Player: A Secret Baby Sports Romance (60 page)

G
oddamn freedom tastes good
. Well, specifically, tequila añejo especial on the rocks is what tastes good, but the lack of iron bars and armed guards around me is pretty fucking nice too.

The Swim
; give me a fuckin break. I've been underestimated before; many times actually, and it's never worked out so well for the other guy. Clearly, Warden Gustavo won't be the last guy to do the same, but he certainly made my fucking list.

You get two things when you go for The Swim, because apparently the good Warden has a fucked-up sense of humor. You get a life-vest tied tightly around you; not so that you
live
, but so that you can't just say fuck it and drown yourself. You also get a gun with a single bullet, and that one’s a
gift
; the
last
gift you’ll ever get, and you can use it whenever you want. Maybe it's for when the sharks come. Maybe it’s for when night falls and the terrors of what might be beneath you in the deep get too much for your own head. Maybe you make it a day or two, but then realize you're going to dehydrate or starve to death and that piece of lead starts to look
real
good.

I frown into my near-empty glass, shaking my near-brush with death from my head and reaching for the bottle on the balcony table next to me.

Lightning flashes as the motor cuts. One of the two guards on the boat jumps at the sound of thunder before his buddy punches him in the arm and calls him a pussy in Spanish.
The thunder and lightning smashes against the sky again, and I can’t help but grin at how awesome and dramatic a send-off this is for my own funeral.
“Hey, puta!” The second guard calls to me; “I hope you didn't eat anything in the last half hour. You don't want a cramp!”

Hilarious. Gallows humor to another fucking level.
They haul me up, tightening the straps to my life vest. The guard that jumped at the thunder grins as he hands me a pistol, butt first. He’s not grinning because he's helping me though. We both know there's one bullet in this gun, and we both know shooting him isn't what it's for.

Let me rephrase that; HE knows shooting him isn’t what it’s for. Me? I’ve got a different opinion.

He gasps and looks at me in total shock at the sound of the trigger being pulled. He's tumbling backwards, clutching his gut as he jerks overboard. The second guard is charging me from the bow of the boat firing his pistol wildly. I manage to catch him in the face with my own empty gun before I duck and lung, knocking him with my shoulder and shoving him over the side into the water as well.
I'm revving the engine and tearing off, only then realizing that the outboard motor at the back of the boat is smoking from a bullet hole and that I've got no fucking idea where I'm going.

But fuck it; I used to call these waters home, back in my smuggling days. I can do this. There's a map of the Venezuelan coast taped to the side of the wheel, and though I sincerely doubt I'm going to get that far with smoke pouring out of this fucking engine, it’s worth a shot.

Thunder crashes overhead again, and I glance up once more before locking my eyes on the map. I want to laugh when I see what the closest point of land is that doesn’t involve me setting fucking foot on Venezuela again. But as I rev the engine, I pray to God I make it to there before I sink into the ocean
.

* * *

I
slug back the añejo
, trying not to dwell on the past and my escape from death. I've had enough of those already for one or five lifetimes; I don't need to dwell on the latest. Point is, I'm free, and thanks to the wallet I lifted at the docks from one of those guys coming off a cruise ship, I'm set up nice and pretty in the penthouse suite of the Ritz-Carlton. I've got tequila in my hand, the sun on my face, and a view of some
seriously
hot women hanging out by the pool. Life could be worse.

There's a flash of something blonde, and my head swivels to the doors by the pool bar.

Damn
.

She almost seems to glide out of the doors, her hips swaying in the sarong around her waist and her mouth-watering tits gently cupped in a white bikini top. Her eyes are covered by the dark shades and Panama hat she wears, and her long blonde hair spills out around her tanned shoulders.

Well hello, freedom
.

I tip back another swig of the the tequila before I stand, leaning against my balcony railing and staring down at the girl. She's young, and sexy as sin in a way that reminds me that I’ve been in jail for almost nine fucking months. The Warden's wife was a mediocre distraction, but this girl has my
full
damn attention.

