PLAYERS: The Complete Series (Springville Rockets (Sports Romance Books 1-3)

by Daphne Loveling

  “I’m in grad school,” I tell him. “In neuroscience.”

  He gives a low whistle. “Impressive.”

  “I don’t know about that,” I say ruefully. “I’m not that far into it yet. I just started my master’s this past year. I have a long way to go.”

  “So, what kind of neuroscience?” he asks. I’m surprised he wants to know. Usually, when I tell someone what I’m in school for, their eyes glaze over and I change the subject so I won’t seem boring.

  “I’m studying the neuroscience of spinal cord injuries,” I tell him. “In particular, I’m interested in new ways researchers are exploring to rewire nerve tissue, with a view to restoring function.”

  He nods. Again, I’m surprised. Most guys, even past boyfriends, if they even let me get this far into talking what I’m studying, start rolling their eyes and making jokes by now. Being a science nerd isn’t exactly considered sexy by most of the male population.

  “So, researchers think they might be able to regrow damaged nerves?” he asks. His brow furrows, and it looks like he might be actually interested in this stuff. I can’t believe he actually listened to what I just said. It’s weird.

  “Yes,” I tell him, pushing down my surprise. Now that I’m a little less worried he’s going to think I’m a boring geek, I start to get kind of excited, like I always do when I get to talk about this stuff. “See, when a person gets injured in, say, their arm or their leg, the nerve bundles at that site grow back, because growth-stimulating proteins flock to the site of injury to help them do so.” I stop to make sure he’s following. “But spinal cord axons — those are the nerve bundles that carry signals back and forth between the body and the brain — are different from nerve bundles elsewhere in the body. Spinal cord axons don’t grow back after injury, because in the central nervous system, when there’s an injury, chemicals that actively block axon growth flood the site, which prevents regrowth and recovery.”

  He frowns, then nods. “Got it.”

  “So,” I continue, glancing at him to make sure he isn’t getting bored, “Researchers are working on ways to recreate the conditions that promote nerve recovery in other parts of the body. For example, by transplanting Schwann cells — those are cells that secrete growth factors after peripheral injury — to the site of a spinal cord injury. Or, by adding nerve cells to the injury site toward the healthy nerve cells, kind of like a trail of bread crumbs, and hoping that will guide the axons at points along the spinal cord.”

  I take a deep breath and let it out. “So, yeah, that’s what I’m interested in studying.” I sit back and look at his face to gauge his reaction. He’s taking it all in, a serious expression on his face.

  “That’s pretty damn interesting,” he tells me. “How far out are we talking here? For finding a cure, I mean?”

  “Well, what we know about spinal cord injury has dramatically increased over the last forty years or so.” I reply. “The future looks bright, and the rate of acceleration of knowledge and improvements will continue, but we still have a long way to go.” I’m aware that I’m talking like a textbook, and suddenly feel a little silly. “Sorry,” I say with a rueful grin. “I know I can get kind of carried away about this stuff.”

  “Don’t feel weird about it.” One corner of his mouth turns up sexily. “I’ll pay you back one day with a monologue about how important low pad level and head and shoulders are for a wide receiver’s route running.”

  Laughter bursts from me. “Well, you’ll have to tell me what a wide receiver is, first.”

  He grins. “I can do that.”

  With the two of us smiling at each other now, something subtle seems to shift in the air between us. It’s like I forgot to keep my guard up while I was telling him about my studies. And while I wasn’t paying attention, the invisible wall I was trying to imagine separating him from me has just… evaporated. Suddenly, as his eyes bore into mine, I’m uncomfortably aware I’m only wearing a cotton nightie. God, I’m not even wearing panties. The thin cloth is barely enough to cover the parts of me that right now are starting to react to the fact that a very hot, half-naked man is sitting less than two feet away from me.

  “Um,” I clear my throat as the smile dies on my face. “I guess I feel better now.” I nod my head toward my bedroom. “Thanks again for, uh, coming to my rescue just now.”

