Hard Knox

by Amber Malloy

  Remy bit her lip and lowered her eyelids to peer up at him. She was going for seductive, maybe, or she might just look like a drunken mess. Either way, she wondered if he would fall for this little act.

  Knox had seen her tipsy but never drunk. Obviously, he wanted to capitalize on this current mood and get her to spill her innermost thoughts. Sinking down to her knees, she grabbed the sides of his sweats and pulled them with her.

  “What are you doing, Heartbreaker?” he asked with a husky tone. She didn’t bother to reply. Instead, she kissed the tip of his cock that sprang free. Pre-cum coated her lips before she opened her mouth and took in his large rod.

  “Shit!” Choking his length in her fist, she bobbed up and down on his cock before she pulled him out. With a smacking pop, she licked the underside. “Play with yourself,” he demanded.

  Remy rolled her eyes toward his to see if he was kidding. The dreamy glaze of bliss written across his face told her that he was serious. Before she sucked him back into her mouth to throat-fuck his cock, she leaned back on her heels. Spreading her legs wider, she slipped her finger into her folds.

  “Mm-m,” he moaned. “Come here. Let me slide into that pussy.”

  “Nuh-uh,” she mumbled over his shaft. Passionately sucking him faster and faster, she twirled her tongue around his tip and squeezed his length in the palm of her hand.

  “Oh shit, baby.” He grabbed the back of her head and fucked her mouth.

  “Remy, I’m about to—” She choked his rod harder in her hand. “Argh!” He coated the back of her throat. “Fu-u-uck.” As she allowed the rest of his seed to dribble onto her chest, Knox huffed out a breath.

  Wiping her mouth with her hand, Remy stood. “That was awesome, honey.” He gathered her into a close embrace. “And I can’t wait to remind you tomorrow that you sucked my dick like a fucking porn star, but you didn’t say… Are you going to Canada or not?”

  Chapter Twenty

  The dog days of summer in Chicago were humid as well as suffocating. Of course, her hangover didn’t help. She was barely coherent when Knox dragged her to the clinic. For a subpar medical facility, it wasn’t that bad. Remy had seen worse. Unfortunately, all clinics sported that gray film of despair.

  “Want to grab a bite before we go to Jake’s?” Knox played with the pump on the blood pressure machine.

  “Nope.” Beyond nauseated, she couldn’t think twice about eating. She had woken up with a head full of twist braids accompanied by one hell of a headache. How the hell do I keep getting different hairstyles?

  The only reason she wasn’t still in bed was because Knox had blackmailed her into a follow-up visit to the clinic that had checked her out when she had arrived in the States. It was a completely useless endeavor, as far as she was concerned. Bruised ribs were the least of her problems. Positive that she had caught sight of the man in black on their way there, Remy worried about what he would try next. Since there were too many people around for him to get away with anything, he probably just wanted to keep her off balance with his presence.

  “I’ve got to say that I’ve never seen you this jacked up before.” Knox chuckled. “I thought these girls’ nights would be this obnoxious pain in my ass, but I got the best surprise when you got home.”

  “Huh?” She plopped her sunglasses on her head to scowl at him. “What the hell are you babbling about?”

  Knox stopped toying with the machine to cross over to the exam table. Placing his forehead on of hers, he rubbed their noses together. “You gave me the best blow job of my life, Heartbreaker.” Slowly and sweetly, he kissed her on the lips.

  “No-o-o.” Remy felt her jaw and twisted it around. She had wondered why it had felt crazy sore this morning.

  “After literally ripping my spirit from my body…” Sitting up, he dramatically put his fist to his mouth and pretended to cry.

  “Knox, I swear,” she threatened him through gritted teeth. The urge to hit him rolled through her body.

  “Then the most wonderful, beautiful thing happened… You swallowed.”

  “What the hell?” she squeaked. “And you didn’t stop me!”

  “Why would I?” As he erupted into a deep belly laugh, she punched him on the arm. “Tell me, baby. Was this legit the first time you’ve been drunk? I mean, I truly scored big last night.”