She slinks into a lounge chair, smiling up at a one of the pool boys who brings her a drink on a tray. I make a note to go grease the kid’s palm later and figure out what she's drinking. She takes her hat off, her long blonde hair flowing around her as she sinks back into the chair and arches her back, pushing her tits up against the thin white fabric of her bikini top. I can already start to feel my cock stir in my shorts watching her like this. Yeah, I need to get down there
right now
and work some of that famous Latin charm.

I  snag one more sip from my bottle, feeling the pleasant burn of the tequila slide down my throat. I grab the gun that the second guard on the boat dropped when he went over and slip it into the waist of my shorts. Part of me knows I should just leave the damn thing in the room, but I guess it’s just the soldier in me that grabs it. I mean, not only am I technically an escaped con, but I’ve also managed to walk into Aruba through the side entrance; the kind that doesn’t have a customs agent checking your papers, or lack thereof.

No sense in not playing it safe, I figure.

I push my long hair back from my face in the mirrored interior of the elevator; I really need a trim, but I’m starting to like the shaggy look I guess. The doors open, and I strut my way through the lobby to the pool, feeling the liquid confidence of the tequila coursing through me as I glance around for the blonde.

Oh yeah,
there
she is. Fuck, she looks even better from down here. I grin as I start to make my way around the pool, already musing over all the wickedly sinful things I’d love to do with this girl. But I barely make it five steps before something pings at my brain, and I stop cold.

There are thing being a soldier does to you. Well for one, my social graces are absolute shit. But more importantly, you see things before you'd
normally
see them. Most people wouldn't
see
the two black SUVs screech to a halt next to the hotel. Most people wouldn't
see
the five guys in black suits pour out of them, or maybe even find it strange that anyone in this fucking beach-side paradise would be wearing
black suits
at all.

But the, I’m not most people. Years of fighting in that piece of shit desert with the Spanish Legion, and then chasing the coin through the mercenary circuits of Africa have taught me one thing: that annoying voice in your head? Yeah, you should listen to that asshole as often as you can.

My first thought is that they're here for me, and as my pulse roars in my ears, I'm already turning to run. It isn't the first time, and it sure as hell won’t be the last. But when I glance back, I realize that they don't even see me, and in half a second, the puzzle comes together. They're moving like a slow-motion black wave towards the pool area, and every single one of their sunglass-covered eyes is
right
on
her
.

They’re after the blonde.

Time freezes for a second as I step back into the shadows, my eyes darting between the girl and the men she’s clearly not even aware of who are quickly making their way right for her with weapons drawn. She's still reading her book, her legs curled up underneath her, a small smile on her face as she grins at something in the pages. She reaches up and brushes a strand of hair out of her eyes, tucking it behind her ears and just looking so fuckin perfect and innocent.

Walk away, you fucking idiot.

I grit my teeth, trying to shove that voice in my head away. I’ve done some truly horrible shit in this life. I've hurt, I've stolen, I've blackmailed and cheated; I've killed. I'm a bad, bad man.

But I'm not a monster; as much as I want to be one in that moment.

I know I
should
walk the hell away right then. I don’t know what the hell this cutie did to piss these guys off, but it’s
not
my fight; that much I know. I’m a Goddamn fugitive, I’m here
illegally
,
and I’ve got three stolen credit cards and an unlicensed gun on me. Now is
not
the fucking time to play hero for the first time in my life.

But my gun is out of the waist of my shorts and in my hand before I even know it. God, or fate, or karma didn't give me this freedom for me to sit back and let the world happen like this. This is my shot to do something different, right? I mean that’s the whole point of being “saved”; so you can do good, right?

Yeah, growing up Catholic fucks with your head sometimes. Or maybe I’ve seen too many movies.

In any case, the world slows to a crawl as I look up again to see the men have hit the fence by the pool. One of them is throwing his shoulder against the gate, and its as they start to pour through, she finally looks up.

