Backhand (Gold Hockey) Read online

  He was tired, but that was a good thing. It meant he was working hard.

  Of course, part of that was probably from allowing Brit to lead him on a wild goose chase through the lower bowl of the Gold Mine.

  He’d been following her on her workout since Columbus and still hadn’t gotten any closer to catching her.

  And he probably never would.

  But he’d noticed a difference on the ice.

  Hence, the continued hamster wheel of Brit stairs.

  Round and round they went, never catching up and not really minding in the least.

  His distraction with Brit’s locker room music from earlier in the day — Backstreet Boys, good God — was probably why he didn’t comprehend the light in his bedroom.

  He strode through the door and screeched to what was certainly a very comical stop, had anyone been awake to see it.

  Anyone being Sara.

  Who was curled up on his bed, one of his t-shirts dwarfing her, a blanket half-draped over her body and giving him a glimpse of one bare leg.

  Holy. Fucking. Shit.

  Mike blinked. Glanced away and back.

  But no, Sara was still there. In his bed. Wearing his shirt.

  Suddenly, he wasn’t the least bit tired. He was hard and aching and—

  The sleeping beauty — no Goldilocks — that was Sara stirred slightly on the bed. Mike whirled away, unsure if he should be looking, and caught sight of her clothes folded neatly on a chair in the corner of the room.

  He had to walk by them on the way to his closet, and he couldn’t even lie and say he’d accidentally caught a glimpse of her bra and panties.

  No, he actually stopped and pushed her jeans aside, nearly groaning when he saw the matching black lace set folded neatly atop her shirt.

  Sara was in his bed, in his shirt, without a bra and underwear.

  He bit back a curse and walked through the door into his closet.

  Unzipping his slacks was the hardest — yes, literally the hardest — part. Jacket on the hanger, pants and dress shirt in the dry-clean hamper.

  One sock off. The other and—

  Cool hands on his back.

  “Christ!” Mike jumped and whipped around, almost knocking Sara in the face with his elbow.

  He’d only been able to adjust since he was an athlete and controlling every part of his body was instinctive, but it had still been a close thing.

  “Hey,” she whispered, sleep in her eyes and an impish smirk on her lips.

  His heart had been pounding because she’d startled him. Now it threatened to burst from his chest for a whole other reason.

  Mussed blond hair, naked breasts barely concealed beneath cotton, long bare legs, pink toenails.

  Fuck. Her toenails were pink.

  The same pink he imagined the hidden parts of her were.

  And imagining those hidden parts was not helping his control in the least.

  “Hope you don’t mind,” she murmured. “I got tired waiting for you after the game.” A fingertip trailed down his chest, his abs, slipped under the waistband of his boxer briefs—

  He caught that naughty hand and pulled it free. Her skin was like silk beneath his palm, warm and sleep-flushed, pale with just the hint of a rosy tone. She was strawberries and cream, and he wanted to lick her up.

  “You can be naked in my bed anytime you want, sweetheart.”

  “I’m not naked.”

  He brought her wrist up, pressed his mouth to the delicate skin. “Nearly naked then.”

  “Mmm.” Her other hand lifted, gripping his shoulder as she rose on tiptoe to whisper in his ear. “So why did you stop me?”

  He kissed her neck. “Who said anything about stopping?” A nip of his teeth. “But we should probably discuss the circumstances.”

  Sara huffed out a sigh. “I don’t want to discuss anything. You’re sweet and hot, and we’re together. No talking.” She dropped back onto the balls of her feet, met his eyes, and the mix of need and confidence in her stare made his blood pulse under his skin. This woman. She was hot as hell.

  Especially when she tugged the t-shirt over her head and said, “I want you inside me. I want you to give me multiple orgasms and then wake me up in a few hours to do it all over again. I want—”

  Her words were hot, but his mind stalled on her breasts, all perky and bouncy as she tossed the shirt aside.

