by Amy Daws
“So?” She jerks her chin, shoving back a few loose strands of glossy hair that are glowing in the blue rope lighting that lines the ceiling of my see-through closet. “Brothers have played against brothers in soccer before, I’m sure.”
“It’s called football, Sloan,” I correct with a cheeky wink. She gives me a wry smile, and seeing her face slip back into her old self makes me feel like a fucking champion. This is a fight we have almost every time we see each other, and I’m pleased it’s helping her feel better. “And you’re correct. Brothers have played against brothers. But not the Harris Brothers.”
“What’s so special about the Harris Brothers?” she asks, tilting her head to the side, looking me up and down once more.
My smile wavers. “I guess it’s because there are four of us and we all play.”
“You all play soccer?” Her brows lift in genuine surprise.
“Yes,” I reply with a laugh. I love that after two years of working together, she has never Googled me. “My three brothers all played together for Bethnal Green—the championship league club our dad manages. But Camden signed with Arsenal, so he’s joined me on the Premiership, and the media are having a heyday with that.”
She sighs heavily with a shake of her head. “Wow. Four boys, all professional athletes. Your mom must be exhausted.”
Her offhanded comment cuts through me harsher than I would have anticipated. They say grief gets better with time. Eventually, the parts of you that broke will mend. That’s not been the case for me. Maybe it is because I was with my mum when she drew her last breath. I’ve never been able to shake the sensation of her body going limp in my arms.
For me, grief is a lot like the ankle injury I suffered years ago. The doctors said it was a really bad sprain, but I’d get back to one hundred percent with solid physio and training. I never did get everything back that I lost, though. I’ll always feel that tendon a little more. I’ll always step a little differently wherever I go. Be a bit more aware of my surroundings. And if I close my eyes, I can remember the feeling of the horrid popping sensation in my bones, and the nausea pummels me like the weight of an entire football team.
My jaw ticks as I attempt to conceal the fresh stab of pain Sloan’s words have caused. Clearing my throat, I reply, “My mum died when I was eight.”
Sloan’s face falls, and the look that casts over her features is like kicking a person when they’re down. “Oh my God, Gareth. I am so sorry. I’m such a puke!” She covers her cheeks with her hands, her head shaking back and forth in horror.
“You’re not a puke.” The word sounds odd coming from me. “You didn’t know. It’s fine.”
“God, you were eight?” Her mind seems to have drifted somewhere else. “You were eight and without your mother. Only your brothers and dad…I’m so sorry.”
“My sister, Vi, was there. She’s younger than me but an old soul. She held us all together.” My words don’t seem to be helping her calm down, so I add, “We had Vi and football. We didn’t need much else.”
Her lips are downcast. “Still. Five kids and no mom. I’m so sorry, Gareth.”
“Stop saying sorry. I’m fine.” My jaw clenches, fighting back feelings I normally keep locked up tightly. This is why I keep people at a distance. Surface level relationships are easier. Safer.
And I hate talking about my mum.
I hate thinking about her. I hate remembering her. When the media try to bring her up to me, I instantly shut down. My agent prefaces all of my interviews with that information, and I am desperate to change the subject entirely right now.
“How’s the husband?” I ask, knowing it’s a dick thing to ask. She’s clearly upset, but she’s managed to slice into my personal life with very little effort. It’ll be easier to have the tables turned.
Her eyes flash to mine like a zap of electricity has been shot through her veins. “Why do you ask?”
She looks just as confused as I feel about this entire conversation. Dead mothers and secret husbands. Tonight is blurring every single one of our once cosy personal boundaries.
I look down at her hand. “I noticed you’re missing some hardware.”
She pulls her hand up in front of her chest, chewing thoughtfully on her lower lip as she looks down at the floor. Her thumb strokes the inside of her ring finger that shows a faint tan line. “We’re not together anymore. It’s kind of new,” she adds with a sad look on her face.
