11. Chapter 11
Chapter eleven
~JESSICA~
Dominic’s weight crushes me into the mattress, one hand pinning both my wrists above my head. His breath is hot against my cheek, his mouth dragging down the column of my throat.
“Look at you,” he drawls, the exact kind of tone that melts my insides.
My back arches.
God, I can’t help it. His body is solid heat, muscles caging me in, hips pushing between my thighs.
“Dom…” His name spills out of me like a prayer.
He laughs, dark and pleased, the sound soaking into my skin as he bites the place where my pulse hammers .
His fingers slide down, slow, teasing, purposeful, until they’re right where I’m burning for him, right on my clit.
I gasp, thighs trembling around his hips.
“You think about me like this?” He lifts his head, eyes molten. “When you’re alone.”
His knee nudges my legs wider, and I whimper.
“You think about me ruining you, don’t you?”
“Yes!” It comes out strangled and embarrassingly needy.
His hand tightens around my wrists, pinning me harder while his other hand starts working my slit.
A sharp inhale slams through my chest and my eyes fly open.
The dream dissolves like smoke.
I’m in my bed with the sheets twisted around my legs.
My heart’s pounding like I ran a marathon, and sweat is prickling across my skin.
My thighs… oh God. They’re slick from the arousal between them.
I catch movement at the corner of my eye and lift my head .
Oh, no.
Dominic. The real one. Standing in my doorway.
His hair is damp from a shower, and his arms are crossed over his chest like he’s been there long enough to take in every humiliating second.
His stare is unblinking, scorching straight through me.
“What are you doing here?” I croak.
Did I… moan? Did I say his name? Judging by the way he’s looking at me, I must have. His eyes say everything without him needing to move.
My entire face flames.
He clears his throat once, the muscle in his jaw flexing.
“I apologize for not knocking,” he says, voice low. “You just sounded… distressed.”
Distressed.
If the earth could swallow me whole, I would thank it. I drag the blanket up to my chin, hoping to hide the shame burning through me.
“I… just had a nightmare.”
Dom watches me for one excruciating beat. His gaze drops to my trembling legs, then back to my face .
“I see,” he murmurs. “I’m heading to practice. There’s breakfast downstairs.”
And then he shuts the door, leaving me alone with the echo of my own moan and the violent need still throbbing between my thighs.
I flop back onto the pillow, covering my face with both hands. But even as embarrassment eats me alive, my body is still humming.
I force myself upright and drag in a breath, trying to reset, trying to remember I have a million things to do today.
I spent the last three days almost entirely in my atelier, hunched over fabric and half-finished garments.
I’ve barely seen Dom. He had an away game two nights ago, which he told me about the day of.
I told him I was too behind to come with him, and it turned into an argument.
He still somehow managed to make me agree to go to the next one instead, leaving me irritated and weirdly warm under my skin.
While he was gone, he called and texted all the time.
Little check-ins disguised as orders.
It was… nice. Dangerously nice .
And while the entire team stayed the night after the win, celebrating out of state, Dom didn’t. He came home straight after the final buzzer.
Why?
The question has been pounding inside my head since that night.
He could’ve gone out drinking and ignored me the way a man supposedly indifferent would do.
But instead, he came home.
A tiny spark of something bright blooms in my chest.
All I know, all I feel, pulsing embarrassingly warm in my chest, is that I like it.
I reach for my phone on the nightstand, intending to check the time. Instead, I’m hit with a tsunami of notifications. It’s constant now, a never-ending flood that lights up my screen every five seconds.
My following has tripled since the gala and the charity event and the little behind-the-scenes snippets I’ve posted in Dom’s house. People love the weird overlap of fashion and hockey, sewing tutorials next to clips of Dom on the ice.
I lock my phone and flop back on the pillow again .
Tonight is the launch event for a new sports collection. It’s a brand his team is partnering with, and the Blazers are expected to attend.
And since the PR team is still riding the high of our “relationship,” that means I’m expected, too.
And if I’m going to be dragged into Dominic’s world… I plan on looking fierce while I do it.
Late afternoon sunlight spills through the tall windows, painting the foyer in warm gold. I stand in front of the big downstairs mirror, smoothing the fabric of my dress, turning left, then right, then left again.
The dress is one of mine—the kind I used to make just for the satisfaction of posting the final video, wearing it for a few minutes before hanging it back up forever.
But now? Now these dresses go somewhere. They walk into rooms I never thought I’d enter, and they stand next to men like Dominic Moreal.
