Chapter 23
23
Preston
“ W hat the fuck did you say to Elle?” I ask Maya as soon as I walk into the house and drop my duffle with a loud thud.
“Excuse me?” she asks from her seat on the sofa. Her eyes narrow at me when I move to tower over her. “I know you took a big loss tonight, but I don’t appreciate your tone or use of the f-bomb. You better be glad Finley’s gone to bed.”
I replay the words that just came out of my mouth and…yeah, I would knock out anyone who said that shit to my sister, especially in front of my nephew.
“Sorry, I’m just…I don’t know where Elle is staying, and she won’t tell me what’s wrong.”
“Oh wow. You really do care about her,” she remarks while crossing her legs underneath her.
“Of course I care about her! It’s why I hate whatever this shit is that’s coming between us.”
“Well, I think I may have an idea about why she left the game now.”
“What do you mean?”
“Sit.” She nods to the nearby chair, so I grumble a swear and fold myself into it. “Could it be that Elle was hoping that you were going along with pretending to date her for her sake and not just for your own revenge?”
“How do you…how did you know we were pretending?”
“Because you would do anything to mess with Christian, including stealing his girl or pretending to steal his girl, and bragging about having a bigger stick.”
“Yeah, well, everyone else thought it was real.”
Nodding, she says, “Right. They did. What if Elle was starting to think it was real, too?”
“What do you mean?”
“Come on, Preston. She likes you, and not just in the let’s-just-screw-over-Christian-together way.”
Shrugging, I huff, “Good. I like her too.”
“Now that she knows the depth of your hatred, though, what Christian did to me when I got pregnant, Elle thinks you hate him more than you like her.”
“Oh shit.” I scrub my palm over my face, beginning to understand what she’s getting at.
“Exactly!” Maya says triumphantly. “Now, how are you going to prove to her that you actually care?”
“No idea.”
“Then you better come up with something fast before she hops on a plane out of here first thing in the morning.”
“That’s not going to happen. I have to find her. Tonight.”
“But how?”
“I guess I’ll have to call or visit every damn hotel in town.”
“I’ll help!” Maya offers.
“Thanks. And sorry for snapping at you, I’m just…”
“Yeah, I get it,” she replies with a sad smile. “What do you need me to do?”
“Could you find Elle’s salon on Insta and track down her friend Audrey something? She probably knows where Elle’s staying.”
“You got it,” she says, phone already in her hands.
“Let me know what she says. I’ll be checking with hotels until I hear from you.”
“She probably booked a hotel near the arena, right? Start there.”
“Yeah, okay. I will,” I agree.
Elle
Even though I’m still wide awake, the hard knock on my hotel door a little after two a.m. scares the crap out of me.
I wasn’t even going to see who it was through the peephole, until I hear his voice through it.
“Elle, I know this is your room.”
“How?” I say aloud before I realize he probably can’t hear me through the door.
I finally get out of bed to go unlock the door, but I leave the chain in place. It’ll be the line I need to keep the addictive hockey player on the other side, to not get any deeper into this mess I’m in.
And despite Preston’s “rule” about no sex before a game or during the season, there’s only one thing a man wants when he shows up begging to come in this late at night. I can’t count how many times Christian showed up out of the blue, not caring if I had early appointments the next morning and woke me up.
Seeing Preston standing on the other side of door, even knowing he has ulterior motives, still gives me those nervous butterflies in my stomach. Again. I absolutely hate those fluttery bastards.
The big grumpy man looks good in his jeans and a black hoodie that’s pulled up over his head. He would be a scary sight to see on the street in the middle of the night, or knocking on my hotel room door, if I didn’t know him. Or at least I think I sort of know him.
“You sleep in my jersey?” is the first thing he says as his eyes lower to where the material ends just above my knee.
Shit. I should’ve changed before answering the door. Now he probably thinks I’m pathetic and pining for him.
Which is the truth, but I didn’t need to be so obvious about it.
“It’s nice and warm,” I lie. Quickly changing the subject, I ask, “How did you know which hotel, which room, I was staying in?”
Preston shrugs his wide shoulders. “I called and asked around.”
“Asked around?”
“I stopped by a few hotels and asked if you were a guest.”
“How many hotels?”
“All the ones from here to the arena.”
“Oh my God.” I rest my forehead on the door. He must be really desperate for that booty call.
