Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Leon
I told Erika I love her last night, and she said it back.
She loves me.
What a rush.
What the hell have we been doing all this time?
Now I know what it’s like to have her in my bed, I want every night, every day, and every hour in between with her tucked in next to me.
It was what I’ve always dreamed about.
Her little blissful sighs and soft snores as she slept soundly in my arms settled something deep in my soul.
Waking up with my hand on her breast was something I never expected. I never thought it would happen. Not in this lifetime. Or any other.
When I jumped out of the shower this morning, I worried that it had all been a dream and that I had fabricated our entire conversation last night.
To my relief, as I stepped into my bedroom, I could hear Erika talking to her mom on speakerphone down the hall, reassuring her that she was feeling great today.
Better than great, she’s happier than a sunflower in full bloom. Her words, not mine. Erika never mentioned why she felt that way to her mom, but I know it’s because of me, us. I didn’t hear the rest of their conversation because she skipped down the stairs and out of earshot.
She’s as giddy as I feel.
And I’m horny. Hornier than a two-dicked alien like the one Erika said she read about in a fantasy romance book.
Jerking off didn’t help me. The cold shower didn’t either.
Now that I’ve felt how warm and soft her skin is, how perfect her tits feel in my hands, and how her ass shapes perfectly against my hips, all I keep thinking about is taking her from behind and filling her pussy with my cock.
She was so turned on earlier, I could smell how wet she was for me, confirming she wants me as much as I want her.
And yet, I’m worried, when I never get anxious around women. However, with Erika, I want everything to be right. I don’t want to rush things and screw everything up. She’s too important to me.
We’re taking things slowly.
I was clearly delirious when I suggested it, however, I know it’s the right thing to do.
Now fully dressed, I dash down the stairs, my skin tingling with excitement at having Erika in my house for yet another morning. Maybe I should just ask her to move in with me and go all in on the being-together-and-dating thing.
That’s not taking it slow, Leon.
Shit, yeah, that’s stupid of me.
For years, I’ve imagined her waking up in my arms, having breakfast together, swimming naked in the pool, spending lazy Sunday mornings making love, laughing over dinner with friends, and now I know she feels the same way about me; it almost feels surreal.
Now I want all of those things with her more than ever.
I step into the kitchen, and the happy feelings in my body disappear in an instant, causing all the blood to drain into my feet as my eyes land on someone I haven’t seen in a very long time, and she’s standing next to Erika, who is the love of my fucking life.
“Sage dropped by,” Erika announces, nodding in her direction, her voice deadpan and void of emotion. “Sutton is already in the conference room; she let Sage in.” There’s bite to that comment. “You two used to… you know… apparently.” Fuck. That’s all we did.
But I haven’t even thought about Sage since she left Edmonton. Not once. Or heard from her, and it was presumptuous of her to show up unannounced.
Fuck my life.
After today, my team won’t be allowed to let themselves in, or anyone else, for that matter. Not now that Erika is in my life fully.
“Hey, Leon.” Sage gives me a flirty finger wave.
“Hi.” My temples begin to pound.
“Sage is just back from Australia. She’s been coaching tennis down under.” Erika gives me a hard stare over the rim of the mug she’s drinking out of.
I haven’t seen her in what, over two years?
Sage hops off the barstool and walks toward me. “Miss me?”
No. “Eh…” I can’t explain what makes me hesitate, but I do.
Maybe it’s nerves or the anxiety I feel clawing at my skin that’s causing me to forget how to form words or maybe it’s the fact that my no-strings-attached hookup from way back is standing in my kitchen next to the woman I want to marry but who might just decide to tell me to go fuck myself and die a painful death because my past is too painful to come face to face with.
I wouldn’t blame her if she did, but I will not let that happen, not now that we’ve come this far.
“I didn’t miss you, Sage,” I finally admit.
Sage pushes up on her tiptoes to kiss me, but I stop her in her tracks, stepping backward.
“Don’t,” I warn. What the fuck is she doing?
“Still not into kissing on the lips, then?” Sage asks, sounding amused, fluttering her blue eyes at me and flicking her blonde hair over her shoulder.
“No.” I stiffen when Sage taps her hand against my chest, which makes my skin crawl. “And stop touching me.” I bat her away, stepping out of Sage’s clutches.
“Since when do you not kiss on the lips?” My head snaps to the side when Erika blurts that out, looking perplexed, the little valley between her eyes deep with confusion.
Sage chuckles and looks up at me, rolling her eyes. “It’s too intimate, apparently.”
Please shut the fuck up, Sage.
“What are you doing here?” I blurt out. Of all the times, why did she show up today, now, when Erika is here, and we finally agreed to date? What did I do to deserve this living hell? I hate that my past is haunting me like the ghost of bad choices.
“I’m back for a week to see my family, then I’m off to England to coach, so I thought I would drop in, you know, catch up,” she says, sounding hopeful. She means to fuck, but hell no.
“I’m leaving in ten minutes,” I check the wall clock, not entertaining her advances. “And you need to leave right now.”
“I can come back tomorrow.” Sage is persistent, I’ll give her that.
