CHAPTER NINE
Emma
I was all shades of pissed off when I headed into the training center later that week. Laura had given me a new training schedule, but it might as well have been written in Greek. Though Locke had said he’d show me around the training center, he was MIA. Maybe he wasn’t even in action since I hadn’t gotten any texts from him at all. Maybe he was just dead in a ditch somewhere.
To add to that, before Laura even had a chance to show me around the center, she’d gotten called away to another meeting. She texted me that she wouldn’t be around again today because she was flying to San Jose for business.
No mention of her elusive brother, who I would’ve had a hard time believing actually existed if I couldn’t still feel and taste him, nearly a week after my initial “Welcome to Daytona.”
Some great welcome. The way he’d left me, red-faced and wanting more, was like a grand old “fuck you.”
So basically, I felt like a boat without a rudder, left adrift in a town where I didn’t know anyone. I spent most nights playing Candy Crush on my new phone, which had quickly become my best friend while I missed my family and Wintersburg like crazy.
I might have been green and new to all this, but this didn’t sound like the best way to treat a multimillion-dollar investment.
It wasn’t that they’d left me completely alone though, to be fair. Laura Cage had been texting me nonstop since I got here, trying to make sure their investment was well spent. She was even worse than that beepy piece of shit on my wrist, which I still had a hard time remembering to wear.
But she wasn’t my family. For the fifth night in a row, I ended up ordering delivery Domino’s pizza, eating a whole pie myself and sending a million mammoth, rambling texts to Brody until he finally came back with, Can you fucking leave me alone now? I’m with a girl, and she thinks you’re a psycho ex.
NASCAR drivers didn’t get much time practicing on the speedway — it was against the rules. Most often, they had to rely on realistic simulators, like the one UnCaged had arranged to have set up in the backyard of the offices, in a nondescript warehouse next to the river. It was for all their employees, but they’d had a section of it all set up for me, with the simulator, my own gym, and all kinds of fancy equipment.
Now that I had all the stuff that I thought would give me the edge, it turned out that I didn’t know what to do with it.
Despite never having driven in one before in my life, I’d quickly gotten the hang of the simulator and had been practicing on it every morning to get strong enough to hit my five hundred. I had to say, it helped. When I got done with my first two hundred, I felt the fatigue. And the parts of the schedule from Laura that I could make out were no joke. It had me doing something from eight in the morning until five at night. She had me running five miles a day, then doing the simulator all afternoon. I lifted free weights, because at least I knew how to handle those, and stayed away from the machines.
But something had quickly begun to feel off. After the first couple of days, when all my questions to people around me were met with, “Where’s Mr. Cage? He’s usually all over this,” I realized what it was.
Locke Cage was deliberately ignoring me.
It was bad enough that he’d left me high and… incredibly wet… in my apartment a week ago. I’d spent that night cursing his name. But then, the following day, he’d been all sweet to me, giving me encouragement while that Curling Iron Nazi Adlar tried to pretty me up, so I softened. As he sat there, whispering words that made me want him all the more, I thought that maybe we could pick things up where we’d left them.
And then he just walked away. Again.
I wasn’t going to give him a chance for a third strike. He was out, right now.
At least I told myself that.
When I wasn’t thinking of that rock-hard chest of his. His eyes. The way the right side of his mouth lifted higher when he smiled.
I sighed.
I sucked at playing games with men. I didn’t have time for that shit. But it soon became clear that Locke was a master at it, and the name of this game was, pretend nothing happened.
I wouldn’t have dealt with that shit, had it been anyone else. I would’ve called him out and made him rue the day he ever thought he could pull that shit with me. But something made me bite my tongue.
Namely, a multimillion-dollar contract.
My phone buzzed with a text, and I picked it up. No surprise to see it was from Laura, asking if I was having a good day. Just seeing her last name put me back on the roller coaster of emotions her brother had me on. I scowled. He didn’t have the right to do that. To peel back my layers and delve further into me than anyone else had ever gone, then just leave.