  “Shut up, Knox.” Before she could hit him again, someone tapped on the door.

  As the doctor entered the room, Knox piped down to annoying giggles.

  “Good news…” the doctor said, “your ribs look great.” The tiny woman held Remy’s X-rays in her hand.

  “Hey, Doc, how long after she takes out her IUD will it take for us to become preggers?” Knox asked in a half-joking, not-joking way.

  “Us?” Remy snorted.

  “I’m pretty sure you need me,” he shot back.

  “Somewhere around six months to a year. Uh, let me see…” She glanced through the files in her hand. “It looks like you had a miscarriage, so you might want to get the IUD taken out sooner rather than later. That way you can tackle any fertility issues that can arise while you’re still young.”

  The room immediately filled with suffocating tension, and the doctor glanced between the two of them. “I’m sorry, did I—?”

  Remy hopped off the exam table and plastered on a tight smile. During her last visit, she must have mentioned the miscarriage on the medical checklist. “Uh, thanks. Do I need to come back for anything else?”

  “No, no, you’re one hundred percent. Try not to be late for any more flights, okay?” The doctor opened the door. Remy tried to follow her out of the room, but Knox reached around her and closed the door before she could walk out.

  “What the absolute fuck?”

  * * * *

  Ripe anger poured off Knox in waves, which was almost worse than the hideous August heat. Almost. The telltale signs that his level of pissed-offness had spiked way past red on the angry meter were his clenched jaw and bulging forehead vein.

  In an attempt to keep up with him, Remy doubled her steps.

  “Gavin!” She’d wanted to wait until they left the clinic to talk. However, she didn’t mean until next week. She hated the silent treatment. I fucking loathe it, actually. “Dammit, Knox.” Running around to the front of him, she forced the giant off the busy sidewalk. Her five-foot-nine-inch frame compared against his gigantic six-foot-six-inch stature must have been laughable to anyone who saw them.

  Totally avoiding eye contact, he rolled his baby blues skyward. He couldn’t even look at her. “It was a couple of weeks after we were married. I mean, I was already pregnant because we were banging like…” She couldn’t even get a complete thought out. “Shit.”

  “When you got beat up, right?”

  Clearing her throat, she pushed on. “We thought it was better to tell you later.”

  “We? My parents know?” He finally looked down at her.

  “Yeah. I needed their help with the insurance because Canada has that good stuff.” She tried to joke, but his creased forehead told her he wasn’t in the mood. As the muscle in his jaw worked back in forth, his whole face drew tense. Remy cleared her throat and pushed on. “Everyone agreed that we shouldn’t affect your draft year—”

  “Fuck!” He grabbed the sides of his head. A couple of people stopped to witness their favorite quarterback’s meltdown. Holding her position, Remy trapped him against a brick building. A tiny bunny manhandling a lion probably seemed weird, but she didn’t care.

  Knox had every right to be mad. Purely worn out, she dropped her head onto his bicep. “Trauma to my uterus caused it, but I should still be able to carry a baby to term.”

  His muscles tensed underneath her head. Remy could hear his heart beating wildly in his chest. He finally wrapped his arms around her. “Senior year, right?”

  “Yeah.” They stayed locked in an embrace for some time. The wave of rush hour traffic changed from a trickle to a full-on tsunami of people.

/>   “How many kids can you see us having?”

  Having avoiding the topic with him in the past, she had never put much thought into it. She raised her head to read his expression. Knox had always believed the congressman would eventually give up, but Remy knew better.

  “To tell you the truth, I’ve never really thought about it. Maybe two.”

  “Cool. We’ll shoot for four. That way I’ll be sure to get three.” As if that were the end of the discussion, he kissed her on the head.

  “Uh, how does that work?” She tried to pull away from him, but he held tightly to her.

  “Easy… You have to make it up to me.”

  “Not with a whole damn kid, Knox—or two, with your weird-ass logic.”

  “Hmm-m-m.” He finally loosened his hold on her. “It seems fitting.” He held his out hand. “So, are you ready to go? We don’t have to stay at Jake’s long.”

