Wildcat (Mavericks Tackle Love Book 1)

by Max Monroe

  And I had learned.

  Sweet merciful Jesus, had I learned.

  I was moving at a snail’s pace out of the tunnel and down the hall toward the locker room when Jilly found me. Her lips turned up at the ends when she realized I was in great physical pain.

  I shook my head at her lack of sympathy.

  “I’ll warn you, Jilly. Now’s not the time to push my buttons,” I told her as she fell into step beside me.

  “I disagree. Now looks like the perfect time to do a little poking.” I raised my eyebrows, and she laughed. “I might actually be able to outrun you.”

  I grinned and then nodded. “Yeah…true.” I had to give her that.

  “Anyway,” she murmured, “As much fun as it is, I’m not here to mess with you. I’m here in an official capacity because Georgia Brooks called today to say that she had to move up the recording session for player intros.”

  Georgia Brooks was the marketing director for the Mavericks. She got us into all sorts of stuff, some unorthodox on occasion, but player intros were a standard thing we did every year. They were the little videos on TV toward the beginning of the game that the commentators would play when introducing the starting lineup. Mine had been scheduled to film the following week.

  “To when?” I asked, praying it wasn’t today.

  Jilly could read the opportunity to crush my dreams in my eyes. She smiled sweetly. “Today. Now, actually.”

  “I have to shower.”

  Jilly nodded. “Yeah, I can tell. You smell like a cesspool.”

  Such compliments. I grinned acerbically. “I don’t have my team jersey here either.”

  “Georgia has an extra.”

  I shrugged then. Resigned. My player intro was obviously happening today, whether I liked it or not. Might as well roll with the punches. “Fine. Where?”

  She scrolled on her phone, using a stylus to mark things off on her to-do list. “Upstairs in the main lobby.”

  “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.” Jilly accepted that, moving away without a word when I thought better of it. I’d wanted to call Catharine after my shower. If I didn’t, she’d probably end up on a flight, and I wouldn’t be able to talk to her.

  And not talking to his kitten didn’t make Quinn Bailey very happy. She’d been gone for four fucking days, and I missed her.

  “Yo! Jill!” I called. She stopped walking and turned her head with an exasperated sigh. “Make it forty-five minutes.”

  She nodded. “No problem. I’ll just tell Georgia you had to get your bikini wax in first. Gotta look good for the camera.”

  Teeny just happened to be walking up behind me at the time. Of course, though I was caught unaware, Jillian had known full well what she was doing.

  “Whoa, QB. You waxing your balls before you let ’em get rubbed now?” He whistled. “That’s really considerate of you.”

  I narrowed my eyes at Jilly, fully contemplating firing her again. That only lasted fifteen seconds, though—the time it took to remember all the shit she dealt with for me that I didn’t want to, and how well she did it without even having to be asked.

  She gave a falsely friendly finger wave before disappearing from sight. With a twist on the ball of my foot, I turned tail and headed for the locker room. I didn’t have any illusions that she hadn’t set a timer on her phone for forty-five minutes exactly, and if I had anything to say about it, most of those minutes would be spent on the phone with Catharine Wild.

  After breaking land-speed records for a shower and shave—an important part of the process now that I knew I was going to be on camera—I grabbed my shit and headed for the field. The stadium was big, but people were plentiful. Support staff lingered everywhere, and someone was always listening.

  But the stands were huge and the seating was abundant, and if I couldn’t find a spot within the hundred thousand fold-down chairs where I could get a little privacy for my phone call, I wouldn’t be able to find it anywhere.

  Sunlight speared and spiked through the darkness at the end of the tunnel, and I pulled out my sunglasses to prepare for the glare. It was past midday now, and the sun was high enough in the sky to come up over the top of the stands. I knew from experience that if I didn’t shield my eyes, one wrong look could put spots in my vision for the rest of the day.

  The grounds crew was working when I walked back out and onto the turf, but the stands were blessedly empty.

  I wandered for a while until I found a spot about halfway up, right on the fifty-yard line. I very rarely got the opportunity for the view. I loved football, always had, and wished I got to watch it, live and in action, more.

