Once Upon A Half-Time: A Secret Baby Romance (3 page)

Right. Donuts for the quarterbacks and receivers, bagels for the offensive line, and I was supposed to carry half of the team’s bags to the field before practice.

Busy fucking morning.

Cole leaned close to Elle, his voice low. “Don’t rough him up too much. Piper will get pissed.”

“Don’t worry about me.” Elle raised the camera. “I’ve got a gentle touch.”

Gentle touch, dirty mind, and a mouth that loved to tease.

I’d never had a woman like her before.

And she sure as hell hadn’t had a guy like me.

I subtly tested the tape as she circled the goal posts, surveying the team’s work. I was stuck good. She liked that. I couldn’t move, but I gave her a charming grin.

“
Elle, Elle, Elle
…” Alone at last. “I knew you’d find me sooner or later.”

“You were easy to track down. There’s only two goal posts to check.”

“But you
did
check. Did you miss me that much, Red?”

She laughed. “You think
I
missed
you
?”

“Oh yeah. After what we did at the combine?” I wagged my eyebrows. “I bet you haven’t stopped thinking about me.”

“I’ve penciled time into my schedule specifically for Lachlan Reed related swooning.”

I hummed. “No need to swoon when you could have called me. After a weekend like that, I’d have run back to your bed. And you know how fast I am.”

“Not
that
fast.” She slipped closer to me. “If I remember correctly, you weren’t too fast…weren’t too slow. You were
just right
.”

I was hating the goal post. I shifted my legs. Didn’t help. My cock was about to bore a hole straight through the post.

“You asking for an encore?” I winked.

“Tempting, but…” Elle flicked a loose piece of tape sticking my ear to my head. “You look like you’re in quite the predicament right now.”

“What? This?” I laughed so she wouldn’t see me struggling against the damn tape.

Stuck. Pinned. So fucking close to her and unable to pounce.

“I’ve been in worse,” I lied. “This is just…a way for me to get a little sun after practice.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, see, this is helping me stretch out all those sore muscles.”

“
Right
.” Elle nodded. “I’ll let the trainers know you’ve invented a new regimen.”

“Yeah, gotta put in the work to look this good. You remember. In Vegas, you gave me all sorts of compliments…verbal and physical.”

“And I see none of it as gone to your head.”

“Not the one on my shoulders.”

Elle scoffed. “I don’t think anything goes to that head—compliments, thoughts,
blood
.”

“You didn’t complain at the combine.” I grinned. “Couldn’t. Your mouth was full.”

“And what’s the secret to keeping
you
quiet?”

“Easy. Sit. Spin. Grind. The usual.”

She took a picture, using the flash to blind me. “Were you this dirty in Vegas?”

“You’re right.” I blinked. Hard. “I apologize. Let’s get in the shower and clean up.” I wiggled. “Loosen this tape for me?”

“Nice try,” she said. “But I’ve been with the Rivets for
four
years now, ever since I was nineteen. I’ve earned the team’s respect, unlike cocky rookies like you. First rule I’ve learned…never interfere with hazing.”

“Because the rookie will get it worse next time?”

“No…” She leaned against the goal posts. “Because I enjoy it too.”

“
Mm
.” I squirmed before I was forced to buy the goal post breakfast. “I gotta say—I’m loving your whip-crack, sadistic streak. Where’ve you been all my life?”

“Trying to avoid charming rookies like you.”

“You’re not doing a good job.”

“Ah.” She shook her head. “You were
technically
a college senior when we met, not a rookie.”

“Is that why you didn’t call me after the draft? You knew I’d come to the Rivets?”

“I was afraid where else you might have come, Lachlan.”

I grinned. “Any place in particular you’d like?”

“Nowhere.”

“Edging, huh?” I asked. “You
are
sadistic.”

Elle’s smile was a quick chastisement. “Nope. I’m gonna make this perfectly clear. Now that you’re on the Rivets, you can forget about fooling around.”

“Red, that’s like asking the ocean not to be wet…or that perfect little secret between your legs.”

“Lachlan—”

“Why didn’t you call me? I left you messages.”

She sighed, taking a couple more photos as two cornerbacks jogged through the end zone and patted me on the head on their way to the locker room.

