Nine
She needed this.
She’d made a whole big thing about me coming with her – which wasn’t exactly a chore – but she needed this much more than I did, whether she would admit it or not. It was obvious as soon as we were shown into our private villa, and she let out a deep exhale. I listened for both of us as the butler gave instructions and details for everything, while Wil headed straight for the sun deck, to take in the panoramic ocean view.
I tipped the butler when he was done, then stowed our luggage in the closet before I went out to where Wil was standing, staring out at the water. I stood beside her, taking it in for myself for a long moment – the turquoise water, lush vegetation, and just an air of… peace.
“This really is paradise,” she whispered, so low that I didn’t know if she was talking to herself or talking to me. She leaned into the stone-carved railing of the deck, then turned to me, wearing a lazy smile that hit me right in the groin as she grabbed the front of my shirt and pressed herself against my chest. “Thank you for coming with me.”
“Thank you for inviting me.” My hands went reflexively to her waist – a location that had become their natural landing spot in the few shorts weeks since our friendship shifted into something else. “This is… bananas.”
She shook her head at my word choice, then grinned as she pulled away. “I’m going to take a shower. I feel grimy from traveling.”
“Okay. While you do that, I’m gonna check in with my people, let them know we made it in. And then… maybe dinner reservations? Or, no – room service, scheduled for later. But before that, we can explore a little.”
She stepped back into my space to brush her lips over mine. “That sounds perfect, but you sure you wouldn’t rather just join me in the shower?”
I groaned as her hand cupped my groin and squeezed, then reluctantly caught her by the wrist, stopping her. “I would… but I think you should enjoy this first one alone. Relax. Get yourself in the whole “paradise” mood. And then later… I can get back to working off my debt.”
“Why must you always make such good sense?” she grumbled, but shot me another grin before she headed off to the bathroom. I was just settling into the seating area with my cell when I heard the shower come on.
There was a twelve hour time difference, so I knew my calls would be quick. Ten in the morning here in Indonesia was ten at night in Connecticut, so I kept it brief, spending a few minutes with my Aunt, and then Wil’s parents, letting them know we’d arrived. After that, I shot texts to Clay and Jordan, then used the phone in the room to call the butler. For dinner, Wil and I would dine here at our villa, in the outdoor dining area on the deck. For lunch, all I did was make sure there were places in walking distance for us to choose from. Other than that, for today… we would just go with the flow.
After her shower, Wil came out of the bathroom with wet hair, wrapped in a fluffy white bathrobe. I laughed, standing up from the lounge chair as she lowered herself onto the big King-sized bed and spread out, with a low, lingering moan.
“You have to go experience that shower,” she implored, with her eyes closed.
“Damn, experience the shower?”
She nodded at the ceiling. “Yes, experience it. You were so right about me going alone. I’m pretty sure I still had an orgasm.”
“Well shit, let me hurry up,” I chuckled, turning my phone off before I tossed it onto the coffee table. I bent to kiss her forehead before I headed to the bathroom myself, stripping off my clothes as I went. After a twelve hour flight from New York to Qatar, then another ten hour flight to get here to Bali, I felt grimy too.
There was a stone seat built into the shower, and I absolutely took advantage of it, sitting down and letting the spray of the rainfall-style shower head wash over me. By the time I was done in there, I understood what Wil meant. I wrapped myself up in the other bathrobe, then ventured back into the bedroom to find her exactly where I’d left her.
I grinned as the sound of her soft snores met my ears.
Instead of waking her, I climbed in beside her, and closed my eyes too.
Everything else could wait.
“I’m sorry, you think I’m about to do what exactly?”
Wil busted out laughing at the question, but the shit wasn’t funny at all to me. As I stared up at the ladder I was supposed to climb up to an obscene height in the surrounding trees, my stomach flipped and twisted in knots.
“You’re not… scared, are you Ram?” she teased, wearing a devilish grin.
