Chapter Eight
W hen I got a text from Karel asking if I wanted to come to the next Heat game, as his guest, I said yes.
Maybe this would encourage Jesse to move on.
But I was vacillating as game time approached, pulling a pair of jeans over my ass.
Karel was hot, but was I even into him?
Should I even be dating anybody else with these lustful thoughts I had about my ex? I had barely been able to sleep after feeling Jesse’s hands on me last night.
It wasn’t worth it to get back with him, I reminded myself. How could I ever get over what had happened?
I needed to keep on with my plan of finding someone else. Someone new.
Then I got a text on my phone.
Hey, you aren’t planning on coming to the game are you? Wouldn’t want to distract our boys – Taylor
Our boys?
Keep them both away from me if you can, then, I texted back.
Oh, I couldn’t miss the game now.
I was a bit late and walking toward my seat when the players began heading down the hallway to the ice.
For a moment, I felt that old thrill I always did to see Jesse emerge from the locker room.
Impossibly big and strong, looming in the doorway, his jaw set and ready for the game.
The thrill had been knowing he was mine to cheer for, the person I loved best in all the world.
Then I saw Taylor too, standing backstage. Her eyes narrowed when she saw me.
I met her eyes, though.
“Don’t fucking text me again,” I warned, and I saw by the way her lips tightened that she had heard me.
I felt a gloved hand on my arm and looked down to see Karel right before me.
He looked up at me with such a cocky grin on his face that I couldn’t help smiling at him.
“Hey, sexy,” he said. “Glad you came.”
Then he pulled me down and kissed me.
I could vaguely hear Jesse yelling in the background, but Karel’s lips were firm, his tongue gently teasing at me.
I opened my lips and let him in. The big player grunted in pleasure and his grip on my hand tightened as he plunged his tongue deeper.
He was a good kisser and I stepped closer to the edge and put my hand on his neck, tangling my fingers in his hair.
With a grunt, Karel released me as Jesse knocked into him. Jesse’s eyes were narrowed with fury and my ears were ringing as I saw him get in Karel’s face and shove the other man into the side of the tunnel.
But other players broke them apart and jostled them onto the ice.
Holy shit
My legs shaking, I settled into my seat (next to the ice again , damn it, and I did not want to be this conspicuous).
This was an important game, with division rivals, and the pace was frenetic.
But I was reluctantly at the edge of my seat. Jesse was electric to watch, and I knew exactly how talented he was.
But then I had always known that. Always believed in him. Even when he was a 20-year-old meathead playing street hockey.
I knew he was talented. Knew he had what it took to go pro.
It had fucking stung that he’d thrown everything we had away for someone else.
I didn’t think I could ever get over it. I didn’t think anything he could do would be enough to make up for his mistake.
I was so glued to the game I didn’t miss it. But it would have been impossible to miss.
Karel cross-checking Jesse into the glass right in front of me, shaking the boards so violently that the entire stadium sucked in their breath.
Then it all exploded in a rush of sound as the two pros tore off their gloves.
“That’s your teammate!” several people shouted in my ear as if either man was confused.
My heart was pounding.
I had only seen Jesse in one other altercation in my entire life. He was not a fighter. He didn’t have to be. Usually his size was kind of a deterrent to everyone.
But one time we had been jogging together in the park and he had stopped to fill our water bottles as I ran slightly forward.
Two half-drunk frat boys had called out to me, commenting on my ‘big tits’ and body and as I passed by, one of them swatted my ass.
I had barely turned around in anger when Jesse was there, decking both of them easily. They stumbled into each other as Jesse knocked out with his powerful reach. I heard one guy’s rib crack, then the other guy’s nose crack, and Jesse hit them again, and then again, until I gripped him around the waist and dragged him away.
“What was that?” I asked when I had finally pulled him down the sidewalk.
His blue eyes glinted savagely as he looked at me.
“Nobody fucks with you,” he said.
But I’d never seen him like this before. Karel got a punch in, and then Jesse’s fists were crashing into his face again and again as Karel was driven back so hard he was thrown against the glass right in front of me.
Blood was pounding in my ears as I watched Jesse fight. The entire stadium was so loud the sound was reverberating in my chest cavity.
