Page 96 of The Rebound Plan

Her eyes sparkle in agreement and she takes off running, stopping right beside Shannon and tugging on her hem.

Shannon looks nervously in my direction. “Maybe we can get her one?—”

“The others are all too big,” I say, cutting her off. “Yours is just right to puddle on the floor at her feet.”

I rise, excusing myself from the circle of kids, and cross to her.

Her cheeks turn red even before I lower my voice. “If you need another jersey to wear instead, you can have mine.”

She stares at me.

I’m not sure she’s going to do it, but then she yanks the custom jersey off, over her head.

She’s breathing hard as she hands it to me. Glaring, too. She’s so fucking beautiful, and I’d done holding myself back from making sure she knows that she’s wanted.

I let myself look my fill at her before I step back and put Shannon’s custom WAG jersey on the little girl. “There you go, princess. Fits you perfectly. You can keep that one.”

God bless Mabel for always having a rack of spare jerseys, ready for any occasion—although the way her gaze is darting back and forth between Shannon and me, I imagine she wasn’t anticipating her enforcer draping his number on the captain’s wife at this photo shoot.

“Don’t want you to get cold,” I say as I turn back to Shannon. The thinnest of excuses.

The look of raw but willing vulnerability that she gives me right before I slide my jersey over her head is fucking everything.

It’s a confession. It’s a plea.

She lets me slide her arms through the oversized sleeves. My gaze drops to where my number is, the same part of her arm where I pressed my fingers when we were watching Shoresy.

I want to claim her with so much more than just my jersey.

“We’re ready to start,” the photographer says.

“This won’t take long,” I say just for her ears. “Wait for me.”

Shannon’s gaze pleads with me to just go and do the thing I came here to do—cover for the team, maybe. More accurately, protect her from embarrassment. But more honestly, as soon as I heard her name, I knew I wanted to see her.

And now I want more than that.

I want everything, damn the consequences. Damn the embarrassment.

But the second I turn around and let them put me in the photo with the children, Shannon flees for the door. The last thing I see as she sprints for the hallway is my number on her back.

I know it’s a matter of seconds before she takes off that jersey on the other side of the door.

But I also know that her purse is still sitting on a table against the far wall. She hasn’t left the building. And the second we’re done here, I’m going hunting for her.

CHAPTER 35

SHANNON

Outside I pause in the quiet, carpeted corridor, grateful that it’s basically empty. There’s a guy on a laptop at the end of the hall, and I give him a polite wave before ducking across the hall into an unused room.

I’m not needed for anything to do with this team anymore, and it breaks my heart.

The only person who wants me is the one person I can’t give myself to. My heart cracks open and my hands shake as I pull off Russ’s jersey.

It’s heavy as I turn it over in my hands.

Armstrong.

---