“It sounds worse when you say it like that.”
“Because it is.”
He rubs the back of his neck, and his voice drops a little. “My sponsors are breathing down my neck. The headlines don’t help, the last few events were a mess, and Maggie’s already threatened to drop me if I don’t show them I’m...settled, stable, and not partying with models and punching people.”
“What’s in it for me?” I ask, squeezing my arms tighter around my chest.
His mouth opens, then closes again as if it hadn’t occurred to him that I might need something, too.
Good. I want him fucking stunned.
He swallows once. “I mean... what do you want?”
“Don’t do that,” I snap. “Don’t act like I’m doing you a favor out of the goodness of my heart. And don’t think I didn’t notice the pictures being taken of us.”
The silence stretches between us.
“You’re right,” he says finally, as he stares at the floor.
I sure as fuck am right.
“I’m not asking you to carry this for free,” he says, “I’m offering everything I can.”
“Be specific.”
He steps closer, until there’s no space left between.
The heat rolling off his body wraps around me, and I forget how to breathe. His calloused hand comes up slow, until his palm cups my jaw. His thumb skims the edge of my cheekbone as he tilts my chin up, forcing my gaze to lock with the blaze of his blue eyes.
“You want money? A contract?” He presses in closer, crowding me against the counter, his hand sliding from my jaw to the back of my neck. “We’ll sign one.” His thumb strokes once, slow and possessive, and his gaze pins me in place. “You want to control the narrative? You’ve got it.” He leans in even lower, the edge of a grin ghosting his mouth. “I’ll say we were dating secretly, that I chased you down and fell for you first.”
I raise a brow, and a slow, knowing smirk curves my lips. “And you didn’t?”
He laughs, pulling himself away. “Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to.”
I stare him down, refusing to blink. My gaze drags slowly over his chest, the sweat still slicking his skin, before snapping back to his face with a sharp lift of my brow.
He exhales hard, as his hands scrub down his face before bracing on the counter again. When he finally looks up, his blue eyes lock on mine, stripped bare of all the cocky grins and goofy bravado.
He pushes off the counter, taking slow steps until the heat of him is pressing against me, again. “You can live here, rent-free. Use my kitchen, paint the walls black, and tattoo your art across every goddamn surface. I don’t care.”
His hand comes up, hesitating, then cups my jaw as his thumb is dragging over the edge of my cheekbone. His gaze burns, intense enough to set me on fire.
“I just…” his voice cracks, low and raw, before he steadies it, firmer this time, leaving no room to question. “…I need you.
My breath catches before I can stop it, his hand’s warm and heavy on my jaw, his words still hanging in the air like smoke.
I need you.
No joke, no grin to soften it, just pure, honest truth.
Fuck, it rattles me.
I force a scoff, tilting my chin higher against his grip, refusing to let him see how much the confession cracks me open. “You don’t get to need me, Hayes,” I say, my arms still folded tightly across my chest, even as my skin tingles where his thumb traces my cheekbone. “You’re the quarterback. The golden boy. You don’t need anything.”
A beat passes.
His jaw flexes, and he exhales slowly through his nose, blue eyes steady on mine. He wets his lips, his thumb pressing a little firmer against my skin. “So… what do you want, Amelia?”
