Glancing at my screen, a text alert from Jamie has me tensing. Please don’t tell me he forgot something or is going to prod me again to meet him out.
JAMIE: You are such a bad liar.
What the heck is he talking about? I text him back for clarification.
JAMIE: Either I hallucinated as I was driving away, or one very large tight end was creeping through our backyard and into your bedroom window.
What? Oh, my God! He’s here?
Scrambling off the couch, I nearly drop my phone again. Fumbling it in the air, I’m glad Chris isn’t here to see that I can’t even catch a phone compared to his grace with a ball, but then a deep voice rumbles behind me.
“Remy?”
I let out a squeak. My phone clatters to the floor when I jump at the sight of a shadowed figure in my bedroom. Dropping, I palm my device and pop back up like I got shot out of a Jack-in-the-box.
“Chris! Hey! Hi. Hey there… Um, you’re here.”
“IsPajamiesgone?” His whisper filters through the open doorway.
“Yeah,” I laugh breathlessly, as if I haven’t embarrassed myself enough. Cologne can’t cover up awkwardness.
That nickname he gave Jamie is pretty funny though. My roommate could never be bothered to change out of his pajama pants for the eight o'clock class they had together.
His wide frame steps into the light, his shoulders filling the doorway. Can you swallow your own tongue? It’s really not fair how good he looks. There should be hazard tape wrapped around him.
I’ve always been proud of my self-control. I’m the only person in my family who doesn’t complain about feeling like they’ve overindulged during holiday dinners. Whenever I go shopping, I ask myself if I simplywantan item or if I actuallyneedit when I decide on what to buy. Jamie teases that I’ve never even returned a library book late. I can withstand temptation, except when it comes to Chris Mightener. The man is a walking temptation.
I can tell he shaved for his trip to rookie camp. There’s no trace of the dark scruff that usually frames that square jaw of his. He once told me it helps him look more menacing to his opponents, but I only saw the soft hair that felt incredible, tickling my skin. Right now, however, all cleaned up, he’s even more of a vision than usual. His dark amber eyes finish his scan of the room and land on me. I like when they land on me.
“You did it,” I let out, needing an outlet for my anxious energy.
A smirk ticks up the corner of his mouth, and he lets out a breathless laugh. “Yeah.”
It’s funny the things you realize at the most random moments. I’ve so rarely seen him smile. If I was giddy at the mere sight of him a moment ago, I’m not sure what to call the feeling that the joy in his expression gives me. He has two moods—serious and turned on, and both turn me on, so I’ve never felt deprived by not seeing him smile more.
“How…how were the draft and camp?” I babble, knowing it’s a rare opportunity for us to talk. I can cool my jets. The physical will come later.
Blowing out a breath, he runs his hand down the back of his head over his close-cropped hair. My fingers itch to touch the way it spikes up a little on top, and yet it’s so soft against my fingers.
“It’s been wild. Negotiating the contract, meeting so many other players at camp, orientation—the whole thing. It still feels surreal to have been practicing on an NFL field.”
The way his face lights up slices a pain through my chest. Every word puts more distance between us that I can’t lessen. Many people would probably be satisfied with the fact that a handsome NFL player was standing in their bedroom doorway for a night of illicit desires, but those people haven’t seen his nose buried in a book in the library countless times. They haven’t seen him show up with broken knuckles and cracked ribs or placed kisses on them and then watched him go out and play again only days later. They haven’t heard the special register his voice takes on when he whispers his most unfiltered thoughts into my ear. They don’t know how beautiful his face looks after he comes. And after tonight…I won’t know it anymore either.
“I’m so happy for you,” I whisper against the thickness in my throat. “You’ve worked really hard.”
Straightening up from the doorframe, he takes a step back into my darkened room. Gaze never leaving me, he reaches for the hem of his shirt and peels it slowly over his head. He tosses it to the floor and then brings his hands to the button of his jeans, a coy smile playing on his lips.
“How about a graduation present?”
And like that, Chris Mightener manages to steal all the air out of my house. I swallow, moving with shaky steps around the couch to reunite with that view again. Stepping into my room, I blink at the change in lighting. He kicks off his shoes, glancing at my mattress on the floor.
“My bed frame is packed up in the U-Haul,” I digress absently, drinking in his profile.
I missed all that skin. That thick waist. The meaty globes of his ass. Even his stance—how he looks like a hurricane couldn’t knock him over. I’m only about three inches shorter and have some muscle tone from running at the track, but around him I always feel small…less, until he looks at me.
As his hungry gaze travels down my body, I’m no longer less. I’m everything he wants right now, making me somehow larger than the life force he is to me. His wanting gaze returns to mine, silently saying that my excess of clothing is offensive at the moment.
This is the part I’ve never mastered—feeling sexy. I don’t know how he can look at me like I am, but I’ve lived off that look for two years. Drawing my shirt over my head, my nerves ring like tiny bells throughout my body, exposing my slighter frame.
