Player: A Secret Baby Sports Romance (3 page)

But those eyes, and those lips, and that damn creamy skin of her neck and shoulders has me on autopilot.

This is a fucking terrible idea.

“
S
o listen a sec
, I gotta ask you somethin’.”

I groan for the fifth time in as many minutes, looking up to glare at the douchey looking guy in the open-neck dress shirt and sports coat. For the fifth time, he flashes me what I’m sure he truly believes is his most charming smile, which would admittedly be
slightly
more charming without the bit of food stuck between his teeth and the stale beer breath.

I tighten my lips at the man with the slicked-back hair who seems hell bent on ignoring every single social cue in the world as he leans against the bar leering at me. “What.”

He grins widely, like he’s been waiting for this moment. “Were your parents thieves? Cause honey, they stole the stars outta heaven and put ‘em-”

“In my eyes - right. Wow, I’ve never heard that one,” I say dryly, cutting him off. I reach for the martini in front of me and take a large swallow of it, feeling my eyes water as I force it down. “Un-amusingly, my father
was
actually a thief.”

He blinks quickly, the smile falling from his face. “Oh, uh-”

I try and spot the bartender to signal a mayday, but he’s busy at the far end of the bar, pouring a shot for two guys down there with their backs to me.

Wonderful.

With zero food in my stomach, the two nips of gin from earlier are making me dizzy and slightly fuzzy. The huge martini in front of me that I’m already halfway through isn’t exactly helping in that department.

But that was the entire point of coming here - numbness, solitude, escape. I just want to disappear - to get lost in my own booze-soaked escape, which is why a dim hotel bar on an empty Wednesday night seemed like a great idea, until this idiot plunked down next to me.

My eyes search again for help, but the bartender is still occupied with the same guys at the end. The larger, broad-shouldered guy with the dark hair and his back to me, and the smaller guy with glasses.

“Look,” I snap, turning back to the guy leaning against the bar next to me, the last of the social niceties my mother would approve of dropping like a curtain.

“I’m
not
looking for conversation, okay? Please leave me alone.”

“Aww, c’mon gorgeous, why don’t you let me buy you a-”

“I said
no
, alright?” My voice raises a notch.

“Oh like you weren’t looking for a free drink wearing that hot little number,” he says with a smirk, his eyes dropping languidly to the front of my dress, making me sorely regret my decision to even come here.

I should’ve worn sweatpants.

Hell, I should have had room service bring me martinis to my room all night until I couldn’t operate the phone anymore.

“Look, I don’t think you’re hearing what I’m saying-”

“Oh I heard what you said, honey.” His arm suddenly slides across the bar in front of me as he gets right in my face, making me shrink into my barstool. “But I think you should give me a shot.”

I cringe, swallowing the lump in my throat and my body going tense as his other hand slides across my bare shoulder. And I’m trying to find my voice, when suddenly his hand is wrenched away from me.

“Is there a problem here?”

The Texas-twanged voice behind me is deep and honeyed, like leather and polished wood. I quickly turn at the sound of it, and as my eyes travel up the broad chest to the mouth those words came out of, I feel my pulse skip a beat.

Holy crap.

Those very perfect, very gorgeous lips above a squared and chiseled jaw covered in a faint stubble. The man is
gorgeous
, in a ruggedly boyish way. His hazel eyes pierce right into me as the faintest hint of a smile - something just this side of arrogant - teases those perfect lips.

He’s wearing dark jeans and a white t-shirt, pulled tight across his thick chest and broad shoulders, and even if part of me - the part that channels my mother - wants to raise a brow at how casually he’s dressed for a place like this, I bite my tongue. He’s effortlessly handsome - an easy sort of cool like a young Brando or Paul Newman.

My eyes drop to the inked lines of tattoos swirling down his powerful looking arms. The sleeve-tattoo crowd of LA tend to be scrawny hipster types, while the buff, arrogant types are usually all clean cut.

And here he is not conforming to either one.

“I-”

“Hey pal,” the scummy guy butts forward, boldly shoving a finger at the much bigger guy’s chest. “Move the fuck along.”

Texas’s eyes pull from mine momentarily, and his face darkens as he narrows them at the smaller man. “I asked if there was a problem here.”

The smaller guy snorts. “Not ’til you got here and tried to run your lame game on-”

“On my wife?”

The guy stops, and I jerk my eyes back to the Texan.

What?

“Huh?” The drunk guy’s face scrunches up as he frowns up into my savior’s face, who smiles thinly at him.

“My
wife
.”