  But that was the twist of playing—you very rarely got the opportunity. If someone else had a game for me to attend, I usually had my own to play. One day, when I retired, I’d be right back here, every game, every season, being the most obnoxious fan I could imagine.

  With a quick scroll into my contacts, I put my thumb to Catharine’s name and moved the ringing phone to my ear. She answered on the second ring.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, kitten.”

  Her voice was soft and sweet and melted right into me. “Hi, Quinn.”

  “How’s my favorite Cat doing?”

  She giggled a little. “I’m good. Ready to be done with these flights—”

  I cut her off with a tsk. “Uh-uh, baby. I’m not talking to you.”

  Her confusion made her voice sound even raspier than normal as she asked, “You’re not?”

  I smiled to myself and glanced around to make sure no one was within earshot. “Your pussy,” I clarified. “I want to make sure you’re taking care of her while you’re away.”

  Some indistinct shuffling muffled the phone. Her voice was breathy when she came back on the line. “Quinn, I’m already on the plane. Stop turning me on.”

  I smiled, picturing her trying to find enough privacy to have this conversation while on something with distinct limitations in distance from other people.

  “Sorry,” I apologized easily before dissuading the validity of it entirely. “But I’m fucking aching to put my tongue on you. Suck your clit. Cover my face—”

  “Quinn!” she snapped, and her voice echoed.

  I smiled. I wasn’t sorry at all.

  “Where are you right now, kitten?”

  “The bathroom,” she admitted unhappily. I couldn’t help it—I laughed.

  “This isn’t funny. You think you can just call and get me all worked up before I have to go out there and serve people drinks! I—”

  “Cat,” I interrupted quickly, saying her name again when she struggled to hear me over her own talking. “Cat!”

  “What?” she snapped.

  “I miss you. Have a safe flight. FaceTime me tonight from your room, and I’ll make all the teasing up to you. I promise.”

  Her voice was so soft it was practically a whisper. “Okay,” she agreed.

  “Bye, baby.”

  “Quinn!” she called, panicked that I’d hung up. I smiled into the phone and shook my head. There was no fucking way I’d have removed that phone from my ear until I knew for a fact that she was gone.

  “Yeah?” I asked, waiting as she paused before saying it.

  “I miss you too.”

  A warm glow joined the longing ache in my chest, and then the line clicked dead.

  I pulled my phone away from my ear, and a text message came in from Jilly right then.

  Two words shone like a taunt.

  Time’s up.

  Tonight had been the light at the end of a grueling work schedule tunnel.

  Quinn had picked me up from the airport, and after I’d kissed the daylights out of him in his truck, he’d driven me home. He’d dropped me off at my apartment, and while I’d showered the stench of airplane off my skin, he’d run out and grabbed us takeout.

  Just a simple, quiet night in with Quinn—it was fucking heaven.

  Although, the cheesecake he’d picked up from Carlo’
s Bakery tasted a lot like heaven too.

  I took the very last bite of the decadent dessert and moaned.

  “God, it’s so good,” I announced and felt melancholy over the fact that I didn’t have any bites left. Hopeful, I glanced toward Quinn’s plate, but to my dessert-addict dismay, we’d both finished off our cheesecake slices at the same time.

  He chuckled beside me. “Were you just eyeing my plate to see if I had any cheesecake left, you little vulture?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I retorted, but the giggles that snuck past my lips revealed my truth.

  Quinn grinned and took my plate out of my hands, setting it down on the coffee table beside his. Next thing I knew, he was in motion, lifting me up, and I squealed in response. But he ignored my dramatics and pulled me into his lap, adjusting my body so my legs straddled his thighs and our faces were left mere inches apart.

  He gazed at me, and I felt like I could swim inside the pools of blue that made up his mesmerizing eyes. “I missed you,” he said and rubbed his nose against mine. “Five days was too long.”

  “I missed you too,” I whispered against his mouth and placed a long, soft kiss to his lips. “You want to know something crazy?”