  Remy opened her mouth to dispute the fact that he couldn’t negotiate humans that came out of her vagina, but she decided to let it go for the time being.

  “Uh, yeah.” She intertwined her fingers with his. “Let’s eat something greasy to knock out this hangover.” They maneuvered their way back into the busy Chicago foot traffic.

  “Usually drinking gets rid of it.” He winked at her.

  “The major head you got last night should hold you for a while.”

  “Said no dude ever,” he replied sarcastically. “Besides, who knew you had porn star skills like that? I just want to try them out again to make sure that wasn’t a one off.”

  “Seriously, Knox, shut it.” Too tired to hold her throbbing head up straight, she leaned against his arm. “And never—and I mean never—bring this up again.”

  * * * *

  Murphy’s Pub had a line around the corner. Since Jake’s grand opening, plenty of tourists stopped by in hopes of spotting professional football players. Since the place was packed to the gills, the team went upstairs to the VIP area. Sleek booths were set up for more room against the wall. Since the team had demanded privacy, security had roped off the balcony area.

  Loud beats battled with the voices of the customers. Remy dearly wanted to go home, but she had to wait for the cake. All the wives were supposed to sing happy birthday to one of the players, but she was too hungover to remember which one.

  “Thanks to you, I got another shoot,” Lashonda screamed over the music.

  “That was all you, sis.”

  “If you hadn’t gotten me the job, I wouldn’t have been able to prove myself.” Lashonda gestured with her drink in Knox’s direction. “So, um, are you two okay?”

  His teammates laughed and chatted all around him. Knox sat on the fancy leather bleachers, not bothering to engage in conversation with anyone.

  “He didn’t get much sleep last night—and now with the new season…” Remy lied.

  “Sure,” Lashonda said, before taking a sip from her drink. “And don’t forget that shit going on with you two.” The banging beauty whipped out her phone in perfect Perry Mason Exhibit A dramatics and scrolled through a gossip blog. It showed the fight they’d had outside less than twenty minutes ago. “I would say by that ‘tiny girl blocking big football player’ move, which I am a pro at”—Lashonda patted herself on the back—“you done fucked up.”

  Quarterback Fights with Estranged Wife in Public. Is Divorce Imminent?

  Remy shook her head. “Where was this dude hiding, the gutter?” Blow-by-blow pictures of their fight had been recorded for public consumption. The blog speculated what the problem could be, since she had appeared only months ago.

  “Yeah, you would be surprised at the stuff those toads get of me and Dre,” Lashonda admitted. “And at strip clubs, no less. Freakin’ soul suckers… Isn’t anything sacred?”

  “Don’t worry about us.” Remy handed her phone back. “We’re good. But if we could speed the festivities up, ‘really good’ could happen a lot sooner.”

  “On it.” While Lashonda took off toward the kitchen, Remy made her way to Knox, who sat with a far-off gaze. He continued to nurse the same beer he’d received when they’d walked into the pub. She knew he wasn’t still mad at her—he had always gotten over stuff fairly quickly—but a melancholy edginess emanated from him.

  “Hey,” she said.

  The corners of his lips turned up into a warm smile. As the hard expression he wore softened the tense muscles in his face, the spicy leather scent of Gavin Knox filled her. He brought her lips to his, kissing her with a long and punishing neediness she had never seen before. Remy put her arms around his neck and melted into his touch.

  “I love you,” he whispered in her ear once she’d pulled away. “And I should say it more, like every day, but I’m just afraid that—”

  “I’ll get spoiled.” She laughed. Often, she would hear him utter those words after sex, during that weightless moment where she teetered on the edge of hard sleep.

  “That you’re not real,” he continued to whisper in a husky, sensual tone. “And that you’ll somehow slip through my fingers.”

  Studying his face, Remy wondered where the hell all of this had come from.

  “Remy,” Lashonda called her, “the cake is ready.”

  Knox raised his eyebrow. “Home after this?”