I went back to being mad as a hornet.
I texted back, jabbing in the letters as if the phone was Locke’s face. I’m good, thanks.
Is there anything I can get you? Anything you need?
I looked around. I’d done fine with a lot less in my life. But my brother’s voice was whispering in my ear. This was my one shot, and these little extras were here to make me into the best athlete I could be. I didn’t want anyone telling me what to do, including that overpriced beepy bracelet that I was forced to wear, but…
I sucked in my pride.
I could use a trainer to show me how to use all these fancy gadgets in here.
No problem, she texted back. We’ve got plenty of those.
When I slid into the simulator seat, Bruce, who ran the training center, adjusted the ride for me. “Going to go for four hundred today?”
I hadn’t gotten there yet, hadn’t even gone much past three hundred, but I needed something to work off this stress. I fixed the helmet over my head, feeling adrenaline coursing through my veins. “Hell yeah. Let’s do this.”
The simulator was a hell of a lot easier than a regular race. For one, I didn’t have to worry about dying, and it wasn’t nearly as trying on the muscles. It was a good lesson in endurance, and about the best practice a driver like me could get off an actual track. I tightened my gloves and shuffled my backside into the molded seat.
Bruce’s voice was being piped into my ears since he was playing pit chief, taking the place of Brody, who was home doing daily therapy to build his strength. “All right, James. And you are on.”
I waited for the countdown and tore out of the gate, pressing hard on the accelerator so I could get where I was comfortable. This race had me at pole position, so I didn’t have to get around many obstacles. Should have been easy.
But it wasn’t.
I started out fine. But by lap twenty, I started thinking about my family. Being in a new city, away from everyone I knew, had worn on me. Hadn’t seen my parents in a week, which was by far the longest time I’d ever been away from them. Brody was coming next weekend to train as my pit crew chief, but he’d been taciturn during my marathon texts and strangely quiet during our phone conversations, when I gave him the rundown on everything that was happening. I tried to tone it down, but I could almost feel his green-eyed monster eying me. Not that I could blame him. I would’ve been sore about it too.
And then I started thinking about Locke. Weirdly enough, aside from Laura, who was more like my mother, he was the closest thing to a friend I had out here. And I got it. He didn’t want to mix business and pleasure. I wasn’t so sure it was a good idea myself, but I needed someone to connect with, and not just in a sexual way.
But lately, I couldn’t think about Locke without thinking about sex. He’d made that impossible the second he peeled off his shirt and gave me a glimpse of the chiseled manliness underneath.
There was no denying that I’d never been as attracted to a man as I’d been to Locke. When my mind wandered to what we’d done on the balcony, how his mouth felt on mine, the heavy, tortured groans he’d made as he explored my body… I felt my focus shake. A bead of sweat trickled down my forehead and into my eye, but I blinked it away, even though it burned.
I made it another ten laps before my thoughts wandered again, this time moving right past what had happened on the balcony. It spiraled out into a fantasy, and soon I was letting out a gasp at the thought of our bodies pressed together, imagining each one of those delicious muscles flexing as he thrust into me…
Shit!
Around a curve, I miscalculated and ended up veering too far to the outside of the oval, clipping the car beside me. The simulator spared me all the flames and the likely whiplash that would’ve happened as my car flipped. Instead of real life screaming, it flashed Danger! Danger!
Crash and burn.
I closed my eyes and rested my head on the steering wheel as Bruce’s voice floated into my ear. “What happened, Emma?”
Locke happened. Locke and that deadly body of his, which he’d made the mistake of showing me. And I’d made the mistake of looking at.
Dammit.
Lifting off my helmet, I blew a stray lock of hair off my face and slid out of the seat, skulking toward where Bruce was coming from the control booth to meet me, a confused look on his face. “You were killing it, the first hundred.”
“I know, I know,” I mumbled, not willing to say what really happened; that I’d lost it because I’d been drooling at the thought of being in Locke’s strong arms. “But I—”
I froze and swallowed my words as Locke stepped out of the booth behind Bruce.