The other teammates managed to pull them apart, but the look on Jesse’s face made me press my thighs together to stop the shudder that rolled through my body.
He was not going to let Karel date me
I felt restless and horny after the game, so I drove over to go fuck off some energy with Bryan, only to remember halfway to his apartment that I was on my period so he wouldn’t want to have sex.
Fuck
I drove the rest of the way anyways, and watched him play video games while I twitched restlessly.
It was slick out, so he offered to drive me home, and I agreed, wondering why I’d even come. Fucking Bryan wouldn’t even have solved the main problem—that I couldn’t stop thinking about my ex.
I zoned out as he drove me back, barely listening to his work stories as I replayed Jesse’s fight over and over again.
Gritting my teeth, I got out of the car, moving carefully on the slick sidewalk.
It was late, so I expected everyone to be asleep.
I felt Bryan’s hand on my lower back as he guided me up the steps.
“Be careful, it’s slippery.”
But he had barely spoken when the door of the tent was ripped open and Jesse stuck his head out.
My heart pounded as Jesse came storming down the steps. It wasn’t as cold as the night before, but his breath still made puffs in the air.
“I told you to stay away from her!” he roared.
I had never seen a damn ex so jealous and upset.
“Jesse, stop! What is wrong with you? It’s like you’ve gone fucking feral!”
I stepped quickly between the two men, putting a hand out and gripping Jesse’s shirt to keep him from lunging at Bryan.
“We are casual,” I seethed to Jesse. “Get a hold of yourself.”
“Casual for now,” Bryan put in.
He was wearing on my nerves.
I could feel every ridge of Jesse’s ab muscles under my fingers, his chest heaving in and out.
“Casual forever,” I said.
Bryan’s handsome face twisted with disgust as he looked at me.
“Don’t tell me you’re considering getting back with him,” he said condescendingly. “You’re so much better than that.”
“Fucking stuff it,” I retorted. “I’m better than you, too. Get out of here.”
When Bryan hesitated, because of course he didn’t want me going off mad and losing access, Jesse picked him up by the collar and carried him over to the driver’s side of the car and threw him in.
“You’re making a—spectacle of yourself,” I said as he turned back to me.
I felt light-headed.
He strode back, moving quickly for such a big man, shadows from the streetlights streaking across his massive shoulders.
Then Jesse stopped in front of me.
“Don’t be mad. Please, don’t send me away,” he begged. “Anything but that. I just saw you with him and I—couldn’t stand it.”
He knelt with bowed head in front of me.
The huge broad width of his shoulders looked so strange slumped in dejection.
“The paparazzi might drive by and see,” I pointed out.
“I don’t care,” he said. “I don’t care about my image. All I care about is you.”
There was a purple line beneath his eye, a growing bruise from his fight with Karel, and I couldn’t help the way my heart pounded faster, the tingling warmth that spread through my limbs.
“I’m going crazy thinking about you with Bryan,” he groaned.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but I didn’t fuck him. This time. I was on my period.”
Jesse’s jaw dropped as his big hands clutched at my arms.
“He doesn’t want to have sex with you on your period? Fucking pussy.”
I opened my mouth to object but Jesse rushed on, gripping my waist.
“Let me. You know I love doing it on your period.”
I said nothing.
“Please,” he said again. “I can fuck you better than him. I can love you harder than him. Harder than anyone else.”
“All right,” I said. “Just this one time.”
“Yes!” Jesse crowed, swinging me up and into his arms.
“This doesn’t mean we’re getting back together,” I said firmly.
“Yes, we are,” he said, as he carried me up the stairs so I could open the front door. “We belong together.”
But with each step I took up the stairs I got even madder.
“This means nothing,” I warned him as I shut the door to my room. “I’m still fucking pissed at you. I’m just using you for your body.”
“I accept that you’re pissed at me,” Jesse said, stepping closer and pulling me flush against him. “Use my body, baby.”
“You looked like a real dumbass fighting your own teammate today,” I said.
His hands plunged into my long waves of hair and held them tightly.
“Yeah, I did. And I’d do it again to scare any other man away from you. Can I kiss you?”
“Maybe,” I said, to piss him off, but he sat down on the bed and pulled me into his lap.
“ Nothing was like this,” he said fiercely, his hand tight on my chin as he captured my mouth with his.
