Page 101 of Man On

Lane: You always have a boner.

Noah: You’re always around.

Lane: You sent me a picture of your boner in class yesterday. I wasn’t even there.

Noah: My hands smelled like your soap.

Lane: Because you keep jacking off with it.

Noah: Semantics.

He doesn’t respond, but I can see the grin on his face. I’m not pleased that I have to go a night without him. I’ve gotten used to falling asleep to the sound of his breathing and having his warm body beneath mine. It’ll be weird.

Sam Triviano stands up and clinks a knife against the side of his beer bottle to get us all to settle down and pay attention. It takes a while with so many of us all seated around several tables. Sam has to raise his voice enough that the whole restaurant can hear him, since we’ve mostly taken over.

“I’ll keep it short and sweet; I just want to say a few words about how proud I am of this team. We’re about halfway through the regular season, and we’ve got far more wins under our belt at this point than we did in the past two years. I think that has a lot to do with the quality of our freshman players, specifically, the wonder brothers down there.”

Everyone lifts their bottles or glasses in acknowledgement of the table we’re sitting at.

“Noah, when you first started here, I thought you were a cocky little showoff, and I was right.” There’s laughter all around, even from me. “But you’ve come a long way, and have really become a team player. We owe two of our three winning goals to you. Not just because of your skill, but because you know when to pass and where to pass.” I nod my head in respect, because it’s a really kind thing to say, especially since he’s the one that has put more balls in the net than any other player this season.

“And Lane. You’ve been a beast on the pitch since you got here. Poor Lionel barely has anything to save because you don’t let anything or anyone past your defenses. But I’m happy to see you loosening up and hanging out with the team, being one of the guys tonight.” Lane’s blush is adorable, and a few of the guys around him pat him on the shoulder. Danny ruffles his hair.

Sam makes a few more acknowledgements of great plays and talks a bit about how the next month of games is going to be crucial to making it into the ACC and NCAA championships. I mostly tune him out, keeping my eyes on the other side of the table, where Danny has pulled up a chair to chat with Lane. Every time he touches him, I have to force myself not to growl.

At some point, Lane excuses himself to go to the bathroom. I watch him walk away, trying not to be too blatant about the way I’m checking out this ass. When I pull my eyes away, though, I see Danny watching him, too. I draw attention when I abruptly stand up, and then, realizing I look like a psycho about to take out a teammate for staring at my brother, I excuse myself to the bathroom. It’s not like anyone noticed that Lane went to the same place.

He's washing his hands when I walk in, and I barely take the time to confirm there’s no one in here before taking his face in my hands. Pressing my mouth and body to his, I walk us back into one of the stalls. Locking the door, I thrust my hips against his, pushing him against the door as I kiss him like I’m starving for him.

I am starving for him. Between the bus trip and the match, this is the first time we’ve been alone since we woke up tangled around each other this morning.

“This is fucking torture,” I say, pressing kisses down his jaw to his neck. He groans and flexes his hips against me, but then he freezes.

We pull a few inches apart, and I look into Lane’s wide, fearful eyes as we listen to someone come into the men’s room. It feels like forever that we hold our breaths, waiting to see if they’ll use the urinal and leave. But they choose the stall next to us.

Knowing that we need to be careful, I place one more gentle kiss on Lane’s lips, sucking playfully on his bottom lip before pulling away with a wink. I leave the stall as quietly as possible, tip-toeing across the restroom and slipping out without a noise. I breathe a sigh of relief when there’s no one outside the door. Hopefully, whoever is in the stall next to us didn’t hear anything.

Most everyone is standing when I make it back to the table, ready to climb back on the bus and head to the hotel. Lane comes out of the bathroom a minute after I do, and we both keep cutting our eyes at each other, grinning at what we got away with.

Lane’s back is to the hallway where the bathrooms are when I notice Danny Hastings walk out with an odd expression on his face. He sees me, then cuts his eyes at Lane, who still doesn’t know Danny is there. He’s distracted, making jokes with Miah about which one of them snored louder at soccer camp.

Though I shouldn’t, I make eye contact with Danny, trying not to react to the hard, knowing gleam in his eyes. If he didn’t suspect before, he definitely does now. My eyes cut back to Lane, worrying about how he’ll react.

When I tear my eyes away from him, Danny is standing too close.

“Don’t worry,” he says quietly. “Lane’s secrets are safe with me.” His brown eyes look sincere, but I don’t like the way he phrased that. Is he just trying to freak me out to get me back for being an asshole to him? Or is that a threat?

Loud knocking draws me out of a fitful sleep. It took me forever to fall asleep with the light from the TV on, and without the warmth of a hard body that I’ve quickly become accustomed to.

Rubbing sleep from my eyes, I scowl over at Taylor, who is also stirring.

It takes me a minute to realize that the sound isn’t coming from the television, it’s coming from the door. Someone is knocking frantically at the door. Then I hear my name being called.

“Milner! Wake up!”

What the fuck?

I tear open the door, finding three of our teammates, including Jamie Peters, standing in the hallway. They’re all clearly sleep disheveled, but looking worried.

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