I blushed red as the Phoenix sunset and hoped I could blame it on the heat of the simulator. I hadn’t seen him in days, and he was like food to a starving orphan. He was wearing a black tech shirt and running shorts that bared his well-sculpted thighs and calves.
“Fucked up?” he finished for me, crossing his arms over his chest.
I frowned.
Bruce was nice about it, at least. “It happens. Want to start again?”
I massaged my shoulder and stretched, rolling it. I was already fatigued from running earlier in the day. Plus, Locke was here now, and that meant I wouldn’t be able to concentrate at all. Shit, that was not boding well for my racing career, if I couldn’t perform in front of my own sponsor. “I think I’ll hold off until tomorrow.”
Locke gave me a hard look. “You think that’s wise? Looks like you need all the practice you can get.”
I didn’t know if he was talking from the perspective of the owner of UnCaged or because it was just wired into his brain to give me shit no matter what I did. “I’m listening to my body,” I said. “Good athletes do.”
He let out a short laugh, and I had to wonder what I said that he found so objectionable. That listening to your body was important? That I was good? Or that I was an athlete? Anyway I sliced it, it pissed me off.
“What?”
He shook his head like he had no opinion, but I could tell he was making judgments in that head of his, and not kind ones. Bastard.
Bruce touched my elbow. “Tomorrow will be another day.” He had his Dale Earnhardt ballcap on and was ready to leave for the night. He looked at Locke. “If you’re hanging around, mind locking up for me, Mr. Cage?”
Locke shook his head and waved him away, still eyeing the simulator doubtfully. It suddenly struck me.
“Oh. I get it,” I singsonged as I patted the cage of the simulator. “You think this is a video game, is that it?”
“I never said—”
“Don’t have to. It’s written all over that pretty boy face of yours. And I bet you don’t even think drivers are athletes. Am I right?”
He shrugged. “One. It looks like a video game. And two, yes, it is true, I’ve never thought of car drivers as athletes. After all, anyone can press on a pedal.” A slow smile spread on his face. “Even pretty boys.”
My jaw dropped. So, he was spending millions of dollars on me just so I could press on a pedal? Fighting the urge to punch something, namely him, I said, “That right?” I stepped aside, presenting the seat of the simulator to him like a new fridge on The Price is Right. “Then be my guest.”
He crossed his arms. “I haven’t played a video game since I was twelve.”
I hooked a finger at him, motioning him forward. “Scared, pretty boy?”
“No, I—”
I started making clucking chicken noises, flapping my arms for good measure.
He dropped his hands to his sides. “Fine.” He came up to the simulator, so unbearably close that I could smell the scent of his aftershave. Giving me a smooth, defiant glare, he slid into the seat, holding his hands up as if he didn’t know what button to press. “And?”
I pointed things out to him. “This here is called a steering wheel. The thing under your foot is the gas.” When he gave me a narrow-eyed sneer, I shrugged innocently. “You can figure the rest out yourself.”
“I plan to.”
I went to the control panel. “I’ll start you off easy. Twenty laps. Try not to lose your pants, okay, pretty boy?”
He glared at me, one hand on the wheel as if this was a ride in the park. The screen flickered, showing the beginning of the race. When the countdown reached zero, he floored it. But it didn’t matter. All the other cars tore ahead of him, passing him on each side as if he was standing still.
I watched the tendons in his forearms tense as he leaned forward and fastened both hands tightly on the wheel. “What the… fuck.”
I checked the display. “You’ve got to go faster than that. You’re only going ninety.”
He pushed it, but then suddenly slowed. “Curve.”
I snorted. “Those happen from time to time in an oval.”
He did manage to get through the next few laps, albeit at the very back of the pack. Eventually, he figured it out and managed to get up to one-twenty. But on lap nineteen, overconfident, while trying to make up lost ground, he spun out and crashed, just as I had.
He banged the steering wheel with the heel of his hand. “Christ.” Then he looked up at my superior expression and scowled. “That was my first go.”
