Page 216 of Vegas Heat

“I know it’s late, but I’m on my way home if you’d like to stop by,” I offer.

“Mr. Noah…is this abooty call?” Her voice is filled with shock, but I know she’s just teasing me.

“Hey, a guy’s gotta fit it in when a guy can fit it in, you know what I’m saying?”

She laughs, but the sound sobers quickly. “That’s how it’s going to be, isn’t it?” she asks.

I clear my throat. “I mean…I can’t sugarcoat it. Yes, it’s going to be squeezing in time when we can. Having to do it on the sly will complicate things, but it’s you and me. We’ll manage. Thanksgiving, Christmas…then it all starts. Spring training is voluntary but since it’s a brand-new team, we’ll all be there. We’ll want to start running drills long before that, too, so even like I told your dad earlier, we get through the holidays and it all begins January one.”

“Get through the holidays,” she murmurs. “How am I supposed to get through the holidays when I have to pretend?”

I sigh. “I wish I had the answer to that.”

We haven’t talked about Thanksgiving even though it isn’t far off. I sent plane tickets to my family, and they’re coming for the long weekend. I haven’t thought as far ahead as Christmas yet.

But she’s right. I don’t want to pretend anymore, either. We both braced ourselves for today to be the brunt of it, and then her father had to go and have a fucking heart attack.

I don’t want to pretend, and I also don’t want to spend these important moments without her. But we’re back to square one where we don’t have a choice.

We pull into my driveway at the same time, and it’s a relief to be home with her here. It’s the one place where wedon’thave to pretend, where we can be ourselves, where we can do whatever we want however many times we want as loudly as we want.

She follows me through the garage and into the laundry room, and the moment the door closes behind us and seals us into privacy, I pull her into my arms.

She wraps her arms around me, too, and she clings to me. We simply stand there in the laundry room holding tightly to one another—something she needed after the long twenty-four hours of worrying about her father, and something I needed after the long twenty-four hours of worrying about both her and my best friend.

And in this moment, whatever secrets or lies or fears lie ahead of us, I truly feel that as long as we find our way back into each other’s arms, it’ll all turn out okay.

It’s not until much later I discover how very, very wrong I was.

CHAPTER 7: GABBY

I don’t want to let go. I know if I let go, all the other stuff that keeps getting in our way has the potential to sneak back in. If I stay right here, it’s just the two of us. We don’t have to worry about the secrets we’re keeping. We can justbe, and there’s something so magical and comforting about that—something I’m not ready to let go of just yet, and so I continue to cling onto him.

My brain knows the truth. Eventually we’ll have to let go. I have classes in the morning, and he has responsibilities to get to as well. We’ll need to see my dad. I’ll need to lead the interns this week while I fight for the social media position. There’s a million things on each of our plates, but somehow they all fade into the ether when I’m with him and all that matters isthis.

He pulls me up by placing his hands under my thighs, and I lay my head on his shoulder as he carries me through the house to the couch. He sets me down onto the sofa lounger seat, the longer cushion that can accommodate both our bodies, and he climbs up to hover over me, his lips inches from mine as he peers down at my face.

I stare up at him, totally content and comfortable here in this place.

“Every time I look at you, it’s like this wave of something just washes over me,” he says softly as he continues to gaze down at me. “At first I thought it was love, but I think it’s something so much bigger than that. It’s just fuckinghome, Gabby. I’ve bounced around the last few years, and honestly nothing has felt like home since my dad died. But you…you’rehome. You’re theplace the compass points to when I get lost, and I don’t want you to ever forget that.”

His words touch a place in my chest that goes far deeper than just my heart. They brand onto my very soul, and there is where they will reside until the day I die.

“I love you, Cooper Noah,” I whisper, tears trickling from my eyes.

“I love you too, Gabriella Rose Sunshine Grant.” His lips drop to mine, and he kisses me so tenderly and with the kind of authenticity that only serves to validate the words he just spoke.

He breaks from me long enough to pulls his shirt over his head, and I run my fingertips along the cut ridges of his abdomen before he pulls my shirt over my head, too. He unhooks my bra and helps me out of my jeans before taking care of his own.

And then he’s making love to me right there on his couch, our bodies racing toward the brink of pleasure as I dig my nails into his skin and he growls my name into my ear, our quiet whispers and moans speaking our language for us as he rocks into my body. His lips find my nipple as my body bends and bows under his touch, and he continues to drive into me as he manages to thrill every single erogenous zone seemingly simultaneously. The words we spoke hover around us like a warm blanket, and as I tip over the edge into the abyss of pleasure, I know this is it for me.

There will never be another man like him. Not for me. I will never love like this again. No one will ever make me feel the way he does—not just in moments like these where he physically knows my body so well, but in every moment where we connect beyond the level of physicality. He just gets me, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually, and we have to find a way to go public with what we have because I can’t keep living with the best thing that ever happened to me as my best-kept secret.

My alarm wakes me too early the next morning as I scramble to shut it off, forcing me out of the warm cocoon of Cooper’s arms.

I spot a text from Justin that must’ve come in late last night.

Justin:FYI Mackenzie was on a rampage last night. I’m faking a friendship with her to get her to keep her mouth shut for you, but she told me you’re fucking CN. How does she know? Delete this text.

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