“I’ll be right over there.” I hitched my thumb over my shoulder to gesture toward the coffee shop on the far side of the lobby. I was exhausted from staying up all night, and I coulddefinitely use a shot—or three—of espresso. “Come find me when you’re done.”
“Thanks. I—” Sebastian blew out a breath and placed his hand on my shoulder, giving it a quick squeeze. “I mean it. Thanks for waiting.”
I nodded, and his eyes flicked over my face again. I held Sebastian’s gaze until he shook his head slightly, the beginnings of a smile forming on his lips as he turned away.
Like a love-sick fool, I watched until he disappeared around a corner.
Twenty minutes later, my coffee cup was empty, and my knee bounced restlessly beneath the table as I scrolled through my social media profiles, dropping hearts on all the posts from my teammates, including one from Bell, wishing his husband, retired NHL forward Ethan Harrison, a happy birthday and calling him an old man.
I smiled at the pictures of them together over the years while also feeling a pinch of something unpleasant behind my sternum. In college, my feed had been full of pictures of Sebastian and me, but once it became clear he’d ghosted me, I’d deleted every single one.
I’d tried to take a selfie of us curled up in bed together this morning, the sheets rumpled around our waists, but he’d wrestled my phone out of my hand and tossed it on the floor, just out of reach. Before I could promise to keep the picture private, he short-circuited my brain by sliding down between my legs and taking my cock to the back of his throat.
I might not have that selfie, but I’d be able to live on the memory of that orgasm for a good long while.
A kid, maybe sixteen, approached my table with the nervous energy of someone working up his courage. “Excuse me, are you Taylor Morrison? From the Maine Marauders?”
My eyebrows shot up. Someone recognized me? Here? In Las Vegas?
“Holy fuck, really?” I couldn’t stop grinning. “Sorry for the f-bomb. Umm … yeah, that’s me. You actually know who I am?”
He laughed, and his face lit up. “Dude, that goal you scored against the Storm last season was insane.”
“Right? I still can’t believe that went in—and top shelf, too.” I shook my head, still in disbelief a year later. “Pure luck, but I’ll take it.”
Guys in my position didn’t get many moments like that. That goal might be the highlight of my entire fucking career. This kid recalling it months later? That meant the world to me.
He pulled out his phone. “Could I get a selfie?”
“Are you kidding? Absolutely!” I grinned like an idiot, jumping up to stand beside him, my arm wrapped around his shoulder.
He thanked me, and I gave him a fist bump, dropping back into my chair and buzzing with the unexpected high of being recognized. Maybe I wasn’t as much of a nobody as I thought.
I hoped Sebastian had seen.
I looked around, trying to spot him, when my phone buzzed, skittering across the table top.
Carl
Client’s asking when you’re going to post photos from last night.
Right. The reason I was in Vegas in the first place.
Pulling up a photo of me throwing back a shot of tequila and another of Kwame and me seated in the VIP section of the club, our table littered with branded bottles, I posted something uninspired about how excited I was to be invited and how goodit was to hang with my boy, the caption playing up the jock persona Carl expected me to maintain.
Sometimes I wondered who was working for whom. Carl was supposed to help me build the career—and my life afterward—that I wanted, not forcing me into a box that made me constantly question my own self-worth while he cashed my checks. Maybe it was time to find representation that understood the direction I wanted to go—assuming I could even figure out what that was.
With a sigh, I set my phone face down on the table while I waited for Sebastian to wrap up his call. There wasn’t anything I could do about my agent right at this moment, so for now, I pushed it out of my mind.
“You’re scowling,” Sebastian’s deep voice whispered against my ear a few moments later.
The fluttering of his breath right where the bastard knew I was incredibly sensitive sent a very inconvenient message to my groin.
Down boy.
His hand coasted across my shoulder as he moved around me, sinking into the chair to my immediate left, his eyes twinkling in amusement over what he damn well knew he’d just done to me. “I’d say sorry, but we both know I’m not.”
My cheeks heated, embarrassed over how easily this man could play me.