“You can try again if you want?”
He grabbed his upper arm through his t-shirt and rolled his shoulder. “Shit. No, thanks.”
“Tired?”
He shook his head. “I’m good. Not used to the position, obviously. But good.”
“Oh, of course.” I wiped a bit of sweat from his temple and triumphantly showed him my glistening fingertip. “I’m sure it was just the… position.”
He sat up and rose so that all six-feet-something of him was standing over me. “All right. It may be a tad more involved than I first thought.”
He struck me as the type of person who didn’t admit when he was wrong, so I silently claimed victory. “Well, you ever want to try it again, I’ll keep my training center open for you.” I smiled.
He held out his hands. “I didn’t come here to play,” he said with a superior air, the asshole. “Laura texted me you needed a trainer. So here I am.”
I stared at him, mouth open. “Wait. You?”
“Don’t look so shocked that I happen to know my way around a gym.”
“No, I mean, obviously you do, because…” I stopped. Great, Emma, way to make it seem like all you’ve been doing since that night is drooling over his massive pectorals. Which, to be honest, I had been. They were glorious. Simply unforgettable. Magazine-cover worthy. “I just thought you’d be too busy, considering your schedule.”
“It’s not permanent. Just until we can get someone else in for you. But I thought I could at least introduce you around the gym since Laura said you’ve never been to one?”
“I’ve worked out,” I corrected, following him through a wide doorway to another hallway which led to the gym. “But back home, I’ve just got a barbell and a couple of dumbbells. That’s about it.”
He pushed open a door and let me pass into the gym. Besides the regular weight bench with the free weights, a couple of treadmills, and an elliptical machine, I’d never seen any of these contraptions before in my life.
He clapped his hands together. “All right. So where do we start? What have you done today?”
“Nothing weight-wise. I ran five miles.”
“Treadmill?”
I nodded.
“You should work on running on the beach. The sand adds more resistance and makes for a tougher workout. And I prefer the scenery to the treadmill, anyway. Don’t you?”
I shrugged. I ran, but it didn’t excite me the way it excited him. I could tell from the way he talked about it that he loved it. “We don’t have much scenery in Wintersburg.”
He reached onto a shelf and pulled out a white thing that looked like a parachute.
I held out my hands, instantly petrified. “I’m not skydiving. You know me and heights, Mr. Cage.”
He chuckled softly and spread it out. “After you get good at running on the sand, you can add this for more resistance. It’ll make you stronger, quicker, head to toe.”
I grimaced. It all sounded painful. “Okay. Sand. And chute. Got it.”
He held up a hand. “Don’t try both at once. Ease into the beach running, and once you get comfortable with the sand, you can try both, or else you’re just asking for injury.”
I nodded.
“So you haven’t lifted today?”
I shook my head.
“What did you do yesterday?”
“I lifted.”
His nostrils flared, and I felt his irritation with me grow. “What body parts did you work?”
He was studying me like I was an idiot. And I’d been so cocky a minute ago, at the simulator. “Um. You know. All of them?” Now I was answering his questions with a question because he was making me feel that inferior.
He shook his head. “Okay, okay. Here’s what you need to do. I’ll write it down for you. You work a different body part every day of the week. Monday, legs. Tuesday, chest and triceps. Wednesday, shoulders and traps. Thursday, biceps and back. Friday, start with legs again. You need to give your muscles a chance to rebuild between workouts. Except abs and lower back; you’ll work those every day. Got it?”
He’d rattled it off so quickly I’d been lost a few words after “here’s what you need to do.” But I didn’t want to feel like any more of an idiot, so I said, “Yes.”
“Good.” He nodded and led me over to a large metal rectangular cage that was bigger than the both of us put together. He wrapped his hand around one of the surrounding metal bars. “This is a Smith Machine. We’ll do legs.”
I quickly learned that when he said “we” he really just meant “me.” He showed me each exercise, gave me the correct weight, and then he spotted me, giving me pointers and saying things like, “Back straight” and “Don’t lean forward” like a freaking drill sergeant.