I shook my head. “I didn’t say I was scared, it’s just… when you said you wanted to go to the adventure park, I didn’t imagine… this.”
This was a 20-meter high treetop obstacle course, that looked a little too flimsy for my liking. It was full of people screaming and having fun as they traversed the rope courses, color-coded by varying degrees of difficulty. The one Wil wanted to do, of course, was color-coded black.
Adrenaline Black Circuit.
“I just signed an NFL contract, remember that? I shouldn’t be out here risking my ankles in these damn ropes.”
Wil crossed her arms. “So… you’re scared.”
“Nah, I’m just saying…”
What I wasn’t saying was that the idea of being up that high made me want to throw up. I could be in an airplane just fine, but being all the way up there, with nothing protecting me from impact with the ground… I looked up at the sky, sending up a silent prayer.
“We’ll be harnessed the whole time,” Wil said in a soothing voice as her hand rested on my arm. It was like she’d read my mind, and was trying to provide some comfort, but that little rope I saw attached to the harnesses on other people didn’t do much.
“Looks thin as fuck.”
“It will hold you, fool.”
“What if it’s too long? You trying to have me out here like Trevor from Fresh Prince?”
“Oh my God, stop,” she laughed. “You have nothing to be afraid of, it’s totally safe. And they’ll come out and get you if you get stuck.”
I rolled my eyes. “Nobody said shit about being scared, chill.” I raised my shoulders. “I’m not scared, I’m just… being practical. If it’s “totally safe” why isn’t everybody on that one?”
“Because everybody isn’t a super-athletic, strong, sexy football player like you, Ramsey,” she said, easing in close to me to speak into my ear. “I don’t want to do this by myself. I need you… please? I’ll make it worth your time,” she purred, then flicked her tongue along the edge of my ear. “Packed my banana stickers…”
Shaking my head, I backed away from her. “I need a refund.”
She frowned. “On what?”
“On you,” I told her. “Item not as described. You’re supposed to be sweet. Warm and fuzzy. Not a damn… seductress, with your banana stickers, talking me into risking my life.”
She grinned. “You said talking you into risking your life – not trying to talk you into it. So that means you’re going to do it?”
“That’s all you heard?”
“The important part, yes. Besides,” she whispered, slinking up to me again. “This was always here. You’re just now bringing it out.”
Before I could give a rebuttal to that, she’d grabbed me by the hand, dragging me toward the “start” station. A few minutes later, we were both hooked into harnesses, and waiting at the base of that damn ladder.
“See you at the top!” Wil said, perky as hell, and I shook my head as she grabbed the ladder and started up. I prayed again, for both of us, since I doubted her crazy ass saw the same danger I did, then started up behind her.
The obstacle course itself wasn’t the problem – it was the fact that it was up in the damn trees. Every gust of wind sent things swaying and rocking, and I was suddenly glad we’d just grabbed fruit for a snack on the way out of the hotel.
At the top of the ladder was a wood climbing wall, and I was actually impressed with how quickly Wil finished both of those. I was right behind her, close enough to see the huge smile on her face as she effortlessly moved to the next thing – flying trapezes, which were basically a line of logs tied to a rope. You held on to a rope at the top, while you essentially shimmied down this line of logs as they swayed back and forth in the air.
Craziness.
That was followed by two different sets of “monkey tracks”- grown-up monkey bars that you might die if you fell off of. After that was a tarzan jump into a net, more monkey tracks, and then another ladder taking us even higher into the trees.
Wil was having a blast.
I… was still breathing.
I made it through a zipline, a flying trapeze, and… some more shit that I just got through as quickly as I could. But by the time we made it to end, and I was still alive, successfully managing not to embarrass myself while completing the course… I actually felt good.
Wil, however, was ready to move to the next thing, dragging me right back to a cab for another destination, like we hadn’t been on airplanes for the previous twenty-four hours.
“What are you in such a rush for?” I asked her, as we headed in the direction of the Telaga Waja river, according to the driver.
She grinned. “You’ll see, really soon.”