  In one quick movement, he swept her into his arms and strode back into the bedroom. “I meant more like I’m clean, and I have condoms.”

  “Oh—oh!” She gasped when he tossed her on the bed and pinned her to the mattress.

  He was moving too fast, taking advantage, but this girl had been inside Mike’s head for more than a decade. He didn’t have patience when it came to Sara. He wanted her, needed her almost more than his next breath. If not breathing meant that he could have still brought her pleasure, found his own when he was inside her, then he’d have gladly given up the ability.

  “I’m on the pill,” she said and bit her lip. “I was clean the last time I got tested. Admittedly, it was a while ago, but I haven’t been with anyone since…”

  “Good.” He reached for the nightstand drawer, extracted a condom, and set it on the pillow next to her head. Birth control pills or not, he wouldn’t risk Sara.

  “Good?”

  “Yup.” A smirk as he leaned back on his heels and picked up her foot. In reality, she was tiny, significantly shorter and smaller than him, especially since she always seemed so much larger in his mind.

  But it was hard to deny the evidence of her size when her foot was in his hand. He massaged the sole, her toes with that delectable pink polish, and could easily feel the delicate bones beneath the surface of her skin.

  Fragile. She was beyond—

  Her other foot stroked up the side of his calf, his thigh, his groin, coming to rest just a hairsbreadth away from his cock.

  Hot.

  She was so fucking hot.

  One toe stroked along his length, base to tip, before she allowed her leg to drop to the side, knee bent and effectively exposing—

  Fuuuck. The pinks matched.

  Mike felt his control slip another notch and forced his eyes up to the ceiling. He thought about tsunamis and short-handed goals, about stick length—

  So. Not. Helping.

  “Hey, Hot Shot. Getting lonely here.” His gaze snapped down, and he saw Sara’s hand trailing lower, drifting south. And… hell no. He dropped her foot and dove for her.

  His mouth plundered on its way to her center, nipping, licking, kissing, until he reached the apex of her thighs. He gripped her hips, spread her legs with his shoulders, and went to work.

  She tasted like cotton candy, sweet and soft.

  “Mike!”

  “Mmm.” His tongue traced an intricate pattern that had her gripping his hair like a steering wheel.

  He guessed she liked that. And so he did it again. And again. And again.

  She bucked, twisting on his sheets, squeezing his head in the vice-like grip of her thighs.

  And he wanted more.

  One finger inside. Two.

  “Fuck, I’m going to—”

  She exploded around him, drenching his mouth, holding him tight both inside and out for a long moment before collapsing back to the bed.

  Mike rode out the wave with her, gentling her descent back to reality. Only when she had stopped convulsing around him did he remove his fingers and sit up.

  A kiss to that pretty mouth of hers, sipping in her rapid exhales as she tried to get her breath back. A touch of his lips to the space between her breasts, to one nipple, the other.

  “Mike,” she breathed.

  He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Like you saying my name like that.”

  Her eyes slid closed, a smile smoothed her features; her breathing went slow and even. Sleep. She’d fallen asleep.

  Mike almost didn’t care. Yes, he was hard and aching, covered in a layer of sw
eat, and his balls were probably indigo, but this was Sara.

  His Sara.

  He tugged a blanket from the bottom of the bed, covered them, and pulled her into his arms.

  As she nestled against his chest, her hair got all up in his face. He was so hard that his dick could hammer a fucking nail. She immediately hogged the blanket.

  And he didn’t give a damn because she was next to him.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  SARA WOKE UP wonderfully warm. She stretched, frowning at the soreness of her muscles, the stiffness of her right hip and ribs.

  Had she overdone her run the day before?

  But then she registered the heavy arm across her middle, the rough hair of legs pressing against the back of hers, the erection prodding her butt.

  And — shit! She’d fallen asleep.

  She’d had one orgasm and then fallen asleep.

  Before Mike had gotten his.

  Guilt poured over her. She’d basically assaulted him in his closet, begged that he have sex with her, gotten hers… and fallen asleep.

