Player (A Secret Baby Sports Romance)(25)

I make a mental note to check in with my credit card company and see exactly what I paid for that fucking thing.

And it should get me furious. I should still feel like I got fucking taken for a ride here. But a little tough when I know the truth of it is that she got taken for as big of a ride as I did.

I smirk to myself. Or DIDN’T get taken for a ride, as we’ve established with the unopened condoms.

The irony here is that for all of the wild, insane, x-rated porn-star shit I’ve pulled with hundreds of girls over the years, this one’s a first. This is something new.

Marriage.

I could almost laugh out loud right there in the car like an insane person.

Hell, I’ve done literally everything else when it comes to women - every damn crazy, acrobatic, or chauvinistic fantasy you can think of? Yeah, done it.

Twice.

But this is a new one, and one that sure as shit wasn’t ever on my bucket list.

I married a girl. Not fake-married, but real, actual, legally-binding married.

And I don’t remember a goddamn thing about it.

There are glimpses, of course, but they’re really just emotions that come swirling back through my head like watercolors more than actual memories.

And on the bright side, at least they’re happy emotions. I can remember feeling like everything was goddamn perfect last night. I can remember feeling like I’d won something bigger than any championship, or Super Bowl ring, or endorsement.

Yeah, cause you were stoned and drunk out of your mind, idiot.

It’s a fair point, but I want to believe - or at least hope that it’s something more than that.

Natalie turns suddenly, totally busting me right as I was checking her out, and she glares at me.

“What?”

I shake my head and turn back to the endless desert highway in front of me. “Nothing.”

“Well, quit staring at me.”

I laugh. “You know what, I’ll stare all I want. First of all, you’re my wife-”

“Fake wife.”

I turn and wink at her. “No, princess.” I grin at her, almost laughing at how scowling and pissed off she is at me, like actually marrying her was my evil plan all along or something.

Please.

I blow her an air kiss. “That piece of paper in my jacket pocket says it’s pretty real, actually.” I grin. “I mean, at least in the opinion of the State of Nevada.”

She groans. “God, you kept it?”

“The wedding license?” I make a face. “Well of course I did, dear. For our scrapbook of course!”

She glares right back at me and I blow her another kiss. “Doing okay over there darling?”

“That’s going to get old real fast, you know.”

I laugh, seeing that pouty little scowl still etched across her face.

“Get used to it, sweet cheeks,” I say with a grin. “Oh, and I like my dinner at seven sharp, just so you know.”

Natalie barks out a laugh. “You’d better be kidding.”

I shrug. “Well, you are my wife, and I guess I’m just an old-fashioned kinda guy.”

“You’re going to be the kind of guy who finds poison in his food if you keep that up.”

I laugh, reaching over to flick on the radio. “There’s my loving bride.”

She rolls her eyes and turns back to the window as I crank up the Creedence Clearwater and stomp on the gas. “Happy honeymoon, princess.”





13





Austin




Natalie keeps that petulant little frown on her face all the way into LA, all the way, in fact, until I start to take the car up into the Hollywood hills to the house I bought three months ago.

She suddenly turns to me. “Jesus, you live here?”

“The hills? Yeah, why?”

“More of a movie-star neighborhood, isn’t it? Don’t you play sports?”

I snort. “Football; I play football.” I shake my head. “You know, now that you’re married to the NFL’s number one quarterback, you should probably start watching some Sports Center or something.”

“Yeah, pass.”

I shrug as I take the car around a corner and accelerate up the hill. “Well, if you did, you’d know that I’m making more than most of the movie stars in this ‘movie-star’ neighborhood right now.”

Natalie rolls her eyes. “I do not want to know.”

“Sure you do. Hell, the contract was all over ESPN anyways.”

She shakes her head. “I really don’t want-“

“Forty million.”

She whirls back to me as I suddenly pull us into the driveway that leads up to my place, her mouth wide open.

“You married pretty good, princess,” I say with a grin as I park the car at the top of the driveway.

Natalie’s halfway to the front door of the place when the ferocious sound of Buckley - my mutt of a lab - comes bellowing through the door. Her hand is on the doorknob when I suddenly lurch out of the car.