I catch my reflection smiling an actual, stupid, pleased smile, and shake my head .
The hairs on the back of my neck rise. It’s that dense, warm weight in the air only Dom carries. The soft thud of his shoes on the hardwood comes after.
I meet his gaze in the mirror.
He towers behind me in a black suit—white shirt, black tie, broad shoulders, a jaw freshly shaved, and dark hair pushed back.
My breath stumbles in my chest when he steps closer. Neither of us speaks. We just look at each other in the mirror. Then his eyes drop to the strap on my shoulder that has slipped.
He lifts his hand without a word and slides the strap back into place. His fingers graze my skin, and the touch shivers straight down my spine.
His eyes meet mine in the mirror, and something dangerous flickers in them.
“You planning on keeping this thing on tonight?” he asks. “Or should I expect a repeat of the pool from last week? Save myself the trouble and warn the photographers now?”
I bite my bottom lip to suppress the smile.
“Excuse me?” I ask, faking surprise .
He taps the freshly fixed strap once, light and dismissive.
He turns to go, still grinning.
“Car will be here in ten,” he says, tone composed again.
I don’t know what possesses me, but my hand shoots out and grabs his arm.
He turns his head slightly, brow furrowing.
“Come here,” I say.
The eyebrow lift is subtle but thoroughly unimpressed.
“For what?”
“A photo,” I say simply. “We don’t have any together.”
“We have plenty,” he counters.
“I meant something we’ve taken.”
I tug him lightly toward the mirror, and he lets me.
We stop in front of it and I raise my phone. He straightens subtly, rolls his shoulders back, and slips into camera-ready posture.
His eyes flick to the reflection, studying the distance between us. Then he slides his left hand into his pocket, and his right hand lands on my waist, heavy and warm. My pulse kicks.
This is nothing.
This is work.
But my body can’t tell the difference.
“Look… less homicidal.”
“This is less homicidal.”
I bite back a laugh and lift my phone higher.
We pose. Except pose isn’t the right word. He stands there like a wall of heat and tension, hand tightening just enough on my waist that it sends an electric current straight between my legs.
I hit the shutter, snapping the photo.
“Hold on,” I murmur, already hitting the shutter again. “Just one more.”
He leans down. At first, I think he’s just adjusting, angling himself into the frame, but then his mouth presses against my cheek. A warm drag of lips against skin that shouldn’t mean anything and somehow means everything.
My entire body locks. Heat sparks beneath my skin. A sharp, molten bloom shoots from my cheek straight down my spine, settling low in my belly .
I’m suddenly aware of every inch of him pressed beside me. The crisp scent of his cologne. The way my entire face feels like it’s on fire.
I keep staring straight ahead, unable to look at him, terrified I’ll show the molten ache curling low between my thighs.
I snap the photo, and he pulls back like nothing happened.
“Good?” he asks.
My brain is soup.
“Um, yeah.”
“Post whichever you want,” he says. “They both look convincing.”
Convincing. Not cute. Not real.
“Ten minutes,” he says again, as if nothing happened, and walks away.
And I’m left with my heartbeat thrashing, my pulse beating between my thighs… and wondering how the hell I’m supposed to survive Dominic Moreal.
The event is way too glossy and expensive. It’s full of athletes, influencers, and executives pretending they don’t rehearse every laugh that leaves their mouths.
Neon lights flash against massive screens looping the campaign, champagne flutes sparkle in every hand, and the whole place feels like a curated, polished circus.
I spent the last thirty minutes with the WAGs while Dom and the team did their rounds of shaking hands and taking photos. Melody and I wandered from display to display, pretending to critique the collection while eavesdropping on half the room.
I scan the crowd, looking for Dominic despite myself. A man of his size is easy to spot, and I do immediately.
He’s standing near one of the massive display screens… with her. The woman from his house.
Something in my chest squeezes. She’s wearing a tight red gown tonight, and she’s touching his arm while she talks. Not much, just that casual, intimate press of fingertips, the kind you only do to a man you’ve known in ways I’d rather not picture .
She laughs lightly at something he says, but Dom isn’t laughing. He’s wearing that polite, tight-lipped smile he uses when he’s being civil. And I hate to admit it, but they make sense together.
Her posture matches his perfectly. So does her beauty. My stomach twists sharply. She’s smiling up at him like he’s the only man in the room. Something stings behind my ribs, hot and acidic.