Her book drops to the ground, and she's lunging to her feet and reaching for her bag. The men are shouting and raising their guns, and it’s about to go down. And all I’d have to do is walk away. All I’d need to do here is step back into the shadows and go on with being Javier Toro; escaped prisoner, war vet, mercenary, general piece of shit bad guy.

Yeah, fuck that.

The gun feels almost weightless in my hand as I raise it, the thundering of the chamber seemingly muffled as I level it at the men and start to empty the clip at them.

And Total. Fucking. Anarchy. Ensues.

The men scatter, ducking back for cover as I fire away, my lips tight as I move towards the, I’m sure, terrified blonde girl. I grab her by the arm and yank her behind me, pushing her back towards the other exit to the pool as I jerk my arm back up and fire a few more shots into the group of men.

“Go! Move!” I’m yelling as I grab her hand and start running towards the dock of the hotel marina, ignoring the way she's screaming at me as I calmly reload the one backup clip from my pocket and turn back to train the gun on the gate to the pool.

Just try and follow, fuckers.

They’re firing back as I shove her back behind me again, backing us onto the docks. She’s hitting me and yelling at me, and the spray of metal clanging off the side of the dock next to us sends a jolt of adrenaline through me;
fuck
, I kind of missed this.

But then something happens. The screaming girl I can ignore, but it's when I feel the press of cold steel into my back that she has my
absolute
attention.

What the fuck is happening?

“Javier Toro, you're under arrest by the United States of America. Drop your
fucking
gun, and get on your knees.”

I whirl on her in a flash, and it’s only then that the last puzzle piece falls into place.

Holy fucking shit.

We’ve never met, but that doesn’t matter because I know exactly who she is. In fact, there’s no way I
couldn’t
know her. Nine months ago in another lifetime, her older sister plunged a surgical scalpel three inches into my neck and put me as close to death as I’d ever like to be.

Chelsea Archer, all young blonde blue-eyed little coed in a bikini, is in full-on firing stance with a nine millimeter pointed right at my chest.

I repeat:
what the fuck is happening?

M
y pulse is racing
a mile a second as I squeeze the gun harder in my hands.

Don't let it shake. Shaking shows nervousness and you can't show them anything but cold-hearted killer. You got that?

Yeah, I got that. Training is drilled into your head with the Agency, but training is
nothing
like standing in front of a target with the weight of a loaded gun in your hand. The rush I expected, but the sheer
hit
of adrenaline that courses through me has me fighting to keep my body from shaking with every ounce of my being.

Javier Toro; the devil himself is standing three feet in front of me, staring me in the face like he can't quite believe what’s happening.

“I said drop it!” I yell, flashing my eyes at him and tightening my grip on the gun; “
Now!
” You're supposed to give one, maybe two warnings; then you shoot.

I'm not so sure I'm ready for that part.

“
Now, Jav-”

The dock next to us explodes in splintering spray of wood, and I whirl away, covering my face. I look up to see the men from the pool, the men with the guns, barreling towards us.

Javier’s men.

It’s a moment of chaos, which I know is exactly what he's waiting for.

I whirl back to him, my gun raised; “I said on your
knees
, Javier!”

He looks at me wildly; “Are you fucking crazy!?”

“Now-”

His gun is up, and it's right at me; “Look, I saved your ass back there, princess, but I am
walking
away from this,
right
now.”

I shake my head, trying to meet his eyes instead of the barrel of the gun pointed right at my face. It’s a surreal standoff, eye to eye and gun to gun with Javier on this dock while a small army of men with guns runs towards us.

“I'm taking you-”

Bullets rake the side of the dock next to us, and suddenly, Javier lunges.

I'm pulling the trigger, but his grip is firm as he shoves my hand back and away from him as we both tumble backwards. I gasp as the gun falls from my hand into the water as we topple back into a rubber dingy anchored to the dock.

“Did you just try and fucking
shoot me?!”