Yeah, wait, what?

The smaller, drunk guy swallows quickly, his eyes dropping to the muscled arm slung across my shoulders as if suddenly actually noticing the size difference between himself and “my husband”.

“Uh, look, pal, I didn’t-” He suddenly peers closer at the man standing besides me. “Hang on, aren’t you-”

“Going to let you walk away if you do it right the fuck now?” The man’s voice is somehow both easy and hard - like he’s smiling with a knife in his hand.

The smaller man swallows quickly. “Shit, Taylor, man. I didn’t know-”

“Walk away.”

The other man nods quickly. “Yeah- yeah of course man.” He flashes a quick smile, that piece of food still stuck between his teeth as he gives a final, awkward nod and scurries away.

“Hey!” He turns a few steps away, raising his drink in the air as if the guy that just sent him packing is an old buddy. “Hey, lookin’ forward to an awesome year, dude!”

I am
thoroughly
, thoroughly confused, and I’m still blinking at the man with his muscled, tattooed arm draped languidly across my shoulders when he turns back to me. He grins at me, and I can instantly feel every drop of booze slamming through my system on overdrive, my head spinning as those perfect lips pull into a grin, and those perfect eyes twinkle at me.

“You okay?”

I blink, refocusing on
him
instead of drowning in those eyes like I just was. “Uh,
yeah
, yeah, I’m-”

Lost in that look? Tongue-tied like some sort of schoolgirl?

Drunker than I think I am?

I blink again, forcing myself to focus. “Your wife, huh?”

He grins, that cocky, utterly confident smirk I saw earlier. “I think I saw that in a movie. Hey, it worked, didn’t it?”

“It did,” I bite my lip as I smile back at him.

God he’s attractive.

“So, thanks for that.”

There’s a cough behind him, and we both turn to see his friend with the glasses standing there. “So, I guess we’re done for the night?” the man says flatly.

My Texas-drawled savior nods and shrugs casually. “I think we are, Derek.”

There’s a note of thinly veiled sarcasm in his voice, and Derek’s eyes dart meaningfully to me before narrowing at my stranger. “Try and at least give
half
a shit about what I just said, Austin.”

“Loud and clear.”

Derek gives me a thin smile before he shakes his head and walks away.

Austin - my stupidly attractive savior has a name apparently - turns back, that cocky grin on his face. “
So
.”

He winks at me, half a smile cocked across his jaw. “So…did you want a selfie or something?”

I frown quizzically. “Uh,
no,
I’m good.”

The corners of his lips pull up in a grin. “You don’t want an autograph or something like that?”

“I-” I raise an eyebrow at him. “I’m sorry, is this like a game or something?”

His brow furrows as he peers at me again, almost curiously. “No, I mean…” he grins suddenly and shakes his head. “You’re not really a TV person, are you?”

“Who the heck watches TV anymore? Ever heard of Netflix?” The sass comes out of me with zero filter as I reach for my martini and do my best impression of a movie-star sip, hoping to hell it looks smooth and sexy instead of sloppy and drunk.

He laughs, the sound easy and warm. “Fair enough.”

I can feel my pulse racing through my veins like I’ve just run up and down a flight of stairs as I lose myself again in those hazel eyes. I’m lightheaded - dizzy from the gin and the total lack of food, not to mention the bomb dropped on me barely two hours ago in Vince’s office.

I cringe at the thought -
right, when I left the man I was silly enough to think I was going to marry.

And suddenly, all of it comes rushing back - opening the door to his office and seeing them like that, my stomach dropping through the floor, the “Daddy’s Girl” tattoo on her thigh.

I stand quickly and abruptly, and suddenly grab onto the back of my chair as I wobble on my heels.

And then his hand is there, light but firm on the small of my back as he steps forward to steady me. “Whoa, easy there, princess.”

I smile, my booze-flushed face going even redder. “Thanks, I’m- I’m fine, I just need to go lie down in my room for a while.”

Well, there goes my bid for “smooth and sexy” over “drunk and sloppy.”

I sigh heavily as I shrug. “I’ve- it’s been a weird freaking day.”

He grins and chuckles. “Sounds like we’ve had the same day.”

“Believe me, we haven’t.”

I go to take a step, but suddenly stumble again as my heel catches on the edge of the carpet. I lurch forward, my hands catching on his bare, inked forearm.

“Whoa, hang on, let me get you there in one piece.” My eyes dart quickly to him, the heat hot in my cheeks, and he quickly frowns and shakes his head. “I just mean to the elevator, princess.”

