“’Sup, Deck?” I ask, sinking deeper into the icy water.

“I was coming to ask you that,” he says, taking a seat near the tub. His year-round California tan, bourbon-colored eyes, and thick dirty-blond hair make him a treat for the ladies. He’s devoted to only one woman, though, his girlfriend, Avery Hughes, a sports anchor based in New York.

“How’s your girl?” I lean over to adjust the setting on the ice tub.

“Still mine,” he answers with a swashbuckler’s grin.

“You gonna make an honest woman of her soon?”

“Oh, she’s already honest,” Deck returns. “But if you mean am I going to marry her . . .” He leaves the words hanging in the air, making me wonder as much as the media has about their relationship. Deck and Avery have been pretty private about it until recently.

“Then between you and me,” he says, the humor fading from his eyes and something more sober taking its place, “very soon. I can’t keep doing this. I need her with me.”

Avery is one of the most popular anchors on SportsCo, a large sports channel, second only to ESPN.

“Her contract is up for renegotiation this year,” Deck confides, leaning back in the chair. “She’s requesting the show record in LA instead of New York.”

“Bruh, that would be fantastic.”

“Yeah. This long-distance shit gets old quick.”

You telling me. I’ve only been doing it a few weeks, and I’m sick of it.

“How was it playing Cliff tonight?” he asks, skipping the bullshit and getting right to the heart of the matter. It’s one of my favorite things about Decker.

“Another day at the office.” I grin and tilt my head. “But it felt good shutting his shit down. We squashed ‘em.”

“That we did,” Decker agrees, chuckling darkly. “I’m glad it’s behind you.”

He hesitates, flicking a searching glance at me. “But I know you’re still dealing with the repercussions. What with Bridget’s show starting soon and Simone living on the East Coast now. You know I’ve navigated this. My ex was a real piece of work when we divorced. She up and moved on me, too.”

“Out here, right?”

“Yeah, out to LA when I was living and working in Connecticut.” He sucks his teeth and shakes his head. “Man, I was furious with her. I mostly didn’t want our daughter to see us fighting and to be dragged all over the place.”

“You hit the nail on the head with that one,” I mutter, passing a hand through the frigid water, hoping it might cool my rising temper as I think about all the tricks Bridget has pulled that ultimately hurt our daughter more than they hurt me.

“I know you guys were doing counseling and you lived there this summer,” he says. “That’s good. Keep putting your kid first, man. Even when Bridget takes the low road, which we’ve all seen is her default, take the high. Show your daughter over and over and in every way you can that she’s your priority. They’re in such a weird space at this age.”

“Tell me about it. Fourteen is hell.”

“Everything you’re doing now, even though it seems hard and maybe even like it’s not working, it’ll pay off later when your relationship with Simone remains intact.”

“That’s exactly what I needed to be reminded of. Thanks, Deck.”

He stands and daps me up, chuckling and pointing to the water. “You and the ice tubs. It’s a wonder your dick doesn’t freeze off.”

“Oh, it works great,” I assure him.

I still hear him laughing even after the door closes behind him. I drop my head back to the lip of the tub. My dick definitely still works. With this long-distance relationship, it would come in handy if it didn’t. I’m sure there’s a masturbation joke in there somewhere, but I’m too tired and horny to work it out. At least I should get to see Lotus for a few hours when she’s done at the hospital. Speaking of which . . . where’s my damn phone?

“In the locker room,” I remind myself. She could be trying to call me now with an update on the baby. “I’ll grab it when I’m done.”

I’ve got another five minutes of recovery in here before I can go.

The door opens behind me again.

“Forget something, Deck?” I ask, eyes still closed, absorbing the healing effects of the glacial water even while it bites my skin.

When there’s no answer, I look over my shoulder to the training room door.

Lotus.

“Hi,” she says, her voice deep, welcome, husky. Exactly as I remember it, except last time it was hoarse from screaming after a marathon of fucking on my last day in New York.

I haven’t been back in Cali long, but it feels like months since I’ve seen her. Desire, need . . . fuck it. I’ll say it to myself though we haven’t said it explicitly yet to one another . . . love intensifies the longing and stretches out the time.

I have found the one whom my soul loves.

My beloved is mine, and I am his. I’m yours, Kenan.