“Is it some more daredevil shit?” I asked, and she gave me a sly grin.
“I mean… just another tiny zip line,” she claimed, then avoided my eyes to look out the window. “You’ll be fine, just like the last one.”
It was not a tiny zip line.
It went so far, in fact, that I couldn’t even see the endpoint, traveling across rice fields and trees and all kinds of… other shit.
“Hell no,” I told her, shaking my head, and she grabbed me around the waist.
“Ramsey, it’s just—”
“Hell. No. Have you lost your mind?”
“It’s the only way to get to where the boats are, for our rafting tour!”
“Then I guess I’m not getting on a fucking boat today either, the hell?!”
“Ramsey!”
“What?!”
“Please?” she whined, holding on to my hands as she bounced up and down. I made the mistake of meeting her gaze, and as soon as I saw the pleading in those big brown eyes, I shook my head.
“Shit, man,” I grumbled. “Why are you doing this to me? I thought we were coming here to be lowkey, and relax.”
“We are,” she insisted. “We’re just… getting the high energy stuff out of the way first. I thought you would be into this stuff!”
I shook my head. “I don’t know why the hell you thought that! I like the ground. The water. Shit I can’t fall off of and get crushed by gravity. You have something like that on your itinerary?”
“I promise, we’ll relax tomorrow, if you give me today. I’m sorry you’re not having a good time.”
Something about that grated on me. Because… “It’s not that I’m not having a good time, it’s just… shit. I’m noticing that you really seem to enjoy pressing me.”
She smiled. “Uhh… maybe just a little,” she said, looking cute as hell as she held up her thumb and forefinger to emphasize her point. There it was – that adorable factor that balanced her sexiness, but also made it a lethal combination that might – literally – be the death of me.
A few minutes later, I was hooked in for the damn zip line.
And I had to admit… it was pretty exhilarating.
I had to go first, to prove I wasn’t a punk, and those few minutes flying through the air, wind in my face, were… kinda cleansing. My adrenaline was still pumping when Wil came flying up a few minutes after I landed, with another big smile on her face. We were quickly ushered off to the river, where I soon realized that the “rafting” tour was actually white-water rafting, but… I couldn’t even bring myself to complain. Now that I’d done that zipline, extreme rafting seemed lightweight.
It was not.
But, it was still cool as hell.
I got a good workout with my paddle as we passed mountains, trees, waterfalls, flowers, cliffs, and rice fields, all working together to create a peaceful natural setting that was, simply put, beautiful.
Wil was glowing. Her face and cheeks were blushed red with the effort of steering the boat, and her hair was a wild mess under her helmet, sticking out and sticking to her face, but she looked pretty as hell.
Exhausted, but pretty.
By the time the two hour rafting tour was over, I basically had to drag her to our cab back to the hotel. She fell asleep in the back seat, with her head propped on my shoulder. We made it to our room with just enough time to shower off the day before the butler arrived with his assistants to deliver our dinner.
Wil was still in the bathroom while they set up everything on the outside dining room for us. Shades up so we could see and hear the ocean as the sun set. Torches lit to provide ambiance, and later, once the sun finished setting, light.
I didn’t really know what any of the food was, so I listened as the butler uncovered the dishes, explained the contents, and then covered them again while I waited for Wil. Wok-fried prawns, lemon-basil fried rice, spring rolls, vegetable curry, and a couple of different salads. Dessert was a lychee panna cotta with a mango compote, something I was sure Wil would love. Just as he was placing the cover back on the last dish, Wil appeared.
As soon as I laid eyes on her, I ushered him out.
She was wearing a thin, spaghetti-strapped dress that she couldn’t have been wearing anything underneath. I could clearly see the sway of her breasts beneath the sage green fabric, and it was so short that it barely skimmed her thighs. Her hair looked damp, but all curly and fluffed out as she padded up to the table on bare feet.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked, blushing under my gaze.
