Chapter Seven
MILLER
On the outside, I was calm.
On the inside, I was a mess.
Because I was being faced with another choice, one I was being forced to make.
Date her. Don’t touch her.
Protect her. Don’t touch her.
Spend time with her.
Fall for her.
Lust for her.
Want her.
Do. Not. Touch. Her.
I suddenly needed the first preseason game and practices like I needed my next breath of air. The distraction, the pain, the stress would be welcome after spending the last twenty-four hours with a girl I couldn’t have—story of my life—and didn’t deserve. It was the first time since Emerson I felt it.
That deep—pull.
The connection that you feel without using words.
And I wasn’t just confused, but angry as fuck that the one girl who was hands-off was the only one who had managed to pull it out of me.
Months ago, I’d slept with her and told her it was just once.
I’d lied to her.
I’d lied to myself.
So I did it again that same night to prove that I had control of the situation, and then I sent her packing to prove that I didn’t need her—or anyone.
And when she left, all I felt was panic, and a surging anger that she could remove herself from me so easily when I still felt her skin on my skin—when I tasted her in my dreams.
Shit, I was going to die before this was over with.
“Did we miss anything?” I pulled out my own chair since Kins had already seated herself. The restaurant was incredibly loud for a high-end burger joint. It was dark enough that I knew we wouldn’t be recognized, at least not by our faces. Our sizes, however, often gave us away.
Because what else did a few guys who were over six foot five do with their lives other than play football?
Sanchez gave me a look that said not to bring up the subject, while Em made a cutting motion across her neck.
“Explain to me again, what a quarterback does, other than throw a stupid ball?” Harley directed the question to Jax.
“Oh shit,” I said under my breath then elbowed Kins in the ribs.
She glanced at me and mouthed, “What?”
“I take it you’re not a football fan?” I reached for a fry, thank God they’d already ordered something, I was starving.
Harley grinned over at me. “Oh, I love football. I just don’t like offensive players.”
I choked on my fry while Sanchez murmured a curse under his breath.
“And in saying that, you do realize”—Jax’s jaw did that scary-as-shit ticking motion—“that every guy at this table is offense?”
Harley looked around and shrugged. “Look, I’m sure what you guys do is very hard, but the defense is more aggressive to me. Sorry. Plus they’re bigger.” She eyed Jax’s arms and gave him a sheepish smile.
“There will be blood,” Sanchez said under his breath while Emerson kicked me under the table. What, like I knew how to make things better?
“Funny, how you’d insult something you know shit about,” Jax said in a way-too-calm voice. “I guess that would kind of be like me showing up at your job and telling you that you were doing it wrong. What is it you said you did?”
“Athletic gear. I model it. I also teach yoga around the world . . .” She leaned in, until I thought Jax was going to chicken out and back up, but he shocked me when he met her halfway, his face completely void of emotion. “You gonna show up at my job and bend over?”
Emerson covered her face with her hands. Sanchez let out a low whistle, and I couldn’t peel my eyes from the train wreck.
Jax didn’t move a muscle, instead he tilted his head and finally smirked. “You know, it’s kind of funny . . .”
“What?” Harley’s eyes narrowed.
“How much you don’t know about football, life, men—or probably even your own occupation. Hey, Sanchez—”
Sanchez cursed. “What?”
“How many hours a week do you do yoga?”
I bit down on my lip to keep from laughing.
I knew he only went to yoga because Emerson made him go, because she was convinced it would help keep him from getting injured again. The guy was afraid to go by himself, so he forced both me and Jax to go with him.
It took us one week of getting our asses kicked to beg the coach to hire someone full-time to work with the trainer and the team.
We’d been doing yoga twice a week for the past six months.
And Jax, well, he’d taken to it like a pro.
He was the perfectionist of the three of us.
“Ah.” Sanchez reached for a fry. “I’d say no more than three to four hours a week, nothing crazy.”
Harley jerked back. “You?”
“Us.” Jax grinned, reached for a fry, and shoved it in her open mouth. “So maybe think before speaking next time, or just sit there and look pretty, it might gain you more fans.”
She chomped down on the fry.
And Jax waved over our waiter. “You guys ready to order?”
“That went well,” I whispered to Kins.
She pressed her fingers against her temples and whispered back, “Maybe I should have told her to start with the sex and end with the talking.”
“There’s always next time.” I winked.
“Don’t feel bad”—I patted Kins on the leg—“at least he was so pissed at us for inviting her that he completely dropped all his anger about the kiss.”
Kinsey groaned and slammed her fist against the couch cushion. After dinner, Jax had told her she had the apartment, he was going to their parents’ and he’d see her there in the morning.