  Good Lord, she was the guy.

  That thought made a giggle bubble up in her throat.

  But dang, she was a jerk. Once he woke up, she needed to find a way to—

  “What’s so funny?” Mike’s voice was raspy from sleep.

  She rolled over and stared into his brown eyes. They were soft, not irritated, but there was an underlying heat in them reminding her quite blatantly that she’d left her man hard and unsatisfied the previous night.

  Her man?

  Had she honestly just thought that?

  Except what else was Mike if he wasn’t hers?

  She’d belonged to him in some way — they’d had this unbreakable, silent connection — since she was sixteen and he was eighteen. Wasn’t that the definition of hers?

  Sara wasn’t going to spend time worrying about it. She was going to embrace it, enjoy it. It had been ages since she’d felt alive.

  Mike made her feel whole.

  And since she was embracing this whole her man thing, then she was going to take very good care of him.

  “Sara?” He touched her cheek. “You okay?”

  Her lips curved, and she turned her head so that she could kiss his palm. “I’m better than okay.”

  One brown brow lifted. “Yeah?”

  Sunlight poured through the windows, turning Mike into the equivalent of a Roman god. His skin was golden-hued, his chest squeezable, his abs clearly defined.

  She pushed him back against the gray comforter, letting the blanket he must have covered them with slide down her back as she straddled him.

  “Six yummy squares,” she murmured, running a finger around the defined muscles. “I hear they’re hard to get.”

  Mike hissed out a breath when she moved up and brushed his nipple. “Well, when you don’t have anything else to do besides working out…”

  Mmm. Pecs. They overflowed her hands when she gave them a squeeze. “Really?” she asked and bent down to press a kiss to his chest, then to each of those six squares. “Not anything to do?”

  She traced her tongue along that little trail of hair that disappeared beneath his boxer briefs, that led to his decidedly not little erection, and pushed the waistband down, her mouth actually watering—

  And found herself on her back, Mike above her, eyes hot, hard body pressing into her… everywhere.

  “I believe I promised you multiple orgasms.”

  “I—”

  She didn’t get more than that one syllable out before his mouth was on her breasts. The sound that came from her was almost inhuman, but Mike didn’t seem to mind, just switched to the neglected side.

  He ran a hand down her torso, tracing his fingers straight down and in… in.

  “Mike!” she cried.

  “Like it when you call out my name, sweetheart.”

  Her vision was blurry, her every nerve was on edge, and she was rapidly approaching—

  No.

  But she was already over the brink, cruising over the peak, cascading down the other side. Pleasure made her limbs lax and her legs — which had been squeezing his arm like a vise — flop open to the mattress.

  “What did you put in that ice cream?” she asked, suddenly way too relaxed to move.

  Mike laughed and she joined in, loving the light in his eyes. It felt like those mornings from before. Just the two of them sharing a private joke, them against the rest of the world. Only this time, there weren’t barriers — age, parents, responsibilities, clothes — between them.

  With difficulty, she lifted her arm, which may as well have been a limp noodle at this point, and touched his cheek.

  “I’ve missed you.”

  Brown eyes went intense as he propped himself up, his elbows on either side of her head. “That’s almost better than hearing my name, Jumping Bean.”

  She stroked the bristles on his jaw, loved the feel of him over her, pressing down, all hard and hot. “We need to talk.”

  A pained expression crossed his face, but Mike nodded and sat back.

  Huh? Oh!

  “Not now,” Sara said, lurching upward to latch onto his shoulder. She flopped down, pulling him along with her. “I meant that as a sometime-later discussion.”

  “Thank fuck,” he said, cupping her face in his palms and leaning down to kiss her.

  Hot lips, a searching tongue, teeth nipping at her jaw, her neck. He was a flurry of motion, transforming her languid pleasure of the minute before into a frenzy of need.

