by Jessa Kane
I don’t think I regain consciousness until we’re halfway down the hallway.
Our fingers are interlocked and he’s guiding me toward the luxury boxes, located on the same floor. He opens the door of a box owned by a famous beer company, pulling me inside. The space is air conditioned, smelling of expensive leather, lavishly furnished. The arena where people will chant Eric’s name is spread out below, quiet, but impressive. When I was a kid, I thought the arena was a magical place, but as I grew older, it became a synonymous with my lack of power. My lack of control over my own life.
That’s what I’m thinking about when Eric sits down on the leather couch and pulls me into his lap. If my posture is stiff, I blame it on the view. Blame it on the reminder I got in the conference room of how decisions are rarely mine to make.
Why then do I like being manhandled by Eric so much?
Isn’t his authoritative treatment the same as being told what to do?
How can I loathe one and crave the other?
“Greta,” Eric says, threading his fingers into my hair and gently tilting back my head. Holding me just like that, gaze on the ceiling, his breath in my ear. “I don’t want to make you agree to anything against your will. How do I make you mine? How do I make you need to be mine?”
“You can’t.”
He growls against my ear, that thick part of him pulsing between the split of my bottom. “Explain.”
Dare I? Open up to this man like that? In surrendering to him physically (mostly) I’ve already given up so much ground. Telling him what’s in my heart seems like a risk. What if he gains ground there, too?
That said, I can’t help but be grateful that he wants to listen. That he postponed the signing of an eight-figure contract to have this discussion when he probably could have strong-armed me into agreeing to his terms. And so I find myself confessing to this multi-faceted man. This man who defends me in a club, kisses me with violent passion, makes demands, then gentles his tone. I can’t seem to predict him for the life of me. They say the same thing about him on the basketball court. You never know which move the Silent Assassin will make next.
“My parents got divorced when I was eleven.” I swallow, feeling his gaze on the movement of my throat. “I’d barely seen my father growing up. He was always coaching. Always on the road. So when they split, it was only natural that I’d go to live with my mother. But my father was worried about his reputation being hurt. So he…paid her off. He basically purchased me to avoid a custody battle and to make himself seem like a dedicated father.”
I don’t realize my eyes are filling with tears until Eric swipes the moisture away with the warm pads of his thumbs.
“It hurt. Being abandoned like that, just because a man desired it. Since then, I’ve watched money buy men whatever they want, making the women in their lives…commodities to trade. I swore that would never be me again, so I vowed to stay away from athletes. And what happened in the conference room is exactly why. You’re proving me right, Eric.”
“No.” His voice is a harsh scrape of sound. “I only want to make you happy.”
“You want to make yourself happy.”
He throws me down on the leather couch and climbs on top of me, caging me in with his forearms and pressing our foreheads together. “I can do both.”
Don’t rub against him. Don’t do it. “I’ll never be happy in an arrangement I was forced to make.”
His breath pelts my mouth, his thick, athletic body vibrating with intensity on top of mine. For the second time since we’ve left the conference room, I’m pinned, unable to escape, and he seems incapable of not trapping me. It’s like he can’t help it. And the visible display of his infatuation with me is exciting when it shouldn’t be. My legs shouldn’t be eager to wrap around his hips, I shouldn’t be so breathless for another kiss. But I am. I want him to drop his weight completely and rock his hips into the cradle of mine. Want him to call me little girl again.
Once again, he makes a move I wasn’t anticipating.
“I want you to be with me of your own free will, Greta.” He tugs down the strap of my sports bra, exposing my right breast, touching my distended nipple with the very tip of his tongue and shooting a jolt of lust down to my toes. And when he laves it more thoroughly, looking me right in the eye, a moan breaks from my throat. “I won’t force you to be my wife. Not when it’ll hurt you and cause you not to trust me. Jesus, angel. That’s the last thing I want.”
Did I hear him correctly? “Really?”
