Ash

All through practice, while trying to keep my head in the game, my eyes on the girls, all I could think of was Bronwyn. Half of it was with a not-insubstantial effort to keep from getting an erection. The other half was with a crazy amount of guilt, shame, and self-reproach.

How could I have done that? And more so, how could I have enjoyed it? Enjoyed it so very, very much.

I’m pacing my room despite it bothering my hip because I can’t sit still. If I sit still, then I’ll have to stay sitting—I’ve entered the time of day where I have to keep going. An object in motion stays in motion and all that.

I am an object in motion toward hell for doing this. In all of my years managing and coaching, I have never, ever been inappropriate with a player. Have I had crushes? Of course. They’re incredible athletes, we have this major thing in common, and there have been some that just hit that spot—you know the one that gives you butterflies? Makes your heart beat kinda funny and the stuff in your pants sit up and take notice? Yeah, that. I feel that way about Bronwyn. Have felt that way about her for a long time.

To act on it, though? That’s different. And I don’t do that. Shouldn’t do that. So when she gets here I’ll give her a speech which I spent much of practice composing in my head. “Bronwyn, you’re a beautiful girl and yes, I am attracted to you. You’re an amazing hockey player and I have a great deal of respect and admiration for you on and off the ice. If things were different, you would be the kind of woman I would want. Things being as they are, I apologize profusely, and I’m sure you understand why nothing remotely like that can happen again. Ever.”

She’s a rational person, and she’ll understand. It’ll be fine.

Except that when I open the door, my mind goes completely blank of anything but Bronwyn, what a knock-out she is, and the soft breathy way she says, “Hi.”

I am fucked. Completely and utterly fucked.

Bronwyn

The first second Ash opens the door, he’s standing there looking all resolute and unwavering. But he barely gets his mouth open before he . . . wavers. Me? I say something really fricking brilliant. “Hi.”

“Hey, come on in.”

He ushers me inside and I don’t miss him peeking into the hallway to make sure no one saw me come in. Once I’m inside, I plop on the bed where we slept last night and kick off my shoes so I can sit cross-legged, even though as soon as I do, I realize it must seem like an invitation. Or a demand, which it isn’t. I just wanted to sit, and this is where I feel the most comfortable. Ash clearly does not, because he paces and it’s freaking me out.

“Could you . . . could you sit? You’re making me nervous.”

Ash blanches—is it really that bad? Asking for him to sit down so I don’t have to follow him around the room and so he doesn’t make himself dizzy? But ultimately, he doesn’t protest, just lowers himself gingerly next to me, which is when I realize.

“Oh, fuck, Ash, I’m sorry. I didn’t think . . .”

He waves me off even as he’s grimacing, gritting his teeth. “It’s fine. I can sit.”

Although judging by the way he mutters, “I can fucking well sit, goddammit,” he can’t, actually. When he’s lowered himself all the way down, he’s white as a sheet and breathing hard. Whatever he’s dealing with, it’s not one of those exaggerated injuries like those men’s futbollers trying to get a card pulled for someone nudging them. This is killing him. How can I help?

“This, is, um, maybe too much, but I’m . . . I’m already tensing up about our game tomorrow—” Switzerland. They’re a bit of a surprise to have made the semis, but I still think we can take them. It’s just a matter of keeping our heads in the game. And my head is more on Ash. “Could we lie down for a bit and just . . . cuddle?”

A brief wave of relief crosses his face and then he’s cringing again. “Yeah, sure. Just let me—”

He leans forward to untie his shoes and there is yet more swearing. Jeez. In trying to get us lying down where he’d be more comfortable, I’ve inevitably made him less comfortable.

“No,” I say, sliding off the bed and onto my knees at his feet, grabbing for his laces, and there’s a sharp inhale of his breath as I look up to see what the big deal is. No, it’s not a regular thing for me to get on my knees for men, and I wouldn’t have made a habit of it with Brody—just for the occasional blow jobs—but Ash isn’t going to see this as demeaning. Sexy, maybe, but not something that makes me less even as I untie his shoes and slip each one off his feet in turn. It’s a service, sure, but also caring. I like it.

“B, you don’t have to do that. I can’t have you doing that.”