It was his way of saying he needed space.
I’d dropped her off and then followed her in because she refused to go any farther unless she had backup—apparently she was scared of the dark. I went into every fucking room and turned on each light to make sure someone wasn’t waiting to take her to a foreign country and sell her as a sex slave.
I’d finished the last room ten minutes ago.
Ten minutes ago, I should have left.
Instead, I sat.
Damn it, why was I torturing myself?
“He fled his own apartment, Miller. I’d say he’s pretty pissed. Is it so much to ask for him to focus on his own life for a minute? To have fun?”
“There has to be a story there.” I pulled the remote from her hand and changed the channel. What was with her and that Ballers show? It was offensive, and while completely realistic, just a reminder of how the world viewed us, or maybe how the entire league viewed themselves.
She tucked her feet up under her butt, which was now covered by the gray sweats she’d changed into while I’d been playing private security detail. “He’s just . . . he functions better when he can compartmentalize things. When he can’t, when areas of his life blur, he gets frustrated. He’s hypersensitive about dating the wrong girl . . . almost as sensitive as he is about finding the right one and not being enough, I think.” She frowned. “Our parents . . . they have a pretty awesome relationship. Honestly,” she said, shrugging one shoulder, “it’s a lot to live up to—and a pretty big dream to follow when you’re not only the leader of America’s team, but their perfect captain, the golden boy, the one who doesn’t mess up, who rarely drinks, who visits hospitals on his days off and wants world peace.” She giggled. “Okay, so maybe he got drunk last year when you guys won, and he’s never said anything about world peace, but you get what I mean, right? You guys have this huge magnifying glass on your lives—I think sometimes, because of that, he’s afraid to live it.”
Guilt flashed across her face before she added, “But, he made a promise he’d try—a couple of years ago—so he should at least follow through on his promise to date.”
“And stop locking you in closets before big dances like prom.”
“Yeah, well, now I have my big bad boyfriend to fight him for me.” She winked and jerked the remote from my hand and flipped it back to Ballers. “So, no monsters?”
“Only the ones I told to hide out and wait until you were asleep to make themselves known. Hope it’s cool that I told them they could help themselves to some soda.” I grinned down at her. God, she was pretty, with her makeup-free face, shiny dark hair, and full kissable lips.
I adjusted myself without thinking.
Only to find her watching me.
Hell.
I blew out an exasperated breath, knowing I couldn’t really stand yet, not if I didn’t want her to know—hell, she already knew, it was painfully obvious where my thoughts were headed.
“Thanks, friend.” She said it again to remind me, maybe to remind us.
I nodded. “Anytime.”
“You know . . . since we’re friends, you can stay a bit longer if you want. It doesn’t have to mean anything, just that you’re willing to take guard duty very seriously.”
“Nah.” I shook my head. “That’s probably not a good idea.”
“I know,” she whispered. “Honest moment?”
“Honest moment,” I repeated.
“I could never live by myself, I get too freaked out.”
“And since Jax is gone . . .”
“How about if we pretend to be roommates with absolutely no sexual past who decide to have a slumber party where no touching takes place?” she pleaded. “I’m sorry, I swear I didn’t plan this. I just, now that I’m faced with you leaving, I’m thinking about all of my escape plans and weapons.”
“Give me one escape plan, one weapon example, and I’ll stay.” I crossed my arms.
“You’ll make fun of me.”
“Probably.”
She growled, “Fine, so my first escape plan”—she leaped off the couch and ran to the door—“say someone breaks the door down. I’m all the way down the hall, so there’s this weird hiding spot near the hall closet.” She ran down toward the hall closet, I chased after her.
Kinsey bent over and pulled the screen off one of the vents, then tossed me a flashlight she’d hidden in there along with a prepaid TracFone. “Hold these.”
“Why the hell do you need a flashlight?”
“Intruders always turn off the power first.”
“Shit, I need to talk to Jax about letting you watch TV at night.”
“HLN is my jam,” she teased and winked.
“Never say that sentence again.” I pointed the flashlight at her. “Where to?”
“Here.” She crawled across the floor. “Hurry, get down.”
I fell to my knees, and they cracked against the hard wood floor. “This is crazy. You know that, right?”
“Shhh.” She kicked my shoulder with her foot. “This is survival.”
I grinned; she was cute. Psychotic, but cute.
“Here it is.” She finally made it to a small bookcase, and next to it, a nook, a cupboard that couldn’t hold half of my body. “I put a lock on it from the inside.”
“You?” I pointed the flashlight at her. “Put a lock on? By yourself?”