  “My pleasure,” he drawls, and shifts forward just the tiniest bit. “It’s not the most fun way I’ve ever gotten into a girl’s bedroom, but it was definitely one of the most unusual ones.”

  Him talking about being in my bedroom is not helping me get control of myself. At all. Especially when I’m pretty sure once I’m safely back in bed, I won’t be able to stop myself from fantasizing about what else he’s good at in the bedroom, besides shooing away bats.

  Under my nightie, I can actually feel my nipples begin to harden. I clear my throat again, and try to hunch my shoulders forward a little so he won’t be able to see them through the fabric.

  “Um,” I say.

  Genius, Ivy. You really have a way with words.

  “Don’t bother,” he murmurs as he looks down at my chest. He flashes me a grin that I should find maddening but that only makes me feel more hot and bothered. “Remember, I’ve already had the pleasure of seeing you naked. That tiny nightie you’re wearing isn’t hiding anything I can’t just call back up in my mind.”

  God, his voice… How does he do that thing with his voice, that makes it feel like he’s actually touching me with it? I squirm uncomfortably as heat grows between my legs, and resist the urge to cross them protectively. Knox moves forward again, until his leg is practically touching mine. “So, for example,” he begins, his voice low and raspy, “underneath that pink cotton, I know that the buds of your nipples are just a slightly lighter shade than your nightie.”

  My lips part in shock that he’s actually saying this, but I’m too paralyzed to do what I should do, which is scoot back away from him and tell him to fuck off. “And I know,” he murmurs, “that they’re hardening for me, because you want to know what it would feel like if I bent down and licked them.”

  My breathing shallows. I can’t move. Because he’s right. Of course he’s right. I should stop this. I should stop him.

  “And I know just how creamy the skin of your belly is,” he continues. His lips are inches from mine now, but he’s still not touching me. “And how it slopes down to the mound of your sweet little pussy. And ever since I saw you like that, I’ve been dying to spread those creamy thighs of yours and plunge my tongue inside you to find out what you taste like.”

  I finally manage to gasp out, “You can’t talk like that!”

  Knox chuckles deep in his throat. “Too late, cupcake,” he says. “Too late. This has already started.”

  I try to protest, but before I can say anything more, he leans over and kisses me, his lips hard against mine. It feels like lava is being poured through me as his tongue twines against mine hungrily. Before I can stop myself I’m moaning into his mouth, my head tilted back as I open to him without resistance. My hands go up to his shoulders and grip the hard muscular force of him. His skin is hot to the touch, and the heat between my legs turns to a throb.

  Knox wraps one arm around my waist and pulls me closer to him. His other hand goes to my breasts, as his thumb finds one taut nipple and grazes it through the fabric. I almost jump, it’s so intense, and I gasp and kiss him back harder. This… this is not what I do. I am not the kind of girl to be so close to having sex with basically a total stranger. Every inch of me feels like it’s on fire, and I’m clinging to him, desperately, needing what I know he can give me. I feel like my brain has lost control of my body, like some crazy sort of thing where instead of being paralyzed, my mind just has to look on while my body does whatever it wants to. I’m seconds away from begging Knox for… it, and I send up a silent prayer that he won’t make me ask him. That he won’t make me wait that long.

  Then Knox is hauling me
onto his lap so I’m straddling him, and oh, God, my core is pressed against the massive hardness of him, barely contained by the fabric of his jeans. I shudder with pleasure as my hips grind against him, the ache between my legs lessening just a little, just for a second. He grabs my hips and pulls me even closer, kissing me deeply as I continue to grind. His breath mingles with mine as he growls deep in his throat, meeting me thrust for thrust as I find myself starting to climb higher and higher. I don’t mean to go this far, don’t even realize I’m so close, and then before I can understand what’s happening I buck against him and cry out, pleasure rocketing through me with a force that’s unlike anything I’ve ever felt.

  The spasms continue to rock through me, and Knox holds me tight as I cling to him. When the blood rushing through my ears eventually starts to slow, I realize he’s talking to me, and I struggle to understand what he’s saying.

