Page 48 of Wicked Player

Which meant, as my hand drifted down to my core, already swollen and throbbing, it didn’t take long to get myself off.

I came, crying out Gage’s name.

“Shit.” I reached for the soap and dumped way too much onto my loofah. My voice trembled as badly as my shaking legs.

I was dead wrong. The memories of Gage might have been enough to get me off, but it wasn’t nearly what I needed.

My body needed him.

And now that I knew who he was, how would that ever happen again?

* * *

“That’sall from the Rough Riders’ stadium, where dozens of children and families will be attending this Sunday’s home game, right from this very own field level suite. I’m Elizabeth Hayes with XTCP. Back to you in the station, Amanda.”

I grinned, fake as fake could be, and waited until Jason flipped his standard two-finger salute, letting me know we were clear.

Oh my God. A day in hell couldn’t be worse than the afternoon I’d spent.

Hours. Hours upon hours watching padded and suited up mountainous men grunt and shove and tackle and run and throw.

Why had I never been a football fan before?

I’d missed too much of my life spending it in the kitchen with my mom getting manicures and learning how to braid hair. I should have been on my dad’s lap, learning the ins and outs of the games so I wasn’t so lost.

Today was too much. An open practice where I sat and focused, not only on the upcoming weekend where I’d be forced to watch the game from that field level suite I mentioned in my broadcast, but three hours of seeing Gage run and catch a ball, smack a player’s ass, shove another to the side.

His smile was wicked but focused, his intensity a notch above everyone else, but he still maintained a playfulness that made watching him love the game he played for a living and multi-million dollar contracts and endorsements, so damn enthralling.

My panties were wet. It couldn’t be helped.

I’d rubbed one out to thoughts of Gage more times than I could count over the weekend. It was amazing my knuckles on my fingers hadn’t locked up.

Good God. He brought that lusting on himself with not only the things he’d done to me at Velvet, but by the way he moved on the field.

It shouldn’t have hurt that he hadn’t looked my way. Nope. Not even once. He’d sauntered over to Connor and answered a few questions. He’d even grinned happily down at little miss perky syndicate reporter. But me? As soon as I went to ask a question, he rose his brows, pressed his lips together, and walked away.

Which meant even while I was doing my job the best I could, I wasn’t getting enough to knock this out of the park to secure my spot for the nighttime news desk.

We hadn’t heard from Shayla in the last two weeks since she went on leave. The verdict on that job would be out for months yet until she returned or gave notice, but damn it. My career was on the line and if I didn’t nail it, I’d be stuck doing news reports with giraffes trying to eat my hair for the rest of my life.

And Gage was ruining it for me.

He was ruining everything for me.

The ability to masturbate happily and be satisfied enough for sleep.

He was ruining my dreams and decent night’s sleep.

And hell, he was even ruining my ability to zone out on Sundays to silly love movies on the Hallmark Channel because I knew, just knew, I was now going to be tempted to turn on sports channels. And wasn’t that a swift kick to the boobs?

I’d successfully managed to ignore sports all my life even with a house filled with ultra-over-the-top testosterone driven males and two weeks of knowing Gage Bryant and having his hands on me twice, I’d become a fool.

I kicked at the turf, grumbling under my breath.

My phone buzzed in my pocket and I dug it out, grinning as I read the texts from Amanda.

“Great job today! Damn those men are pretty. Drinks tonight?”

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