Two hours later, I was really starting to get angry at myself for having made fun of him at the simulator. He showed me how to do squats and lunges on the Smith Machine, instructed on the proper use of the adductor machine, and explained how he’d gotten his killer calves on a leg press. By the time I got done doing my third set of hack squats, I thought he was trying to kill me. My legs felt like jelly.
“I hope you hired me a masseuse because, after this workout, I think I need one,” I moaned, trying to stand. It felt like I had lead weights attached to each ankle.
He sucked on the straw from his water bottle and pulled a phone from the pocket of his gym shorts. “I’ll get you one.”
I reached over and covered the display before he could thumb a text into one of his minions. “I was kidding. I don’t want any stranger touching my body.” I shuddered at the thought.
He looked at me like I was insane.
“Oh? So you like being fondled by a complete stranger, Mr. Cage?”
He thought for a moment, tapping his finger on his chin. “Yes. Very much so.”
I shook my head. “I’m not sure if that makes you a pretty boy or a pervert.”
He’d started to walk toward the next piece of equipment, an inclined weight bench, and I followed him, wondering if I could make a run for it before he put me through another series of exercises. “Hey. Don’t knock it till you try it.”
“No thanks. I’d probably start giggling,” I grumped. “I’m actually very ticklish.”
He seemed surprised by this nugget of information because he stopped adjusting the weight bench and looked at me. “Truly? Where?”
We were standing toe-to-toe in front of the bench. I looked up at him and gave him a sexy smile. It was too easy to flirt with him, too comfortable. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
He pointed at the bench. “Sit.”
I crossed my arms and planted my feet. “Oh, hell no. No more legs.”
He put up his hands, conceding. “All right. Core then.”
I groaned.
“You gotta work your core every day.”
I slumped onto the bench, pouting. “All right, but will it hurt me that much if I start tomorrow?”
He ignored that. “Lie back.”
I did, wondering what torture he had in store for me now. He fiddled with something under the bench, and I felt the part of the bench supporting my head lowering down. Ugh, this was not comfortable in any way. Before I could ask him what the hell he was up to, I saw him grinning at me.
“Do your crunches on an incline for maximum results.”
Lying with my head near the ground and the rest of my body up in the air, I looked at my knees, and they seemed so very far away. Gravity wouldn’t be helping me. He positioned my arms behind my ears.
“Okay, now. Lift. Don’t hunch forward. Fist’s width between your chin and your chest. Go ahead. Count them out. Twenty in each set.”
I grunted and strained upward, but only made it a couple inches. I made it another inch before pure, unadulterated pain set in. All I’d done all my life was crunches, so I should’ve been a pro at this. But this kind of contortion was damn near impossible. The human body was not meant to go this way.
I finally managed one before falling back down to the cushion. “One,” I croaked.
“Half of one,” he corrected. “Got to get up higher than that.”
“Damn you to hell,” I gasped, going up for the next one. “I’ll make a deal with you.”
“I’m listening.”
“Ten, and… I’ll tell you where I’m ticklish.”
He didn’t hesitate. He put out his hand, and we shook on it.
The next nine weren’t so hard. Once I got used to the blood rushing to my head, it wasn’t as terrible as I thought, and I did feel it deep in my abdominals.
“Good,” he said when I was done. He shifted the weight bench so that it was level again, and I sat up, straddling the bench, leaning forward to stretch out my core. No way in hell was I doing another exercise for the rest of the night. I grabbed a towel and began to swab off my forehead as he watched me intently.
I loved it. I loved seeing all his control flagging. I could’ve waited all day like this, just to see him sweat it out, the way he’d made me sweat.
Finally, he said, “And?”
“And what?”
His voice was calm, but there was tension in his features. “Our deal?”
“Oh, that.” I grinned up at him and batted my eyelashes. “Everywhere.”
He narrowed his eyes, disbelieving. “Really?”
“I’m serious. I don’t do so good with tickling.”