“Really.” He pulls down the opposite bra strap, stripping the entire garment down to my waist. “I’m asking now, Greta. Not demanding.” He saws his tongue gently over my left nipple, sending wicked tingles to my core, making me restless underneath him on the couch. “I’m asking you to give me a chance. Just a chance.”
I can’t believe it.
He listened to me and…and changed course.
My words mattered to him. They made a difference.
It’s such an unusual occurrence in my life, I’m almost suspicious.
“What does that mean?” He rubs the flat of his tongue over a hard bud and I whimper. “G-give you a chance?”
Eric lifts his head, blue eyes brilliant with hunger. “It means come home with me, tonight, of your own free will. It’s my challenge to keep you there. Make you want to stay forever and be my wife.”
“And you’ll sign the contract regardless?”
He nods once, grudgingly. “I hate leaving this up to chance, but I want your trust too badly. I don’t want you to put me in the same category as the rest of the men in your life. I can’t expect you to believe I’m different if I don’t walk the walk.”
I’m suddenly so turned on, I can barely form a coherent sentence. “It’s, um…hot. It’s so hot that you listened. What…who are you?”
Eric leans down and speaks flush with my mouth. “I’m the man who is going to ride you ragged tonight.” He charts a path down my throat with his tongue, licking across my chest from one peak to the other, capturing the bud and sucking it noisily. “And we’re going to find out why you love being called little girl so much, aren’t we? Never called anyone that in my life. But you…that’s your name. Isn’t it, angel?”
Flushing, I nod, unable to give him anything but the truth when I’m looking him in the eye. “I’m a virgin, Eric.”
The way he pauses, tongue mid-lick of my nipple, hair falling into his eye, might be the sexiest vision available on all of planet earth. “A virgin.” He visibly turns that piece of information over and over in his head. When he speaks again, his voice is threadbare, deeper, resonating in my tummy. “I’m still going to ride you ragged, little girl. No help for it.”
I start to tremble.
Not in fear. No, I’m overcome by his words. What he’s doing to me. The flex of his thighs on mine, the way we’ve begun breathing in tandem, that promissory bulge wedged between my thighs, pulsing, elongating.
“I want to go home with you now,” I whisper, my fingers gathering bunches of the front of his shirt, knees scooting open, inviting him to press deeper. “Eric…”
“You’re horny,” he grates softly in my ear.
My nod is embarrassingly eager.
His groan raises goosebumps everywhere on my flesh. “One fuck and you’re going to be whining for it all the time, aren’t you?” He yanks my knees up around his hips and bears down, giving me one rough thrust and I scream into my closed mouth. “Yeah, I’ll be bringing you on the road with me, won’t I? Banging you before and after games. Halftime if you need it. Going to walk out onto the court smelling like your sweet little pussy and I’m going to love it.”
He’s humping me now. Roughly. Through our pants.
Staring me right in the eye, upper lip curled in a snarl.
And I want it.
I think I’ve had an orgasm before. Once when I was taking a bath, I found a spot between my legs that felt really nice to touch, but…wait, the more he drags that ri
dge up and down the seam of my yoga pants, the more I’m starting to think orgasms don’t merely feel nice. They’re like living things clawing to get free. That’s what I’m experiencing now, this burning grind of my intimate muscles, the lack of oxygen or rational thought. Just sinking my fingers into his juicy athlete’s butt and yanking, yanking him into the juncture of my thighs.
Oh lord, oh lord, what’s coming?
There’s a knock at the door.
“Eric? Greta?”
It’s my father.
If anything, Eric’s hips move faster, his expression turning into a mask of possessiveness. “Not stopping. Can’t stop. Tell him we’ll be right there,” he grunts, shoving my knees higher, folding me in two, body punching and grinding into mine, couch springs complaining loudly beneath us, the sound mingling with our panting breaths. Deep in my sex, there’s a quickening. A glorious inferno of sensation that won’t be held back, scrambling my brain.
