Page 59 of Wicked Player

To my shock, eighteen was stamped in bright white letters right across her front.

She was wearing my number. And seeing her in it knowing my name was stamped across her shoulder blades at the back, rocked me to my feet.

I hadn’t wanted Thursday to go as it had. I’d wanted to take my time with her, to slide inside of her and remove her blindfold, but there was something about the moment we shared after I took her off the cross, after I stripped out of my clothes and laid her on the bed.

I’d crawled up her body, kissing every inch of her skin, chuckling as she arched into me, rolled her hips up to meet mine.

I pinned her hands over her head, itching to remove her mask to see her eyes when she came. To finally see what she truly looked when I slid into her, but I’d stopped.

One more night with the anonymity even though she’d already given away she knew who I was. It was stupid to keep pretending. It was also immature.

But was I ready to take us public? For the first time in my professional life, I knew that moving forward with Elizabeth wouldn’t just change everything.

It risked everything as well.

Seeing her in my number?

Being with her was worth it.

I headed that way. A gaggle of kids were jumping and laughing. The healthier ones on their feet while the sicker ones were sitting in wheelchairs. And I finally admitted to myself that I wasn’t moving straight toward Elizabeth, the reporter, to answer more questions. It was her, laughing with the kids and showing how genuinely good she was that made me realize what I’d spent weeks trying to deny.

I started falling for the pretty little blonde as soon as I walked into that room weeks ago when she wore nothing more than a smile and white lace panties and I’d kept falling for her, when I saw how hard she worked and how much she loved the kids at the hospital.

This was a woman who had the potential to give me everything I’d always wanted.

At the wall in front of the kids, several teammates stood, signing autographs for the kids and their parents.

I headed there, forced my feet to move as I focused on settling my heart.

Her gaze, wild with excitement, head thrown back in laughter at something one of the kids at her side said to her landed on me and sobered.

A pink hue slid to the apples of her cheeks. The hint of her tongue slid across her bottom lip as her gaze went hazy.

Had I not been dressed for the game, that look would have made me drag her to the ground so I could myself to the hilt deep inside of her.

Damn.

“Hey! How are my brave favorite fans doing?” I called to the mass of kids screeching my name as I grew closer.

Kolby Jones, one of our other starting wide receivers, slapped my pads and our center, Matthews, gave me a chin lift. They signed a handful of notepads, shoved in their direction by the kids.

“Dude,” Jones said. “Some of these kids want to take our jobs from us someday.”

“Yeah?” I scanned the small crowd of excited faces and pointed to one of the kids in a wheelchair. Brandon was still too sick to come, but this kid looked like it was a risk for him to be there as well. “How about you? You want my job someday?”

“Nope.” He grinned, all teeth and stretched lips. “I’m gonna be Quarterback. But for Dallas.”

“You’ll have to work hard.”

He slapped his hands on the armrest. “As soon as I’m outta here I’m gonna start training.”

I laughed with the kid. He looked eight or ten. I guessed he was older. That was the thing about kids being sick, they grew old souls but their bodies took longer to catch up.

He shoved his football in my direction and I took it, scribbling my name on to it. “You get out of that, you get a hold of me. I’ll grab Beaux and we’ll teach you everything he knows.”

“Wow. Really?”

I tossed the football back into his lap and capped his pen. “Absolutely. What’s your name?”

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