His face is livid, and before I can say anything, he raises his gun. I do flinch this time, shrieking as I close my eyes at the sound of him firing. But he's not shooting me, he's shooting
them
.

Ok seriously, what the
hell
is going on here?

Javier moves like lightening. He's got the rope off the cleat on the boat and the engine roaring before I even know what’s happening; “Drive, Archer!” He shouts, standing to raise his gun at the men at the end of the dock.

Bullets pepper the water around us as I stare at him; “What?!”

“
Drive the fucking boat!
” He screams at me, ducking as another wave of bullets flies our way.

I'm grabbing the outboard motor and jolting us forward so fast that Javier tumbles back into the boat as we roar off into the marina; “Where the hell are we going?” I scream at him, still eyeing the gun in his hand.

Javier looks up, his eyes wild as he scans the marina, before they narrow; “There.”  He's pointing to a mid-sized luxury yacht at anchor.

“What?”

“That one.”

“That one,
what
?”

“That’s the boat we're stealing.”

I start to slow the engine, but he whirls back to me; “You want to die here in Aruba, princess?”

Not really.

“No.”

“Ever been in a fucking gunfight before?”

I scowl at him; “I've had
plenty
of training in-”

“So yeah, that's a no then?”

My eyes narrow at him, but I don't; answer.

Javier’s eyes dart to the men running onto the dock behind us; “Get us to the boat, spy-girl, or we're toast.”

* * *

“
N
ice driving
, princess,” He mutters as we clamber up the stairs of the yacht's back landing.

“Will you
stop
calling me that!” I say, snapping at him.

He whirls; “Well that
is
what you are, isn't it? Daddy's little princess? Heir to the fucking Archer throne?” I can feel my face going pale as I stare at him, all the while watching his grin get wider; “Yeah, I know who you are,
Chelsea
.”

His accent is thickly Latin; all smoke and espresso and liquor. It’s salsa dancing and late, dangerous nights.

It’s also the voice of the man who almost destroyed my life, and that’s as raw and dangerous as it gets.

My eyes drop to the gun in his hand, suddenly tensing as the reality of this insane situation starts to really sink in. He looks at me questioningly before he follows my gaze. Quickly, he puts the safety on the gun and tucks it into the back of his shorts.

“You're welcome, by the way.”

I frown; “Excuse me?”

“For saving that cute princess ass of yours, baby.”

“You didn't-”

“Oh, seriously?” He rolls his eyes at me as he turns and marches toward the main cabin.

“Hey! Get back here!” I stomp after him, my eyes darting around the boat for
something
to stop him with. This whole thing was
planned
, down to the letter. I spent three days straight figuring every angle, every exit, and every variable of this whole thing.

Clearly, that was a colossal waste of three days.

I storm into the control room just as Javier starts to rev the motor; “Do
not
start this boat up, Toro.”

He snorts and shifts the engine into drive, not even turning around; “No can do, princess. We stay, we get shot.” He shoots me a smirking grin over his shoulder; “I somehow doubt you've ever been shot, so let me just spoil the surprise and tell you it fucking sucks.” He turns back, lurching the boat forward; “It sucks almost as bad as getting stabbed in the fucking neck.”

My eyes suddenly land on the gun sticking out of his shorts and I freeze.

'Whats the matter, rook? Ain't got the stones?'

Koufax’s obnoxious voice rumbles through my head, and before I can even second guess myself, I lunge forward and yank the gun out of his pants; “I said
stop the fucking boat!
”

That
gets his attention. He lets the yacht drift to a stop as he freezes.

“For the
last time
, I'm telling you to get on your knees and-”

Javier whirls, knocking the gun from my hands as we both topple backwards. There's a scramble, and I'm shoving against him, but the reality is that he's much stronger than me. In a second, he's got me on my back, his body hovering over mine with my hands held firmly by the wrists above my head.

There's something almost sexual about the position, and I can feel my whole body burn with heat feeling him against me like that. His face looks wild with his strong, chiseled jaw, and his dark brown eyes flashing at me. His black hair is tousled, framing his face, and I'm suddenly keenly aware of his lack of shirt.