Elle shrugged. “We said everything we needed to say at the hotel.”

“We didn’t really
talk
at the hotel.”

“To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t interested in your mouth then.”

“I’m definitely interested in yours now.”

She rolled her eyes. “At least I left a good impression on you.”

“An
impression
? Woman, be glad there’s a goal post holding me back.”

“Oh yeah?” She lowered the camera and baited me with a wiggle of her hips. “Tell you what, Charming. If you can get out of the tape, you can have me.”

I thought better of thrashing, gnawing my hand off, or uprooting the goal post. The tape already cut off most of my circulation. I wasn’t risking anything happening to my hands, not after I dropped my share of passes this practice.

Instead I gave her a dimpled grin and a promise. “Nah, Red. Next time we’re together, you’re gonna
beg
for me.”

She laughed. “The
next
time?”

“Yeah, the next time. You owe me.”

“What could I possibly owe you?”

“You didn’t say goodbye when you left. Just up and disappeared. You gotta know what that does to a guy like me.”

“Did you want me to stay? Help you whittle a mark into your bedpost?”

“Baby, you
are
the mark in my bedpost. You’re the pinnacle. The gold—no,
ebony
standard.”

“Oh, Lord.”

I smiled. “Red, my bed is
cold
without you.”

“Might I suggest a blanket?”

“I’d prefer body heat.”

Click
.

She took another picture, watching me squirm. Desperation in black and white.

Still, I gave the lady what she wanted.

“Enjoy it, Elle. Here. Let me flex.”

She giggled. “At least you’re a good sport about this. You know the hazing will get worse.”

“I’ll let them tie me up naked next time, provided you’re there to document it,” I said.

“Oh hell…I wouldn’t miss that. The team wouldn’t even have to pay me.”

“Fuck the team, we don’t need them. We’ll do it this Saturday night, just you and me.”

“You’re relentless, you know that?”

Couldn’t help it. I finally had her in my sights…and we had a
lot
to talk about.

“Let me take you out,” I said. “We have some unsettled business to sort through.”

“Enticing.”

“Legally binding.”

“Underwhelming.”

I sighed. “If your panties aren’t soaked, I must not be selling this opportunity right.”

“I’ll wring them out when I get home.”

That sass. She needed something in her mouth to silence it…or a man to worship her while she dished out the harassment.

“You really should go out with me.” Any attempt at sincerity was wasted as my erection smashed into the goal post. “We should talk.”

The camera lowered. She wove a hand through her hair, twisting one of the red locks over her finger.

Why did that look so familiar?

“Lachlan…I’m not the kind of girl you think I am.”

“The one I’m spending the rest of my life with?”

“Not even close.” She shook her head. “I’m not someone who spends a weekend with a complete stranger, indulging in hour after hour of remorseless, anonymous sex.”

“Good thing we’re not strangers anymore,” I said.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m not that type, Lachlan…at least, not without copious amounts of alcohol.”

“Then drop the camera and grab a bottle of wine, cause I think we’ll have a lot of fun together.”

“I know I never said goodbye.” She took a breath. “And I never thanked you for the weekend. It was more fun than either of us should have had.”

“I’m the gift that keeps on giving, Red. Go out with me again so we can talk when I’m not…” I gave a tug. “Indulging the team’s traditions.”

Elle ripped a piece of tape from my shoulders. She hesitated, as if considering helping me escape. But that fantasy was too good to be true. She patted the tape over my mouth without the decency of a kiss first.

“
Shh
. It was a one-time thing, Lachlan. Not a mistake, but it wasn’t anything that can happen again. We’re working together now. I’m not on the field getting my head crushed by linebackers, but we have to see each other.
A lot
. Let’s not make this any more complicated than it already is.”

I laughed. The sound muffled in the tape, but she wouldn’t have listened even if I yelled it.

Jesus, she didn’t remember
anything
from our weekend.

Wow
.

Well…it would be an awkward conversation when she finally decided to talk.

And a major life revelation.

Wouldn’t she be surprised.

Elle stepped away, taking one last picture. “Start at your ankles. The tape’s a little loose down there.”

I nodded, but she didn’t stay to watch the fun as I shredded through the tape.