I look up at him from my place at his feet, and I cock my head. “You didn’t ask me to do this, I volunteered. If I thought you’d be a dick about it, I wouldn’t be here right now and I sure as hell wouldn’t be doing this. I’m not trying to make you feel less-than, either. I’m trying to help a person who I care about, who’s in pain, be in less pain. Would you do this for me if our positions were reversed?”

He’s looking at me with that intense gaze of his, and he croaks out an answer. “I would, in a heartbeat.”

“Then I don’t really see the problem.” And honestly, for reasons I can’t explain, I’m comfortable down here. Especially when he reaches out a hand and strokes my hair. I probably shouldn’t be getting so much pleasure out of this, but it’s nice, comfortable, and some of the feeling like I’ve got the weight of the world on me has melted into the floor. Because I like it, I shift from my knees to sitting mermaid style and set my head on his knee, wrap my arms loosely around his calf and ankle.

I sit for a while, enjoying the quiet, trusting Ash to not read too much into this or to take advantage, just give this to me because I need it right now. After about fifteen minutes, I feel like Bronwyn jelly and I’d really like to take a nap, rest up for the remainder of our team obligations for the day. They’re not physically strenuous, but it takes a lot of mental energy to study up on our next opponent. Also, it’ll be fun to watch the men’s game, but we’ll have to be on because no doubt the cameras will be on us some.

Getting my bones in order, I crawl up to join Ash on the bed and flop down on the wall side trying not to jostle him as he lies back slowly, cautiously and then gathers me to him with an arm around my shoulders.

It’s oddly comfortable after just a day; he feels and smells like home to me, and I can breathe here. I don’t want to ruin it, but this isn’t technically what I came here for. “So, you wanted to talk?”

He inhales, his chest rising under my cheek, and I let my hand creep further up his ribcage, which makes his breath hitch.

“Yes. I did. I think we should. Right?”

“I suppose.”

“So, uh, about the whole, uh . . .”

“Kissing?” It’s both frustrating and fun that I can’t see his face. I can imagine it, especially when I walk my fingers over to a button on his shirt and toy with it.

“Yeah, that.” His voice is scratchy with strain, and I’m taking entirely too much pleasure from being able to make him sound like that just from the small movement. “That, uh, it wasn’t a good idea. I’m your coach, and I shouldn’t be taking advantage of you like that, and I—”

Where moments before I’d had only warm fuzzy comfortable feelings, irritation flares. I shake off his arm around me and push up on my elbows to look him in the face. His surprised face. “You know, I’m really fucking tired of dudes telling me what I should do. I don’t mind it on the ice, because you know what you’re talking about and I trust you out there, but in here? Do you really think I’d be here if I didn’t want to be? Do you think I would be lying in a bed with you if I felt like you were manipulating me? I don’t. If anything, I feel bad because you’re probably feeling guilty for betraying your professional moral code.”

I wish I had a ruler to slap into my hand to emphasize my points while I school him, but given how he’s looking at me, I don’t need one.

“I am, some,” he concedes while looking up at me with wide eyes. It’s not just surprise, though, there’s something else there. Like he wants me badly, but doesn’t think he should. Like he’s hungry, and I’m a nice ripe apple that he’s drooling over but can’t quite bring himself to pick. I want to be picked, I want him to sink his teeth into me.

“Did you mean it when you said I could have anything I wanted? That it was just sitting there, waiting for me?”

“Of course I did.”

“Then give me this.”

I lean over him, bearing my weight with my hands on either side of his head, and kiss him. He hesitates, and if he pushes me away, I’m going to have a serious case of tomato-face. Also rage-face, because I’m not a little girl who doesn’t know my own mind. If this will cost him too much, I’ll back off, but I think he wants this, too.

After an unbearably long time of pressing my lips to his, he gives in and starts to kiss me back, his tongue licking against the seam of my lips, asking for entrance to my mouth which I’m only too happy to grant. It makes my insides warm, makes blood flow to the pertinent parts of my body, makes my breathing come hard.