And so I’m looking Eric right in the face when I call out, “I-I’m coming, Daddy.”
Something primal flares in Eric’s eyes and he makes a choked sound, his hard body stiffening. Warmth rushes between my legs, his lower body making jerky, stuttered movements. He grinds down roughly, baring his teeth and pushing me over the finish line, which I am quite sure I’ve never been over before now, because my God, I’m whining into his mouth like a baby. He muffles the euphoric sound at the last second, his own throat issuing long, gritty groans that pulsate along my tongue. And there was something, an extra something about looking this man in the eye and saying the word daddy that holds me in thrall, makes me tremble that much harder on the way over the cliff.
We lie there for long moments after the waves of pleasure fade into a glow, his mouth moving possessively but lazily over mine, his hips still pumping slowly, as if the movement is unconscious. Casual ownership that should make me want to slap him again. It doesn’t, though. I’m tripping through a forest of wonder, amazed than another human being can make me forget myself so completely.
I’ll have to be really careful with this man.
Or I might actually break my rules and end up his wife.
The fact that I’m even contemplating such a thing jolts me, inviting Eric’s scrutiny. He opens his mouth to say something when there is another, more insistent knock on the door. “The press is here to get a shot of you signing the contract, Bentley,” comes my father’s voice from the other side. “We need you out here.”
It seems to cause Eric physical pain to roll off me and stand. Immediately, he pulls me to my feet as well, rocking me side to side in the cradle of his arms, his chin resting on top of my head. “Do I get my chance with you, Greta?” he asks, gruffly.
It’s no mystery that I’m as stubborn as they come, but I can’t help but want to give this man what he’s asking for. He took my concerns into account and adapted. He compromised…and I really like that. So I find myself nodding into his chest, letting him fix my clothing and smooth my hair. He brings me into the small bathroom and holds a hand towel soaked in cool water to my neck, kissing me on the forehead. And then he takes my hand and walks with me out of the private box, looking my father right in the eye as we pass, his expression communicating one thing and one thing only.
Mine.
Chapter Five
Eric
Greta arrives at my doorstep late that night. On purpose. That much is clear. She might be bending her own rules, but she’s making it known—loud and clear—that she’s at my home on her own terms. And Jesus Christ, the bratty look she gives me when she steps out of her little pink sports car makes my cock hard.
The goddamn thing has been stiff as a pike since I signed the contract this afternoon and she breathed a sigh of relief. Surprise, too. That I put my signature on the dotted line without forcing her into marriage.
She doesn’t need to know I signed the wrong name.
Coach Welding was so glad to have it done that he didn’t check, either, shoving the documents back into the file and crowing about future championships to the gathered press. Maybe no one will ever need to know about the phony signature. It’s possible that I’ll win Greta entirely on my own and won’t need to point out the contract was never truly signed, but there is no way I would leave something so important to chance. This girl is the breath in my lungs. If her stubborn streak prevents us from being together, I’ll have to show her mine.
When she stops in front of me at the front door, the light, crushed berries scent teasing my nose, I do encounter a flash of regret that I’ve duped her. She believes I’m a better man—and I will be. I will be as soon as I know she’s staying.
Permanently.
“Hi Eric,” she says, haltingly, her nervous tone totally at odds with the haughty set to her chin. This girl is going to be a handful. I knew this the moment I saw her, but I’m reminded now. Not only because she’s got a temper. Not only because she is stubborn as hell, but because she’s got a tender heart lurking beneath her beautiful surface—the kind that could gut a man for all its vulnerabilities. She’s trying to put me on the defensive by showing up late. Trying to act like she’s in charge, but the truth is, she’s feeling exposed. Her fingers are trembling around the handle of her overnight bag and her shoulders are tensed in the vicinity of her ears.
That’s when I notice the textbook sticking out of her bag.
Sports medicine.
“What’s that?” I ask, nodding at it.
She follows my line of sight. “In case you bore me and I need to study.”
