Page 28 of Flame After the Fumble

I’m about to double, maybe even triple, my weekly meet ups with him. If I thought things were tough now, they’re about to get a whole lot harder. After taking the dark walk back to my dorm room, I’m spent. My key wiggles into the door, just as my phone pings.

Hartley: Got the all clear from Coach. Is 7 too early?

Me: Yay! Nope. See ya then.

Hartley: ;)

20

Hartley

The discussion with Coach went smoother than I anticipated. Once we got past the initial shock that I was actually participating in a class project that wasn’t mine, he agreed fervently to allow us use of the locker room. Did I disclose that this project involved a firecracker of a woman who could bring me to my knees with her laugh? No. Those are details that I’ll iron out as they come.

“Anyone here?” Her sultry voice echoes through the empty locker room.

Deciding to play around with her, I holler back, “Are we playing Marco Polo now, Goldie?” I peek around as she turns the corner into the main locker room area.

I’ll never get tired of the sight of her. Her slick straight hair drapes over one shoulder as she tosses the other half over the other. She’s in one of those dresses she likes, this one with tiny embroidered roses over the black fabric. She’s always a vision, and I’ll need to practice some serious self-control if our time together is about to increase substantially.

“Hartley! What the. . .” She drops everything she’s holding, and it slams to the concrete floor sending echoes across the room. Her hands fly to her mouth then to her eyes as she sticks one hand out and backs away frantically. “Put some clothes on! Geez!”

A belly laugh erupts from deep in my core. “Don’t be silly, Goldie. I’m fully clothed.”Fully, being the word in question, but I’m wearing boxers. That should count for something, right? “Isn’t this what a muse is supposed to wear?”

She peeks one eye in between the slits of her fingers as she continues to wave her hand toward me. “This isn’t that kind of art! You’re supposed to be natural.” Her laugh rattles out, and the sound does something funny to my chest.

Reaching to the bench next to me, I grab the pair of gray joggers I wore here and slip them on. “The coast is clear. My pants are on.”

She peeks through those slits again to confirm that my pants are, in fact, on before she drops them to her hips. “What is wrong with you?!” she scolds. This side of her riles me up even more.Let’s go, babe.

“Come on.” I grab my hat off the bench and flip it backward before making my way across the empty room to her. “Is this your first time seeing a man in his boxers, Goldie?” I throw my hands on my hips and give her a playful grin.

“Excuse me?! For your information, no, it is not, but you caught me off guard.”

I throw my hands up in mock innocence as she shakes her head from side to side in disapproval. She should know to expect the unexpected.

“Can we forget this happened and start the sketching?” She chuckles.

“After you, my lady.”

Liza spends the next few minutes explaining my role in this project. She begs me to act like ‘she’s not even here’. She’s everywhere to me, but that feels a little too intimate for a friend to say, so I bite my tongue. According to her, the perfect shot would be of me packing and unpacking my things into a practice duffle bag. She also asks me to go about my pre-practice routine as I normally would so she can capture movement. After about thirty minutes, she pops off the bench and announces that she has what she needs.

“Can I see?” Walking towards her, I reach for her sketch pad, but she clutches it to her chest while her mouth forms a little ‘o.’

“No way!” She shoots me a disgusted look. “You never show anyone the initial sketch. First sketches are horrible.”

“Let me be the judge of that.”

“No.” Pursing her lips, I realize this is a battle I won’t win.

Inching closer and closer until her back hits the wall, I brace my arms out along both sides of her. Her breaths are staggered and her sass from a minute ago is long gone. Leaning down slowly, I graze her ear with my lip before whispering, “I’ll respect it, but if you show anyone, it better be me.” Taking a long swallow to gather myself, I back away to watch the way her throat moves up and down. My eyes zero in on the small parting of her lips.

“Who else would I show it to?” Her voice is strained.

Licking my lips, I allow my cockiest smirk to surface. “I don’t know, Liza, but it better not be your boyfriend.” I push off the wall and back away before I lose control and claim her as mine.

“I don’t have a boyfriend,” she spits back.

“That’s not what it looked like last weekend.” Jealousy sears through my veins as the picture of her making out with Locke resurfaces to the forefront of my mind. That should have been me.

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