My cheeks blush again as I quickly look away.

Of course that’s what he meant.

“Yeah, thanks, that’d be great.”

His arm goes around my waist, his hand holding me firmly by the hip against his side as he slowly walks me across the bar to the hotel lobby. I can feel the heat of his body blooming through my skin like a hot flush, sending shivers down my back, making me dizzy, and making me bite my lip as he floats me towards the elevators.

Lord, what is wrong with me.

The doors to an empty elevator opens, and I’m feeling silly at how reluctant I am to leave the warmth of that hand on my hip and that body so close to mine.

“So, yeah, thanks again for…you know.”

“Lying about you being my wife?”

I blush as the grin creeps drunkenly over my face. “Yeah, that.”

“Anytime.”

I start to step into the elevator when I stop and turn back to him, as if I need to somehow prolong this moment. “Now, do
you
want a selfie?”

He laughs, the sound so easy and so effortless as he winks at me. “Maybe I’ll take a rain check on that.”

I step into the elevator, my eyes locked on his standing right outside of it. And it could be the booze, or the free-fall rush of the day’s events. It could be that sneering grin on Vince’s secretary’s face.

‘You’re frigid, honey.’

But whatever it is comes rushing through me like this wave of crazy, and before I can stop myself, I’m sticking my foot in the closing elevator door, grabbing my stranger my the neck of his t-shirt, and mashing my lips to his as I kiss him with every single thing I have.

Fiercely.

He’s frozen for a second, but then it’s like his whole body comes alive as he suddenly wraps me up in his powerful arms and kisses me right back. I moan as I feel his lips open as they press back against mine, opening slightly as his tongue slides into my mouth. His hand cups my jaw,
claiming
my mouth.

I have
never
been kissed like this before.

His other hand drops to my hip again to pull me tight against him. And then it’s like we’re frozen like that, right there in the hotel lobby, with my mouth pressed tightly to my gorgeous stranger. Lip to lip, breath to breath, a flick of a tongue across the other’s.

And then suddenly the last shred of my sanity pulls me out of the fantasy free-fall. And I’m pulling back, my face hot, my body alive, and my mind exploding in a million different directions. He’s looking at me with this amused and yet animalistic wild look in his eyes. And I know I’m drunk, and probably just made a complete fool of myself, but I also just don’t care.

In fact, it feels pretty damn good
not
to care, for once.

“So, goodnight, stranger.”

The door starts to close as I bite my lip and step to the back of the elevator car, my eyes locked on him as he stands there, his eyes burning right into me.

“Night, princess.”

And then the doors shut, and I’m alone with my racing heart.

I
sit
up in the bed, blinking groggily at the morning light piercing through the open shades. I grimace at the cotton taste in my mouth and the sweaty feeling that comes from sleeping in your clothes on top of the sheets.

So, that happened
.

“That” being me insanely kissing a stranger in the lobby of a fancy hotel lobby like a crazy person.

Or a drunk person, as the case may be.

I groan at the memory, grimacing at the morning-after regret of letting my inhibitions run wild like that. What happened was reckless, and insane, and totally out of character.

And amazing.

The rush of feeling his lips on mine - the spike of adrenaline at the boldness of kissing him like that - lances through me like a drug, jolting me out of bed. I glance briefly at my phone, squinting at the dozen missed calls from my mother and from my sister, which only means Vince told them about me skipping out.

I’m willing to bet he’s omitted the part about him boning his secretary.

Yeah, what I’m sure are vitriolic, panicky voicemails can wait. I’m still wearing my dress from the night before, and I fumble for the straps, letting it slip from my body as I stumble across the plush carpet of the room.

God, those eyes.

Those lips, those hands on my body, that voice like oiled leather, and that smile like the promise of something wicked.

I flick on the coffee machine as I pad to the bathroom and start the shower. I step under the hot water soothing the aching in my head. I let my hands push through my hair under the spray, letting the heat and the pounding rhythm of the water seep into my skin as I try and make sense of the last twenty-four hours of my life.

I want to groan - to hide away and bury my head in the pillows of the hotel bed over my ridiculous behavior from the night before. But even thinking about it has the thrill of my recklessness teasing coursing through my body. My stranger - Austin, that’s his name - is like no man I’ve ever interacted with. In my world of finance types, and garden parties, and suits and ties and polish, the gruff, stubble-chinned cowboy with the tattoos and the t-shirt and jeans sticks out like a sore thumb.

A wickedly attractive, boldly forward thumb.