“Maya sent Audrey a message on Insta. She told her which hotel but not the room number…”
He walked around looking for me? Had his sister message Audrey? Why didn’t she tell me? Not that I’ve had a chance to tell her how this whole thing blew up in my face. I didn’t feel like talking to anyone tonight, not even my best friend.
I can’t believe Preston would go to so much trouble after a grueling hockey game. I also can’t believe the hotel would rat out my room number.
“And the front desk just told you which room I was staying in without my permission? What if you were a criminal coming up here to rob me?”
“Since the man at the front desk and his manager recognized me, I don’t think they were too concerned about me robbing you.”
Shaking my head, I mutter, “Oh. Right. We’re in your hometown.”
He uses every inch of his height and size to crowd the small opening. “Is there any way I can talk you into letting me come in?”
“Why?”
“So that we don’t have to talk through the crack in the door?”
“There’s nothing to talk about.” And I can’t sleep with you .
I don’t say that last part to him. It’s not that I don’t want him. I do. It’s that he was right. I’m not over Christian, or at least the pain he caused. Until I am, I shouldn’t be intimate with Preston or anyone else yet. Especially when my feelings are one-sided in this situation.
“Oh really?” he asks. “Maya seemed to think there was some confusion that needs to be addressed.”
“No, there’s no confusion. I get it, Preston. Really, I do. What Christian did to her, you have every right to hate him.”
“Agreed. Please tell me you don’t feel guilty about making him jealous, Elle.”
“No, I don’t feel guilty about that.”
“Then what’s going on?”
“I…I think I got the wrong idea about us. I thought maybe it was real. And I shouldn’t be upset with you. From the beginning, you told me you don’t date, that you don’t want any distractions. It was stupid to think I was an exception.”
“That’s true, I don’t date. I haven’t dated anyone since I made it to the pros.”
“I know, and I understand. You’ve been so focused on helping take care of your sister and your nephew. They depend on you, on your paycheck. I get it. You have to avoid letting anything mess up your career at all costs. I don’t want to cause any problems for you either. Even if this doesn’t count because it’s not real…”
“Elle, I want you to be the exception to all my rules. I want it to be real, too.”
“Why?” I whisper.
“I know it’s probably hard to believe, but I like you more than I hate Riley.”
Trying to purse my lips together rather than smile like a lunatic, I say, “If that’s true, then you must like me a whole hell of a lot.”
“I do. Why else would I have spent an hour searching the city for you in the middle of the night?”
“I-I don’t know.”
“Trust me, cupcake, wanting to see you doesn’t have anything to do with making Riley jealous.”
“It doesn’t?”
“No. I meant it when I said I missed you. You, not the rumors or the publicity or whatever. I asked you to come to D.C. so I could see you in the stands wearing my jersey, and so we could spend time together after the game. Preferably alone.”
“Oh.”
“Now, will you please open the door? I just want to be in the same room with you for a few minutes. I know it’s late and what this may look like, but I swear I’m not here for anything else. I know you’re still not over him.” When I don’t confirm or deny that statement, Preston says, “He always came by late at night too, right?”
“He did. The only time I usually saw him unplanned was in my chair for a haircut or, um, late at night. At least he would bring over a late-night snack…”
“I hate him even more for treating you like you didn’t deserve his days, too.”
That comment finally has my fingers reaching up to undo the chain on the door because it’s exactly how I feel. Like I was Christian’s part-time hookup when I wanted to be with him all the time. At least Preston gets that.
And how ironic is it that now, with Preston, it’s the complete opposite?
“Hi,” he says with a smile that makes me nearly melt when I open the door wide enough for him to walk in.
“Hi,” I reply before shutting and locking the door behind him. “I really am sorry you lost tonight. And that I didn’t stay for the game.”
“I get it,” he replies. “I should’ve told you the truth from the beginning. Maya told me to when I got home from Greensboro, but I was being stubborn. I’ve got serious trust issues…”
“You’re protective of her and Finley and want to keep them out of the media frenzy. I don’t blame you. If I had a sister and a nephew, I would feel the same. People online can be so cruel.”
“They can. I hate the shit they’ve said about you. They’re just jealous morons, you know that, right? They don’t deserve a second of your time.”
“I’m trying not to read the comments. At least the Warhawks’ fans were nice to me at the arena. Only smiles, no screaming assholes.”
