Day is shifting into night.
I need rest. I know I do. I went hard at practice for my first day fully back at it, and I need to cut myself a break. I should get in the shower and jerk off like a normal person, and instead, I’m sprinting on my treadmill like I’m running away from all of this.
It doesn’t help.
I turn up the music.
A good neighbor would use headphones. I never claimed to be a good neighbor.
I run harder. Faster. Uphill to the highest incline.
I’m sweating. I’m panting.
It doesn’t erase the image of her lips.
Her ass.
The way she went into his arms like they fit together.
I hated it. I shouldn’t hate it when I hateher, but I did. I have no reason to be jealous, but I am.
I am.
Who the fuck is he?
Who is he to her? Who is she to him? Why do I care?
My lungs burn as I fight for breath. This is stupid. If I go too hard, I could easily hurt myself before I ever get back onto the field, and that’s the last thing I want. I can’t let her do this to me. I can’t let her take more from me when she already has access to so much.
I force myself to slow down. I can’t stop thinking about her. I turn the music up to drown her out of my head, but it’s useless.
The song ends, and it’s in the dead air between songs that I hear a loud rapping at my front door.
It’s louder than rapping. It’s pounding. Angry pounding.
I stalk to my door. Let’s be honest here, there are very few options as to who it could be. It’s not going to be my upstairs neighbor since, according to Milton, they’re snowbirds who are currently at their home in Minneapolis. It won’t be my downstairs neighbor since nobody lives in the condo beneath me. That leaves us with exactly one option, and I throw the door open to find her standing there.
Her eyes are a little glassy, as if she’s had a drink or two. Her face is scrubbed clean of makeup, her hair is piled on top of her head, and she’s gorgeous as fuck. She appears to have rolled out of bed to come over here to confront me. She’s wearing shorts so short that they could hardly qualify as shorts and a gray tank top that shows off the hard curve of her nipples beneath the fabric.
Fuck.
I can’t take my eyes off her tits.
“Turn that down!” she screams at me. She’s furious with me, but I don’t miss the heat in her eyes as they flick down my abdomen. I’m not wearing a shirt, only a pair of basketball shorts, and I see the way her eyes flick down to my external obliques that create that V-line by my hips that make women forget their own goddamn name.
“Or what?” I snarl as Korn taunts the two of us with “Coming Undone.”
“Or I’ll call Milton and have him tell you to do it since you clearly have no respect for your neighbors!” She’s still screaming despite that heat in her eyes.
I point to my chest, which is still heaving from the exertion of my workout. “Ihave no respect? What about you and your random guests hanging around outside our two doors? For all I know, he’s a crazed superfan.”
She scoffs. “Right, like he was here to seeyou.”
“Who was he?” I hiss.
“None of your goddamn business.”
“If you’re trying to get inside my head so you can know every last piece of who the fuck I am, then you better think twice about keeping me on the outside.” I can’t help the growl in my voice at the words.