For a second I felt pure panic, then only a rush of heady sensation as his hands bit down on my chin and waist, pulling me closer to him.
Jesse was kissing me with bruising force, making me gasp as his tongue plunged into my mouth.
He kissed me with deep, urgent need, his big hand crushing my hair in his fist as he pressed me deeper into him.
“Fuck, you’re so hot, Josie. I missed every fucking thing about you.”
My thighs were trembling and my nipples felt so tight as they brushed against his chest, but I only said, “I had some guys who knew what they were doing.”
Jesse groaned, low and painful, breaking off from my mouth to kiss my throat.
“I deserved that. I deserve everything you’ve thrown at me. But it still makes me so pissed I’m seeing red to think about any other men. I’m going to fuck you so good, baby, you’ll forget all about them.”
“Hm, we’ll see,” I said noncommittally as he pulled my T-shirt impatiently off, hissing as he saw my heavy, full breasts.
“Fucking hell, you look so amazing.”
He dragged his tongue between the full swell of my breasts, then nipped gently all along the curves, his teeth biting down just exactly the right amount, just exactly the right tiny prick of pain mixed with pleasure.
I ground my pussy into him and he stopped to kiss me again, my lips still throbbing.
“Want to go in the shower?”
“You’re not going to fit in this shower here,” I retorted.
“OK, let’s spread a towel out.”
He set me gently down on the ground and I walked over to the closet with rubbery legs to get one and put it on the bed.
“Got a condom?” I asked.
He swallowed.
Before, I had been on birth control and we didn’t use condoms. But I sure as fuck wasn’t doing that now.
“Yes, I do. I-I got tested a few weeks ago, and I’m STD-free. But I know you don’t really trust me right now.”
“Put it on,” I said.
He nodded, and reached for the string of his sweatpants.
“You’re so fucking hot, Josie. The most beautiful woman in the world.”
He pulled off his T-shirt and I swallowed to see all those defined muscles, the way his abs flexed with each movement.
But I waited as he pulled his dick out and rolled the condom down the length of it.
Heavy and thick, his hands shaking as he rolled the condom down the whole length of it.
“Please let me be the only one,” he said hoarsely, his blue eyes wild. “I’ll do anything. Please let me work my way back to you trusting me.”
“Why should I?” I said, languidly stretching back on the towel. “I can find other men.”
“But no one,” he growled. “No one who could love you like I do, Josie.”
He put a hand on both of my thighs and I stifled a moan as he drew my period panties down.
Unlike other guys, he never commented negatively while I was on my period, because he had never cared about any of that shit.
Jesse spread my legs gently.
“Wait here,” he said, reaching down to grab my hot pad and roll it up into a round cylinder.
Then he put it behind my lower back, raising me up gently so my hips were tipped up.
“I know your back hurts sometimes,” he said, and I felt his cock drag up my thigh, burning my overheated skin.
One hand gently cupped my breasts, swollen and heavy with my period.
I felt so slick and wet and he gulped loudly as the head of his cock parted my lips.
“Oh my god, you feel amazing. I don’t know how long I can last.”
His hands were braced on either side of me, and I felt them shaking too with his concentration.
He began to slide in again, inch by inch, so big that my sensitive skin began to pulsate with how he filled me.
Sounds began to spill from my lips, little cries of need.
Fuck, I had to admit to myself I had missed him, disgusting betrayer that he was. Missed his teasing, missed his warmth, missed the way his cock was so thick my inner walls throbbed as he pressed all the way in until he was fully sheathed.
Then he began to roll his hips, in that low, sensual way I remembered, building heat in a slow rolling boil until sweat was dripping down my throat and back. Then he put a finger on my slippery clit and began to rub, dragging me to the precipice and back again until my legs were weak and trembling from the delicious, wicked edging.
“I could do this all night,” Jesse growled as he nipped at my throat, my breasts, the rosy pink tips of my breasts.
My stomach tightened and I gripped his broad shoulders as I came, hurtling over the edge with a cry, and Jesse said I love you over and over again, rumbling into my belly so I felt him in my chest cavity.
I didn’t say it back, but when he bent down to kiss me again I opened my sore and throbbing lips for his and the pleasure of his tongue.