“Yeah?” He leaned forward, eyes roving over my body. I knew what that look was. He was going to test out that notion.
And I couldn’t wait.
“So, if I touched you on someplace like… here?” He reached out and touched the top of my hand.
No, it wasn’t ticklish. It was electric. I held in a breath, let it out slow. “Yes.”
His fingers walked lighter than a breeze up my forearm. “Here?”
I could’ve pulled away, told him to stop, but I didn’t want to. I felt heavy, like gravity was pressing me down harder than before. Pressing me toward him. “Yes,” I managed to breathe out, wiggling into his touch.
His fingers skirted my waist, and he gave it a little tweak. I burst out laughing, grabbed for his hand, but he was too quick. He took that wrist first, then the other, rendering me immobile. He dragged me up to standing, and as I stood there, with barely an inch between us, I felt the heat rushing off his body.
He stared down at me, his eyes dark with desire, hands holding me firm.
Then he lowered his mouth onto mine. There was no tentativeness. I got the feeling he never hesitated when he claimed what was his. No, he kissed me savagely from the first. I gasped against his mouth in surprise, but that didn’t stop him.
“You drive me crazy,” he said against my mouth as he walked me backward until a bench hit the back of my legs. “Crazy. Hard as I try, I can’t think of anything but you.”
I moved my hands to his face, pulling his mouth back down on mine. I knew exactly what he meant. I felt the same. A moment of sanity entered my mind and I pushed against his chest. “Are you sure?”
His nostrils flared as he shook his head. “I’m not sure about any of this. Emma.”
It was the first time he’d ever said my name. I leaned into it, loving the way the M sound vibrated on his lips, long and low and sexy.
I wasn’t sure about any of this, either, but at that point, I no longer cared.
Hands on my shoulders, he pressed me down until I sat on the bench before kneeling in front of me. I was surprised when he did nothing more. He just buried his face in my neck, not doing anything but breathing into my sweaty skin.
And I understood. He was still at war with himself. He was trying to find the willpower to leave. A part of him felt like what we were doing was wrong. Because he was a good man. An honorable man. I knew that down in my core.
Across the way, in the workout mirror, I saw him kneeling before me, his strong back muscles rippling under his shirt. I ran my hands under the sweaty material and up his spine to his shoulder blades, just relishing him as he held me. I felt his heat and his breath and was powerless to do anything but be his.
“I want you too, Locke,” I whispered, pressing my lips to his temple. “I don’t think it’s wrong. I think it’s inevitable.”
His only movement was to squeeze me tighter, and I watched his muscles flex in the mirror. “I’ve tried to stay away for you. I may own you, but not like this,” he murmured, not even a whisper, just a breath I felt on my ear. “But dammit, I can’t help it.”
Taking his face in my hands, I pushed until he broke free of me. I gave him a gentle smile before peeling my bra top over my head. I was sweaty, and a part of me wanted to rush to the shower before anything went further. But the other part of me knew this was exactly how our love making should be. Sweaty. Raw. Real.
“I want this,” I told him as I tossed the top to the side. “I want you. Ever since that night at my apartment, you’ve been all I can think about.”
His eyes darkened as they roved down my body, and he licked his lips. He ran a finger down my side, and it flirted with the edge of my gym shorts. “Emma, I need to taste you. Now. All I can think about is tasting you. Take these off.”
I let out a shaky breath. I looked down at my gym shorts and slipped them off, kicking them and my shoes into a pile beside my workout bra, leaving me naked while he was completely clothed. His eyes raked over my body, and I started to tremble. I was so hot, an unbearable need coiling in my belly.
There could be no mistaking it. It was desire, and only Locke Cage could quench it.
He reached out, sliding his fingers down my belly, which clenched at his touch. He positioned me in front of the weight bench and gently nudged me down. “Lie back,” he instructed. “Spread your legs.”