“Really?” Preston says in surprise. “That’s good. I’m glad. I didn’t think about how the crowd would treat you, but I should have.”
“The home team seems very supportive of you and I dating. But after tonight, when I left the arena and the Warhawks lost, they could all be blaming me.”
“Nobody can blame that loss on you. Our whole team was off, playing like they thought game three would be a piece of cake after winning the first two away games,” he says with a sigh. “But seeing you, knowing you were sleeping in my jersey, makes the loss a little more bearable. Do you have on shorts underneath?”
I shake my head no.
“You are killing me, cupcake,” he growls before fisting the sides of it to pull me closer to him. Flush against his body, I can feel exactly what he means. As my fingers grip the tops of his wide shoulders, a rush of liquid heat warms my lower belly, making me wish he didn’t have that stupid rule.
And when Preston’s lips lightly graze mine, that heat has me nice and slick for that particular activity.
He kisses me like he’s pouring every second we were apart into claiming my mouth. This goes on for so long my knees are weak.
When he finally pulls back, our mouths are a hair’s breadth apart, our breath mingling, Preston says, “Give me one little taste, and I’ll never ask you for anything again.”
I nod my head in agreement, even if I’m not entirely sure what he means by “a taste.” That could encompass several possibilities…until Preston sinks to his knees in front of me. His large palms slide up the sides of both of my thighs, heading underneath the jersey until they come to the waistband of my panties. With his gaze locked on mine, Preston slowly peels them down my legs, only breaking eye contact when he reaches my ankle. He looks down to help me step out of them.
He dangles my navy-blue thong on a single thick finger while he examines the growling head of a yellow feline on the front triangle. “I didn’t even know they made Bobcats’ panties.”
I have to clear my throat to respond. “Those are obviously my lucky panties if they won tonight. I told you that underneath the Warhawks’ jersey, I’m still a Bobcats fan.”
Still studying the panties as if they’re the first he’s ever seen, Preston says, “If they’re lucky panties, then you’re definitely not getting them back.”
When he balls the panties up and shoves them into the front pocket of his jeans, I gasp indignantly. “You dirty pervert!”
Grinning up at me with his palms sliding up my legs again, this time taking the hem of the jersey with them, he tells me, “How about this? Let me stay here with you tonight. I promise to keep my hands to myself, and I’ll give them back to you in the morning.”
“I don’t know,” I reply, causing his hands to pause just an inch before exposing all of me to him. “What if I don’t want you to keep your hands to yourself all night?”
Just because I’m not ready to have sex with Preston, doesn’t mean I don’t want him to touch me.
“Deal,” he quickly agrees.
A second later and his face is pressed against my sex, lips kissing me softly in an incredibly intimate area. When he tries to lift the material up my stomach, I cover his fist to stop him.
“Can the jersey stay on?” I ask. His dark eyes peek up at me before he nods. His fist releases the material, leaving his head to hold it up high enough to keep it out of the way, while his hands slide underneath, up over my hips, my waist, and ribs, before reaching their destination—my bare breasts.
Preston cups them and groans against my flesh before squeezing them and flicking the pointed tip of his tongue over the bundle of nerves at the apex of my sex.
“Oh my god!” I cry out at the warm, wet sensation, my fingers sinking into his soft hair.
One of his palms releases my breast to lift my right leg, draping it over his shoulder. The move opens me to him, allowing his tongue access to every sensitive inch. His palm moves around to squeeze a handful of my ass while the other holds my breast, his thumb brushing my nipple.
“God, yes,” I moan as he tastes me frantically, furiously, as if he can’t get enough. Preston’s tongue dips and swirls, making me crazy. The pressure in my core builds and builds until it explodes within me, setting off fireworks behind my closed eyes, and tremors through my entire body.
When the pleasurable waves begin to ebb, I realize that Preston’s hands tightly gripping my waist are all that’s keeping me from falling on my ass.
Pressing a chaste kiss to my mound, he gets to his feet, lifting me off mine to carry me to bed.
Once I’m lying down, my head on the pillow, he joins me. Spreading my thighs apart, he lies down flat on his stomach between them, looks up at me, and says, “I lied. I need more than one taste. Call a timeout if you want me to stop.”
My lust hazed mind can’t even process his comment before his head disappears underneath his jersey, and he begins devouring me yet again.