Silence falls over us. I should say something. Something respectful. Something proper. Something meaningful. Something to cheer her up. “I’m sorry to hear that.” Or something painfully generic.
“Yeah, thanks.” She gazes up at me, her eyes squinting with question. “I suppose that’s the proper response, right?”
“I guess so?” I respond with a question because I’m not sure what she’s getting at.
She looks around the room, searching for her answer. “I should be sorry. I should be concerned. I should be sad, right?” She looks back at me for my response.
I can only shrug. She looks sad enough to me. Although, perhaps sad isn’t exactly the look I see in her red-rimmed eyes. More lost. “I think you should feel how you want to feel,” I reply sternly.
“That’s the thing, though!” she peals, her eyes wide and anxious. “I don’t know how I want to feel. My marriage is over and I don’t know how I should feel. I thought about it the entire drive over here, and it’s making me crazy that I don’t just know.” She tugs nervously on a strand of hair that’s fallen loose from her ponytail. “Can you tell me how to feel? Please?”
“No,” I state quickly, taking a step back. If I tell her how I want her to feel, it’s happy. Turned on. Liberated. I’d tell her to feel fucking euphoric to be free to do whatever she wants with whomever she wants. But telling her that would only serve me, not her. “It’s your life. A life I’m just learning about. So it’s certainly not my place to tell you your feelings. They should just…come naturally.”
“Well, they’re not.” Her tone is exasperated. She looks like she’s going to lose it again.
“They have to be there,” I retort, stepping closer to her, loathing the lost look in her eyes. “Fuck, I’m an unfeeling prick nine times out of ten, but even I’d have some sort of reaction to not being with the person I loved anymore.”
“That’s the thing!” she exclaims, her voice rising in pitch. “I don’t think I love him! I was just existing with him! So now that I’ve told you that, how do you think I should feel?”
This is the most bizarre conversation I’ve ever had, and that’s saying a lot because my brothers have spoken to me for hours about the size of their balls. But in all the visions I’ve had of Sloan and her husband, I never considered her not even loving him.
Swallowing hard, I reply, “Try saying the first thing that comes to your mind. I’ve split with my husband and I feel…”
“Out of control!” she exclaims, her eyes wide and watery. She moves closer to me, an urgency causing her hands to shake in front of her body. “I feel like I’ve been out of control through the entirety of my marriage and getting divorced doesn’t change a damn thing. He will still have all the power, and I’ll still have zero control of my own damn life.”
“That can’t be true,” I argue. “You won’t be with him anymore. That’s the ultimate freedom. And you have an incredible business you’ve built. You work for some of the wealthiest people in England.”
“He pushed me into this job! And those people just tell me what to do!” she replies with a laugh I don’t entirely trust.
“They ask for your opinion,” I scoff. “You tell them what to wear.”
She smiles, but it looks like it hurts. “I’m a glorified order-filler. I shop and make thoughtful selections, then they send me back to get them something else. You’re my only client who wears what I tell you to wear. Why is that, Gareth?”
She steps even closer to me and grips the sides of my arms with her long, delicate fingers.
I flex in response because her hands on me normally feel strong and reassured. But with the crazy look on her face, I’m not sure how to feel right now. “I don’t know. I guess I just tr-trust you,” I falter.
“You’re the only one.” She sniffles and swallows down a lump in her throat while staring at my chest. “You’re the only one who listens.”
She presses her forehead to my chest and her body trembles against mine. Instinctively, I wrap my arms around her. One hand cups her neck while the other wraps around the small of her back. We’ve never embraced like this, but she fits perfectly beneath my chin and I can tell she needs this. I squeeze her tightly in a vain attempt to take her pain away. Then I envision punching her fucking husband for turning her into this out of control, emotionally tortured mess before me. Sloan deserves so much better.
“How can I fix this for you?” I ask, wanting to kiss the top of her head but holding back because I don’t know if she’d welcome the touch. “I fix things, so just name what you need.”
