Me: LOL. Fuck.
Winnie: I like this expression better.
Me: Oh, yeah? What's it called?
Winnie: Genuinely happy.
She had no idea how right she was.
Me: You just like it because it makes you feel powerful.
Winnie: Making you smile in public? Yeah, you're right. I do feel powerful.
I had to see her.
Me: Training room. Now.
Maybe everything was going to be okay. Maybe I wasn't the only one thinking this was more than some repeated, emotionless fuck.
"Gentlemen," I said with a nod, stepping away and heading straight for the tunnel that led to the inner workings of the stadium. I hoped she'd follow from wherever she was, because I had no plans to pause to look or find out.
I walked straight to the end of the hall and around the corner and into the training room, turning my back to a table and leaning into it to wait for her arrival.
We were finally going to have an honest talk.
But with the way I was feeling, I had to be honest. It was probably going to be right after we had an even more sincere fuck.
A breeze blew in just as she did, a frantic kind of worry in her eyes. I didn't know if she was worried she'd stepped over some boundary or what, but I hoped it was anything but that. Winnie wasn't the type of woman to worry what anyone thought, let alone some stupid fuck of a guy, and the thought that maybe I was turning her into that kind of person, bled a small amount of doubt into my abdomen.
"Is everything all right?" she asked. But the way she asked it, comforting like a bandage to a bleeding wound, actually made it so it was.
She wasn't worried she was stepping over some boundary. For maybe the first time since I was a kid, someone was worried about me. It was confounding. Eye-opening. Goddamn beautiful.
Unable to wait any longer, I moved toward her swiftly, backing her wide-eyed wonder straight into the door until it closed, and locking it with a hand between her hip and her arm.
I moved my hands up to cup her jaw, ran the pad of my thumb along her soft bottom lip until it caught, and rubbed the tip of my nose along the side of hers. Everything inside of me came alive as a shiver tore through her body and vibrated into mine.
"It's never been better," I told her and myself.
It had never been fucking better.
The sex, the company, the way I felt.
Her eyes eased closed, the flutter of her eyelashes just kissing the apple of my cheek as I stood there and breathed her in. She didn't just smell like peaches and coconut anymore-now she smelled like mine.
"Take your panties off, Winnie," I whispered, and her hips flexed softly into mine.
She shook her head just slightly, and I nipped at her throat.
"Take them off, baby," I coaxed again, moving one hand down to rub a soft circle into the front of her hip.
She kissed her way to my ear, slowly, tenderly, tugging at the lobe there, and ended the trail with a whisper. "I can't."
Sensation skated from her breath on my neck to the rapidly beating heart. Pounding and pumping, it nearly jumped out of my chest.
I moved back just enough to meet her eyes, hard dick throbbing restlessly against my abdomen, and asked roughly, "You're not wearing any?"
She shrugged then, a cute mix of helpless damsel and flirty minx. "Laundry day."
Both my laughter and my tongue flirted with her throat as I lost all control, reached down, found the hem of her sensible skirt, and yanked it up to the very tops of her hips. I skimmed my hands along the perfect skin of her ass and down, lifting up when I met the place where ass met thigh and forcing her smaller hips to meet mine.
She didn't need an invitation, reaching down between us and taking charge all on her own. The buckle of my belt and the top of my pants were undone so quickly, I barely had to pause before I was inside of her.
"Wes," she whispered, and with her voice so rough and vulnerable all at once, I pushed more, trying to get deeper.
My lips to hers, I nibbled and sucked and licked my way around them until the only place unexplored was inside. Parting her lips with the tip of my tongue, I started to move, in and out with my hips and my tongue, making love to her mouth and pussy at once and getting equally lost in both.
Her breath hitched with every inward stroke, and the way she clung to my shoulders, the very edges of each nail carving their way into my skin and my soul at once, had me working not to come before she did.
