She worked through the media obligations as fast as she could, giving answers that were professional and brief and completely distracted by the knowledge that somewhere in this building, Mara was finishing her coaching duties and preparing to debrief with the staff. A reporter from ESPN asked about the transition from field hockey, and Lex gave her standard answer about transferable skills and coaching, but what she was thinking about was Mara's hands on a whiteboard drawing up the play that had produced the second goal. A local anchor asked about growing up in Boston, and Lex smiled and talked about childhood memories of this arena, but what she was remembering was Mara's face in the hotel room this morning, sleepy and bare and looking at her with blue eyes that held nothing back.
Lex was still in her gear, her jersey damp with sweat, her hair plastered to her face, her body buzzing with the twin highs of competition and anticipation. The smell of the rink clung to her skin, cold air and rubber and the salt of her own exertion. She excused herself from the last cluster of reporters and walked through the arena corridors, away from the media room, awayfrom the locker room, toward the unused team facilities in the far wing of the building. Her cleats echoed on the concrete floor. The corridors grew darker, the overhead lights spaced further apart, the sounds of the post-game celebration fading behind her until the only thing she could hear was her own pulse.
She found an empty locker room three corridors deep. Visitor's equipment room, unlocked, lights off, the smell of old rubber and disinfectant. She pulled out her phone and texted Mara.Equipment room C. Third corridor past the media room. Come now.
Three minutes passed. Four. Lex leaned against the lockers and listened to the building shift around her. The ice plant hummed through the walls. A pipe clanked somewhere overhead, loud and hollow. Her body was cooling from the game, the sweat turning cold on her skin, but the heat beneath her ribs had nothing to do with hockey. She checked her phone. No reply. Five minutes now.
Then footsteps in the corridor, quick and purposeful, and the door opened and Mara slipped inside and the door closed behind her and the dark room contracted to the space between their bodies.
"What are you doing?" Mara's voice was breathless. She was still in her coaching gear, jacket zipped, ID badge around her neck, hair in its game-day ponytail. She looked professional and composed and her eyes were burning.
Lex didn't answer with words. She stepped forward, took Mara's face in both hands, and kissed her. The kiss was hard and hungry and tasted like cold air and salt, sharp and clean, and Mara's hands found Lex's jersey and gripped, and her body arched forward, and the professional composure evaporated like ice on a hot blade.
"You were incredible tonight," Mara gasped between kisses. "The second goal. The transition read. I've never seen anyone play like that."
"I was playing for you." Lex pushed Mara backward until her shoulders hit the row of empty lockers, the metal rattling under the impact. She pressed her body against Mara's. She'd stripped her gear in the visitors' stall after the media scrum — jersey, pads, shin guards, all of it dumped in a pile — and was down to a sports bra and compression shorts, her skin still damp from a quick rinse, her body radiating heat from three periods of hockey. The contrast of Lex's bare, flushed skin against Mara's fully clothed coaching gear was intoxicating. Lex smelled like soap and the sharp salt of exertion, her system still running hot with adrenaline, and Mara's hands found the bare skin of her waist and gripped.
Lex's hand went to Mara's waistband. She unzipped Mara's pants with the efficiency of someone who'd been thinking about this for three periods and sixty minutes of elite hockey, and her fingers slid inside and found Mara wet and hot and ready.
"You've been thinking about this during the game," Lex said against her mouth.
"I've been thinking about this since you scored the first goal and looked at me."
Lex groaned and pressed her fingers deeper. Mara's head fell back against the locker with a dull clang, her mouth open, her eyes closed, her hips rocking against Lex's hand. The locker room was dark except for the emergency strip lighting along the baseboards, casting everything in a dim red glow that turned their bodies into shadows and their sounds into reverberations off metal.
Lex worked her fast and hard, her fingers curling inside Mara with the confident rhythm she'd learned, knowing exactly where to press, exactly how much pressure, exactly the pace thatturned Mara's breathing into gasps and her gasps into moans and her moans into the broken, desperate sounds that Lex lived for. Her other hand was braced against the locker beside Mara's head, her body pinning Mara to the metal, her mouth kissing and biting Mara's neck above the collar of her coaching jacket.
"You can come when I tell you," Lex whispered against her ear. "Not before."
Mara whimpered. Her hands were gripping Lex's jersey so hard the fabric was straining at the seams. Her body was taut, every muscle locked, her hips moving in tight, desperate circles against Lex's hand.
“Please,” she gasped.
“Not yet,” Lex said. “Wait” Lex fucked Mara with steady thrusts, knowing she was holding on to the edge and the thought of it thrilled her.
"Now. Come for me now,” Lex growled.
Mara came with a muffled cry, her face buried in the shoulder pad of Lex's jersey, her body convulsing against the lockers, the metal rattling with each spasm. Lex held her through it, fingers slowing, easing her down, and pressed her lips against Mara's temple.
"That's it," Lex murmured, and felt Mara shudder, an aftershock that rippled through her entire body.
Mara was still trembling when she opened her eyes. They were glazed and dark and looking at Lex with an expression that was wild and wanting and free of every wall she'd ever built. Without a word, she put her hands on Lex's shoulders and pressed downward.
“Please… I want..” Mara’s voice was raw but Lex knew what she wanted.
Lex's knees hit the concrete floor. The impact barely registered. She was on the ground looking up at Mara, who was leaning back against the lockers with her pants unzipped andher chest heaving and her blue eyes burning down at Lex with an authority that was different from anything Lex had seen from her before. Not the coaching authority. Not the professional composure. Rawer. Authority that belonged to the woman underneath the coach, the woman who had been learning what she wanted and was starting to ask for it.
Lex pulled Mara's pants and underwear down to her thighs and put her mouth on her and Mara's hand came down to grip her hair, hard, and the sound Mara made was a prayer and a command rolled into one.
Lex made Mara come again with her mouth, fast and fierce, Mara's hand fisted in her hair and Mara's body shaking against the lockers. Then Mara pulled her up and pushed Lex back against the opposite row of lockers and dropped to her own knees and looked up at Lex with those blue eyes and said, "Now you."
“I’m sweaty as all hell, Mara,” Lex said. Not that she didn’t want Mara’s mouth desperately, she did.
“I don’t care,” Mara said, “ I need to taste you.” Her voice was desperate as she rolled down Lex’s shorts and briefs.
Lex's breath left her body. She braced her hands against the locker tops and looked down at Mara on her knees and the sight alone nearly finished her. Mara's mouth was warm and eager and what she lacked in recent experience she compensated for with a hunger and intensity of focus that was pure Mara Ellison, the woman who did nothing halfway, who gave everything she had to every task she undertook. Her tongue found the rhythm Lex needed within seconds, and Lex's hand gripped the locker top until her fingers went numb, as she ground her pussy into Mara’s mouth and she came with a raw, bitten-off groan that echoed off the concrete walls.
They were still catching their breath, still tangled against the lockers in the dim red emergency light, when the door opened.