  “Of course.”

  “I found out this week that work is a lot more fun when you’re stalking my flights.”

  Quinn smiled, and his eyes lit up my living room. “I found out this week that life is a lot more exciting when I’m stalking your flights.”

  It was my turn to smile.

  We stayed like that for a long, quiet moment, me in Quinn’s lap, his arms wrapped tightly around my waist, and our gazes locked. The silence was comfortable, a peaceful space of sweet and tender. And I savored the warmth of his companionship. There was something special about being able to enjoy someone’s presence without the need for conversation. It was a rare kind of thing, one that was generally reserved for only your nearest and dearest.

  As the silence stretched thinner and thinner, like a balloon blown big, the temptation to rupture it grew too great to resist.

  “What are you thinking about right now?” I asked.

  “How insanely pretty you are.”

  I had to give the man credit where credit was due—he was smoother than silk.

  And to sweeten the answer, he flashed that smile that had me tied up tighter than a banker’s money. But unlike a vault, it wasn’t claustrophobic at all. His smile, his presence, only provided a sense of comfort and safety.

  The more time I spent with him, the more time I wanted to spend with him.

  I wanted to ask him a thousand questions. I wanted to witness all of his smiles and hear all of his laughs. And more than that, I wanted to be the person on the receiving end of those reactions.

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  He tapped my nose with his index finger. “You know you can ask me anything, kitten.”

  “Why do you like me?” I asked, and he furrowed his brow. “Wait…before you answer…I want you to know I’m just asking that question out of curiosity, not insecurity,” I added, and honestly, I wasn’t sure if that was one hundred percent the truth. My uncertainty over my own truth stirred an awkwardness in my belly, and I found myself tracing the freckles of his arms, connecting them with invisible lines, in order to distract myself from my own thoughts.

  “How could I not like you?” he retorted and lifted his arms off of my waist to cup my face, lifting my eyes to meet his again. “You’re beautiful. Intelligent. Funny. And so fucking cute that it takes my breath away. If anything, I should be the one asking you that question. Why is a gorgeous girl like you giving a guy like me the time of day?”

  I snorted. “A guy like you?”

  “Yeah.” He nodded. “A sometimes stubborn, sometimes stalker—” he grinned “—not the world’s greatest singer, goofy guy like me.”

  “I’d love to know how you consider yourself stubborn.”

  “I got you to go on that first date with me, didn’t I?”

  “I figured that fell into the stalkerish category,” I teased.

  “Okay, okay.” He chuckled. “You got me there. I guess it’s a little bit of both. But it was my stubbornness that led to the semi-stalking.”

  “I liked the stalking,” I said through a giggle. “That probably makes me sound crazy.”

  “Well, I liked doing the stalking, so I think that makes my crazy crazier than your crazy.”

  I laughed. “You’re crazy.”

  “Apparently, when it comes to you, I am.” He pressed a soft kiss to my lips. “Completely crazy for you,” he whispered against my cheek as he peppered my skin with kisses, moving his lips across my jaw, down my neck, until his fingers slid my T-shirt out of the way so he could place kisses across my collarbone.

  A soft moan fell from my lips when he reached my chest, hovering between my breasts. The warmth of his breath against my skin urged goose bumps to burst up my arms. My nipples pebbled and hardened beneath my clothes when his fingers slipped under the hem of my shirt and lifted it over my head, revealing the sheer white material of my bra.

  “God, you’re beautiful,” he whispered.

  Deftly, he unhooked my bra, sliding it down my arms and off my body. He leaned forward and sucked my right nipple into his mouth, swirling his tongue around and around until my skin flushed with arousal.

  “I need you, kitten,” he said against my skin. “Let me taste you. All of you.”

  “Yes,” I moaned.

  We were in motion after that, Quinn standing up, and with my legs still wrapped around his waist, he carried me into the hallway. His long and quick strides ate up the hardwood floor until he reached the threshold of my bedroom.

  Between one pounding heartbeat and the next, Quinn had me on my back, my body sinking into the mattress of my bed.