I didn't need to think anymore, didn't need the dominance or the play on control between us. All I needed was more, deeper, further inside the woman who was burrowing her way inside me more and more each day.
She wasn't even trying, pulling away just as much as she pushed inside, trying to keep herself and her family safe from the unrequited love of a needy but unavailable man.
But it was that strength, that resilience and complete grasp on her own self-worth that drew me to her with an unfrayable, unbreakable rope.
"Yes, Wes," she breathed, and-thank God-I knew she was getting close.
I pushed our torsos closer, moving them up and down together as I moved in and out of her, striving for the place that made her moan every time.
There was no skin slapping, no fast strokes of a frenzied man. Instead, this was the slow and not-so-patient trial of a man physically showing a woman that the meaning of her to him was so much more than physical.
It was visceral, spiritual, and poignant in a way I'd never known was possible. Maybe it was the lack of example at home-maybe it was just the way I was made-or maybe it was the lack of the right woman, the one who made me want to be anything she wanted me to be because all of those things made me a better version of myself, but I felt like I'd been emotionally born all over again.
"Fuck," I grunted as a jolt of pleasure gripped the base of my balls and squeezed so hard there was no way I'd avoid coming now. Thankfully, she screamed too, abandoned and completely unconcerned with who could be on the other side of that training room door.
No doubt she'd have felt less complacent about it in just a few short moments, but for now, she was fully invested in me, the moment, and our connection.
Still inside her, come barely done shooting from me into her, and breathing so harsh I sounded ragged, the words rushed out in a geyser of honesty.
"I know you were thinking about moving to New Jersey, but I hope you don't. I hope you'll stay in Manhattan with your brothers."
"With my brothers," she whispered, tucking her chin to my chest and huffing a small, thoughtful puff of air.
Okay. Half honesty.
"And me," I admitted, lifting her eyes to mine with a thumb and finger on her chin. "I hope you'll stay with me."
"Wes … "
"I know the commute isn't ideal logistically or financially, but I'm willing to work with you on that. Whether it's a commuting stipend or hiring a car … or if you're vehemently opposed to those things, you could ride with me."
"Wes-"
"Just don't say no," I babbled on. "I know I'm asking a lot, and I'm being honest here when I say I'm asking for myself. I don't know the particulars of how anything is going to work between us, or even what I'm after, but I know I want to try."
"Why?"
"Because every time I see you, I expect the excitement to lessen or the universe to finally turn back to right-side up, but it doesn't. I miss you the minute you leave until the moment you arrive, and daydream constantly about you all the time in between."
"We're new and-"
"Win," I interrupted, and she leaned it to listen. "I knew you might say no, but I had to ask anyway."
"Why?"
I shrugged helplessly. "How else are you supposed to say yes?"
She smiled then. Raised a hand to cup my jaw.
"Wes."
"Yeah?"
"I wasn't going to say no. I was going to ask if we could maybe have the conversation when your come wasn't running down my leg, but I wasn't going to say no."
"So, yes?" I asked hopefully, and she laughed.
"Maybe. The answer is maybe."
"Okay, Fred. Maybe it is."
"Fred?"
"Short for Winifred," I explained with a smirk. "That is your name, isn't it?"
"Who told you?"
I shook my head; she poked me in the chest. "You better tell me. I've got a stake all carved for their heart."
She wheezed as I laughed and tightened my arms around her.
"Sorry, Fred. Not gonna happen."
"God." She cringed and shook her head in distaste. "At least use the whole thing if you have to use it at all."
"No," I disagreed and touched my lips to hers. "I'm saving the ‘Win' for the day your maybe becomes a yes."
New York was freakishly warm for the day after Thanksgiving, and as a result, I'd decided to turn the heat off and open the windows.
Lounging on the couch, me watching Golden Girls and Lexi nose-deep in her iPad, watching videos about dominos and then running to play with her own set, we were enjoying the soft sun and warm breeze flitting through the house and some quiet time together when my phone rang.