I approached her, making her shiver a bit as I gently tugged the hem of that itty-bitty dress. “Because… I don’t want a damn thing on this table more than I want you right now.” She let out a moan as my hands went under her dress to confirm my suspicion that she wasn’t wearing any panties. Her lips parted, chest heaving a little as I slipped my fingertips between her thighs. Her body responded with immediate wetness as I dipped into her, first one finger, then a second.
Her eyes closed as I stroked her again, pressing my thumb to her clit as I moved. She propped her hands up on my shoulders, holding on to me I plunged deeper, faster, harder, until I had to hook an arm around her waist to keep her upright.
When the tremors from her orgasm stilled, I raised my hand to my mouth, licking her off one finger before I put the other one to her lips. Her eyes were hooded with lust as she opened her mouth, accepting the offer.
“Good girl,” I murmured to her as she closed her eyes and licked it clean, then brought her mouth to me for a her-flavored kiss that really had me ready to say “fuck dinner”.
But then her stomach growled, and we were laughing too hard to keep kissing.
So we ate.
We both tried everything, some things we liked and some things we didn’t, but it was cool to experience. We talked, and laughed, and I couldn’t speak for her, but my mind wasn’t on anything except that dinner. On her. Not on my grief, or the job change, or my concerns about the impending season, just… the moment.
Afterwards, we migrated to the lounge area next to our private plunge pool. Instead of taking separate ones, we stretched out together on the same chaise, with her practically on top of me – not that I minded. It felt like the most natural thing, laying there with her head on my chest as she drifted off to sleep with her arm hooked around my waist.
In fact, what felt strange was thinking about us ever having a different dynamic than this. Being “just friends” felt completely foreign, and her almost marrying somebody else? That was a distant bad dream.
I wasn’t even stressed about her declaration of not being ready – or at least not ready to define – anything deeper than the friends with benefits thing we had going. I was comfortable here, with us doing the same damn things we’d been doing anyway, just with the added element of sex – something I hadn’t realized I missed until she and I started doing it.
After my mother passed, my interest in casual flings had dissipated. Before that, after Lena, casual was the only thing I would entertain, because I wasn’t willing to give another woman a chance to get her hooks in me the way Lena had. Negative aspects of the relationship aside, it had been hard to let go of. We had history, and loathe as I was to admit it, we had chemistry. Regardless of what happened between us, there was love there, and it hadn’t disappeared overnight.
Which was why I was more than willing to give Wil time – I still needed it too.
This was really a great decision.
That thought kept playing in my head as I glanced beside me to Ramsey, who was holding an animated conversation with our driver as we headed back to the hotel.
We’d spent the morning at a shark conservatory – something I’d almost chickened out on. But Ramsey went in on me, reminding me how I’d been all over him the day before about the obstacle course, and the ziplining. So I went, as planned, and loved it. Touched and fed the sharks, had lunch, got to talk to new people. When we got in the car to leave, our driver had recommended a trip all the way into central Bali, to visit the holy spring at the Dalem Pingit Sebatu Temple. I didn’t want to spend two hours in the car just to get there, but again, Ramsey insisted.
And it was amazing.
There was a little bit of a hike to get there, but once we made it, it was worth it. We were both mindful of being respectful of the local Hindu religion, but I only knew God by one name… and to my surprise, I felt him there, in that water, like it was cleansing to me. We stayed longer than we probably should, and then changed into dry clothes again for the drive back.
It was there, in the backseat, that I found myself very grateful that Ramsey had been with me. Not that we hadn’t had a great time the day before – we did, despite his complaints. But today was notable because of those two experiences I wouldn’t have had without him pushing. Because of him, I now had those memories to treasure.
Back at the hotel, we changed into swimming clothes and headed to the beach for the first time since we arrived. We found a cabana, ordered drinks, and settled in, soaking up the sounds of the ocean and basking in the sun.
“You having a good time?” Ramsey asked, drawing my attention away from gazing out at the water.
I nodded. “I’m having a great time. What about you?”