Her head lifts, her eyes rising to my face, zeroing in on my lips. My gaze falls to her mouth in response. Her lips are pink and wet and open just enough for me to see the tip of her tongue. A shift in the air has me pulling in a deep, cleansing breath. She looks tearful like before, but there’s a spark in her eyes that I’ve never seen. It’s electric. Mesmerising. Meaningful.
I can smell her perfume and feel the warmth of her breath against my whiskered jaw, and it’s doing things to me. Things I should probably put a stop to. She’s clearly not in a good place, but what’s happening right now isn’t voluntary.
“Why are you so kind to me, Gareth?” she asks my lips. Her voice is deep and different than I’ve ever heard. “I don’t have many friends out here, and you’re one of the only ones who’s kind.”
My voice is like gravel when I reply, “I li-like you.”
Her gaze roves over my features, taking in every millimetre of my expression like she’s looking for a lie. It hurts to see her like this. Sloan is always so thoughtful and patient. So understanding. What kind of a sick bastard could make her doubt herself so much?
I would never make her feel this way. In fact, I would do literally anything to take away this pain she’s feeling. Seeing her falling apart feels dangerous, like she could break and disappear at any second.
I lean in toward her lips. The sugary scent wafting off of her makes my mouth water. I can practically taste the sweetness of her skin and we haven’t even touched yet. “Tell me what you want, Treacle.”
She sucks in a quick breath and tightens her grip on my biceps. “What does Treacle mean?”
My eyes close because I didn’t mean to say it out loud. It’s an East London word that an old trainer for Bethnal used a lot, and for some reason it stuck. “It’s a British term for sweet. Treacle is a type of sweet molasses.”
Her nose wrinkles with disgust. “Why would you call me molasses?”
I press my lips to fight the chuckle that is rising in my chest. “Because you smell sweet. You’ve always smelled sweet since the first time I met you. Like syrup.”
“Oh,” she says, looking down and thinking that over. “And you like that?” she asks, looking up at me with hope.
Not at first, is the reply that pops into my head. Instead, I press my nose to her neck. The skin is soft and puckers with goosebumps as I inhale deeply. Lightly touching my lips to her neck, I murmur against her flesh, “I do now.”
Sloan swallows slowly as I pull back and take in her flushed cheeks. “So it’s like a term of endearment?”
“You could call it that.”
Her eyes well with tears, and I fear that I’ve gone too far. A droplet slides down her cheek, so I reach out to cradle her delicate face in my hands. My thumb slowly slicks the moisture away. “I’m sorry if that was too much. I won’t say it again. I just really want to make this pain you have go away. I have to make these tears stop.”
“It’s not too much,” she croaks, leaning into me so our bodies are pressed against each other. I thought it was my lips on her neck that upset her, but now we’re so close I can feel every breath she takes. “I’ve never had a term of endearment.”
I’ve never been inspired to give one, is what I think. Instead, I reply, “You should have that and so much more, Sloan. Just tell me what you want and I will give it to you.” My body is roaring to life in a way I’ve never experienced, and it’s taking every ounce of my control to not ravage her on the spot. But that’s the last thing she needs. She’s come to me saying she feels out of control. I’m not about to enable that feeling.
“What do you mean?” she asks, watching my lips as she licks her tongue across her own.
“Tell me what to do. Give me an order. Whatever you want. You’re not out of control right now, Sloan. You are completely in control. With me. I give it all to you.”
A breath she had been holding escapes her lips in a garbled sort of moan, like the thought of me giving in to her is turning her on. God, I want to see her turned on. I want to see her let go so fucking badly I could roar.
She inhales and husks against my lips, “I…want a lot of things.” Her eyes drift down my body, and her chest rises and falls with deep, labourious breaths.
“Considering how badly I want you right now, I’m bloody well positive you could have anything from me.”
Her eyes snap to mine, and an ember burns in them that wasn’t there before. “Anything?”
