at me from their seats scattered around the lecture hall, their eyes occasionally dipping to look at my body. Little did I know how much that semester as a TA would be training me for this. John Kirby, sitting there, staring at me, paying more attention to my pencil skirts than the lectures themselves.
Unfortunately, this is going to keep happening more and more as my belly swells. I’m only twenty weeks pregnant but you’d think I was already a giant mutant by the way they’re looking at me right now.
My hand gravitates to the little pooch protruding out. It’s a strategic move; equally designed to swing their attention back to what I’m saying but also a sweet comfort for me. I’m carrying life inside of me.
Correction: Lives.
“Also, schedule enough time to read over chapters one through five again before then. Pay really close attention to the practice problems at the end of each chapter — you just might see one or two literally copied and pasted onto the exam.”
The back door swings open, drawing the attentions of a few students. The whispers and shoulder nudges begin immediately and before I know it, the entire lecture hall turns in their chairs to look back at him.
I guess it’s not every day a professional football player just waltzes into a university Chemistry class.
John sits down in an empty seat in the back row, purposefully smirking at me as the spotlight above his head grows brighter and brighter.
“Okay, guys, let’s break early for today,” I say, speaking louder to combat the growing swoons of my students. “I’ll see you all on Monday. Please bring your own calculators and scrap paper for the exam!”
The class lets out a few celebratory hoots as they stand up and I take a moment to sit down and rest my feet.
John waits in the back with his hand raised, purposefully flashing his new championship ring while accepting the various handshakes and high-fives as the students pass by. He’s so adored around here, I get the feeling some students enrolled in my class just on the off-chance he might show up every so often.
Once it’s just the two of us, he stands up.
I furrow my brow, glaring at him as he marches toward me.
“You were supposed to meet me in my office,” I say.
“But this was way more fun.”
I deepen my glare.
“Oh, come on,” he laughs. “You just dismissed them early on a Friday. If you weren’t their favorite professor already, you are now. These stuck-up Ivy League kids need a little excitement once in a while.”
I slide a hand over my belly again without thinking. “Maybe you’re right.”
“Of course, I am.” He extends his hand to help me stand up. “Now, come on. I want to get another look at Alexander and Benjamin in there.”
“Oh, I’m sorry…” I tease. “I can’t hear you over the obvious heartbeats of Dana and Ramona.”
He shakes his head. “Nope. Sorry. They’re boys.”
“I’m pretty sure they’re girls, John.”
“Why?”
“I feel girls...”
“That’s not science.”
“Women’s intuition and motherly instinct transcend science.”
He scoffs. “No, they don’t.”
“Okay, then. What makes you so certain they’re boys? Hm?”
“Hey, I planted them with my seed,” he argues. “Those are my boys growing in your womb garden.”
I wince. “Stop calling it that.”
He laughs and throws my bag over his shoulder. “Let’s go.”
* * *
“Go ahead and make yourself comfortable, Rose,” Dr. Jones says. She smiles wide and offers a kind nod to John as we step into the ultrasound room. “I’ll be right back and then we’ll get started.”
“Thank you,” I say, sliding into the chair and putting my feet up. I let out a long sigh, relishing in the moment to relax a little. Only twenty weeks in and I’m already exhausted all the time. I can’t imagine what it’ll be like when my girls are finally here.
Yes, John. We are having girls.
I raise my shirt to expose my belly as John sits down by my right side with a permanent smile etched onto his face.
The Bad Baller Collection Page 36