My laughter cracks and she smiles slyly, all while I make a mental note to check into private tutoring for the times she’ll be with me on the road. Female tutoring. “Studying, huh?” I take the bag out of her hands, tipping my head toward the open entrance so she’ll precede me. “Never really considered this dilemma.”
“Which dilemma?”
I follow after her into the house, salivating over the twitch of her buns beneath the short, white pleated skirt. God, if I don’t get her beneath me soon, I’m going to blow. “Who disciplines you for a bad grade now, when you haven’t agreed to marry me yet? Me or Rick?”
She sends me a sniff over her smooth shoulder. “I discipline myself just fine, thank you.”
“Is that right?” We stop in the foyer, coming toe to toe, making it necessary for Greta to tip her head back, and I’m momentarily struck speechless by having her here, looking so beautiful in my home. It was just another four walls until she walked in. “How do you do discipline yourself?”
“When I get a bad grade, I force myself to watch basketball.”
Again, my laughter catches me off guard, ricocheting off the white, Spanish-style interior of the house and I close in on Greta, setting down her bag, my hands settling on her hips. Squeezing. Circling around to her butt and gripping it tight on both sides beneath her skirt, kneading the taut flesh, watching her mouth fall open on a gasp. “I’ll make you a bet.”
“I…” Her eyes start to glaze over, but she visibly shakes herself and focuses. “What? What k-kind of bet?”
“I make you enjoy basketball and you wear my jersey at the next game.”
Her snort makes me want to bend the girl over my knee. “Deal.” She shakes her blonde hair back. “Because it’s never going to happen.”
“Never say never, little girl.” I swat one of her buns and she whines a little in her throat, that vulnerability catching hold and lingering, slowly eclipsing her brat act and leaving her with big, obedient eyes and parted lips.
There’s a chance I could have her now. Right this second.
More than a chance.
She’s all but pressing her juicy little ass into my hands, mewling sounds growing louder and louder in her throat, but there are few things I’ve wanted in this life more than to see Greta wear my jersey, so I toss her over my shoulder and head downstairs to the indoor basketball court, already forming a game plan.
Greta sputters, poking me in the back. “I’ve o
nly been inside your house for two minutes and you’ve already manhandled me twice.”
I trail my fingertips side to side in the crease behind her knee. “Should I keep my man hands to myself?”
“I didn’t say that,” she grumbles.
“You can womanhandle me, you know.” I slide my palm up the back of her thigh, massaging as I go. “Any time you like. No objections.”
“Of course I can. You’re a dude. All men want in life is a woman to stoke their egos and their, er…”
I chuckle. Damn, I’m having fun with this girl. I knew she had a good sense of humor and a quick wit, but now that we’re getting more comfortable with each other, she’s getting even better. That doesn’t bode well for me trying to get a handle on my growing obsession. As if I could. “Their what?”
“You know what I mean! That thing that men want stroked.” She pokes me in the back again. “Women don’t like being manhandled quite so much because we don’t have a choice. Men do. You can use your strength against me.”
I frown at the gymnasium doors ahead, considering her words. And I realize she’s right. As badly as I want Greta, if I was the kind of man who didn’t wait for permission, I could still take what I wanted. I’m over a foot taller than her and more than double her strength. “God, Greta. That makes you pretty brave for going anywhere alone with me. Or coming here at all.” I tug her down from my shoulder, gratified when her legs wrap around my waist. “Especially considering I tried to strong arm you into marrying me.”
She doesn’t know the half of it.
Fuck. It hurts to look her in the eye and know I’m not being one hundred percent truthful. I’m going to tell her everything right now. Except, then she plants an innocent, little kiss on my lips and snuggles closer. “Want to know one of my favorite things about you, Eric?”
“Yes,” I say gruffly, pressing my lips to her forehead.
“You listen when I say something. You really think about it.” Her thighs tighten almost imperceptibly around my waist, but my dick takes notice and thickens about two hundred percent. “I really like that.”