I'm also keenly aware of
something
pressing against my thigh.

Oh my
God
, is he
hard?

His lips part slightly, his teeth white and flashing at me. Our eyes meet, and there’s just this pure fire between them. It’s wild and animalistic, mixed with anger and resentment. But there's a single second when we lock eyes on each other, and we both see it.

But the moment passes, and then I'm just being held to the ground by a target I'm supposed to have halfway back to an embassy by now. And so I do what any rational woman would do when pinned to the ground by a dangerous, shirtless stranger, however perfect a body he has or however handsome a face: I scream.

He jerks away from me as soon as I start to thrash and yell in his face, my hands clawing for him as he scrambles away from me; “Dios fucking mio; calm the fuck down!”

I quickly stand, squaring off against him as I snarl like some sort of puma ready to pounce.

“
Look!
” He points across the marina, where the men are quickly piling into another boat of their own; “Something tells me those pendejos aren't with you, right?”

I shoot him a heated look before I shake my head.

“Great. Well if we stay here, they’re going to shoot at us, comprende?”

“If you think I'm going to help you escape-”

“I'm helping
you
escape,
princess
!”

We lock eyes again; the standoff all over again.

Finally, he rolls his eyes; “
Here.
” He hands me the gun, butt first; “I'm going to drive, hold this if it makes you feel better.”

I glare at him, but I reach out and take the gun from him. It's heavy in my hand as he mutters something in Spanish and turns back to the wheel.

'You up for this, Archer?'

'Absolutely, sir.'

“Javier,
turn off the boat.
”

The gun feels like it weighs a thousand pounds as I flex my sweating hand around the grip. Desperate times, desperate measures, and all that shit. I'm not going to kill him, but he can still talk to the C.I.A. with a hole in his leg.

He freezes for a second, still not turning around; “You won't.”

The boat continues on, plowing faster and faster as we cruise out of the harbor and around the lighthouse point.

I pull the hammer back and take a deep breath.

“You have three seconds, Toro. Turn off the fucking engine.”

“No can do, princess,” He says with an arrogant chuckle; “Can't go back, so we're going forward.” He lurches the boat faster, and I can feel my finger tighten around the trigger.

This asshole is seriously going to make me do it.

“Besides,” he says with a chuckle; “We both know you're not
actually
going to-”

I squeeze.

Click
.

It's empty.

The sound of the trigger still has Javier jolting upright though, and he whirls, his face a mask of absolute shock; “You fucking
shot
me?!”

“I did not!” My face is pale and I'm staring at the gun in my hand like it's some kind of wild animal.

“Yeah but you
tried to!
”

Holy shit, I did
.

I've hit the targeting range about as hard as I did with schoolbooks, but I've never pulled a trigger on an actual person before. I stare at the piece of metal in my hand like it’s a snake that might bite me. I want to throw it away, but reason takes over and I hold it firm, trying to keep my hands from shaking.

This is
my
op
; I'm supposed to be in charge, and I'm supposed to be
in control
of the situation. And yet here I am on a stolen yacht, with the fugitive I'm supposed to bring in, being chased by a mob of men with guns trying to kill me.

I am very much
not
in control of this situation.

But I turn and look out the back of the cabin to see the men starting to untie the boat back at the docks, screaming at each other and pointing in our direction. I turn back to Javier -  the devil himself staring me in the face with that hard glint in his eye and that teasing smile across those lips of his.

“It- it wasn't loaded-”

“
No shit
, princess.” He sighs, his shoulders deflating a little with the moment. His eyes follow my gaze to them men in the smaller boat; “You know what? Fine; you're the boss, chica. What’s the call.”

Men with guns, or the man that kidnapped my sister?

I narrow my eyes at him; “Drive the fucking boat, Toro.”

“Aye aye
capitan
,” he salutes with a grin on his face before turning and lurching the engines forward, roaring us out of the harbor.