Erika jumps in and says, “We’re going on vacation.”
Sage slaps her forehead with her palm. “Oh, shit, I’m sorry. Did I interrupt something?” She then waggles her finger between the two of us. “God, I feel like such an idiot. Are you two together?”
“Yes,” Erika replies with such fierce confidence that it makes me want to run over to her and kiss her breathless.
Sage laughs and then drops a truth bomb that makes me feel uncomfortable. “Well, I never thought I’d see the day Leon Hill would finally settle down.” She shakes her head and tuts.
Neither did I, because I thought the person I wanted didn’t want me.
Erika jumps in, blowing all my brain cells into tiny fragments.
“Until we admitted how we felt about one another, I never thought he’d settle down either, Sage.
” She sets her mug down on the kitchen island and walks over to me, over exaggerating a hip wiggle, pulling at the bottom of my T-shirt as if trying to cover herself up, which she shouldn’t. I love her endless legs.
She looks me dead in the eye with a smirk playing across her mouth. “But it turns out that all he needed was the love of a good woman. Isn’t that right, baby?” she coos, sounding seductive.
What is she doing?
Next, she lifts her hand to my face and plants a soft kiss to my lips, then another, and I almost come in my boxers.
She’s kissing me. In front of someone. This is real and happening.
I grab Erika, loop my arm around her waist, and hold her against me, not caring that we have an audience, and kiss her back slowly at first before pushing my tongue into her mouth, and it’s like a bomb going off in my brain as our tongues touch again.
Every cell, nerve, and neural pathway opens up, expands, in what feels like yet another life-altering moment.
The room feels like it’s spinning, my mind doing the same.
“Wow, well, that’s all the proof I needed. I guess I should go.” Sage’s faint chuckle fades away, and the next thing I hear is the front door closing, signaling she’s gone.
Erika pulls away, all dopey-eyed, swollen-lipped, and breathless. “Well, that got rid of her. You’re welcome.”
Please don’t stop kissing me. I want more.
I’m fucking panting like a dog in heat on a summer’s day.
“I didn’t want Sage here. I played dirty to get my own way,” she says between our deep, erotic kisses.
I’m dumbfounded by how bold she was in front of Sage. “I like it when you play dirty.” I brush my lips against her mouth before pulling back and stare into her eyes that read mine: we can’t believe this is actually happening.
Her brows furrow. “You don’t kiss on the lips?” She seems confused by that.
“I don’t.”
Shock makes Erika inhale a breath. “But you kiss me. I’ve lost count of how many times.”
“Six times.” I’m keeping score. I grin at her and move closer, desperate to feel her lips on mine again. “I don’t kiss hookups. I’ve only ever kissed two women since I was drafted to the NHL.”
“Gigi and me?” she guesses.
After kissing two girls in high school that I never felt anything for, I vowed not to kiss anyone unless they were important to me. Gigi and I dated for a good while; if I hadn’t kissed her, it would have been weird. Ultimately, I did it just to please her.
“I kissed Gigi, yes, but it never felt like it does with you.”
I give her space to let her think about that.
“Why?” She steps out of my arms, and I miss her instantly. “Why do you not kiss?”
“Kissing for me is about vulnerability. Trust and a way of expressing affection. Long, sinful kisses, soft pecks, slow ones, touching tongues, that’s a level of intimacy and physical closeness that has so much passion and power.
That’s why I don’t kiss just anyone.” I plan on kissing Erika and only her for the rest of my life.
“But…” She struggles to make sense of my admission, as if her thought is stuck like a broken record. “So, you really are telling the truth about liking me for all these years?”
I nod slowly. “I promise never to hide anything from you again. I’m in love with you, Erika.
” It’s all laid bare for her to hear. “The first time I kissed you, it was like the world tipped on its axis.
It meant something to me. The planets shifted, the sun shone brighter, hell knows what happened, but it touched me in ways I never fully understood at the time.
“Then there was Gigi, but there was no spark. Still, I gave us a shot even though I wasn’t one hundred percent sure she was who I wanted to be with, and that’s what ultimately made us split up.
She knew I wasn’t in love with her. All the other girls I slept with were just a means to get off, but you, you were everything.
You are my everything.” I pull her into my arms again and squeeze her tight.
“I’m sorry if some of that is hard to hear. ”
“It’s fine. I like your honesty.” She plays with the top button on my Henley. “It’s refreshing, and I like how much we are opening up to each other.” Her fingertip moves to her mouth and traces her bottom lip as if recalling my mouth on hers.
She surprises me when she says, “Our kisses don’t feel the same as when we were younger.”
“No?” Worry clouds the clear water I thought we were in now.
“They feel better.”
And I feel about ten feet tall. “Yeah?”
Her eyes well with emotion. “Yes, Leon. If you want to label us, then I know what to call ourselves.”
“Tell me,” I urge, desperate to find out.
“We’re dating.”
“Are we now?” I smirk against her lips.
“Yes, Leon. We’re a couple.”
“Fuck, I love the way that sounds.”
“I do too. We’re official.”
She’s officially mine.