“Grudgingly.”
I laughed. “Why grudgingly?”
“Because I’m still salty about yesterday,” he said, taking a long swig from the Hennessey and Coke in his hand. “Would you have still wanted to be my friend if I’d gotten stuck on the obstacle course somewhere?”
“Are you kidding? I would’ve come to save you.” I reached up, lowering my sunglasses a bit to look at him over the top. “I accept payment in the form of sexual favors, for future reference.”
He scoffed. “So I would’ve added to my debt? No thanks. I still owe a lot more dick to pay for this whole thing, since you won’t let me reimburse you.”
“You don’t owe me anything, but I’ll take whatever you’re willing to give. But… hey… I hope you don’t feel weird about not paying for this. Seriously – it was already paid for, and going to waste. And besides, you paid for your plane ticket.”
“Right, because grown men are supposed to pay their way in the world. I may not have A-list actor money, but I do okay enough that I could pay you for this trip, Wil.”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh my God, please. You were a pro football player, and I know for a fact that you have Tariq Evans managing your money. Do not act like that.”
“I’m not acting like anything, but I’m saying… I was on a rookie contract, as a running back. Four years, five million dollars. It wasn’t like today, where they’re giving rookies twenty million out the gate. That’s why they were so pissed when I left – they wanted to hurry and sign me to another shitty contract, and that didn’t work out for them.”
Wow.
“I had no idea they’d undercut you like that. You were like, their star.”
He scoffed. “I know. But that’s how it goes, when you’re a poor kid from the hood, desperate just to get your mother somewhere safe, you know? It didn’t even occur to me to negotiate – that I could negotiate. And again, big contracts weren’t such a norm for a running back in those days. The Kings, however, know how to treat a man,” he laughed.
“Well, I’ll drink to that,” I said, holding up my own fruity cocktail for us to clink glasses. “But, to backtrack a little – please don’t feel weird about me having paid for this trip, okay? I just appreciate you coming with me. There’s no way I would’ve had as good a time by myself.”
He chuckled. “You don’t enjoy your own company?”
“No, I’m not saying that. I’ve taken trips alone before, and had a great time, I just… I don’t think I’m in the right space, not right now. Having you here is…”
“A good distraction?”
“I was going to say a nice change,” I corrected him. “But… I guess you could say that too.”
He shrugged, then took another long sip from his glass. “I don’t mind it, Champ. I have thoroughly enjoyed being your entertainment so far.”
“You know that’s not all you are to me, right?”
I really didn’t mean to say that out loud.
Since our initial conversation about giving our friendship room to shift, I’d tried to be careful about how I expressed myself to him – a source of frustration, honestly, since I’d never had to do that before.
But I was trying to be fair to him, trying not to set up an expectation I couldn’t really fill. Ramsey was a really, really good man – one who deserved an actual, fulfilling relationship if that’s what he wanted. As it stood right now, I was standing in someone else’s way, under the guise of being his “friend”, while I gained all the benefits of him being my man. What I didn’t want to happen was me… stringing him along, making him believe that things were going deeper than they were.
Even though… they were going deeper.
I just didn’t want to talk about it.
If I avoided thinking about it too hard, perhaps I could ignore that, especially now that we were intimate, I was maybe falling for a man at the same time I was getting over the one before him. Honestly speaking, I wasn’t sure it was fair to either of us, but that wasn’t pleasant to think about.
I preferred to focus on the joy of the moment – the teasing grin on Ramsey’s face as he raised an eyebrow in disbelief, the amusement in his eyes, the fact that he was sexy, golden-brown perfection lounging beside me with a glass of dark liquor in his hand, wearing nothing but swim trunks. I’d said he wasn’t a distraction, but I don’t know… he’d certainly done a good job keeping my mind off of everything except being here with him.
“Tell me anything,” he said, his words bringing me back to the fact that we were having a conversation. “You know you don’t have to front, right? Brought me along to use me for my body, just tell the truth girl.”