We kiss for a while, learning each other, exploring, tasting. His hands settle at my waist, tentatively, as if he’s not sure what else he’s allowed to do even though we’re pretty well ravaging each other with our mouths. It’s not relaxing like sitting at his feet or laying by his side, but it’s tensing an entirely different part of my body, spaces I don’t mind so much being wound up. With a break between us, I beg, “Touch me, Ash. I want you to touch me. Under my clothes. Everywhere.”

Again with the hesitation, but I don’t stop, just kiss him again, hoping my genuine enthusiasm will coax him into doing what I’ve asked. I don’t want him to doubt that I want this, I want him. One of his hands finds a firmer grasp on my waist, and the other slips between my shirt and my back, his fingertips skimming along my skin, up to my bra strap.

Unhook it, unhook it. But I don’t say it; I can be patient. Sort of. Sometimes. Fuck that. I sit up, straddle his thigh and pull my shirt over my head. He’s clasping me at my waist again and clenches his jaw when I reach back and do it myself, and when I strip the cotton from my chest and my arms, drop it on the floor, he mutters, “Fuck me.”

“That’s the plan.” My chipper reply earns me another choked noise as I grip the placket of his shirt, and tug. “Can I take this off?”

I love the groan he makes, and love even more how he responds not with words, but with pulling the shirt out of his waistband while I attack his buttons. When it’s joined my shirt on the floor, I lean over him and gasp, because our chests against one another feels as good as I’d ever hoped for.

Scratchy and soft at the same time, I take advantage of the sensation until my nipples are drawn up and taut, aching to be touched, and blood pooling in my breasts and between my legs. Which would explain why I start to rock against his thigh, pleading for contact and friction.

Then he’s gripping the sides of my ribcage, pressing me up far enough to slip his hands between our chests and work at my breasts, kneading and taking my nipples between his knuckles to tweak that makes me grind against him even harder.

“Inside me, I want you inside me now.” It’s possible I shouldn’t be so very horny—it’s not like I’ve had any sort of dry spell—but even when I’m a mess mentally or emotionally, sex has always had a way of being a way to sort myself out some. Physical intimacy and also using something I’m good at to handle things I’m not so great it—all good things.

I roll onto my back, unbutton and unzip my jeans, shove them over my hips and kick the lot to the end of the bed. Then Ash is turning to hover over me, but he’s got that pained look on his face. Stupid, stupid, Bronwyn, when are you going to learn? When are you going to be as considerate of him as he is of you?

I stop him with a hand on his chest. “Is having me like this going to hurt you?”

I can hear the grit of his teeth. “It’s fine.”

“It’s not fine. If it’s going to hurt you more than you already hurt, it’s not fine. We’ll figure out another way.”

“But—”

“No buts, Levenson.” I use my hand to shove him onto his back. “I don’t want to worry about whether I’m hurting you while I’m getting fucked. It would be distracting. So tell me, would this be better? Me on top?”

His glass-green eyes narrow, but he doesn’t argue with me. “Yes, that would be better.”

“Cool. Do you have condoms?”

He gestures with his head to the bedside table and I lunge to slide open the drawer, pull out a strip of them. “Got your quota, I see?”

Ash barks a laugh. “Yeah, sure do. I don’t know why, I wasn’t planning on . . . Just a fit of optimism I guess?”

“You think six is optimistic? I think we’re lucky there’s two of us so it’s double. Think we can do it?”

His eyes roll back in his head and he blows a breath audibly through his mouth. “I don’t know, but that’s the kind of challenge I can get behind.”

I rip one off the strip and toss it on the bed, but as eager as I am for him, there’s something I want to do first.

Ash

“Pants off.”

Holy hell, my head is going to explode. She’s like a block of C4, and her combination of being bossy in a caretaking way, but also needing me so badly is intoxicating, makes a chain reaction set off in my brain. She’ll be lucky if I last at all once I get inside of her.

I expect her to unbutton and lower my fly, tear open the packet, take me in hand and roll the latex over me while I throb and try not to spill in her grip, but she doesn’t. We work together to get my pants all the way off and then she settles herself over one of my thighs again . . . and goddamn, lowers her head to take me in her mouth. If I thought I was in danger of losing it before, I’m skating on the edge of indignity now. Not that anyone could blame me, with her dark hair making a curtain around her face, framing the pretty picture of her pink mouth sliding up and down my cock, her dark lashes fanned over her cheeks until she looks up at me with those gold eyes.