I’ve replayed those moments and the sentiments we borrowed from King Solomon a hundred times in my head. Turning them over, analyzing them to see if there is any way she was not saying she loved me.

“Hi, yourself,” I finally reply, unable and unwilling to withhold my shit-eating grin any longer. “How’d you get back here?”

“Oh,” she says, leaning against the training room door. “August owed me a favor.”

“Yeah?” I ask, taking her in. The platinum hair is golden–brown again. I can’t keep up with her hairstyles and colors. A simple royal blue sundress ties at one shoulder, leaving the other exposed, and follows the curves of her body faithfully from breast to ankle.

“Yeah,” she continues, tilting her head to the side. “I practically delivered his son.”

A happy laugh barges past my lips. “Holy shit! So it is a boy?”

“Yup, secret’s out,” she says, joy lifting some of the fatigue from her eyes. “Michael Spencer West.”

“Nice. I got a stick I’ve been saving for Rook.”

“A stick?” One sleek brow lifts and she turns the lock, the sound echoing in the otherwise silent room. Even in the frigid water, my cock goes hard. “You mean a cigar?”

“Usually.” I don’t relinquish her heated stare. “But a stick could mean a lot of things now that I think about it.”

“Hmmmmm.” She frowns, takes the few steps that bring her to me beside the ice tub. “What else could a stick be?”

“Well, it could be . . .”

Words melt in my mouth when Lotus unties the knot at her shoulder and the dress falls to the ground. She’s completely nude, and with me sitting in the tub, I’m eye level with one tight, pierced nipple.

“You were saying?” she asks, brows brunched like she can’t imagine why I stopped talking. “Something about driving stick?”

At her modification, I release a strangled laugh. She leans her elbows on the tub, serving up two dark nipples I can’t resist a minute longer. Fuck flirting. I lean forward, taking the pierced one into my mouth, and watch her face. Her eyes drift closed and a shiver trembles through her body. She grips my head, pressing me harder into her ripe curves.

“I missed you, Button,” I mumble against the silky skin between her breasts before shifting my mouth to the other nipple.

“I’m picking up on that,” she says, her breath stilted. She pulls back and uses the step against the tub to climb up.

“Lotus, babe, no. It’s freezing in here,” I warn her.

“Scared you can’t get it up in the cold?” she asks, standing on the step and looking down on me for once.

“Oh, it’s already up.” I spread my legs so she can see the erection in my trunks through the water. “But for real, babe. You don’t just jump into this. It takes a long time to acclima . . .”

I trail off when she tests the water with one small foot before climbing in and sitting on the opposite side, facing me with her breasts bobbing on the water’s surface.

“Oh, this is sooo cold.” She fakes a shiver. “I don’t know how you big boys stand it.”

“You’re not human.” I laugh. “Maybe you are a witch.” I extend my arms toward her, and she takes the two steps through the water to reach me. “My witch.”

I kiss her, and the first taste of my sweet girl does things to me. Of course, my dick goes even harder despite the freezing water, but everything else melts. There’s a wall I erect when the season starts—a firewall of sorts to insulate me from the constant scrutiny, the pressure that never lets up, and all the drama that has nothing to do with ball. It’s what allows me to focus so completely, almost to the exclusion of all else.

Against Lotus, that wall doesn’t stand a chance.

It’s down and she’s storming the gates, inside, invading, marauding all my defenses. My attention, my thoughts are her willing captives.

“God, baby.” I can’t get enough, pulling her mouth open wider, spearing both hands into her hair to hold her head still so I can eat my fill. “What you do to me.”

Her hunger rises to match mine, her small hands gripping my head and her eager tongue delving in aggressively, devouring me back. She spreads her thighs over mine, rubs her breasts into my chest, mewling like a little cat in heat, scalding me in arctic water. She tugs at the string on my trunks. With her hands shaking, she jerks them down over my hips.

Damn, that’s cold.

“I don’t have a condom,” I mutter into the wet, searing heat of our kiss.

“Good,” she says, turning her back on me, catching my eyes over her shoulder, positioning herself over me. “You don’t need one.”

In one swift move, she takes me into her body, offering sanctuary, and we share a gasp. The contrast between the freezing water and the wet heat of her pussy squeezing me, the muscles contracting to keep me, steals my breath and most of my sanity.