  His mouth moved to her breasts and, yes, she liked that a whole hell of a lot, but when he slid lower, obviously on the trail to south of the border, Sara’d had enough. Look, obviously, she liked oral sex, and Mike was really freaking good at it, but she needed him inside her already.

  So she used her yoga moves — which made her actually appreciate the torturous exercise for a change — and stopped him by wrapping her legs around his hips.

  “S-Sara,” he hissed out.

  In fairness, she was hissing too. Because her move had brought his cock right there.

  She could feel the heat of him against her, so close and yet not in, and started to shift her pelvis to close that final bit of distance between them.

  Mike stopped her, one big hand spanning her waist. “Hold on, sweetheart.”

  She couldn’t hold on, couldn’t wait another second, not after waiting ten years.

  Her body was on fire, the need coursing through her almost painful.

  And so she tilted her hips and brushed against the hard length of him.

  “Fuck!” He thrust forward, the tip of him brushing her heat, but just as quickly he was gone.

  “Mike, I—”

  “Almost, Sara girl, just—”

  The crinkle of a wrapper drew her gaze, and she watched as he rolled the condom on. He was back between her thighs, poised at her entrance a second later.

  “Yes?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she replied before he’d even finished the word.

  And thank God she had because then he was there, filling her, stretching her from the inside out. But it wasn’t just physical. Somehow, he was stretching her heart, filling her soul with more than just—

  A swivel of his hips pulled her right out of any semi-rational thoughts she had remaining.

  She wrapped her legs tight around his waist, clawed at his arms, and held on tight as Mike rode her like a prized stallion.

  In and out, in and out, grinding forward, pressing tightly, retreating… basically turning her into a writhing, begging puddle of desire.

  But the hottest thing was the way he talked to her. The dirty little sentiments whispered in her ear, naughty enough to make her wetter even as her cheeks flushed.

  Her moans were loud, her breathing uneven, and when Mike ordered her to “Come for me. Now,” she didn’t consider disobeying.

  She exploded.

  One, two more thrusts, and he was following suit.

 
Sara had never heard anything hotter than the long, low groan of Mike’s orgasm. It drew hers out, pleasure sliding outward from her center to the rest of her limbs, sparks of sensation exploding along her skin.

  Holy shit.

  Holy fucking shit.

  What in the hell was that? That was soul-shattering, incredible sex, and it meant—

  Fuck. What did it mean?

  She should—

  She needed—

  Good God. What did she need to do? Run? Jump on top of him for round two? Pretend the whole sexual escapade had been mediocre? That it didn’t actually mean anything?

  Except he’d heard her verbal orchestra of orgasm — scratch that — orgasms. He knew it had been good for her.

  Mike must have sensed her panic, because although he had his head buried in her shoulder, rapid exhales puffing against his neck, forearms propping him up and preventing his body from crushing hers, he said, “Later, sweetheart. That talking part doesn’t have to come now.”

  The knot twisting her insides loosened, and he rolled them to the side, shifting to cradle her back against his chest.

  “It will all be okay.”

  She nodded, felt her hair slide against his chest. But it was mostly an empty gesture.

  There was no way that things would be okay.

  Her life didn’t work that way.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  MIKE REELED AS he held Sara.

  He’d just had the most incredible sex of his life, and yet he’d lied to his partner in the process.

  This thing between them had the potential to destroy them both.

  “Did you feel it?”

  Her whispered question undid him.

  “Fuck yeah, I felt it, sweetheart.” He released her, tugging her shoulder until she faced him. When scared blue eyes met his, he leaned forward and kissed her. He forced his panic to the side, forced that fear of getting burned away, and let himself get lost in the embrace.

  This is what he needed to focus on.

  Not the what-ifs.

  Sara’s expression was slightly less petrified when he pulled back. Or at least there was heat and desire tempering her concern.

  “We’ll figure it out, yeah?”

  A nod.

  “Together this time.” He rested his forehead on hers. “This time we’re not alone.”