She wraps a firm hand around me before she pops off. “I meant to ask if this is okay, but I . . . got distracted.”

Her gaze darts back to where she’s leisurely stroking me and when she moistens her lips I just about die. “So can I? Do you like this?”

“I . . .” Fucking hell, why do I sound like I swallowed a frog? “Yes, I like this very much, and of course you can, but . . .”

Any protest I was going to make dies in my throat as she swallows me down, her tongue slicking a sense-blowing spiral over the head and down my shaft, like almost all the way down, so far she has to unwrap some of her fingers to make room.

The woman has no discernable gag reflex, and it’s taking all of my willpower not to blow in her mouth. Christ on a cracker, cannot think about spilling in her mouth, because that renders my mind into gray matter Jell-O. Horny brain matter soup. Partly because of what she’s doing, but also her generosity and easy acceptance of my limitations. Some of the women I’ve dated haven’t been as easygoing about it. They’d made me feel like a disappointment and a burden. Bronwyn makes it seem like more of a game: how can we make this work, how do we both get what we want?

Gratitude has me slipping my fingers into her loose hair to offer affection, greed has me gathering it away from her face so I can watch her while she’s sucking me. She draws off again, and I think I’ve gone too far, even though I was careful not to tug or yank. There’s a glow in her eyes that tells me this is in no way pity head, but that she’s very much enjoying it, and then her swollen mouth tugs into a wicked grin.

“You can pull, you know. I like it. Not like jerk me around, but a little strain on my scalp?” She hums with pleasure, her eyes closing in a long blink, and shit, yes, I can do that. With a graze of her breasts over my aching dick, she settles again and when she takes me in her mouth again, I do as I’ve been given permission to, wrap my fingers in her soft hair and draw my hands back until she makes a pleased little moan around my cock. I have died. Died and gone to heaven.

After a few more minutes, I cannot take it anymore, at least not without this being over, and I don’t want to disappoint her. Not after what she’s given to me, not after what she’s asked for.

“B, if you want to come with me inside you, we, uh, have to move to the next portion of this program.”

There’s the vibration of a laugh around me, and I have to brace myself in order not to just spurt down her throat. But there are no insults, no roll of her eyes, and though I would so not mind if she took this all the way, I like that she’s determined to hold onto what she wants, too. Finally she’s rolling the latex over me, and settling herself over my hips. Since I can basically stay still, it’s not so painful. Way less painful than a bunch of the alternatives, at any rate, and I’m willing to suffer a little for this.

“I can’t . . . I can’t move a lot, but you can ride me as hard as you want. I’ll be okay, promise.”

She gives me a look that says she doesn’t quite believe me but I don’t want to leave room for argument. “Look, this is one of the best options. Yes, it’ll be a little painful, but I’m deciding it’s worth it, and I want it. If you get to make that call, so do I.”

I grab her hips and pull her in and thank the hockey gods that she grips my cock to angle me right while she sinks down. It feels like every good thing I’ve ever asked for, and while she starts out at a gentle rock, she doesn’t stay that way for long. Soon she’s thrusting back, spreading her legs as wide as she can, and working her clit against my pelvis until she’s panting and digging her short nails into my shoulders.

“God, Ash, you feel so fucking good. Yes, oh my god, yes.”

Which is when I feel it, the pulse of her internal muscles gripping me, urging me toward my own climax. I hold off as long as I can so she can rock out the rest of her orgasm on me, but it’s not long until I’m digging my fingers into her hips and holding her still so I can make a few painful but also, god, exquisitely pleasurable thrusts up into her slick core.

Dead, dead, I’m fucking dead, my mind blown wide open, all thoughts of anything but her scattering to the corners of the earth. After we’ve both eked out every ounce of pleasure from coming, she rolls to my side and I use a tissue to clean up while she pulls up a blanket from the foot of the bed and drapes it over both of us.

That is not how I anticipated that conversation going, but if this is how I can help get her through the rest of the SIGs, I’m not going to argue.