Desire flares in his grey eyes, and between us, I feel a twitch against my groin. He blinks, and it disappears. “I do,” he says, groaning in frustration. “But after, I’m all yours.”
I lift an inquiring eyebrow. “All mine, huh? Does that mean I get to tap your amazing ass again?” My palms cover his denim-clad cheeks and squeeze to emphasize my point.
He scoffs, trying to scowl, but I spy the cute blush blooming across his face. Oh, yeah. He wants this D again. “I gotta go.” He pecks my lips. “Love you.”
This kiss is so quick I’m stunned for a moment. When I blink to clear my lust-fogged mind, he is already walking away, scooping his team hoodie off the floor and pulling it over his head. “Aren’t you going to brush your teeth?” I call to his retreating back. He doesn’t respond, and I roll my eyes to myself. He’ll be asking to use some of my whitening strips tonight, mark my words.
His car is gone by the time I’m dressed and ready to leave. I climb in my truck and head for the coffee shop, definitely not speeding to make up for lost time.
Arriving only five minutes late, I jog to the door, open it, step inside, search for Sullivan . . .
And feel my heart sink to my feet.
CHAPTER 34
TAHEGIN ELLINGSWORTH
In the far back of the empty coffee shop, Sullivan sits at a high-top table, a familiar man beside him and even more familiar shoulders in front of him.
I know those shoulders—had kissed and held them only hours ago in bed. The red Rubies hoodie covering their broad expanse serves as extra proof of who the man with his back to me is.
And if I wasn’t already sure, Mathis sitting in front of him would be a dead giveaway.
Sullivan eyes me over his steaming coffee, his grumpy expression clearly displaying his displeasure with my tardiness. When he waves me over, Hendrix’s shoulders stiffen. He peeks over at me with one grey eye, his emotions impossible to decipher.
My sneakers squeak on the wood plank floor as I cross the empty room to the only available chair at their table—beside Hendrix. Clearing my throat in the awkward silence, I subtly try to scoot my chair away from Hendrix for God knows why. If they’ve gathered us here, the cat must be out of the bag.
“Don’t bother,” Hendrix mutters, casting his signature scowl in our coaches’ direction. “They know.”
All the air whooshes out of me in one big rush. “How?” I breathe.
“Someone put two and two together,” Mathis explains, brandishing a manilla envelope from his lap. He sets it on the table and pulls out the contents from inside. Picture after picture is spread before us. “Apparently, you two have been communicating during games using sign language?” He points at a photo of us in our Rubies uniforms last year, our hands mid-sign. “Not smart, guys. It’s been done before, and it’s banned for a reason.”
I stare unblinkingly at the pictures in front of us, each one capturing our hands moving, some from last year and some from the most recent season, but that’s it. “So we broke a rule. Okay. We’ll pay the fine. I don’t think this calls for a secret meeting—”
Mathis pulls another page from the pile, and it’s enough to make my mouth go dry, effectively cutting off my voice. “This does call for it, though.”
In the picture, Hendrix and I are on the ground together during one of our games this year—it’s impossible to tell which of the three. It looks as if we both took a tumble and are in the process of standing up, but our eyes are locked, our hands coincidentally tangled from the fall, and parts of him are touching parts of me in a way reminiscent of last night.
“Take a picture of any guys colliding in a game, and you’ll see this exact position over and over again. It’s a contact sport. This picture proves nothing. Tank tea bagged a guy last year, and they made a whole meme about it.” I slap my hand on the picture and shove it in their direction.
A hand lands on my thigh, squeezing. “Tahegin.”
Turning, I meet Hendrix’s somber gaze, and he gives me a slow shake of his head. “What?” I ask him, then our coaches when he doesn’t answer.
Mathis lays out more pages, one at a time.
An article, written by some small sports blog about my decrease in salary by signing with the Treasures. It lists all the other offers I received and turned down, each one better than the last. Where they got the information, I’m unsure, but it is scarily accurate.
More pictures of us out in public with red marker circling the times Hendrix and I are side by side. Aleks, Micah, and Kit are in each of them, but the pattern is clear. No matter our companions, we are always together. One picture is from a night out at the club—from when Hendrix and I were still figuring out how we felt about each other. I know that because we haven’t been back, not wanting to risk the exposure after someone posted pictures outing some Miami players visiting that same club a few months back.
God, do people not have anything better to do with their lives?
There are pictures of both Hendrix and me arriving late at the middle house and leaving at the same time the next morning—also a copy of the property information with neither of our names on it, which looks as suspicious as we tried not to make it be.
Shit.
One page appears to be an unpublished article by whoever sent the “evidence” to our coaches. It details everything in a nice little summary, then calls for a—
“A Super Bowl rematch?” I exclaim. “Without Hendrix or me? Are they insane?”
“That is for the team’s board of directors to decide,” Sullivan speaks gruffly for the first time since I got here. “This person is threatening to go public, and the board is debating whether they will pay for silence.”
I stare at everything, knowing it’s enough to cause at least a bit of a scandal. “But . . . we were going to come out this summer,” I whisper.
Surprise flickers across our coaches’ faces.
“So.” Sullivan clears his throat. “This is a thing, then?”
I raise an eyebrow at him.
“Not just a . . . hookup? A fling?”
Both Hendrix and I remain silent, watching the men across from us squirm in their chairs.
After a minute, Sullivan clasps his hands and places them on the table. “Is there any chance you two would consider breaking up?”
“Excuse me?”
