Page 69 of Anatomy of a Player

“If you need to call that guy back…” I suddenly realized that it was pretty late for work calls.

Jealousy rose up, but keeping my goal to try harder in mind, I shoved it aside. It wasn’t even as hard to do as I’d expected.

Because I trusted her.

That thought hit me like a ton of bricks. I trusted this girl. It had been so long since I’d trusted anyone but Dane or the rest of the guys on the team. I couldn’t even trust my own mom.

That glimmer of hope called to me, making me think maybe this time it really could be different. I grabbed Whitney’s hand and kissed the back of it, needing to hold on to her, on to this. “I can tell you’re stressed. Talk to me.”

Her blue eyes slowly lifted to my face. “I’ve wanted to be a journalist for so long. I swore I’d do whatever it takes.”

“So do it. If you need to take care of something tonight, I can wait.” It’d be torturous, and I’d be frustrated as hell, but I could do it.

Sadness edged her smile. “It’s not just tonight. It’s… I’m learning that writing stories and digging deep…” She released a long breath that seemed to have a lot of frustration behind it. “Sometimes you find out things you don’t want to know. Things that might hurt people. A serious journalist would probably expose them in the name of the truth, and I know that’s what my editor wants, and what I need to do to get ahead… It’s just dirtier work than I thought it’d be.”

“Look, the truth’s the truth. It comes out. If it’ll help you get the job you need, you expose it.”

There was something about the way she looked at me that made me feel like I was missing pieces of the puzzle. “If you want something badly enough, you do whatever it takes,” I said. “It’s how I got good at hockey. It’s how we won playoffs last year. No mercy, Reporter Girl.” I chucked her on the chin. “If the big news is too stupid to see how amazing you are, you can always get a job covering sports.”

“Ha-ha,” she said, and at least this smile was genuine.

“I’m serious. A little more tutoring on sports terms—tutoring I’d be happy to provide. And you’re certainly opinionated enough…”

Her mouth dropped open and she moved to smack my chest with the back of her hand, but I caught her wrist just before contact. “I like that you’re opinionated. I’m surprised as anyone, but I do.”

“Yeah, but what if there was something huge we disagreed on. Likestronglydisagreed.”

“I think we could find a way to work it out.” I pulled her closer and ran my hands down her back, cupping her ass and pulling her tight to me. Then I waggled my eyebrows.

It had started out as a playful, joking move, but with her against me, I grew hard, my body remembering all the things I wanted to do to hers. Yeah, we could work out any differences, I was sure of it.

A shallow breath escaped those perfect lips, and I decided we’d talked enough. Time to show her exactly what I meant. I walked her backward until her back met the wall, and crushed my lips to hers.

She gasped into my mouth, and I took advantage, plunging my tongue inside for a taste. She clung to me, her nails digging into my arms, and I ground my hips against hers.

“I see what you mean,” she said on an exhale, then she dragged her nails up my arms and neck and drove her fingers into my hair, sending tiny electric sparks across my scalp.

I kissed her neck and she leaned her head to the side, offering more of her skin for me to lick and tease with my teeth. Her lips called to me again, and I recaptured her mouth. Whitney rolled her tongue over mine, and as the world went fuzzy around the edges, she reached between us and unbuttoned and unzipped my jeans. I moaned in relief as I sprung free from the too tight fabric.

I pushed her skirt up her thighs and ground against her again, groaning when I could feel her wet heat through the thin fabric of her gloriously tiny panties.

“Hudson,” she whimpered, and I ground into her again, fire burning deep within me as her half-lidded eyes met mine, the passion there reflecting my own.

I didn’t deserve this girl, I knew that much, but for the first time in a long time, I wanted to believe in something. I wanted to believe in Whitney and me.

“Bedroom,” she said, then she curled her hand around the waistband of my boxers and tugged me toward the door.

I didn’t catch many details about the room, just the vague idea of a desk and a lot of pink. The bed jumped out as the most important feature, and I stopped letting her pull me, pushing her until the backs of her knees hit the bed. I wrapped an arm around her and lowered her onto the quilt.

I edged up her shirt and trailed kisses up the center of her stomach, dipping my tongue into her belly button and smiling at the “oh” that fell from her lips. I continued my way up until her shirt was off, revealing a lacy pink and black bra that matched her tiny thong. With a flick of my wrist, I undid the clasp, and just as the bra slid free, revealing perky breasts, she sat up and grabbed my hand.

“This is going to sound crazy, but…”

I dragged my gaze away from her hard nipples, even though it took every ounce of my self-control not to take a tiny taste first. “What? Tell me what you like. I’m open to whatever, no matter how kinky.”

Her entire body blushed at that, the pink spreading across her breasts and up her neck before settling in her cheeks. “It’s not… What you’re doing is good—like, really, really good, actually—and that’s kind of the problem. Every time the sex is good, I know it means the guy’s going to end up hurting me. So maybe it’d be better if it was just okay.”

Itdidsound crazy. She wanted to have a mediocre experience the first time we had sex? “Not going to happen.”

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