Page 92 of Shot Taker

I swallow a laugh and duck toward the door, leaving them alone.

Outside, my gaze lands on Clay’s door across the hall.

It opens and he peers out, doing a double take.

His arched brow when he sees me makes me want to bite my lip.

He’s wearing sweatpants slung low on his hips, his shirt in one hand like he was in the middle of pulling it on.

Or taking it off.

God he’s gorgeous. I should be over it after all this time, desensitized from being in the presence of that much hotness on a regular basis, but I’m not.

“Should I be jealous?” he murmurs, taking in where I’ve come from.

“Maybe,” I tease.

“Of Miles or Michael?” he asks.

I throw up my hands. “Does everyone know about this?”

“They did it to me my first year. We weren’t even on the same team.”

His slow grin is contagious, and I can’t stop the laughter that rises up.

My shoulders rock until tears warm the corners of my eyes.

A player I don’t know heads down the hall, and he and Clay exchange a nod. I step closer to Clay to avoid being in the way and get a hint of his clean male scent.

“What are you doing in the players’ hotel, pretty girl?” Clay murmurs near my ear.

My gaze runs over his muscles and tattoos, my throat going dry.

I peer up at him through my lashes and shrug out of my jacket to show him the jersey.

Hisjersey.

“I was hoping to get this signed.”

His eyes darken. “Watch it. I’ll write my name on you with permanent ink.”

I bite my lip. “You already did that.”

“That was my number. And I said I owed you a tattoo.”

“You still do.”

He goes back into his room and returns with a pen. “Where do you want it?”

I debate a second before I pull down the neck of my jersey, exposing my ribs over my heart.

Clay writes carefully across my skin. I’m not watching the pen—I’m watching him.

“Before you look at it, I need to tell you something.” He clears his throat. “Everything I am, everything I did, was about basketball. The one time I faltered, the one time I blinked back in college, it burned me. Bad enough I swore I’d never hesitate again.

“Coach’s accident got me thinking about how everyone in this hotel, in that arena, knows me for basketball. If I died tonight, that’s what they’d remember me for. But I want more than that, Nova.”

My breath catches.

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