Player (A Secret Baby Sports Romance)(65)

“Dude,” I turn and grin at him. “You’re seriously going to have to quit playing favorite with my girl, traitor.”

My girl.

I roll my eyes as I drop my head back on the couch.

I think of the little voice in my head that I ignored, that first night at the Chateau Marmont when I saw her. I think of putting my fucking nose where it didn’t belong in the lobby the next day.

I think of that stupid fucking ice cream shop.

The deal.

The napkin.

The fact that I still have it, tucked in a drawer at my desk up in my study.

At this point, I honestly have no idea what the fuck I was thinking. This arrangement of ours hasn’t actually done anything but make both of us crazy. I’m not signing any deals, I’m not different.

Or am I?

I shake my head as I bring up the tumbler and knock back another belt of my drink.

I’m not alone anymore in this giant house - nothing on Buckley of course. And I’m not chasing meaningless tail trying to fill some sort of boredom or emptiness with random women I don’t give a shit about.

And then, there’s the way she looks at me.

“I get that I’d kill to have a girl that looks at me the way she looks at you.”

I swear. Goddamn, how’d she get into my skin like this? This whole thing was a deal - a play, a move, like any other I’d take on a football field after the snap puts the ball in my hands.

And yet there she is, buried deep and fucking. My. Shit. Up.

I kick back the rest of the bourbon, and I’m reaching for the bottle to top off when I stop and wrinkle my brow.

Seriously, where the fuck is she?

I slip my phone out of my pocket, rolling my eyes at what a damn pussy I feel like texting her like this.

Where are you?





I toss the phone onto the couch next to me as I drop some more booze in my glass. It buzzes, the screen lighting up the darkness of the room before I snatch it up.

Out.





I grumble. Yeah no shit.

Out where?





I want her here. I want her home. It’s possessive, and raw, and ridiculously macho, but it’s the only thought going through my head.

Of course, part of it - hell, most of it - is that I want her again - I’m craving her. I want to hear her moans, dripping in my ears. I want to watch her eyes close in bliss as the orgasm crashes over her face.

I want to feel how her body clenches up around me tightly when we explode together.

But it ain’t just sex, and that’s the fucked up part. If this whole thing was just about getting laid, I’d have two cheerleaders over here right fucking now fighting to see who’d get to first ride. Or I’d be at some shitty God-awful club pulling something strange.

Buckley leans over and licks my hand, and I groan.

Because here I am: home, alone with my dog, drinking whiskey.

I am every country song I grew up hearing my mom play on the kitchen radio.

My phone lights up again, and I glance down and frown.

Out having fun, just like you.





Fuck this.

I pick up the phone and call her.

“The fuck does that mean?”

There’s club music blasting somewhere muffled in the background when she answers the phone.

“It means I don’t play games, Austin.”

I clench my jaw. “I’m not.”

“Sure, whatever you say,” she mutters dryly.

The music changes up behind her, bass thumping like a drum into the receiver.

“Where are you?”

“Hey babe!”

My vision goes red at the sound of some fucking guy’s voice there with her.

“Come back and dance, gorgeous!”

I growl out loud, every muscle in my body tightening as the rage comes bubbling up.

“Who the fuck is that.”

Natalie snorts. “Austin, drop the possessive shit, okay?”

“Who is that,” I say again, my voice tense and edged.

“It’s a nice guy I’m going to have a drink with, okay?”

I take a deep breath, trying to calm myself.

“You’re my wife.”

“Austin-” There’s hurt in her voice, something off and something cracked.

“I have to go.”

The line goes dead.

Buckley growls lowly on the couch next to me.

“Exactly,” I mutter, abruptly standing and storming for the front door. I snag the keys to the Land Rover in lieu of the Vanquish this time, since it seems more appropriate as the war chariot it’s basically about to be.

Because fuck this, I’m going to go find my wife.

This is war.





33





Natalie




The club guy I’m only half-heartedly dancing with is every club guy - a cookie cutter version of every obnoxious, trying-to-hard guy with “vintage” clothes and an ironic haircut.

I mean the man is wearing sunglasses.

He’s basically the literal opposite of Austin, and I wasn’t about to actually have a drink with him, I just said it to get under Austin’s skin. But now here I am, reaping my karma and pushing condensation around my untouched glass of wine with the king hipster of the club.