I did, anticipation causing me to tremble as he settled between my thighs. Our eyes met over the length of my body. When he hesitated, I whispered, “Please.” The word had barely formed and disappeared before his tongue, his amazing hot tongue, flicked over my clit. “Oh!” I gasped.
I lifted my head to watch in the floor-to-ceiling mirror. There, I saw his muscular back straining, his arms wrapped around my legs, pulling me closer to him. It was the most sensual moment of my life, watching his head bobbing as he ate me, moving in a steady rhythm, like he couldn’t get enough. Like I was his very last meal.
“Yeah, that’s right,” he breathed into my folds. “Damn, you’re sweet.”
I blushed at first at his words, but then all shame fell away. He liked this. I tossed my head back as he lapped away at my clit, unrelenting. I stifled a moan that wanted to be a scream because, god, I’d never felt anything like what he was doing to me.
I threw back my head. I writhed on the bench, arching and bucking in time to his tongue’s lapping. I coiled my fingers in his thick hair and pushed his face into me harder. And just when I thought it couldn’t get better, he slid a finger, then two into my depths.
And holy shit, I went insane. I screamed and bit down hard on my hand. “No!” I mumbled hoarsely. “Oh, god, no! No more!”
“You want me to stop?” he breathed into my folds, and I saw the effort it took him to pull away.
“No. Please, no.”
He grinned and slowly eased another finger into me, making me shudder uncontrollably. He slid them in and out in time to my thrusts against him as his mouth did wonderful things to my clit. I felt myself being pushed to the edge, to the point of no return, where resistance was impossible. Stifling what was inside me was impossible. I keened, arching and bucking against his face in a whirlwind.
“Oh God, Locke, please…” I found myself begging. Please, what? I didn’t even know what I wanted from him. Just more of this.
Suddenly, I was exploding. Screaming and sobbing and falling to pieces, with his fingers buried deep inside me. He carried me over to oblivion, holding tight to me as I spasmed and trembled uncontrollably.
Then he climbed up my shuddering body, the stubble around his mouth glistening. I blushed, hard and hot.
“Oh my god,” I mumbled. “Fuck.”
“Emma,” he said with a grin, and he kissed me again. “I’ve never tasted anything as sweet as you.”
I’d never had such a fervent lover before. Never had anyone been so willing to pleasure me. I thought of back home and the few men I’d known. No, not men. Boys. The ones I’d had in the back of their pickup trucks.
For some reason I’d never understand, something Brody said to me planted itself in my mind: You’re gonna be a long ways from Wintersburg.
The sense of fulfillment ebbed and was replaced by a deep, gaping hole of guilt.
Brody.
Guilt surged through me, followed quickly by shame.
What would my brother think if he knew what I was doing? Drivers only got one real chance to make it big. He’d told me that he didn’t value his one chance until after he lost it. He’d made a stupid mistake, one stupid mistake, trying to get out from behind that one car, and he’d lost everything.
What if this was my stupid mistake?
Locke felt amazing. He was hot, and irresistible, and… clearly a good lover. But entangling with my boss was so stupid. At best, it could cause all sorts of sticky feelings, resentment, awkwardness.
At worst, it could bring this whole thing down.
He lifted me off the bench to kiss him again, and I knew what came next. I looked at my naked body in the mirror and was so ashamed.
I pushed him away and leapt to my feet, panic seizing me. “You know…” I backed away, not even bothering to pick up my discarded clothes. “I think I don’t feel so well. I’d better…”
He reached for me, and every part of me wanted to step back into his arms. But I couldn’t. We couldn’t. I had to go.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered and fled to the locker room. I expected him to follow me, and when he didn’t, I leaned against the cool wall in relief. After another few moments, I splashed water on my face and quickly dressed in the extra clothes I kept there.
When I had no more reason to linger, I quietly opened the door and stepped back into the gym. My heart pounded hard when I realized he hadn’t left.
Instead, he was on the bench, breathing so hard he was groaning as he pressed the barbell over his head at a furious pace.
I didn’t disturb him. I slipped out of there without a sound, and went back, alone, to my apartment.