There’s that
look
- the way he looked at me like no man ever had before. That piercing, hungry, amused look - cocky with a touch of arrogance. It’s supreme confidence, but with the swagger and the boldness to back it up.

And that kiss. I can feel the sizzling heat from it lingering on my lips, teasing through my body as the steam and the water drape across my skin in the hotel bathroom.

Why did I walk away?

I know
why
, of course. Because I’m certainly not
that
girl - the one who drags strangers up to her hotel room.

But that’s not to say I’m not thinking about it, and dreaming about it, and wanting it now.

I close my eyes under the steamy spray of the shower, feeling the forbidden heat of that kiss tingle through my body like a whispered secret. In my head, I’m not pulling away from him at the elevator door. As my eyes close and my fingers move over the tingling skin of my body, and as my thoughts turn to the forbidden fantasy inside my head, I’m not pulling away at all.

I’m letting him take me.

I’m pulling him inside the elevator, letting him shove me up against the wall as the doors shut behind us. I’m sliding my fingers up his muscled arms, feeling his hands trace over the curves of my hips as I wrap a leg around his waist. In the heat of the shower, as my fingers slide across the heat between my legs, I’m imagining him reaching back and punching the emergency brake, keeping us locked away from it all in that elevator car as he strips away my inhibitions and my clothes, swallowing my moans as he takes me hard and fast. His hands all over me, his mouth, those lips, that cock-

The ring of my cellphone, rattling across the marble bathroom countertop, drags me kicking and screaming from the fantasy. And then I’m alone in the shower, not stuck between two floors in a dark hotel elevator with my mystery man from the night before.

Okay, stop it.

I quickly bring my hands away from my body and lean my forehead against the tile wall, feeling the heat flush through my face.

Enough of that
.

I quickly shut off the water, shivering in the sudden chill that takes its place. Wrapped in a terrycloth robe, I step back into the suite, pouring a merciful first cup of coffee and slumping down on the sofa to glance at my phone.

My mother, of
course
.

I toss the phone away, groaning. Yeah,
that’s
a conversation I can’t wait to have.

There’s a chance she knows even without
talking to Vince. God only knows how, but there’s almost a sixth sense to the missed call icon on my phone that tells me she knows what’s happened, and that somehow, this is
my
fault.

“Men will be men, Natalie. You mustn’t let a silly dalliance get in the way of your own future.”

I roll my eyes at the very probable line I can almost literally hear coming from my mother’s mouth. I might not want to have that conversation now, but it’s a sobering reminder that it has to happen at some point
.

‘Some point’ is certainly going to wait until after coffee though, that’s for sure.

I’m grumbling into the steaming mug, curled up on the couch in my robe with plans to spend the next week in here if I have to, when my cellphone rings again.

My mother,
again
.

I roll my eyes and turn back to my coffee, but it buzzes a third time, and then a fourth.

Goddamnit.

I groan as I answer the call.

“Hello mot-”

“Natalie Elizabeth Ames!”

Yep, there’s that vitriol.

“
Ten minutes
before his company
gala
, Natalie?” My mother sounds absolutely aghast. “You don’t just
leave
like that, Natalie!”

“Are you at all interested in my side of the matter?”

Of course she’s not.

“Oh don’t get dramatic, dear. There are no
sides
here, merely what’s
proper
, and what’s
not.
”

I bite my tongue, pulling the phone away from my ear and taking another necessary sip of my coffee.

It’s not that I don’t want to tell her about walking in on Vince’s flagrant affair, it’s that I know she’ll actually
still think I’m in the wrong for leaving him.
I’m
the “improper” one for not calmly taking a seat outside his office and waiting for him to finish.

She’s still talking when I bring the phone back to my ear.

“
Furthermore
, I see no reason why you feel a need to drag this family through anymore mud then-”

“
Mother
,” I interrupt, something I know gets under her skin like nothing else. “How’s Aspen?”

She sighs heavily at my abrupt subject change. “Aspen is
fine
, dear.”

Aspen, where my mother is currently vacationing with Monty - her third husband - at his new ski chalet. I scrunch up my face, loathing that I’m about to ask this.

But when you’re out of options…

“I was, uh…” I take another breath. “I was thinking about visiting?”

Mother gives a mirthless, brittle laugh. “Oh, dear, no.”

“Wait, seriously?”

“Oh, no, honey, I mean there’s no skiing this time of year.”

I frown. “I don’t ski.”

“Well,” she huffs. “We’re doing a bit of maintenance, you see.”

“Mother, I was just hoping to get away for a little while and-”

“Natalie…” My mother sighs again. “You are a grown woman, you know. You’re old enough to face and solve your own problems.”

