Page 71 of Dirty Player

Three and a half million dollars a year, minimum, and she’d blown it all?

“How is that humanly possible?”

He flashed me a dumbfounded grin and shook his head. “I have no earthly idea. She’s currently fighting to extend the support.”

“You’re fighting her this time, though, right?”

“I’m cutting her off, and she knows it. She’s pissed. Today’s display was a way for her to get what she wanted a different way.”

His lip curled and I sat back. Wow. I’d met women like this. I’d seen it happen at bars and after-game parties and in the box suites where most wives and girlfriends watched the games. Serena had seemed so genuinely sweet when I first met her, I never would have pegged her as one of the women like that.

“When you followed her, you looked like…”

I couldn’t finish the thought. Just remembering the way he’d chased after her, looking so lost, made my stomach roll.

“Like I loved her?”

I nodded.

“She’s a memory, Shannon. She was also a part of me for most of my life. High school, college, my draft…football. Everything. She’s wrapped up in all of it. I can’t take that back. I grew into a man with her. And I can’t lie and say that when I found out what she’d been doing all along I wasn’t wrecked. I was. For a long time. I’m not sure when I quit caring about her at all, but I know I did. I went after her today to give her the attention she wanted and to make it clear that she’d never see me or my money again.”

I understood so much of what he was saying. Hearing him confirm it, at least tell me he knew he was over her, helped.

We all came with baggage. Mine—mostly from Patrick—was losing trust in what seemed so good.

“I might have been projecting some of my own insecurities onto you this afternoon after what happened,” I admitted.

“I’m not a cheater.” He leaned forward and pressed his palm to my cheek.

I leaned into his touch, his scent, and the strength in his hand.

“I never have been. I wouldn’t do that, and I’m not going to lie, it’s not like I didn’t have opportunity. But I was always faithful to Serena, and if we had stayed together it would have been a lifetime. I’m not that guy.”

“I believe you.”

We stared at each other for several moments, that familiar heat beginning to swirl between us.

My heart began beating faster, my pulse a little bit louder in my ears when he leaned closer.

“I’m going to kiss you now,” he whispered. “And you’re going to kiss me back.”

I smiled, a puff of breath escaping my lips. “I’m sorry I got upset and ignored you.”

“I’m sorry I walked away from you for Serena.Thatwill never happen again.”

His lips met mine then, soft and sweet and slow and absolutely delicious. I melted into him, pressed myself to his chest when his other hand wrapped around my back and pulled me to his lap.

We kissed for hours. And when we fell asleep, curled and entwined together on a lumpy couch, only a sheet to cover us, I woke up the next morning knowing with certainty that that night had been our beginning.

Chapter SEVENTEEN

OLIVER

“Oliver.” Accompanied with her breathy little gasp, I knew Shannon was waking up, enjoying the ministrations of my fingers against her already hot, slick flesh.

Always ready for me.Me.Not the football player, because she didn’t give a shit about that. If anything, that was a point against me.

It’d been years since a woman had looked at me and seen me. Didn’t see the dollar signs or the endorsements or the potential photos in magazines with her on my arm. I never knew how much I’d missed it until the previous night, when Shannon had listened to me, understood me, and believed me at my word.

---