I laughed. “Oh, whatever. We haven’t even had sex since we got here.”
“That’s because you’ve had us moving around the whole time, seeing everything. Not complaining, just saying.”
“Well, you are in luck Mr. Bishop, because I am all out of “see everything” energy. I need a couple of days of just… being laid up drinking, having lazy sex.”
The way he met my gaze was damn near scary, considering the fact that I was wearing sunnies, but he still seemed to be looking me right in the eyes. “Why are we down here then, when we have a whole private pool and villa to ourselves?”
“That is a great question.”
It didn’t take us long to get back up to the resort from the beach, but we were stopped on the way by a couple of people who recognized us from the show, and were on vacation as well. Ramsey took it in stride, taking a moment to stop and chat, but it made me antsy. Nobody pulled out a smartphone, thank God, but the whole thing freaked me out – I was on vacation to get away from everything and everybody, and being recognized just felt… like a violation.
But that was silly, and I knew it, so I didn’t say anything, just thanked my lucky stars that we hadn’t felt moved to do anything inappropriate out on the beach. My anxious feeling lasted until we were back in the privacy of our villa, set apart from everything, and were out in our amazing little personal infinity pool, sharing a bottle of wine.
Ramsey leaned against the edge of the pool, and I leaned against him, trading wine-laced kisses after we’d both had several glasses, and opened a second bottle. I was buzzed, but it wasn’t just the wine, it was him. Every time I was around him now, I felt… tingly, and ready, just waiting for him to touch me, or taste me, or take me – a feeling I’d long lost with Darius.
“I see you really are feeling lusty, huh?” Ramsey asked, as he squeezed my ass under the heated water.
I nodded, grinning as he turned us the other way, so that it was my back against the wall instead of his. “I told you… this is what you bring out of me.”
I whimpered as he dropped his mouth to my neck, sucking and biting me there. Even under the water, I could feel him getting harder as his kisses grew deeper, and then started to trail down the line of my bikini top. I closed my eyes, tipping my head back as his fingers went to the back of my neck, skillfully untying the strings.
When I opened my eyes again, it was to watch him. He’d moved us to a more shallow part of the pool, and I sipped from the last glass of our second bottle of wine as he lifted and squeezed my breasts, then dipped his head to suck one of my nipples into his mouth. He sucked hard, and it was so good that I felt the pull all the way down in my toes. That, plus the wine, made me lose my balance enough to slip a bit, but Ramsey caught me around the waist, keeping me up.
“Let’s take this inside.”
We didn’t even close the doors. They were glass anyway, so what was the point? We were wet from the pool, so after he snatched apart the strings on my bikini bottom, he propped me up on the wide table nestled behind the couch, and plunged into me right there, so deep and so hard to our hips knocked together. But he felt so good that I didn’t care.
I draped my arms over his shoulder, planting my hands at the back of his neck to pull him in. As he kissed me, he swallowed my appreciative moans, and maneuvered his hands between me and the table so he could grip my ass as he stroked. I threaded my legs around his, using the leverage to meet his motions, something that seemed to prompt him to go deeper, and faster, neither of us caring that we were rocking that little table harder than we probably should.
“You feel so damn good,” I purred in his ear, dropping my hands to his ass cheeks. I dug my fingernails in at the same time I sank my teeth, just slightly, into his neck. That made him growl, and grab my ankles, raising my legs and then pushing them back. Because of the height of the table, he was plunging into me at a downward angle that left me wide open for him. I wanted to scream, but he caught my lip between his teeth, nibbling before he sucked it into his mouth as he filled me up, over, and over.
When my mouth was free – because he’d dipped his head to nibble and suck and lick my nipples into hard, sensitive peaks - I used it to scream and moan my pleasure, and beg him for… I don’t know what. There was nothing more he could possibly be doing, because this was perfection.
Or so I thought.