Translation: I’m old enough to just go and marry my own stubborn rich asshole of a husband.

Like she did.

Three times.

Of course, there’s the unspoken reason my mother doesn’t want me interrupting a vacation with her newest beau. And that would be that she’s already had enough of Monty trying to peek down my top or up my skirt at their elaborate Tuscan wedding celebrations four months ago.

Third time is apparently
not
the charm.

“No, Natalie, this is
not
the time for running away, this is a time for smoothing things over with your future husband.”

I groan, dropping my face into my hand.

“Oh, and Vivian says you haven’t returned her phone calls either, Natalie.”

Right, my older sister, the queen bee socialite of New York City. The perennial favorite. The one that our mother seems perfectly okay with seeing a new man for every season.

And I get
conniptions
about leaving my fiancé for screwing around on me.

The room phone starts to ring as my mother continues to talk, and I grit my teeth and grip the mug of coffee a little tighter in my hand.

“Mother, I have to go.”

“Oh, do say hello to Vincent for me, won’t you?”

I hang up without dignifying that with a response.

The room phone rings again and I groan.

Now what
.

* * *

“
T
his is
insane
!
”

I’m staring at the hotel manager across the check-in desk, feeling the heat flood into my face as she patronizingly shakes her head at me.

“Ms. Ames, I’m sorry, but we can’t charge a card that’s been declined.”

It’s the fourth time she’s said it, and it’s been getting less and less apologetic in tone with every run-through.

“It’s my
fiancé’s
credit card.”

You know, technically.

“That may be, Ms. Ames, but the card
has
been reported stolen.”

That fucker
.

I feel humiliated, standing there in the same freaking cocktail dress I wore the the night before - the one I
slept in
- holding my shoes like some sort of walk of shame tragedy. There’s a line forming behind me, and I can feel the eyes of the people waiting to check-in glaring at the back of my head.

The concierge sitting awkwardly between the manager and I at the front desk console swallows thickly and smiles weakly at me. “Ms. Ames, if you have another card, we could-”

“Goddamnit, I don’t
have
another-!”

I clamp my mouth shut mid-shout, feeling my face turn absolutely crimson.

“I don’t
have
another card,” I say, quietly this time.

My phone buzzes in my clutch, and I shoot another evil look at the manager before I yank it out and feel my blood pressure go through the damn roof when I see who’s calling.

“You have got to be fucking
kidding me
, you fucking-”

“Now now, Natalie, let’s be adults here.” Vince’s voice on the other end of the line has my lips tightening to thin white lines across my mouth, my hand clenching in a fist tight enough to hurt at my side.

“Vince,” I say sharply, taking a deep breath. I’m not ‘thinking of the good times’ or ‘holding onto what we had’ or anything other bullshit line I’m sure he’s about to feed me. Because all I can see is
her
. All I can see is my own pride being swept way - and me
allowing it
to happen.

“They’re not going to let me
stay here
if you report my credit card as stolen.”

He chuckles, and I swear to God I almost throw the phone through the etched glass doors of the hotel.

“Well, Natalie, it’s
my
credit card, to be fair-”

“Which is
mine
to use-”

“For expensive hotel rooms and bar tabs after embarrassing me at the gala?”

My head’s spinning.

I
embarrassed
him
- this is literally how he’s looking at the situation.

“Vince-”

“Here’s how this is going to work, Natalie,” he says abruptly, cutting me off. “I’ll pay for your silly night on the town, okay? I’ll cover the bill for last night,
if
…”

I grind my teeth together. “If
what
.”

“If you just come home, and we can put this silly thing behind us.”

This time, I
do
make the scene I never wanted to make, when the entire lobby gasps in shock as I scream. I wind my arm back, every intention of putting my smartphone violently through the plate glass door of the hotel entryway, when suddenly there’s a hand on my wrist, stopping me.

“What if we
didn’t
do that, princess.”

I jerk my head around at the sudden grip on my arm and the familiar voice in my ear.

Austin.

I blush bright red as I realize the man I never actually expected to see again - the man who got the full brunt of my drunk recklessness and shattering of inhibitions - is standing right in front of me. It’s like that moment when you say goodnight to a friend after dinner, only to realize you’re both parked in the same lot.

Only, you know, roughly ten-thousand times more embarrassing, given the context of our last exchange.

“Um, hi.”

Um, hi?

I cringe inside as the words fall from my lips before I can stop them. So much for years of training in polite conversation and etiquette.