Page 54 of Most Valuable Player
We start with our stretches. He muscles through his discomfort as music echoes through the basement, his forehead gleaming from strain. He does better at sit-ups, his face coming closer to mine as I sitatop his feet, counting, trying not to wonder what he’d say if I leaned forward and bumped our lips together.
I don’t knowwhy. Why is hedifferent?Is this…
Is this what attraction is supposed to feel like?
I’ve always liked looking at him. That’s why I asked him out—if he said yes, staring at him unblinkingly wouldn’t be (as) creepy. But after spending time with him, it’s becoming more than the desire to look. I want to touch. Tofeel. I want to tug on his hair and smooth his palms out and trace the indent of his spine. I’ve never had that desire with my previous partners, and Mason isn’t even my boyfriend.
It’s half the reason people break up with me. The disinterest in physical intimacy. The other half being that I never let them get close enough to see the jostled bricks in my walls. It should’ve been the same with Mason, but somehow, he saw through the holes from as far back as he could’ve possibly been standing. All it took was a couple of hours of one-on-one interaction.
He’s been chipping at them gently. He knows I have two sides, an exaggerated one and an authentic one, and a strange central line where the two blend together. He knows I’m a momma’s boy and that I used to paint rocks and that I was bullied at my old school. And…I don’t know. I think I’ve started to cut through his own fortified, looming steel walls. Centimeter by centimeter. Though, I’m still painfully in the dark.
All I have to go on is that damned necklace.
He’s starting to get irritated with the stretching. I can tell because when we’re doing a partner stretch, our legs spread into a V and our sneakers pressed flat against each other’s, he pulls forcefully on my hands as if to punish me. But I’m used to exercises like this, so I merely follow his tug and stretch over my open legs, smiling knowingly.
“Trying to hurt me?” I ask skeptically.
“Hmm?” His gaze is detached and cold. “Cameron Morelli, why would I want to see you in pain? Could it be because you added a stretch to my regimen that literally forces me to spread my legs for you?”
I hack on my own saliva. “It wasn’t intentional!” I choke out.
“Oh.” He leans back, pulling my arms again, stretching me so far forward that I’m starting to feel the ache in my thighs.
“Wait, I’m serious, I didn’t mean—ack, water boy, mercy, please!”
Mason heaves a sigh, straightening up and freeing me from the excessive stretch. But his eyes are glinting with amusement, and I realize he’s not actually annoyed—he’s just pretending to be so he can torture me.
Little. Shit.
“I have a new stretch,” I say darkly, and his expression shifts at my tonal change. “This one works your abdomen.”
“Crunches again?” he asks, sounding miserable.
“Worse.” I fold my legs in so our feet are no longer pressed together, then yank on his hands, sliding him across the ground and into my lap. He barely has time to rasp out a confused noise before I’m jamming his fingers into his waist and rib cage, causing him to suddenly shriek and wriggle against my iron grip.
“Wait!” he cries out, laughter raking his body as I poke at every sensitive spot on his midsection. He’s trying to wrench his arms free, but they’re pinned firm between our chests, thanks to the arm I have wrapped unyieldingly tight around his back.“Don’t you dare, let go, I’ll never forgive you, I’ll tell your mom—”
The rest of his words dissolve into uncontrollable laughter. The sight of his smile in full force, so close to me, his lashes sparkling with tears, his cheeks peachy pink, his forehead shimmering with warmth, is too much.
It’s too much.
The hand I’m using to torment his waist slides up his abdomen, his chest, until it’s latching around the back of his neck. His honey-brown eyes, glazed with delirium, sharpen the moment his forehead falls to mine. His hands, which have been pounding against my chest, fall still and unfurl. The tips of his fingers graze the skin above my collarbone. Cool. Centering.
We sit frozen for several seconds, an echo of the night I drove him home from the beach party, his legs curled around my waist, his weight positioned atop my thighs, his face invitingly close. His thin lips are pressed firmly together now, but the edges are curled upward, like he’s still fending off his previous laughter. His breaths are tight, quick, and the sound makes my chest thump harder. Neither of us care that our foreheads are sticky and will probably peel apart like glue when he draws back.
The point is that he’s not drawing back.
But he rejected me. Right? He only took the tutoring thing up to help the team and probably to have an excuse to get out of his house. If not for that, he would be avoiding me at every corner, because he’s made it clear my personality isn’t his type. So why…?
Why is he watching my lips like that?
I probably shouldn’t. I ghost them against the outer corner of his mouth anyway, my face moving in against my instincts. His head twitches, like he wants to meet them, like he wants to correct my course. He decides to keep still, though, and allows my lips to brush up against his skin, a mere inch away from fully kissing him. His lashes flutter shut—he’s still not pulling back. His fingers, though, are tensing against my chest, like he’s bracing for the moment he might want to shove.
My gut feeling is telling me to stay away from his mouth. So I drag my lips lower, catching his soft, pale chin instead, my hand still pressed flush to the back of his slender neck. The faintest fragrance ofsomething woodsy and warm tickles my nose. Did he dab cologne on himself before he came? Just for dinner and working out?
I press a slow, careful kiss under the jut of his jaw. My left arm remains hooked around his waist—it fits perfectly against me. My right thumb works the divot behind his ear, and he might be sensitive there, because I can feel his heart pulsing faster, deeper.
“Just my face?”
