That was honestly a pretty good idea, but I didn’t think that Linc would appreciate me blocking his agent.
Just as I had that thought, shivers started to race down my spine.
Then a pair of hands met my shoulders. “Hey, can you come with me for a second?”
Landry’s eyes were wide with mirth as she watched me stand up without a word. “Excuse me.”
Landry winked but didn’t say a word, and I chose to think that she didn’t realize what having Linc’s hands on my body did to me.
My chair made the most obnoxious sound on Earth as I scooted it back, and I blushed a fiery red when every single eye in the restaurant turned my way. By doing so, they didn’t miss the possessive hold Linc had on my hip now.
I bit my lip and ducked my head, following Linc into the hallway that led to the bathrooms.
The night had been a lesson in patience.
Each time I shifted my body, I was reminded of what we’d done the night before and got hot all over again at the thought of doing it again.
It was exquisite torture at its finest.
We’d just made it to the end of the hallway where I assumed he was going to stop us and talk, but then he pushed into the family bathroom and closed and locked the door.
He didn’t bother with the light.
The frosted glass allowed light from the hallway to seep in, making it to where I could see Linc coming toward me.
“Linc…”
Hands traveled down my back to cup my ass. Then his mouth was locked on mine, and he was devouring me.
His head was slanted, and with the way his hand was wrapped around my jaw holding my own face slightly tilted, he was controlling every aspect of the kiss.
His tongue was practically mating with mine.
And I wanted to rip his pants off along with mine, and then ride him like a stallion.
But I knew that he wouldn’t go that far.
Not here. Not with all those people on the other side of the door.
At least, I didn’t think he would.
His friends were nosey little shits.
I knew without a shadow of a doubt that they’d seen Linc follow me in here. I also knew that if we stayed in here too long that there’d be no doubt in their minds as to what we’d been doing.
“Linc, what are you doing? Our dessert is on the way,” I whispered.
“You’ve been squirming on that seat for the last half hour, and it’s killing me slowly.” He growled against my lips. “Do you know what it does to me to see that?”
I could feel what it did to him. It was currently pressing into my belly and felt like a column of fire lashing across my stomach.
But before I could even reply, his obnoxious phone rang again.
I sighed and said, “You should answer that. It’s happened five times now. I don’t think she’s going to stop.”
Seeing Linc sigh in frustration, he held his hand out for the phone that I promptly set in his palm.
He swiped his finger over the screen, then pressed the speakerphone button before answering.
“Hello?”
“Oh, thank God,” his publicist, said furiously. “Do you know how long I’ve been trying to get ahold of you?”
Linc sighed. “Listen, Elouise,” he grumbled. “I’ve been busy. This is the offseason, is it not?”
“You’re with your pregnant fiancée at a barbeque restaurant called Mobetta’s. You’ve been done with dinner for so long that there’s no reason you can’t freakin’ answer the damn phone. Especially when I have something so important to share with you,” she challenged.
I thought back to who was in the room and decided that it was probably the young couple posting pictures of Linc and me eating. “By the way, let’s finish this up. It looks like your dessert arrived, according to the most infatuated fans ever. Plus, they said that you’ve disappeared into a family bathroom and have been in there for well over ten minutes now.”
I growled in frustration, all thoughts of doing anything with Linc so far on the back burner that it’d probably not be reached for again tonight.
“Fine. What’s up?” Linc sighed, letting me go completely.
I straightened my clothes and went to the bathroom counter, inspecting myself in the mirror.
I looked tired, flushed, and happy.
It was a weird experience being this happy.
I didn’t think anything could make it better.
Then his publicist made one hell of a smile break out over Linc’s face, and I felt something inside my chest get even more excited.
“You finally got it,” Elouise cheered. “They chose you. FaithSports wants you to meet them in Branson, Missouri next Tuesday for a press conference announcing the decision. Congratulations!”
***
I laughed when I saw the picture of Linc and I coming out of the bathroom.
He had me around the waist and was spinning me around in his exuberance as he bounced me on his shoulder.
I loved the picture. I loved it so much that I saved it as the desktop background on my laptop.
“What’s that smile for?” Linc rumbled from the bed beside me.
He’d just made love to me. Slow, sweet, heart-stopping love that I was confident I’d remember for a long time.
“I like the picture,” I told him honestly. “It makes me happy seeing it.”
He rolled over until he was pressed up against me, his big hand going to my face and pulling me bodily to him.
I went, dropping the computer on the bed beside me before rolling until I could wrap my arms around his big head.
“You make me happy,” Linc said. “I love you.”
I felt something inside me take off at hearing him say that.
“Linc,” I said softly. “Do you think we’ve done this too fast?”
He laughed.
The big shit laughed.
“Linc.” I pinched him, causing him to curse.
“What?” he chuckled.
“Why are you laughing?” I questioned. “This isn’t a laughing matter. You just declared your undying love to me.”