“So I like Home Depot! What of it?”
“You’re hearing yourself, right? This entire conversation? Crawling across the floor? Why all the fear?”
Her face fell. And then she stood. The moment was lost. “You’re right, we should—”
“Friend.” I spoke the word so close I nearly touched her lips, then brought her back down to the floor. “Let’s try the truth, just this once. You talk, I’ll listen.
“Sometimes the truth is scarier than the lie, Miller.”
“Sometimes it is, Kins.”
“How about we leave it at this . . . It’s important to use every minute of the life you’re given, and I’m a lot like my brother in that, when faced with what I can control, I want to control it. I want to know that if someone breaks down that door, I did everything in my power to save myself.” Her eyes shut closed as she whispered, “Because life isn’t full of people who are willing to save you—sometimes, all you have is you.”
My heart stuttered. I felt its cadence sputter to a stop as I cupped her face with my hands. “That’s the fucking saddest thing I’ve ever heard, Kins.”
“The truth can be sad too . . .” she admitted.
And maybe I had no right.
But I promised myself. In that moment, that if it ever came down to me or her—it would be me. Because girls like Kinsey, ones who blindly trusted, who saw the best in everyone, who made it their job to find happiness, they were the ones who deserved a savior, someone to fight for them, so that in the end, if it came down to it, they’d die knowing that it wasn’t because they were alone.
The sound of the door opening had me leaping to my feet.
She made a startled noise and then pulled me into a bedroom, shut off the lights, tugged me into a walk-in closet, and pressed a hand over my mouth.
“Kins?” Jax’s voice definitely had my heart kick-starting again.
“Shit,” I hissed. “If he finds me in here.”
“We’ll tell him we were playing hide-and-seek!” Kins elbowed me.
“With my dick?” I hissed back at her. “Because you know that’s exactly what he’s going to assume!”
“Kins?” he called again.
“Shit, your phone,” I whispered in her ear. “Where is it?”
“Pocket.”
I quickly shoved my hands in both of her pockets, and then groaned when I slid it in the back pocket, cupping her ass in the process. She gave a little yelp. I squeezed, unable to fucking help myself.
Because that woman’s ass.
“Miller, focus,” she whispered, holding her hand out.
I gave her the phone, but kept my hand in place.
And told myself it was because any sort of movement could make noise, even though we were talking.
She turned her phone on silent.
And I was suddenly thanking God that I’d left mine in the car.
My keys, however . . .
“Your keys.” She started patting me down like I was getting searched at the airport. And even though I knew my keys were on the kitchen counter, I let her. “I can’t find them.”
“Look harder.” I smirked down at her busy hands as they moved slower this time, over my body and then stopped when they reached the front. “Sorry?”
“You liar!” She smacked my chest. “You don’t have them, do you?”
“I forgot.” My smile was firmly in place while my dick was ready to launch an all-out war against my jeans and break free.
I caught her hand before she slapped me, then the other until both of her wrists were pinned above her head.
Footsteps sounded.
I slowly backed her up against the far wall of the closet, behind a few winter coats, and pressed my body against hers.
Kinsey’s eyes didn’t leave mine.
Our bodies fit perfectly.
I already knew that though.
I’d been inside hers and I was still pissed off over the loss of her heat, of those legs wrapped around me.
Of the tight way she held on.
“Stop that,” she whispered.
“I’m not doing anything.”
“You’re . . .” She looked down. “You are.”
“I can’t control everything, not with you, Kins, sorry.”
The footsteps got louder.
The door to her bedroom opened.
A light flicked on.
The closet light was still off.
Her worried expression wasn’t helpful. Then again, neither was the fact that if he found us, he’d assume the worst, because we were blatantly hiding from him together.
Tears welled in her eyes.
And suddenly it occurred to me. This was more than fake dating.
More than her dad’s sickness.
More than Anderson.
I just didn’t know how the dots were connected and why it was so important that I protect her.
“Look at me.” I licked my lips. “Just focus on me.”
She nodded her head and didn’t blink.
Minutes later, the sound of the front door closing echoed through the apartment.
I exhaled.
My body on fire.
Ready.
Kinsey stood up on her tiptoes and kissed me on the cheek. “Thank you for that.”
“The pat down? Anytime.” I tried joking when all I wanted to do was strip her naked and slam her against that same wall, enter her with all the enthusiasm that had been building up between us, and sink between her legs, live there for a few years in bliss, and repeat the process.
“You know what I mean.” She held my hand and led me out of the closet.
And later that night, when she fell asleep on the couch, she was still holding my hand.
She might as well have been holding my fucking heart.