I should have followed. Should have run after her. Shouldn’t have let her leave without telling her the truth and demanding another dinner, another night, another morning with her.

Elle thought our story had ended?

Hell no. Our fairy-tale was only beginning.

T
he sweltering summer
afternoon was made hotter because Lachlan Reed was on the field.

I was starting my
fourth
season with the Rivets, and I’d never once gone boy-crazy. Most of the guys weren’t my type, some were already married, and the others were notorious bad boys. To protect my career, the closest I ever got to the players was through a four hundred millimeter lens.

Except
this
training camp was different.

It was like Lachlan stuffed a magnet down his jock strap. I’d tried to keep busy, but I crept further onto the field, parking my butt in the middle of the wide-receivers’ routes as I searched for him. I wasn’t very subtle. Even surreptitiously capturing pictures of the rookie tight-end twenty-yards away got me into trouble.

“You’re open, Elle!” Caleb shouted to me from across the field.

I peeked through the viewfinder in time to see three footballs spiraling through the air, aimed dead center for my forehead.

With a camera in hand, humiliation was always closer than it appeared.

I ducked, twisted, and collapsed to the grass before the balls plunked around me, much to the delight of the offensive line.

Jack and his two backups laughed. They reared back again, and, like some medieval general loading the catapults, Jack aimed for me.

“
Fire
!”

I pointed the camera and got the shot of Jack mid-release, his arm flexed and the ball
just
out of the frame. That gave me no time to hide. I spun. The ball spiraled right into my ass, and the dull
thunk
of pig-skin against
my
skin would entertain the men for the remainder of the day.

I could expect some great lunch-time conversation about the imbedded league logo that probably bruised my butt.

At least Jack’s photo would look good uploaded onto Instagram. He wagged another ball. Just fortunate it was regulation and not the Play-Maker’s special duo.

“Okay, okay!” I surrendered my spot. “I’m done.”

I lied. I snapped one more and hurried away. Uploading some of my morning pictures was a good excuse to duck back into the air-conditioned practice facility…if I didn’t melt on the way in first. The sun
scorched
the team. I chugged water, but the sweat poured off of me. I twisted my damp hair into a bun and surveyed the field for any other promising shots.

Peter, as head photographer, followed Coach Thompson for the morning. That was fine by me. I was still staying as far away from him as I could, even if Peter hadn’t said anything about the missing SD card.

Yet
.

Maybe I had escaped without notice. That probably meant we desperately needed to clean the office. But if the clutter had hidden my tracks, I was ordering out for lunch today—the more styrofoam containers, the better.

But piling more trash on our disaster-area of a desk wouldn’t solve the problem. Sooner or later, Peter would realize the incriminating pictures were gone.

And I still couldn’t believe we had the photos.
Every team
we played had a folder. Offenses. Defenses. Special teams. Blitz installations. Trick plays. The images were from other teams’ practices, all date-marked before our biggest games of last season. I had no idea where they came from or how Peter got them, and I wasn’t about to Lois Lane this mess to find out.

If the league president, Frank Bennett, knew the intel we had?

Hell, if the loud-mouth Sports Nation reporter, Ainsley Ruport, thought something was suspicious?

There wouldn’t
be
an Ironfield Rivets anymore.

It wasn’t heroic of me to take the card, but I had to figure out what to do with it. Any, all, or none of the coaches might have been in on it. God only knew how long the team had been cheating and how many more photos they’d planned to take.

Until I had the full story and knew exactly who I could go to, the only way I could protect the players was if I kept my mouth shut.

And that was easy enough—for now.

I headed to the defense, but that crossed my path with the only douche on the team I tended to avoid. It was best to ignore him, but Bryon made it so damn hard. Sure, the team had trouble-makers—Jack had been the worst before he married Leah, though Lachlan would certainly fill his shoes. But men like Bryon were just
trouble
. He’d be one of the league’s greatest running backs…if he could stay out of jail.

Bryon whistled for me. “Hey, Elle. I’m ready for my close-up now.”

“Not without something slipped in my drink,” I said.

He posed, lifting the hem of his shirt to showcase his abs. “You sure? How ‘bout a picture, baby? Say the word, and I’ll give you a show.”

