“If I’m being honest, winning the Super Bowl was great.”
I roll my eyes playfully. “Rub it in, why don’t you?”
Hendrix tightens his embrace. “Buuut, all I could think about these last few days was how much I wanted to celebrate with you. Everything else dulled in comparison.”
“Sap,” I tease, but my heart isn’t in it. If I am being honest, he is all I have wanted these last few days, too.
“I’m glad the season is over.”
“Really?”
“Mhm.” He plants a kiss on my nose, making me wrinkle it. “Now, we can plan how we are going to come out to the entire country.”
My heart stutters, stops, then flies away. “Are you serious?”
“I’m rarely ever not.”
I pull him into a kiss that is more smiling teeth than lips, chuckling happily against him. We kiss and kiss, hands roaming over skin we haven’t touched in too long, until he grabs my ass, lifting so I can wrap my legs around his waist. I shut off the water using my foot, and he walks us out of the shower and into the dark bedroom before crawling onto the mattress with me stuck to him like a koala, our wet bodies soaking the sheets.
“I considered staying at the other house tonight,” he pants as I suck reckless hickeys on his neck. “Because I didn’t want to disturb your sleep. But I couldn’t stand another night without you.”
“You should have woken me up,” I admonish between kisses.
“I was going to after I showered. Though about waking you up with my mouth on your dick.”
“There’s still time.”
Hendrix pauses, looking at me with one eyebrow slightly quirked.
Warmth blooms across my cheeks at being called out on my dumb statement. “You know what I mean.”
“Do I?” he whispers playfully against my lips, but as he begins to lower himself, lips trailing down my neck, my chest, my abs, my navel, I know he knows exactly what I meant—and he is about to give it to me.
✧ ✧ ✧
A ringing phone wakes me too early the next morning, and I feel around blindly for my glasses on the nightstand. My elbow slips and lands on Hendrix’s side, but he’s so deep under that he doesn’t even notice.
After slipping on my glasses, I stumble out of bed in search of Hendrix’s phone because mine is sitting silently on the charger beside the bed. I follow the ringing to the bathroom, the phone forgotten on the counter.
Coach Mathis’ name flashes across the screen.
I carry the phone into the bedroom with me and shake Hendrix’s shoulder to wake him. “Hey.” I use my most assertive whisper, knowing he is sleeping like the dead. The soft snores are evidence enough. “Are you late for something? Mathis is calling you.” One glance at my phone display reveals that it is too early for anything team-related. What does Mathis want?
The phone in my hand goes dark, then immediately begins ringing again. Same caller.
“Rix, wake up!” I hiss.
He jerks up with a start. “What? I’m up.”
I wiggle the phone in front of his bleary eyes. “Are you late for something? Mathis is—” A new ring cuts off my words, and I look over to see my phone alight with my coach’s name.
Both our coaches? Calling us at the same time?
Not. Good.
Flinging Hendrix’s phone at his confused face, I grab mine and step into the hallway so our coaches won’t overhear either of us talking in the background. “Hello?”
“Oh, good. You’re up,” Coach Sullivan says, sounding too awake and pissed off. “We need to meet.”
“Um, okay. Can I ask what this is about?”
“No, you cannot.” He gives me the address for a coffee shop in the city, tells me to be there in thirty minutes, and hangs up without any explanation.
I stare at the dark phone in my hand, confused and dreading what this unofficial meeting will entail. Maybe he is giving me a heads-up that the Treasures are dropping me before next season. It could be a coincidence that our coaches called us at the exact same time.
Right?
Returning to the bedroom, I find Hendrix already stumbling into a pair of jeans and a hoodie. “Mathis wants to see me ASAP. Wouldn’t tell me what it’s about, but it sounded important.”
“Are you wearing that?” I ask, pointing at his chest.
“Yeah. Why?” He looks down at the golden-colored hoodie. “Oh.”
“Hey, if you want to meet your coach in a Treasures hoodie”—I shrug with a smirk—“by all means, go ahead.”
Hendrix yanks the hoodie off, leaving his messy blond hair standing up with static, and I take a moment to admire his naked torso. Snagging my hand in the front of his waistband, I pull him against me.
“Mm. Are you sure you have to rush off so fast?” I purr.