  “…so fucking hot, Ivy,” he murmurs. “Jesus. Jesus.”

  I take a couple of deep, gasping breaths, trying to get hold of myself. Now that my brain is starting to clear, my first horrified thought is that I’ve probably left an enormous, embarrassing wet spot on the crotch of his jeans.

  My second thought is that he’s still massively, alarmingly hard.

  As I’m trying desperately to think of something, anything to say — like, what? Thanks for the amazing brain-shattering orgasm? — Knox’s hand comes up to the back of my head and pulls me into a deep, hungry kiss. Then before I realize what’s happening, he’s lifted me off of him and onto the couch. Just as I feared, there is a massive wet spot on the front of his jeans.

  “I, uh…” I stammer. “You… you’re still…” My face flames red. I can’t make myself say the actual words erection or dick or anything else.

  “Yeah,” he growls thickly. “I’m still fucking hard as a rock for you, Ivy. Shit, can you blame me?” He shifts on the couch, adjusting the bulge and groaning softly as he does so.

  “Do you…” Good God, I’m such an idiot. How can I be almost twenty-five years old and not be able to talk about sex, like, at all?

  He chuckles and lifts my chin toward him with a finger. “Tonight was all about you, cupcake. And by the looks of it, you needed it,” he says, nodding toward his jeans. I open my mouth to apologize, but he stops me. “Don’t you fucking dare be embarrassed about that,” he rasps. “That shit was a fucking fantasy scenario.”

  Knox bends toward me and covers his mouth with mine again. His tongue probes deep, sending another wave of heat through me. Then the kiss is over, and I have to stifle a mewl of protest. “You’re welcome, cupcake,” he whispers against my neck.

  And then, before I even understand what’s happening, he’s gone, the French doors closing slowly behind him.

  8

  Knox

  When I get back to my place, I stride through the living room, down the hall and go straight to my bedroom, where I kick off my jeans, flip off the lights, and lie down on the bed. My cock is so hard it’s fucking aching. I grip it in my fist, take a deep breath and let it out, and stroke as slowly as I can possibly manage. It’s no use trying to draw it out, though: my head’s so full of Ivy’s face as she came all over my cock that in less than a minute I’m groaning my release, thick, hot jets of come coating my chest.

  I lie there, gasping and staring up at the ceiling, and try to catch my breath. What just happened back there with Ivy — it was goddamn incredible. Jesus, she’s fucking sexy. I don’t think she even really realizes it. She’s pretty buttoned up most of the time, or at least she tries to be. But when I finally got her loosened up so that she stopped being so self-conscious… holy shit. Just watching her body as she got more and more turned on, the way she writhed against my cock — the thought of it makes me start to stiffen up again, even though I just came. God, more than anything in the world right now, I want to know what it feels like to be inside her, to press myself inside the wet heat of her. And I will. I’m sure I will. Hell, I could have made it happen tonight. The startled look in Ivy’s eyes when I pulled her off of me told me everything I needed to know.

  So why didn’t I stay? Why didn’t I pick her up and take her into the bedroom, and make her come again with my cock before emptying myself inside her?

  I don’t even know, exactly. I’ve never left like that before. Mostly, I guess I wanted there to be a next time. Usually, once I’m with a girl once, or maybe twice, I’m kind of done. But Ivy’s got more to her than most girls I meet. It sounds fucking cliché, but she’s got some substance to her. Some depth. And I have to admit to myself, I want to know more about her. More about what makes her tick.

  Plus, I want the anticipation to build. I want her so goddamn bad I can practically taste it. And I want her to be practically begging for it when I finally take her.

  My eyelids start to feel heavy, so I grab the T-shirt I was wearing earlier and wipe my chest off, then head into the bathroom for a quick shower. Suddenly, I’m fucking exhausted, and I practically sleepwalk through soaping up and rinsing off. Even so, by the time I’m out of the shower and toweling off, my cock is standing at half-mast again because I can’t stop thinking about Ivy. In bed, I force myself not to jack off again, knowing even as I drift off to sleep that I’ll wake up to thoughts of Ivy tomorrow morning and won’t be able to resist the temptation.