  He kneeled above me, his fingers unzipping my jean shorts and his hands sliding both denim and silk panties down my legs. He haphazardly tossed them onto the floor and gripped my thighs with strong hands, spreading me wide and baring me to his heated gaze.

  In one fluid motion, he took off his shirt and added it to the clothes pile on my floor. My gaze moved down his body, taking in his broad shoulders, his toned chest, the way his abdominal muscles rippled and flexed with each subtle movement, until they locked on to his visible arousal, heavy and hard beneath his jeans.

  While Quinn moved up my body, pressing openmouthed kisses against my thighs, my mind started wandering, thinking, obsessing, over the idea of giving him a blow job.

  Was this about to be an oral exchange?

  And if so, could I even give him a blow job that would be worthy of a climax?

  Do I have to do that whole deep-throat thing?

  My brain was fucking me over, making me focus on the absolute wrong things at the worst time. I should’ve been enjoying the fact that his lips were now moving up my inner thighs. I should’ve been losing my mind when he slipped his tongue out of his mouth to take a long, soft lick over my clit.

  When he sucked me into his mouth and spurred tingles up my spine, I should have gotten lost in the pleasure he was providing. I felt his moan against my skin, and I gripped my breasts with both hands and arched my back.

  It all felt so good. His lips, his tongue, his hands running up and down my aching skin felt so fucking good. Instead of focusing on that, my manic mind jumped to a subject that catapulted my anxiety.

  Can I make him feel this good?

  My incessant and stupidly insecure thoughts might as well have been a bucket of ice water, drowning my pleasure and forcing me out of the moment.

  It was official. My brain and my vagina were at fucking war.

  One wanted to overanalyze blow jobs, while the other just wanted a fucking orgasm.

  Frustrated with myself, my stupid brain, I abruptly sat up and maneuvered my body away from Quinn’s oh so perfect mouth.

  He looked up at me in shock, his mouth parted and his brow furrow
ed.

  Oh God, now I’ve really screwed this up. Hurry up. Do something.

  Quick as a rocket, I switched positions, forcing Quinn to lie back on the bed while I kneeled between his thighs, unbuttoning his jeans.

  “W-what are you doing?” he asked, words stuttered, eyes still shocked.

  “I need to taste you,” I whispered and didn’t give him any time to decide, sliding my hand inside of his boxer briefs and pushing them down his thighs. His cock was bared, still hard, still ready, standing tall and proud and directly in front of my face.

  I licked my lips. He looked delicious.

  Can I do this? Can I make him come with my mouth?

  Still, my mind was at war with itself, my damn blow-job insecurities wreaking havoc on my confidence.

  You can do this, Cat. Just suck him like your own personal lollipop.

  Yes. I could do this. And I did. I wrapped my lips around the thick and rounded head, swirling my tongue around to taste velvety silk.

  “Uh…Okay…” Quinn moaned. “I g-guess we can do this now…”

  Okay. Good sign. Keep going.

  I moved my lips down his shaft, sucking and softly flicking the tip of my tongue as I went. Again, I was rewarded with more Quinn-toned moans.

  And I loved it. His moans. His cock. The way he filled my mouth.

  Okay, we can do this, my brain and vagina agreed. I could suck him deep and enjoy it at the same time. I was already halfway there.

  Wait…halfway? I don’t have his entire dick in my mouth yet?

  With a quick inventory of my current mouth-to-penis location, I realized I was, in fact, only halfway. But good God, my mouth was full, and the tip was already saying hello to my throat. If this were a hot dog eating contest, I would’ve stopped taking in wieners about an inch and a half ago.

  But, fuck, I didn’t want to disappoint. I wanted more of his moans. I wanted to blow his mind. Literally.

  Deep breaths, Cat. In through your nose, out through your…well…nose because your mouth currently has a dick in it. But you got this. Just close your eyes and take it all the way, baby.

  Throwing caution to the wind, and with Quinn’s pleasure my top priority, I attempted to take all of him, moving my mouth all the way down,