I'd worn a groove in the carpet by the time the door opened.
I’d spent two hours pacing, watching the medal ceremony on mute while my whole body buzzed with energy that had nowhere to go. The burger Natalia told me to order sat cold on the desk because I couldn't eat, couldn't sit still, couldn't do anything but wait.
The door beeped. The handle turned.
Joel walked in still wearing the costume, black and sweat-damp, stuck to every line of him. The gold medal hung against his chest. His hair had come loose, dark strands plastered to his temples, his forehead, the back of his neck.
He smelled like work. Like hours under arena lights. Like a body I wanted to get my mouth on.
The door clicked shut. He dropped his bag and looked at me, and everything he wasn't saying was right there on his face.
Then he crossed the room in three strides and shoved me against the wall.
The impact knocked the wind out of me. His hand closed around my jaw, forcing my head back, his thigh shoving between my legs hard enough that I groaned before I could stop myself.
"Finally," he said, low and wrecked, and licked up the side of my throat.
I grabbed his shoulders. His thigh ground up, and I was hard, had been half-hard since he walked through the door.
“Why are you here, Red?” he murmured against my throat.
“Your manager gave me a room key.”
“Not that. In LA. Why didn’t you fly back with your team?”
My eyes fluttered closed as he kissed my throat. “You know why.” His grip on my jaw tightened, and I swallowed against it. "You kept me waiting two hours while you did press."
His mouth curved, and he leaned in, lips brushing my ear. "You want an apology?"
"I want you to act like it matters that I stayed."
He pulled back just enough to look at me. The amusement in his expression made me want to shove him off and drop to my knees in equal measure.
"You came to me," he said. "You sat in my arena and watched me win and then you came up here and waited. That's what you wanted to do." His thigh pressed harder. "Wasn't it?"
My jaw locked. He was right, and that was the worst part.
"It matters." He said it against my throat, already moving on, his mouth working down toward my collarbone. "You're here. I noticed."
That wasn't the same thing. But his teeth scraped my skin and my hips bucked forward before I could stop them, grinding on his thigh like I had no pride left.
Then I remembered Salt Lake. The bite mark. The fight.
"Wait." I grabbed his hair and pulled his head back. "Not where they can see."
His mouth was wet, his face flushed. He just nodded once.
"Where, then?"
"Anywhere else. Chest. Thighs. Anywhere under the pads."
He leaned in and pressed his mouth to my collarbone, right above the neckline of my shirt. "Here?"
"Lower."
He bit down hard through my shirt, right over my left pec, and my whole body jerked. The pain bloomed, mixing with the pressure of his thigh between my legs until I couldn't separate them.
He kissed me like he was trying to take something, tongue in my mouth, hand fisted in my shirt, the medal cold and sharp between us. I yanked at his hair and he growled against my teeth. I was leaking already, soaking through my boxers, and I hated how easy I was for him.