“You sound so fucking sexy,” he growled at me, propping my leg up over his shoulder, somehow getting even deeper as he wrapped one of his big hands around my neck. “This is good for you?” he asked, as he plunged again, but didn’t pull back, simply circling his hips instead, knowing that he was pressing right against that spot that was going to make me come unglued.
“Yes,” I breathed, swallowing hard against the light pressure of his hand.
He pressed his lips to mine for a soft kiss as he somehow pushed deeper. “Yeah?”
I nodded, half-moan/half-whimpering another “yesss” just before he pulled back, and started moving again. A few seconds later, the tingle in my core turned into full-blown tremors, and he let my leg down long enough for me to lock them around his waist, holding on, digging my fingernails into his shoulders as he stroked me until I came, with a scream that the whole resort probably heard. And Ramsey wasn’t much quieter – plunging into me a growl that probably put any nearby animals on high alert.
Afterwards, we drug ourselves to the bathroom to shower, and then tumbled into the bed, tipsy and sleepy and spent. I snuggled in close to his nude body and got comfortable, closing my eyes, and letting myself be lulled to slumber by Ramsey’s steady breaths as he fell asleep.
A perfect end to a perfect day.
The next day, we did the cooking academy tour through the resort. Early that morning, they took us into the village, to the fish market, and then back to the resort kitchen where we were walked through a meal that we shared for lunch.
After that, we made our way to the spa, using the vouchers that came with my package to get facials and massages and pedicures and pretty much everything we could. Back in the room, we napped, and talked, and napped, and laughed, and napped a little more.
That evening, we had dinner in our room again, since we’d ended up waking up in time to catch dinner in the resort restaurant the night before.
“So who is your next interview with?” Ramsey asked, then ate a spoonful of the tiramisu we were sharing.
“Trent Bailey. They liked what I did with the rookie interview, so they’re letting me talk to one of their stars. In his home, at that,” I added, and Ramsey nodded.
“That’s what’s up. You know, this new show is a good look for you. Even though you’re the interviewer, and your subject is the focus… I don’t know. It’s like your personality shines a little more.”
I sat back, chewing at my bottom lip. “You think so?”
“Yeah, I do. And I’ve seen and heard the chatter about it, you know? You’re well received, which you know is never guaranteed.”
I laughed. “Right. I’m just glad to have something my father didn’t have to buy me into,” I quipped. “I might have to come back out here and jump off of one of these cliffs if I find out Daddy made a big donation to the Kings.”
Ramsey shook his head. “You don’t know that Jack “paid” for you to be on From the Sidelines, come on. It could have just been… a token of gratefulness, after the fact. Don’t assume the worst before you talk to him – unless you’ve already talked to him.”
“Nah,” I denied. “I haven’t, not really. I hinted at it, but he was so upset about the way all of that went down, and talking about lawyers and breach of contract and all of that, and I was just… ready to be past it. So I asked him to drop it, which means I can’t really bring it up to him.”
“Does it matter anymore anyway?”
I took a sip from my water, looking out at the darkened ocean as I considered that. We were out in the open air dining room again, and the sun had sank into the horizon a long time ago, leaving the firelight of the torches to set the ambiance. After a few moments had passed, I shrugged.
“I honestly don’t know. It’s like… I want to confront it just so that I can say – please don’t do this again. But on the other hand, I’d really like to be able to trust that he thinks enough of me now, that I’ve proven myself enough that he wouldn’t see a need to, you know?”
“That’s assuming it was about that in the first place.”
I rolled my eyes. “If you know Jack Cunningham like I know Jack Cunningham, you know that if he saw an opportunity to give his one and only baby girl a leg up… he took it. And I can’t fault him for that. But you know what sticks to me most about that conversation with Connie and Sarita? I’m not even mad about being pushed out of my job anymore – I’m mad at the implication that I’m only somebody because of who my parents are. It’s… frustrating.”