  The next morning, just like I thought, I wake up with a world-class case of morning wood. I greet the day by groaning Ivy’s name as I come shuddering into my fist.

  I take another shower, grab some breakfast, and get into my car to head out to the team’s facility. I want to put in some time in the weight room before practice. As I drive my thoughts turn back to Ivy again, even though I feel like I shouldn’t let myself think about her quite so much. I remember what she told me last night about being in grad school. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that she’s studying something high-powered like neuroscience. She definitely seems smart enough for it. But she’s not exactly what most people would picture when they think “neuroscientist.” I try to picture her in a white lab coat and a pair of nerdy glasses, but then my brain makes her naked under the lab coat, and pretty soon I’m pitching a tent and have to make myself think about something else.

  It’s cool she’s studying spinal cord injuries, though. I find myself wondering if someday one of the cures she’s studying will be able to help my buddy Chris. Hell, maybe something she discovers will be the thing that can make him walk again. For a minute, I let myself indulge in the hope, then push it back down and concentrate on driving. Chris’s injury is due to a completely severed spinal cord, I know. In his case, even with some amazing scientific breakthroughs, it’s unlikely anything will change for him.

  My best friend from high school is still on my mind when I pull into the facility. Inside, I change into my workout clothes and spend an hour in the weight room. Then I suit up and get ready for some speed work with the offensive line. In between drills, we talk about our upcoming training camp: three weeks at a university two and a half hours away, on the other side of the state. Among other things, training camp is a chance for a new player like me to acclimate to the team and bond with my teammates. A week ago — hell, two days ago — I was really looking forward to it. And I still am, but part of me is kind of bummed out now that it also means three weeks without seeing my hot next-door neighbor.

  I’m just leaving the facility later that afternoon when I get a call from my younger brother, Cash. I take the call leaning against my SUV, which is under one of the rare patches of shade under a tree in the parking lot.

  “Baby bro,” I answer. “Long time no talk. What’s up?”

  “Hey, buddy!” His unmistakable voice comes through the earpiece, cheerful as ever. “How’s life as a Springville Rocket?”

  Cash is two years younger than me. He’s the pride and vexation of my mother. A college dropout, he ditched the academic four-year plan after he discovered he could make more money playing online poker than he was ever lik
ely to make as a math major. These days, he mostly plays cards face to face instead of virtually, though he’ll occasionally get online to make some quick dough. Although his official home base is Vegas, he spends his time traveling to different tournaments around the country, so I usually don’t know where he’s calling from on the rare occasions I actually hear from him.

  “Good so far, man,” I tell him. “Just settling in, getting to know the team. You know how it is.”

  “Hey, how’d you like a visitor for a few days?” Cash asks me. “I’ve got a couple weeks between tournaments and I could use some downtime. You up for me crashing at your place for a weekend?”

  “Definitely. When you thinking about coming down?”

  “I dunno… in a few days?” He swears and says something about some asshole cutting him off, and I realize he must be driving. “I’m road trippin’ it. I just got this sweet Porsche 911 off a guy who lost to me in a game last week. Okay with you if I call you when I’m getting close?”

  “Yeah, that works,” I say, chuckling. I won’t be surprised if he just shows up on my doorstep unannounced instead of calling. But that’s Cash. To say he lives in the moment would be the biggest understatement of all time.

  “Sounds good, big bro. Talk to ya!” In the background, I hear an engine revving, and then the call ends. I chuckle again and shove my phone in my pocket. Then I climb into the Tahoe and head for home, wondering on the way if Ivy’s around and what she’s doing tonight.

  9

  Ivy

  After Knox leaves my apartment that night, I grab my pillow and a blanket to sleep on the living room couch, just in case the bat in my bedroom had a friend.

  I barely sleep a wink, though. After everything that’s happened in the past two hours, I can hardly keep my thoughts straight. As if being scared half out of my mind by a bat brushing my face in the dark wasn’t enough, having Knox bang on my door loud enough to wake the dead almost finished the job.