  “Hell yeah.” She pecked him on the lips one last time before she faced the wives to join them.

  “Hey,” she asked Allison, “is there a private bathroom up here?” Afraid her period had started a little late, she didn’t need the paparazzi to get another embarrassing shot of her on the way home. Allison pointed to the side door. “Thanks,” she muttered. Remy veered away from the group and pushed the long door handle. If she hurried, she could slip back into the crowd near the end of the song.

  The door shut behind her. Seconds too late she realized that the stairwell led to the exit. That idiot Allison had lied. Locked out, she tried to knock, but no one could hear her over the thundering sound of music in the bar. Giving up, Remy went down the narrow stairwell that led out of the building, but thankfully someone opened the door behind her. A stream of music and laughter flowed toward her.

  “Thank goodness, I thought—” Her words died in her throat.

  “Hey, baby girl. I’ve been waiting a long time to finish what I started.” The man in black practically flew down the stairs at her.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The hypnotic beat of the music annoyed him to no end. From the moment they’d walked in the pub, Knox hadn’t wanted to be there.

  “Hey, man”—Andre passed him a bottle of beer—“you look like you could use something stronger.”

  Knox accepted his second beer of the night and sucked down the nutty, bitter taste. It was some craft crap, which Jake had named after one of the Maverick players. Each player had a special beer to honor them.

  “Taste like shit, doesn’t it?” Andre asked with a wicked grin.

  He wanted a normal-tasting brew but didn’t hold out much hope of getting one at this particular pub. “Yep, whose is it?”

  Andre chuckled then tilted his head in the direction of their relief quarterback. “This beer should be labeled weak as fuck, like that fool’s arm.”

  Knox nodded in agreement.

  “Okay, what the hell is wrong with you? That was funny,” Dre asked.

  “Nothing. Tired, I guess.” The wives came out with a ginormous cake covered in sparkler candles. He scanned the group for Remy but didn’t see his wife. “Shonda?” Knox threw his hands up.

  “Just saw her a second ago.”

  “The side door,” Allison offered a little too gleefully for his taste. “She thought it was the bathroom.”

  “Why didn’t you stop her?” Lashonda barked. “You know it locks once you leave.”

  Panicked into action, Knox jumped from the bench.

  “I’m not her keeper.” Allison cackled. “So, she’ll have to get in line with the posers. It’s not a big deal.”

  “Hey,” Mo
och asked, most likely reacting off his frantic expression, “you want me to help look for her?”

  “Check out front.” Knox hurried to the side door at the far end of the room. Jake warned them that if anyone left that way, they would have to go around to the front of the pub.

  Knox flung open the door and was instantly dipped into complete darkness. A keyhole of light from the bottom of the stairs showed a flurry of shadows.

  Without his mind truly comprehending anything, he charged. Holding her own, Remy fought, but slipped back a step. The man grabbed her wrist and shoved something into her side.

  She gasped, a harsh sound that echoed into Knox’s head, vibrating over and over again.

  Before the sick fuck could use the knife a second time, Knox body slammed him into the wall. He felt a sharp sensation of pain—a slice into his arm—but it wasn’t enough to stop him. Smashing the man over and over again, a whimper from Remy snapped him out of his rage.

  The minute he took his eye off the goon, the man fled out of the side door.

  “Don’t,” she murmured.

  “I’m just trying to help,” Mooch reassured her. He tried to reach for her again. “I need to stop the bleeding.”

  Jagged pieces of everything Knox had told him over the last few weeks had apparently gelled together into the perfect picture.

  As Knox pulled his shirt over his head, he knelt next to his wife. Remy’s beautifully brown eyes went languid. “Go get your car,” he told his teammate calmly.

  “She needs an ambulance!” Mooch screamed, damn near hysterical.

  Knox pressed his shirt to her side. “Get your fucking car, now!”

  For weeks she had slipped him a little information here and there with off-the-cuff conversation that had made no sense. Research for a story, he’d thought at the random non-sequesters she would lay down, but no, Remy had prepped him subliminally.