The hump of his hips wasn’t pleasant. That sort of gyrating would transmit six different diseases across the field.

“Sorry, Bryon.” I reached into my bag, holding up my camera lens. “I don’t have a big enough zoom.”

His middle finger was anything but gentlemanly. Didn’t bother me. The bigger the asshole, the smaller the prick.

I’d spent enough time with the team to grow accustomed to the usual alpha-jock behaviors. I knew when to duck out of the way of flying athletic supports, I had a sixth-sense on when to avert my eyes before the entire defensive line dropped their pants, and I definitely knew who
not
to photograph one-on-one. Over the last couple years, more and more guys ended up on that list.

Fortunately, the scariest men on the team were some of the biggest teddy-bears. I ducked into the defensive practice and joined a circle of linebackers, huddling before they drilled.

It was weird to drop to my knees in a group of six men, but ordering around Cole
The Beast
Hawthorne was probably a worse idea.

Still, this was an awesome shot.

“Let your hair down, Cole.” I aimed the camera. He scowled. That was fine—it added that menacing, defensive atmosphere I hoped to capture. “Pretend this is a game.”

Cole’s shoulder-length blonde hair remained firmly secured in the pony tail.

“Come on. This.” I gestured around the huddle. “Looks great. The linebacker core—all prepared for battle. Can’t ask for a better image.”

Paxton, our most senior veteran, grinned his toothy, handsome smile—always good for a photo, though his two gold front teeth usually reflected my flash. “Elle, baby, you just say the word, and I’ll give you all the modeling you could want.”

“I can’t afford your rates, Pax.”

“For you?” He flexed his biceps. “I’ll do it for free.”

“A session like that would melt the camera.”

“A wet dream come true, Elle.”

“And yet you’ll wake up the same way you always do—alone and…” I snapped a picture. “Sticky.”

“Jesus, have mercy.”

We were still missing one camera-shy, irritated linebacker. I curled my finger for Cole to approach.

“It’s not the same with you brooding,” I said.

“Yeah, Cole.” Sean, our third-year outside linebacker, took the opportunity to rest. He puffed hard, resting on his knees. “Take the pic. I need a breather.”

“Piper says you’re not really that beastly, Cole,” I said. The dozen pictures I had of him hugging his step-daughter on the sidelines proved it. “One picture. Sean, move in a bit.”

“Don’t think I should.”

“But there’s a gap—”

Sean wavered. “Breakfast isn’t sitting good.”

Paxton snickered. “You ate
eight
hard-boiled eggs. Can’t imagine why you’re sick.”

“That was cause…” He swallowed. “I already ate leftover…left…
over
…”

“What?”

“Corn…chowder.”

Oh, God.

Mistake. Huge mistake.

The sun beat down on the field, and even in my white shirt and shorts, I roasted in the huddle. The guys sweated, exhausted, working on their drills and routes all morning in the heat.

One wavering step, and Sean nearly crashed into me. His muscles weren’t the only things bulging. Nothing cute was coming out of those chipmunk cheeks.

Paxton shouted. “Oh
shitttt
….”

I tried to bolt, tripped over my feet, and tumbled into the grass. Cole reached for me.

Too late.

My life might have flashed before my eyes, but I couldn’t see it, not while staring directly into the remains of Sean’s egg and chowder disaster.

The hot day was made hotter by the splash of liquid hell on earth. But, somehow, I froze.

I didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. Didn’t try to brush away an unfortunate chunk of egg that had rolled onto my shoulder.

The field silenced.

Well, except for Sean. He had the decency to heave away from me this time. Nothing came up. The big guy got most of it out on the first go-around.

On me.

All over me.

Hair. Clothes. Skin. I panicked and pushed the camera away before it landed in the pile of misfortune that was my life.

And then…the chorus began.

Paxton had the first solo, diving beyond the fifty to gargle his breakfast with the team. A harmony of retching coughs cascaded down the field, like a single domino toppling the entirety of the Rivets in a wave of ninja-quick sickness. Blitzed from the shadows…and the stomach.

The only thing worse than throwing up? Watching someone else do it.

Or, in this case, the entire organization.

First the linebackers. Then the corners. The safety.

It crossed into the special teams when our punter tried to do the right thing. Unfortunately, he projectiled his politeness beyond the garbage can on the sidelines.

