Page 31 of Love Game

His brow furrowed and then smoothed as her implication sank in. “Oh.” He nodded, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he cast a longing glance at his car. Color rode high in his cheeks. “So…maybe next week?”

A guilty flush warmed her skin. “Maybe,” she replied. But there was no way in hell.

Jim ducked his head to peck the usual chaste kiss to her cheek. “Night, Coach.”

Annoyed by the use of her title and not her name, Kate bit the inside of her cheek as she slipped her key into the lock. “Night, Davenport.”

Safe inside her house, she kicked off the sadistic sandals and flopped onto the sofa in a huff. The straps left livid pink marks crisscrossing her feet. She rubbed at them, frustration—intellectual and physiological—roiling inside her.

Closing her eyes, she drew a deep breath in and let it go slowly. Her body hummed, but it wasn’t the result of her date with Jim. She tried to dissect the attraction that sizzled and popped every time Danny McMillan came near, but she couldn’t parse it. Everything about him got to her. The dark hair and electrifying eyes. His solid, muscular build. The swagger in his step and the arrogance in the lift of his square chin. Maybe it sprang from nothing more than the allure of forbidden fruit, but oh, the man did something to her.

Kate licked her lips, closed her eyes, and let her head roll back. Two fingers under her skirt. That’s all she needed. The vibrator in her nightstand could take care of her problem in seconds. The pulsing jets of her showerhead could drown out the low-frequency hum in her blood, but she knew damn well that none of those options would be enough. It would take more than simulated sex to scratch the itch that had niggled from the moment Danny’s mouth touched hers. The man was fucking with her head even if he hadn’t fucked her body.

Yet.

The stark acknowledgment of inevitability made her eyes pop open. She sat still, hands curled around the edge of the sofa cushion, her thighs pressed together.

Her mind raced. One by one, she rifled through possibilities and scenarios, each more impossible, and therefore more desirable, than the last.

She could call Millie and get his number. Millie wouldn’t think twice about it. Kate used to call Stan Morton when he was head football coach. But she never wanted Stan’s hands on her the way she wanted Danny’s. She called Ty every now and again to talk shop, but frankly, she avoided it for fear of having to socialize with Mari. Still, a phone call from one coach to another wouldn’t raise any eyebrows.

She could make up some bullshit story about the boosters and coordinating summer athletic camp schedules. Millie’d give her his number, and she could call him, and…

Two fingers. Hell, one would do it, she was so keyed up. Almost of its own volition, her right hand uncurled, releasing its death grip on the cushion in favor of pushing up under her skirt. Her panties were damp. Damn him. She brushed the tips of her fingers over the silky nylon blend.

Friggin’ Davenport. He didn’t deserve these panties or the pretty matching bra. She scowled as she edged a finger under the elastic. The chocolate cake wasn’t that good. But oh, that was. Right there. A shuddering sigh rolled through her as she began to stroke her clit with the quick, feather-light flicks that no man would ever dream of employing.

She’d bet anything Danny McMillan wouldn’t. He’d charge in, take control, and claim that tender swell of flesh as his due. She arched her neck, straining against the too-soft touch and picturing him looming over her like he had on the court that night. In her mind, it wasn’t her finger working the magic. It was his. Big, blunt, a little rough, but still too maddeningly gentle. She didn’t want gentle. She wanted him to drive her up, fast and sure, relentless in his pursuit of her pleasure. Hold her hands over her head. Thrust into her. Over and over…

Kate cried out as she pushed her own finger into the tight, wet channel, gasping and groaning as she climaxed.

The rasp of her breathing echoed in the quiet room. She blinked at the blank television screen. The magazines on the coffee table seemed to be written in a foreign language. Perhaps it was the civilized tongue of people who didn’t get themselves off on the living room sofa the minute they got home from a bad date. She blinked and pulled her hand out from under her skirt, careful not to touch anything with the glistening digits.

With a grunt of disgusted disbelief, she sunk into the sofa. “Well, shit.”

Draping her left arm over her eyes, she focused on regaining control. Her muscles felt heavy with the special kind of languor that only sets in when one is replete. Or exhausted. Her brain latched onto the thought. Maybe that was the key. A few hours in the gym wouldn’t hurt. She could build up the stamina she needed to keep up with middle and high school students who would cycle through her summer basketball camps. Burn off some energy in a manner that wouldn’t make her look like a fool, get her fired or, worse, risk falling in love with another man incapable of seeing past his own ambition.

* * *

Danny grabbed the safety bar and jumped onto the side rails of the treadmill. Sweat streaked down the sides of his face and dampened his hair. His brand-spanking-new Wolcott Athletic Department T-shirt clung to him, and he tugged at the neckline as the belt continued to whir. The smart thing would be to stop and walk it off. A six-mile run with no cooldown was enough to guarantee screaming knees.

But he didn’t want to walk. He wanted to keep pounding away. Needed to work off all the excess energy bubbling inside him. At least working out was productive. He’d already spent too many mornings thinking about Kate Snyder and exercising his right hand.

The blare of Nine Inch Nails in his ears did nothing to cool his blood. The song was almost an anthem for how he felt from the second he’d decided to kiss her. Desperate. Unstoppable. Exposed. One stupid kiss, and he wanted more. So much more. Like the song said, he wanted to crawl inside her.

The hell of it was, he wasn’t thinking about her tits or her high, round ass when he jerked off that night or again in the wee hours of the morning. He was thinking about her eyes. Whiskey-colored and every bit as intoxicating, they were as fascinating as the ever-shifting glass in a kaleidoscope.

The whimsical thought jolted him from his reverie. Intoxicating? Kaleidoscopes? He snorted and yanked the buds from his ears. What the hell was going on with him? He wasn’t a poet or an artist. He was a football player. He stared hard at his reflection in the mirrored wall and jammed his thumb on the button that would slow the pace.

Get a grip.

Ah, but he had. He’d had a good grip on her. He would have had her on her back if she hadn’t come to her senses. Damn, she felt good. Lean and muscular, but soft. Indescribably soft. Grasping the handrail, he closed his eyes until he found rhythm in the measured steps.

The ferocity of his attraction to Kate Snyder caught him off guard. Lust didn’t begin to explain it. If it were as simple as needing the physical release, he had plenty of opportunity and had never been shy about exploiting it. Older women were a little more brazen than the younger, but that was okay with him. He preferred easy pickings to the complications the young ones toted around like handbags. Didn’t hurt that he was a decent-looking guy with a seminotorious reputation. Women loved that crap. And he was still in pretty good shape. Maybe not underwear-model material, but fit, and not so beat-up he scared the villagers.

But he couldn’t stop obsessing over Kate’s hitchy little hiccup when she’d pushed away. Did she make the same kind of noises when she fucked? Christ, he’d give his left nut to make that throaty moan he’d tasted explode into a scream. The realization that it had been too long since he’d even thought about sinking deep into a woman’s body scared him. It was easy to convince himself he had been too focused on resurrecting his career to think about a relationship, but sex? What could possibly make him never think about sex?

Well, he was thinking about it now, and he needed to stop. Hell, just thinking about how she’d tried to humiliate him on these very treadmills ought to have been enough. But it wasn’t. Apparently, his libido had the power to override his ego these days. And if that wasn’t a dangerous set of circumstances, he didn’t know what was.

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