Page 35 of Game Changer

His phone lights up on the console between us.

“Someone’s texting you…”

My voice trails off as I see the flesh-colored image.

It’s a woman.

Naked, or nearly, with a Kardashian figure and barely-there lingerie over huge breasts and a very waxed everything else.

“Sorry, I wasn’t trying to look,” I say, embarrassed.

Clay glances at the screen, his expression revealing nothing.

He flips the phone facedown.

This is probably normal for him. We’re from different worlds. He could have any woman he wants—glamorous, confident. I forgot it for a minute, but this is a blunt reminder.

We drive the rest of the way in silence.

“Don’t turn up the driveway,” I tell him when we reach the house.

Clay stops at the foot of the driveway, and I reach for my seatbelt, pressing the release button.

It doesn’t give.

I try again.

Over and over, until I’m slamming it with my finger.

“Dammit.” I slump against my seat, feeling the warmth emanating from his body as he leans in.

“What’s wrong?” he demands.

He means now, in this car, but my head is still back at the park.

“When you said you were going to take me home, for a moment I imagined you meant with you.”

He stills over me.

We spent the last two hours talking under the stars, until the moment we heard those wild animals.

Instantly, he shuttered. The walls went up, the man I was with vanished like a ghost.

Clay pumped some intoxicating drug through my system, and now that I’m back for more, he’s nowhere to be found.

“Maybe it’s crazy to imagine you wanting to, but for a second…” I huff out a breath as I cradle my wrist. “It didn’t feel crazy.”

I half expect him to laugh, thinking of the picture message and the stunning woman praying for the slightest show of interest from the all-star next to me.

He doesn’t laugh.

He bends closer, the scent of wood and ash mingling into a heady aroma.

“I don’t do that, Nova.”

The blood pounds between my thighs, echoing the throbbing in my wrist.

“You don’t have sex,” I counter.

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