Page 5 of Tempting

Mackenzie moves the slightest bit closer to me. Her long, soft chestnut-brown hair blows in the wind, causing the gentle scent of spicy vanilla sugar to invade my senses, and my mouth waters as every protective instinct my father drilled into my brothers and me all our lives kicks into overdrive.

My grip on her hip tightens, firmer than I mean for it to be, while I reach out to him with my other hand. “Don’t you want to introduce me, Mac?”

My words sound almost threatening, and I don’t bother tempering them.

Let him be threatened.

Mackenzie looks up through long, inky-black lashes and worries her pouty bottom lip before forcing a small, fake as fuck smile. “Nixon, this is Dr. Richardson. He’s head of my department at the hospital.”

Dr. Richardson looks like an uptight, entitled prick who belongs on a polo horse. If that weren’t an insult to the horse. He glances disdainfully from her to me before tentatively offering me his hand in a limp-ass handshake.

Fucking pussy.

He winces when I squeeze more forcefully than necessary.

Probably because I’m a dick who just made sure he knows which of us would win in a fight. Maybe he’ll take it as the warning it’s meant to be not to fuck with a woman half his size. Especially this one. Mackenzie is barely five-five and might be a hundred and ten pounds soaking wet.

My mind drifts to her standing in the shower. Her damp hair hanging down around her shoulders. Bubbles lathered on her wet skin...

Fuck—that’s a pretty fucking picture.

When I grin, he rips his hand away, like he knows what I just saw in my mind, and wipes his palm on his starched khakis like he just touched dog shit. “Zane Richardson. And you are...?”

Kenzie takes another small step into my side, and that bad fucking feeling grows.

Guess that’s going to be my excuse for what I’m about to do.

Couldn’t have anything to do with the fact that this girl was the first girl I ever crushed on before I even knew all the ways I wanted to make her scream my fucking name. What can I say? We were thirteen, and she was the new girl in a bikini in my parents’ pool. She was a literal wet dream come to life.

And there goes that picture of her in the shower again.

“Nixon Sinclair.” I let my glare go dark like it does before a fight on the ice. “Her boyfriend.”

Mac’s breath gets stuck in her chest before she lifts those shock-filled, honey-brown eyes my way. After a minute, her surprise turns into a small, hesitant smile—still fake, but not as obvious this time—when she turns back to this asshole.

Dr. Richardson nods slowly. Creepy as fuck. A little too calculated for my liking. “Sinclair... Your name sounds familiar,” he muses as if trying to place me.

Good luck, asshole. There’s a shit ton of Sinclairs in this town, and I’m related to all of them.

“Nixon plays for the Revolution with my brother,” Kenzie offers sweetly, her voice quiet. Too quiet for this woman.

“Hockey?” he says the word like it’s beneath him, and I grind my teeth. “For some reason, I was thinking football.”

“That’s my father and grandfather,” I grunt and wait for it to click.

I don’t have to wait long.

“Your dad is Declan Sinclair? The hall of fame quarterback for the Philly Kings?” he asks with an awe in his voice I know well. Declan Sinclair is pretty fucking awe-inspiring. He’s a pretty amazing dad too. “That makes your grandfather the coach.”

I nod, used to this shit.

This town worships football, and my family is Philly football.

Dad. Grandpa. Uncles. Cousins.

Poor Dad got three hockey-player sons instead of football players though.

We like to say we’re tougher.

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