Page 21 of Broken Play
I chase her around with a towel, and I can't remember the last time I had so much PG-13 fun with a woman. Sometime between flicking a dish towel and pretending I'm surrendering, her laughter breaks, and my hands find her waist as naturally as breathing. Static crackles between us, and our eyes lock. Water streams over her mouth and down her neck, but my focus stays on her lips. We smile into a warm and wanting kiss, smooth and buttery from the cornbread.
The world around me blurs, and we kiss until our lips are raw. My hands slide up her bare torso as my thumbs swipe over the silky-soft skin, dangerously close to her breasts. She laughs into a sigh. "Greyson."
Nuzzling her lips between mine, I say, "That was the best kiss of my life."
Her shoulders lift, and a seductive giggle filters from her mouth. "Mine too. But what do we do now?"
"Well, the way I see it, we have a couple of choices. You can go upstairs with me and check out my new custom-made bed." She arches a brow. "Or we can break in the couch."
Sutton stands there with her hip cocked, eyebrow arched, and just enough defiance in her smile to make my pulse skip. "I'm not that easy."
I grab her hand and lead her to the couch in the great room.
"I said..." Her body tenses, and I feel the uncertainty in her hand.
"Just stay and watch a movie. I haven't watched a moviewith a woman since college," I say as I click the television remote. "What type of movies do you like?"
"True crime documentaries or movies, psychological thrillers. Anna and I loved that series calledYou. Have you seen it?"
"Can't say I have, but I do love mysteries. Let's see what I can find."
Sports Showdown lights up the television. Before I can change it, the anchors are talking about tennis, and her ex-boyfriend's picture looms large on the left side of the screen. Her fingers straighten in my hold, letting me know the internet was right. They used to be a thing.
"What's your story with him?"
"Who?" she deflects.
I point to the screen. "Bodhi Creed."
"No story. We dated and grew apart."
Biting my bottom lip, I mull over what to say. Do I tell her I know they were together for what amounts to forever in a young adult's life, or do I let her give me the details on her own terms? I'm not good with the unknown, and I don't want to get involved with Sutton if she still has feelings for Bodhi Creed. So I angle my body toward hers.
"I have something to admit, and it may sound stalkerish, but when I met you at your dad's house, the first thing I did was look you up on socials. To my surprise, you don't have any. How does a professional athlete not have social media accounts?"
Sutton's eyes fall from mine, and she presses her palms against her thighs, rubbing them down toward her knees. I'm no psychologist, but this seems like it would be a stress response.
"I deleted all my accounts. I wasn't good enough for hisfans. They constantly trashed me, calling me an amazon or saying how he should be dating a celebrity, not a tennis player who can't break the top five."
"Did you believe that you weren't good enough for him?"
She shakes her head. "I believed I was lucky to be with him. I don't know if that is the same or not, but he has always been the poster boy of American tennis."
"How long did you date?"
I watch her eyes close before she speaks. "We were at the tennis academy together, and he was my boyfriend on and off for a decade."
"I saw some photos of the two of you as recently as this past winter. Were you dating when we met at the Denver nightclub?" My eye twitches; I'm not sure if I want the answer. Dating someone who cheats is a no-can-do for me. When I settle down, it will be forever.
She fiddles with her fingers. "No, we had broken up a few weeks earlier. Bodhi's home base is Denver. His parents live there too. Anna, my best friend, and I played an indoor hard-court tournament, so she convinced me to get out to forget about him."
"And did you?"
"Did I what?"
Why did I ask? It's too late now, so I clarify. "Did you forget about him?"
Her silence is deafening. With her lashes lowered and lips pressed into a flat line, she pulls at the straps on her tank top. As the seconds tick by, her failure to answer feels like a slow leak in my chest. Nausea creeps up my throat as I realize she's not over him. I can handle being tackled by two-hundred-fifty-pound linemen, but her not looking me in the eye and saying, "I'm over him," hurts worse than most thingsI've experienced in life. The way we clicked tonight, trading laughs and kisses while washing the dishes, has me believing this could be something real.
