Long: A Secret Baby Sports Romance(25)

“Sure,” he said. “That’s fine with me. Can you get to my place by seven every morning?”

“I guess so,” I said, and I already felt exhausted.

He grinned. “We don’t have to do it this way. I just leave at seven thirty every morning for class, and I don’t have another break until right now.”

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll be there. Then we can meet here every day around now?”

“Perfect,” he said. “Let’s start on Wednesday. Want to get some work in right now, too?”

“No, thanks. I’m pretty sure of what you’re going to say.”

He smirked at me, shaking his head. “You keep pretending you don’t want me, but we both know the truth.”

“I’m not so sure about that, Gibson.”

He stepped close to me, and I felt my breath catch in my throat. “I’m sure. I see the way you look at me, like you can barely contain yourself. I’m willing to bet my career that if I put my hands down those tight jeans, I’d find a dripping wet pussy.”

“Not even close,” I said, although I was lying. He was right; he drove me wild every time I saw him.

“Lie all you want,” he said, “but I’m not going to pretend like my cock isn’t fucking hard as hell thinking about your ass in the air, begging to be fucked.”

I shook my head, taking a deep breath. He came closer to me, and our bodies were inches apart, practically pressed together in the shadow of the large statue. I wanted him to kiss me so badly, wanted him to press my back against the concrete as his fingers found my soaking pussy.

I wanted to feel him again. I wanted it so fucking badly.

But just as I felt like he was about to pull me against him, a group of guys came walking around the corner.

Hearing their voices snapped me out of it. I turned away from him, embarrassed, and took a couple steps away.

“I’ll see you bright and early Wednesday,” I said to him.

“Yeah. All right, Avery.”

I quickly walked away.

I had been inches away from throwing myself at him. If those kids hadn’t shown up, I didn’t know what I would have done. I could barely control myself when I was around Gibson, as much as I wanted to. There was just something about his cocky grin, the way he stared at me, the way he spoke to me, like he was constantly about to take whatever he wanted, and what he wanted was my body.

I kept thinking about that night in his truck, the way his cock filled me to the brim, his warm lips against my neck. I’d never felt that incredible before. He had fucked me rough and hard, like he couldn’t get enough of it. That was probably why the condom broke, after all. Gibson couldn’t be contained.

But I was going to need to contain him somehow. I needed to set boundaries if we were going to make this work. It was complicated enough being pregnant with his baby. I didn’t need another level added to our already fraught relationship.

I sighed and headed back toward my apartment. I had lots of planning and charts to make.





11





Gibson





The ball left my hand, another tight spiral. I threw over and over, hitting my targets one after the other, but my head wasn’t really into it.

Coach was going easy on me, letting me get in a little rest day. I couldn’t complain about that. But even if he decided to run me into the dirt, I still wouldn’t be fully present for this practice.

Too much was going on. I kept thinking about what the mafia wanted from me and how much they were willing to pay for it. They wanted me to purposefully play badly, to go into halftime behind. I wasn’t sure I could even pull that off, because I only had control over our offense. If our defense played well, we might still be up at halftime.

I didn’t know what they’d do to me if I couldn’t come through. I’d heard some pretty fucked-up shit about the mafia when I was a kid, mostly from my dad. They cut people’s hands off who couldn’t pay back their debts, or at least that was the sort of shit my dad used to say.

I couldn’t be sure how much of that was bullshit, but the mafia was known for some pretty violent and brutal tactics. They had to do that shit, otherwise people would try to take advantage of them.

I wasn’t fucking around. If I was going to do this, I was going to do it for real. I couldn’t half-ass it, couldn’t go halfway. I was going to do what I could, make sure the offense couldn’t get into a rhythm, and let shit play out.

“Gibson.” I turned my head and saw Reggie staring at me. “The fuck you doing, man?”

I cocked my head. “What?”

“You just threw three miscues in a row. You fucking around or what?”