Page 19 of Daring You

5

Ben

Something blonde fellonto my cock, and while I don’t hate it, I don’t exactly remember it, either.

She’s no longer in my bed, and the salty smell of bacon reaching my nostrils has me believing she’s cooking us breakfast in my kitchen.

That makes it tough. I can’t kick a girl out who makes me bacon.

I sit up, rubbing my face, scratching my scalp, and grimacing at the achey sway of my brain when I move. There was a lot of drinking last night, thanks to Ash. He found me after my team lost the playoffs, knowing full well I was in freakout mode, since it was also the moment my contract was up and I became a free agent this spring.

In true Ash fashion, he figured finding the answers in a bottle of brown liquor was better than any talk session, and he’s right. My mind ain’t talking right now. It’s screaming.

I groan as I throw my legs over the side of the bed, fresh bruises mottling my hips. Last game of our season, and I’m tackled like nobody’s business, rolling around on the field, losing my helmet somewhere along the way, and bucking against the grass like someone’s trying to perform an exorcism on Giants number 9—me.

What a way to go. Benched in the second quarter of our playoff game because of the NFL’s new, touchy stance about the risk of concussions and removing players who’ve hit their head one too many during a particularly enraging tackle.

Maybe I should be thankful I’m even around to smack my noggin on other dudes’ padded chests. There was a time it was questionable I could even go on as Ben Donahue, MVP of the Gators and third draft pick of the Giants. I would’ve had to leave all the thumps, grunts, and jockstraps behind and figure out a new career, and fuck knows what that could’ve been. Since I was five years old, I’ve been obsessed with football. Playing it, watching it, studying it. When it became clear to my dad I possessed actual talent—in that while other kids smacked into each other because it was fun, I did it because they were in my way as I charged to the Gatorade stand—he hired me a personal coach that showed me where the real end zone was, and that was the start of my predestined future.

What was it, six years ago? Less than a decade since everything I strived for, the past I worked to forget, was nearly toppled by a scrawny, drug addicted idiot named Dodge Hennessy.

I got lucky, then. A few days after the morning that shall not be named, Dodge was found dead of a drug overdose. A bad packet of meth, or maybe meth so good and pure, he took way too much. I didn’t concern myself with the details.

All I cared about was that my secret died with him.

The memorial plaque the team placed for him, the moments of silence we gave him on the field, gave enough thanks for the life he threw away.

Did it make me a dick to think that? When, hand over my heart, music playing, the announcer asked for three minutes of silence in memoriam to Daniel “Dodge” Hennessy before the national anthem? Possibly. But Dodge held my destiny in his hands, and he was willing to scrunch it up and rip it to pieces because he felt left out. And out of some sort of psychopathic, horny mission, he ruined any relationship I could’ve had with—

Nope. Not doing it. Not thinking about her.

“Ben? That you?” a light, musical voice asks down the hall.

“Yep,” I call back, and stand and do a few stretches. I hop a few times, too, in an attempt to dislodge my brain from glueing to one side of my skull.

Fuckin’ Ash.

Throwing on a pair of athletic shorts I find tangled at the end of the bed with some…hmm…particularly lacey dental floss, I clomp out of the bedroom toward the tantalizing smell of breakfast after sex.

“Hey there,” the blonde says as she hears my approach. “Sit down. Food’s ready.”

My stomach rumbles its approval. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Well,” she purrs. “Since you showed me such a good time last night, I wanted to show you the same kind of appreciation. I’m a great cook.”

“Are you now?”

I attempt to peer around her to the frying pan, but frankly, if I move again I’m at risk of passing out like a fucking damsel in front of this lady.

“Why don’t you tell me?” she says with a smile while she turns and raises a wooden spoon to my mouth.

It’s cheesy, creamy, and just the right amount of mushy to make me want to hurl.

“It’s—it’s good,” I choke out. I find a glass of orange juice beside me and down it.

“You don’t like eggs?”

“I do. Love ‘em.”

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