Page 9 of Maverick
Then he’s leading me across the parking lot. And I have to act like I’m okay with it. Or I don’t. I don’t have condoms. Does hehave condoms? He probably does. He certainly does. He’s that kind of man.
He flings open the door to my horse trailer, and I am aware that Holt and Cade are still watching us. So then I step into the door of the trailer, grip Maverick by the shirt, and pull him in.
Then I step away into the tiny space. It’s like a little one-person camp trailer, with a place for horses in the second compartment that’s much larger than the space for the human.
There’s a bed and a tiny little table. A place for me to put a cooler and a hot plate. And little else. I never have anyone in it, and with a man his size there, I’m overwhelmed.
He can’t straighten entirely, but even so, with his shoulders hunched, he begins to rock back and forth, making the whole trailer move with him.
“They’re going to think–”
He smiles at me, his expression something wicked. “Isn’t that what you wanted? You were out there making a show, little girl. And I assume that was for a reason. Haven’t you ever heard that saying? Don’t go cashing checks your ass can’t cash. Because I think that’s what’s happened just now.” He stops rocking then and looks at the bed, not me. “Now hush. I’m tired.”
“Aren’t you going to…”
“Fuck no. I don’t have to take a bet to get a woman into bed. I can get sex if I want it. What I’d like is a good night’s sleep.”
It’s the first time I notice that he’s changed since his event. Since I saw him standing there smoking a cigarette. He doesn’t smell like smoke anymore. Or dust or hay. He smells clean.
He stretches out on the bed, putting his hands behind his head, looking at me through hooded lids. “I’m going to sleep in here. That’s my prerogative. I get you for the whole night. Didn’t say what I had to do.”
“I… I…”
“You want them to think that you’re daring. But what the hell would you have done if they’d won? Because I’ll tell you what, Holt would fuck you.”
“Maybe I wanted to fuck,” I say, my face getting red.
I’m shaking now. I bet myself and this man – this epic villain of the circuit – is going to leave me untouched?
I’ve never felt so stupid. So sad and small and ridiculous, because aren’t men just supposed to drop everything when they have an opportunity for sex? Morals, common decency, et cetera.
“Well, too bad for you, because I won.” He looks me up and down. “You’re what? Twenty-three?”
“I’m twenty-four,” I say, crossing my arms. “I don’t know what that has to do with anything.”
He’s belittling me now and that’s just mean.
“You just betyourselffor a night. That was some dumb mid-twenties bullshit right there. I recognize that, because I’ve been it. But I’m not it now. And I’m not going to play this game. But you can have your reputation, and I’ll keep mine. Everyone can continue thinking I’m the bad guy, who took you up on that bed, and you can remain unsullied.”
“Maybe I wanted to be sullied.” My earlier fantasy of his mouth on mine comes back to me in a rush, and I feel heat flood my cheeks. Like he can see what I’m thinking about. Like he knows that he’s the one I actually wanted.
I didn’t want Holt.
But if he’d won I could have made it about finally losing my virginity, about learning a new thing – I really do like to learn a new thing.
Maverick won, though, and that was exposing in a whole new way and now he’s rejecting me which is just…
Brutal.
“By me?”
My heart slams into my breastbone. He’s too close to the truth. “I wasn’t closed off to it.”
He makes a chiding noise. “That’s only because you don’t know me that well.”
“Actually, I kind of thought that was the point.”
“Why would that be the point?”