“I get it,” he nodded. The firelight reflected back at me in his eyes as he held my gaze. “But… you know that your upbringing isn’t something to reject, right? You have two good parents, who’ve afforded you a life where you haven’t gone without anything you needed. In college, you could focus just on athletics, not wondering where your next meal might come from if you missed dinner in the cafeteria. No worries about if your mother was eating. When you left the sport, you had your family to fall back on, etc, etc. Don’t be so quick to downplay it, Champ. You’re lucky.”
“I know that,” I agreed. “And I hope I don’t come across as spoiled, or ungrateful, it’s just… I don’t want to be under a shadow, you know? I’m proud of my parents, grateful for everything they’ve provided for me, but… I’m a grown woman, with accomplishments of my own, that I worked damn hard for. But every time I’m the subject of an interview, it always goes back to Jack and Carla. There’s always this undertone that something was given to me. Even Darius did it sometimes, and it drove me nuts. It’s like… I just want to do enough, be enough, that I reach a point where people look at me and see… me. Just me. Just Wil.”
Across the table, Ramsey smiled. “When I look at you, that’s all I see.”
As soon as he said that to me, I was so glad that it was – hopefully – too dark for him to see me blush. Ramsey had always been that guy with an encouraging word, but for some reason, it felt a little different now. And I didn’t help that… I knew he wasn’t just saying it. He meant it.
This man is trying to make me fall in love.
“Thank you for that,” was the response I chose, trying to keep the emotion I felt out of my voice. But my face was hot now, and so were… other places. I needed to change the subject.
“So how are you holding up?” I asked, knowing he would know what I was talking about. “I’ve read that it never really gets easier, but… is it any easier now?”
He cleared his throat, then picked up his wine glass, draining the rest of the contents. “I… don’t know, actually. I went to the gravesite, for the first time since the funeral. Told her about signing the contract with the Kings. Managed to stay upright, so I guess that’s progress.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I would say so. How did you feel afterward?”
“Like I missed the shit out of my mother, and would give anything for her to be at my first game,” he told me, like he’d thought about it a lot. He probably had thought about it a lot – was probably trying not to think about it, which made me feel really shitty for bringing it up.
He picked up the half-finished bottle of wine and poured himself another glass. Before he could put the bottle back down on the table, I was in front of him, and then in his lap, snugging close.
For a second, he hesitated, but then he wrapped his arms around me as I buried my face in his neck. “I’m sorry for making you think about that,” I whispered. I saw, rather than felt him shake his head.
“Nothing to be sorry about, Champ. Just like you… it’s something I can’t seem to get away from. So I guess… I don’t know, maybe we just have to learn to take it in stride. Embrace it. Or hell… just start telling people to leave you the fuck alone about it,” he laughed, which I was glad to see.
“You know we can’t just tell people to leave us alone about something.”
He scoffed. “Speak for yourself. You must have forgotten what my interviews used to look like. I never give them anything but football.”
“But what if I interviewed you?” I asked. “You know you won’t be able to pull that with me.”
He smiled. “I guess I could give you the goods, Wil in the Field,” he teased. “Exclusive access.”
“Oooh, talk dirty to me why don’t you?”
Pulling me closer to him – even though I was already as close as we could get – he laughed. “That turns the reporter in you on, huh?”
I nodded. “You know it.”
After a few seconds of silence passed, I looked up, meeting his eyes. They were still full of firelight, and… full of something else too, that made me feel just as warm and tingly as his words had, a few minutes ago. I sighed as he brought his lips to mine – contentedly. Being with him like this, in his arms, in paradise, filled me with a kind of happiness I couldn’t even describe.
So I didn’t try, at least not with words.
I straddled his lap, and pulled him free from his shorts, and sank down onto him, taking full advantage of the fact that the only panties I’d packed were for outside of the resort. He tugged the straps of my dress down, freeing my breasts to the tropical warmth of the night air before he covered them with his hands, and squeezed. Lowering my lips to his, I kissed him deep, matching the swipes of my tongue with the movements of my hips as I rode him freely, without a single care.
For now, and for the next two days, as far I was concerned, we were the only two people in the world that mattered.