He looked so freakin’ sexy, face sleepy, and mouth split wide. He was still very much naked, and each time a chuckle left those delectable lips, his abs would tighten and bunch.
“I did,” he agreed. “But what I also did was laugh at you because you think this is too early.”
“Well,” I hesitated. “It is. We haven’t been seeing each other for long. Hell, at some point it went from a joke Phoebe blurted out to being a favor to you to something real, and I’m not sure when or how that happened. When is our anniversary? Is it the day that the media found out I was fake-pregnant with your baby? Or is it when we first did the deed?”
His head tilted. “Is it important?”
I gave him a level look. “Of course, it’s important.”
His grin kicked up at the corner. “Fine,” he said. “Then our anniversary is November sixth.”
I looked at him blankly.
“What are you talking about? It’s the summer. We’re still three months away from November,” I informed him haughtily.
He lifted his hand up and smoothed my hair over my head, getting all the flyaways out of my eyes.
“November sixth is the day that you were first introduced to me,” he said. “It was the day that I saw you for the very first time.”
I felt everything inside of me still.
“Linc…”
“You were dressed in blue jean shorts that showed off your hot as fuck long legs, a pink cheer shirt, and you had your hair up in a ponytail.” He paused. “You weren’t wearing any makeup, and you had the cutest glare on your face that I’d ever seen in my life. I knew within ten seconds of seeing you standing there behind Steel that you would be mine.”
I felt tears burning my eyes. “You’re serious.”
He nodded once. “As a heart attack.”
I couldn’t help it. He had to know that I felt the same exact way.
“I’ve loved you from the time that your eyes met mine,” I whispered. “I’d never been given a lot in life. Everything was a struggle, and I was in a perpetually bad mood because nobody ever wanted just me.”
“I only want you,” he whispered fiercely. “I’ve managed to keep you all to myself, and I’m going to keep it that way.”
I buried my face into the hollow of his throat, and never knew that in just twelve short hours, every single glorious moment of the last five minutes would be forgotten.
There were forces that were hell-bent on keeping us apart, and neither Linc nor I could change that.
Chapter 16
Home is where those fuckers aren’t.
-Conleigh to Linc
Conleigh
I smiled when I felt warm lips running over my cheek, and heard Linc’s rumbled, “Love you, Con.”
I cracked one eye open and offered him my lips. He took them and then patted my ass. “I’ll be back in two days. Text me when you wake up.”
I licked the wetness he’d left behind off my lips, and then sleep reclaimed me.
The next time I woke, I forgot his request to text him, mostly because I’d slept through forty minutes of my alarm and had to rush to get to work.
At some point during the morning, after being at work for well over half the day, I remembered getting a text.
I ignored it because I’d been ankle deep in a cardiac arrest and hadn’t had the time to spare to check it.
It wasn’t until an hour later that I had a chance to check the message.
Linc: Erobf
Thinking he hadn’t meant to send me anything at all, I shoved the phone back into my pocket and went about my day. Maybe if I hadn’t, maybe if I’d called to ask him what that text had meant, things wouldn’t have turned out like they did.
That night, after finally catching my breath from work, I called.
And called.
And called.
And called.
He never answered. Not once.
Finally, after getting fed up with his lack of contact, I’d gone to bed, only to sleep straight through my alarm again the next morning.
***
The saying goes like this: All good things must come to an end.
Mine and Linc’s end came in the form of a picture.
I’d been darting around the emergency room all morning for the second day in a row and hadn’t once picked up my phone because it’d been so freakishly busy.
Maybe if I had, and seen Linc’s text messages or eighteen thousand calls, I would’ve known something was wrong.
Maybe if I had, maybe if I’d done something other than overreact like I always did and thought about the fact that Linc would never do that to me, this might’ve gone differently.
But it didn’t.
Then again, maybe I wouldn’t have.
Maybe I’d have seen the pictures and been just as horrified.
But I didn’t get his calls explaining the pictures, and I did get upset the moment I had a chance to breathe and check my alerts on my phone.
What I saw took my knees out from under me.
I was furious.
I was madder than hell at the situation, and I was even more upset that I’d done this to myself.
I knew that Linc’s fame would someday come back and bite us in the ass.
Knew it, yet I’d done it anyway.
“Are you okay, Conleigh?” Pru asked warily.
I’d only meant to pick my phone up for a quick glance to see if Linc had gotten back to me, and that quick glance had turned into me seeing a Google Alert with Linc’s name plastered all over all thirty of them.
The first one I’d clicked on had been accidental. I’d tried to swipe my phone open and had ended up accidentally clicking the Google Alert. From there, I hadn’t been able to look away from the train wreck in my hand.
I swallowed hard and swiped to the next picture, repeating the process over and over again until I got to the very last alert, this one of him in front of a hospital looking like shit warmed over.
