Page 20 of Play Hard
“Huh? Who, me?”
She sat up slowly, and I immediately missed the view of her cleavage spilling over that top to the point where I could just barely see the darkening of her nipples.
“Yes, you!” she replied with a glare over her shoulder. “You get off on torturing me.”
From the way my dick had been jumping during this entire hour of a workout would tell a different story. Torture was not being able to press her back against this wall and fuck her until she screamed my entire name. Or, better yet, torture was commencing these workouts either in the gym or in a four-mile run around the park every morning at five for the past two weeks, with her in the tightest workout clothes I’d ever allowed myself to enjoy.
At any rate, I felt like I was the real loser here… or winner, depending on how you looked at it. Despite the obvious torture of wanting to get my hands on this woman, there was the benefit of simply being in her presence. I couldn’t underestimate how good that shit felt. After all this time, all those nights I lay in bed thinking about what could have been. Not that I’d spent myformative years dreaming of a happily ever after or any nonsense like that, because I hadn’t.
Growing up, I always had a roof over my head and food on the table. I went to school in clean clothes, mostly designer because my mother was big on brand names. Christine loved money and the men who would give it to her. She drank, did drugs, made sure I had a fresh cut, pressed clothes, and anything else I wanted. She also worked a full-time job at the hospital because while she loved men, she loved money more. Stacking her own cash in banks while whoever she decided to lay down with paid her bills was like a second career for her. Well, more like a third. Her second career had to be being a punching bag for every one of those bastards who paid her bills.
“Hey? Are you listening to me?”
The slight sting of the towel Serra had swatted me with brought my thoughts back to the present and I blinked to be sure she was the woman standing across from me and not my mother. Not, the only other woman who’d ever held a spot in my heart.
“Of course, I’m listening,” I replied, grabbing the towel on the second swipe she attempted. She didn’t release her grip, which I knew she wouldn’t, and I used mine to pull her forward until she slammed into my chest.
Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, a slim black band over the top. Her face was free of any makeup and still pretty as fuck. The way she had to tilt her head back to meet my gaze made me momentarily feel weak. Like, at this moment this woman could ask me to jump up and grab the sun for her and I would do my damnedest to complete the task. I’d give her my kidney if she needed it, fuck her into a coma if she made the slightest indication that she needed that, too. There wasn’t anything I wouldn’t do for Serra, except give her my heart again.
“Good,” she replied after blinking a couple of times. She wouldn’t pull out of my grasp, she was too proud for that. We’d been doing this thing in the past couple of weeks where we seemed to be proving a point to ourselves and each other. I wasn’t going to fall in love with her again, and she wasn’t going to give in to the physical pull that threatened to choke us. I could do the physical, would get naked and let her have her way with me in a heartbeat, all she had to do was whisper the words. But I wouldn’t give her any more of myself. That might sound weak or even foolish, but I couldn’t. Even after learning what really happened that day, knowing why she’d pushed me away, didn’t change how that day impacted the rest of my life.
“Then, you’re buying breakfast,” she continued. “Cool. I want French toast with loads of powdered sugar and syrup. Cheesy eggs and crispy bacon.”
I raised a brow, and with my free hand, touched a finger to the tip of her nose. “So, fuck this work-out, we’re going straight for the carbs.” I missed how much I enjoyed working out with her.
“Not at all,” she countered, her free hand gripping the edge of my shirt. “After this intense work-out, I deserveallthe carbs, the fatandthe sugar!”
When her lips lifted into a smile, I couldn’t help but join her. I loved when she looked at me like this. Like there was nothing else between or around us, there was only the two of us against the world.
Chuckling, I let my finger linger over to her cheek until I eventually cupped her face. “You’re right,” I told her, my voice lowering without my consent. “You deserve anything your heart desires.”
This time she blinked slowly and caught her lower lip between her teeth. I couldn’t help it…my dick jumped, and I leaned in closer. “The French toast, the syrupandthe bacon.”My lips were just a whisper away from hers, our gazes still locked.
“Don’t forget my cheesy eggs,” she whispered, tilting her head until the tip of her nose brushed against the tip of mine.
My hand slid back to the base of her neck, holding her in place while I swiped my tongue over her plump bottom lip. “Yes, sweetness,” I whispered. “You can have the eggs too.”
“You havethe right to file an appeal,” Gayla said as she stood on one side of the table at the back of the bar.
It was taking everything in me to restrain the fury bubbling inside of me at this moment. Jeret had given up on restraint about three sentences ago. “What the fuck?” he roared. “We filled out all the paperwork…twice! Got the three reference letters, which no other business in this entire town has had to do, just to get three fuckin’ permits.”
“Jay,” Del said, placing a hand on Jeret’s arm.
“No, don’t fuckin’ Jay me,” was Jeret’s stormy reply as he yanked his arm away. “I want her to look us in the eye and tell us the truth.”
Gayla, a slimly built woman with smooth, almond-toned skin and straight black hair that hung past her shoulders, looked only partially ruffled by Jeret’s language and candor. I could admit, even if just to myself, that she seemed a little irritated when she came into the bar fifteen minutes ago and announced she needed to talk to us.
Lance was the only one missing, but we could and most definitely would fill him in later.
“So even after we did everything you asked of us,” I began, hoping to get the answers Jeret, and the rest of us ultimatelywanted, “you’re still not giving us the permits, because…why? What reason did they offer?”
The expression on Gayla’s face said she knew we weren’t going to like her reply. “A few members on the council don’t believe it’s a good idea to have such a big event so close to the four-day Independence Day Festival that’s been on the calendar since last year,” she said, her hands gripping the back of the chair in front of her.
“So, once again their independence comes before ours,” Jeret shot back.
“Same shit, different decade,” Rock grumbled.
“We pitched a one-day event and all we needed was a permit to serve drinks in the four-block radius outside of the bar. We already have the license and permits to serve alcohol inside of the bar, so why was this request so difficult?” Del took a breath, one I knew he was using to temper his own rage. “That pencil-neck Carter then claimed we needed permits to block off the streets and bring in all the equipment for the event. But there’s no record in the public files of permits for this Independence Day Festival which will shut down all of Main Street and the park for four days!”