I swallow slowly, a heavy, important weight pressing down on me with that single word. “Anything.”
Her voice is quick and brisk, like a flash of lightning. “I want to see you naked.”
Fuck. Me.
It has just been confirmed that the woman I’ve fantasised about nineteen different ways since the second I met her wants me naked. It’s not at all what I expected but more than I could have ever hoped for. I want to thrust my victorious fists in the air and hoot for joy, but I’m going to conceal my childish excitement.
She’s fragile right now. Raw. This needs to be about her desires. Not mine. It’s important for her to know I’m taking her seriously. And there’s no way in hell I want any of this to stop.
Releasing her cheeks, I step back and yank my shirt off over my head. Before my eyes open, she’s in my space, raking her fingers over my shoulders and through the short hairs on my chest. Her eyes watch the action as her nails bite into my flesh, leaving thin red lines as they go.
My grunt has her eyes back on mine. “Do you like that?” she asks nervously, trying to read my expression.
Swallowing and trying to maintain control of my impending erection, I nod slowly. I like it too much. I like it more than I’ve liked a woman’s hands on me in ages. My tone is guttural. “I like it a lot.”
My chest begins rising and falling quicker the longer she looks at me, eyeing me with renewed strength. “Can we really do this?” she asks.
“Yes,” I reply automatically, needful for more. “We can do whatever you want.” And I seriously mean whatever she wants.
“Unbutton your jeans,” she whispers tremulously and takes a step back to watch my reaction.
Her eyes are strong and full of passion. They look confident, no longer crazed and out of control. Giving her this control is a turn-on like I’ve never felt before.
Reaching down, I unbutton the snap of my jeans, pulling apart the zipper seam with a simple bend of my wrist. Sloan’s eyes travel down the line of hair running from my navel to my groin. She bites her lip and her head lolls back like she’s trying to maintain control of herself.
Fuck me. I’m not even touching her and she’s reacting this strongly. Don’t fucking stop, Treacle.
“Tell me more,” I croak, my voice deep and gravelly as I stare at the beautiful flesh on her neck. “Tell me everything you want me to do.”
She nods, her shoulders rising with this newfound empowerment she’s trying so hard to embrace. Her hands slide up her body to the back of her neck. “Rub yoursel
f,” she states. “Over your jeans.”
My brows lift. God, why am I so proud of her in this moment? She’s fucking stunning, that’s why.
I press the heat of my palm over the crotch of my denim, careful not to do anything more than what she’s requested. My dick is hardening from watching her watch me. She’s a fucking vision.
My forearm flexes as I begin to massage my groin, my dick pressing against the seam of my jeans and growing by the second.
“Go inside your jeans. Rub your bare…cock.” She hesitates on the last word and pulls her lip into her mouth, clearly unsure of herself.
“Anything,” I whisper, my voice quaking because my level of arousal is a bit terrifying.
My reply gives her confidence. She licks her lips and eyes the veins running up my arm as I slide my hand into my tight jeans. I’m rock-hard now, but there’s no room to play. Regardless, I’m following orders and everything feels so fucking good.
“I want to see you, Gareth,” she all but moans. “Take off your jeans.”
Thank fuck, I think to myself as I slide the jeans down my legs and kick them out of the way. She’s asked me to take off my jeans for a million different fittings, but I usually remember to put underwear on when she comes by. Perhaps it was destiny that I forgot tonight.
I’m completely naked while she remains completely clothed. It’s the most erotic thing I’ve ever experienced with a woman. There’s a shift in the room. In the universe. A change in our axis. The power she has over me as I stand in front of her naked and vulnerable is a heady, sexy sensation. A strange desire to fall to my knees and worship her overcomes me, but I remain on my feet, slowly stroking my cock for her half-lidded eyes.
“Will you drop to your knees?” she asks, wringing her hands together in front of her.
I look at her like she’s reading my fucking mind. “Will you demand it?” I want to hear the order. I crave it.