From there the bile bomb spread, barraging unsuspecting players in the early-afternoon heat until the only sound echoing over the field was Jack Carson’s bewildered bellow.

“
What the fuck just happened
?”

“Elle, I’m so sorry…” Sean collapsed into the grass.

It was Cole who helped me up, surprisingly resilient. I held my arms out and pretended I wasn’t…
dripping
.

Instead, I silently screamed in abject horror while I faced the team with a smile.

This day could not
possibly
get any worse.

Whistles blew, trainers burst onto the field, and I reevaluated the life choices which brought me to this moment. It had taken a long time for karma to find me after running away from home at sixteen, but here it was. Fate was one chunky
come-uppance
.

“Elle?” Louisa was the team’s only female trainer, and she understood most of the difficulties women faced on the team. Usually. This was not one of those moments. She handed me a towel the size of a dishcloth. “Are you…
ew
.”

“Yeah.”

“There’s a lot of…”

I didn’t want to look at myself, but I felt
it
on me. Tried not to smell it either.

“Wow.” Louisa and the linebackers stared at me. “You should…go clean up.”

“Yeah...”

The team didn’t have enough water bottles on the field to fix this. Jumping in a tub full of hand-sanitizer wouldn’t fix
this
.

“Why don’t you…go take a shower?” Louisa couldn’t even look at me. “I don’t think anyone’s in the locker room.”

And it wouldn’t matter if they were.

Nothing
could be worse than quivering in the sick of a three-hundred-pound linebacker and his foolhardy choice to eat
eight
hard-boiled eggs for breakfast on one of the hottest days of the year.

I hobbled off the field, ignoring the squish that followed me. It wasn’t the grass. Something soggy mushed in my shoe, but keeling over dead was preferable to fishing out whatever trespassed around my tootsies. The squeal of a baby stopped me.

Leah Carson bounced her son, Sammy, on her hip as she took a phone call. Sam gave me a devilish grin, inherited from his father.

She lowered her phone, too busy to look up. “Hey, Elle, do you have those pictures of Lachlan? We were going to give them to the Sports Nation producers for his interview today…” Her words choked. She stared in horror, her mouth gaping as she backed away. “What…what happened?”

“We had a little incident on the field,” I said.

“Is anyone left
alive
?”

“It was touch and go for a while. I gotta…shower.” I faked a smile. “Hi, Sammy.”

Even the baby kept his distance. Leah let me pass as Sammy attempted one of his daddy’s quarterback sneaks out of her arms.

“We can…” She grimaced. “Meet up for the pictures later.”

Yeah. Lachlan’s pictures. Leah’s PR firm could spin the hell out of a handsome, first-round draft choice signed to a championship team. That was easy. But I didn’t want to think what would happen if I gave her the
other
photographs, the ones so burned into my skull the league would subpoena my head for evidence. Leah was good, but even she couldn’t silence that potential scandal.

Despite the eye-candy that filled the locker room, both the toweled and non-toweled varieties, I usually avoided the space. Muscles were nice. The occasional peek even better. But fifty-three alpha-male, testosterone-fueled, sweaty men did not make for a great picture.

Or smell.

Though I wasn’t exactly a bouquet of spring flowers myself.

Thankfully, I was alone. The only other silver lining? A change of clothes in my office.

I stripped off the shirt and shorts and plopped the soggy mess into the garbage can.

Soap. I needed a cauldron of it. And shampoo. Hopefully conditioner.

I didn’t have any toiletries…but Lachlan had plenty. My turn to haze the rookie, but at least when I stole his stuff, I wouldn’t refill it with mustard or hot sauce. I grabbed the soaps and took a step further into the locker room than I had ever gone.

Until today, the showers were a No-Elle land—especially when it was my butt that was bare.

I clutched a towel and crossed the tiled floor, past the first two dozen shower heads and behind the partial wall that offered another row of showers. Good enough to hide in. I hunkered down, turned on the water, and used half of Lachlan’s soap to lather up.

Dumb move.

Scent was a
strong
memory, and I had a lot to remember from my weekend with Lachlan. His spicy, regal tease was just as potent out of the bottle as it was blended with his skin.