In the picture, he had his phone to his ear with one hand fisted in his hair, and I wanted nothing more than to shove my fist into his throat just so he’d feel the pain that was currently dominating the inside of my chest.
My breathing turned ragged, and I scrolled backward, looking at the photos that were much worse than the last one.
“Oh my God.”
I swallowed as Pru put voice to my words.
Though, I wouldn’t have stopped there.
I felt tears starting to swell in my throat, and I started to hyperventilate.
And, closing my eyes and praying for strength, I closed my phone, turned it on silent, and pushed it into my pocket.
Then, without another word, I went back to work and didn’t once think about Linc again.
Also, that was a lie.
***
I didn’t make it through the day well, but I made it.
“Whoa there, darlin’.” Someone grabbed my wrist when I pushed angrily out of the back doors to the hospital.
I smiled absently at the man but froze when I saw that the man holding my wrist was a man that looked almost exactly like Tyson, but more rough and tumble.
Tantor. His twin brother.
Oh, holy shit.
As if my day couldn’t get any worse.
God. Dammit.
“Sorry,” I extricated my wrist from the man’s grasp, feeling my heart thundering in my chest. “I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.”
Actually, I had been. Only, I never expected someone to be entering the exit only door that only employees were supposed to use.
You know. To fucking exit.
“No worries,” Tantor lied. “Do you mind opening that for me?”
Yes, yes I did.
I wasn’t opening the door to the back entrance of a hospital enabling the man to completely bypass the security guard as well as the metal detectors that he’d be forced to pass through had he gone the front way like he was supposed to.
I winced. “I can’t. I’m sorry. It’s an exit only and this one doesn’t have a badge scanner. You actually have to have a key.”
That was a lie. I had a key, but he didn’t know that.
His eyes narrowed on me, but he allowed me to pull away from him.
“Bye now.”
He grunted something and had stepped back into my path when I heard my name called from somewhere beyond the man.
The simple relief at seeing the man that I loved beyond this man that I knew had done bad things to my family and friends had me breathing a sigh of relief. A sigh of relief that quickly turned to a whimper as I remembered the awful pictures that I’d been trying in vain to purge from my memory since I’d seen them.
He looked awful, and as I paused there, looking over the man who was still for some reason blocking me from moving, I realized that he looked sick.
I would be, too, had I been caught doing what he’d been doing in those pictures.
“Excuse me,” I murmured, trying once again to go around Tantor.
Tantor grabbed my arm just as Linc arrived and grabbed my other.
I obviously went with the enemy I knew rather than the one that I didn’t and would’ve likely hidden behind Linc’s back had Tantor let me go.
I twisted my wrist hard and took the man by surprise.
The moment I was free, I moved until I was behind Linc.
His big body felt reassuring, and I wanted nothing more than to throw my arms around him.
But then I saw that he was still wearing what he’d been wearing when he left—those stupid blue goddamn workout shorts and a simple gray tee—and remembered where those clothes had been.
I took a step back, and another, and another, not realizing it until it was too
late that I’d left Linc and Tantor alone—or at least alone enough for Linc to feel justified in taking a swing at Tantor without fear of me getting in the way.
I gasped when he did it, wincing slightly when Linc’s fist connected with Tantor’s jaw, and he went down like a sack of potatoes.
The moment his body hit the concrete, I felt Linc’s attention turn toward me.
“You didn’t answer your phone,” he accused.
I laughed then.
“Neither did you.” I paused. “Which is funny. I guess you were busy doing that girl instead of meeting with FaithSports. Was this just some elaborate ruse that you worked out with your agent just so you could have a reason to leave?”
I said it so calmly that you would think that we were just having a short conversation about the weather—not about the photos of him cheating on me being splashed all over the internet.
“And just so you know, I’m going to kill you.”
Linc bent over and threw up.
That’s when I decided it was time to leave.
“No!” Linc moaned. “Please wait.”
I viciously ripped my hand that he’d somehow latched onto away from him and growled. “Leave me alone! I’m going home.”
“I’m going with you,” he said. “We really need to talk.”
I laughed then.
“You’re fucking out of your mind if you think we’re talking after what I saw today.” I laughed. “Out of your mind. No. You’re going to your house, and I’m going to mine. Thank God that I didn’t move in with you.”
Thank. God.
That would’ve been awful.
At the end of the day, at least I had somewhere to go that was away from him.
He reached for me again, and again capturing my wrist.
“Please.” He squeezed my wrist tighter. “Please listen.”
“I can’t listen right now,” I told him honestly. “Truthfully, about all I’m capable of right now is killing you by wrapping my stethoscope around your neck.”
Linc’s shoulders slumped, and it was then that I saw the hospital bracelet that was on his wrist.
But I shoved the concern for him back and turned away from him.
Talkin' Trash (The Bear Bottom Guardians MC Book 2) Page 17
