Page 19 of Irresistibly Risky

“Is there coffee where you keep your sports drinks?”

“I’m sure there is, but I don’t drink coffee during the season, so I don’t know if it’s any good.”

I squint up at him, shielding my eyes with my hand to block the sun as I do. “Why don’t you drink coffee during the season?”

“It’s a diuretic, and I don’t want to dehydrate. No caffeine, no junk food, very little sugar and alcohol.”

“Sounds like a great time.”

He reaches out and tugs on a piece of my hair before tucking it behind my ear and dragging his thumb along the shell. “I am if you give me the chance.”

“Stop flirting, player.”

His hand moves away, and his expression grows sincere. “I’m sorry. I am. It’s just that you’re easily the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. You have the kind of beauty that fucks with a man’s head and self-control. My natural instinct is to flirt, so I can try to win your attention. But you’re right. I’m being inappropriate and likely making you uncomfortable. I’ll behave.”

I blink up at him, my mouth agape as my heart flutters in my chest. “You’re serious? That wasn’t a line?”

He looks surprised by my shock. “No. I meant every word.”

“Uh.” I have no idea what to do with that. All I know is that it’s making me flustered and feels like I have ants crawling on my skin. I’m itchy, and my body simultaneously tickles and burns like it’s on fire.

“Coffee?” he offers, and I nod numbly. He waves his hand over his shoulder as he starts to head toward the tunnel, and I follow after him. “I told Coach I was going to talk to you more, so it should just be us for a while since the rest of the team has another forty minutes or so of practice.”

“Okay.” I’m still stuck on that most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen thing.

He leads me into the locker room that, well, smells like a locker room. Like men and sweat and rubber and gym equipment.

“Sit tight.”

He points to the bench and asks me how I take my coffee. I tell him, and he walks off only to return a few minutes later with a steaming cup for me and a sports drink for himself.

He removes his cleats one by one, and then my face scrunches up when he starts pulling off his red jersey and pads, tossing them toward a dirty laundry hamper.

“What are you doing?” I screech.

“Going to shower while we talk,” he says simply as if he isn’t stripping in front of me and will be naked and wet and smelling like soap in another minute.

I stand. “Um, no. We can talk on Monday when I do your pre-op.”

“This isn’t sexual,” he promises in earnest. “You won’t see anything you don’t want to see.”

Except I’m already seeing things I, unfortunately, do want to see. Like his incredible chest and abs, and hell, his shoulders. I have a thing for shoulders, and I’m not simply talking about the mechanics inside of them. His are perfect.

“Give me five minutes, please, and then we’ll talk. Drink your coffee, just stay. Don’t go.”

Stay. Don’t go.

I’m getting another flash of a memory and I close my eyes, trying to capture it, but it’s gone just as quickly as it was there.

He turns and heads toward the showers in the next room, unlacing the strings on his pants as he goes.

I spin around, my hand over my racing heart. What the hell? I can’t be in here while he’s showering. Only I don’t want to seem like that woman. The one who is skittish and immature. He isn’t bothered by it, and he already said it isn’t sexual, so why am I making a thing out of this?

Because a hot man who thinks you’re the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen is naked not even twenty feet from you.

Just because attraction is there doesn’t mean we act.

I sit back down and cross my legs, my knee jumpy as I take my first sip, and of course, I burn my tongue because that’s how everything is going for me lately. Five minutes later, as promised, he returns wearing nothing but a towel. Water runs down every inch of him, over every muscular ridge and valley before getting absorbed in the white cotton.

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