Chapter 14 Maddox
MADDOX
Ionce played a college football game that went into six overtimes.
In high school I was a three-way player and most Friday nights I was on the field for every play of the game.
I’m a professional athlete who has his body slammed every Sunday by guys who don’t fuck around in a weight room.
So tell me why I’ve never been so tired as I am right now after working at a bakery for six hours.
“Here Gallagher, you earned it.”
I look over my shoulder to see Gabi—who looks tired, but not as tired as me—setting down a bottle of water and a bear claw. “I thought we sold out?”
“We did,” she says as she sits across the table from me with her own treat.
I notice she went with a jumbo brownie and her standard Coke Zero.
“I might’ve put one aside for you earlier when I realized that suddenly the bear claw was going to be making a comeback among the Gen Z and millennial clientele. ”
“You did?” I say, trying to keep it cool, even though inside I’m doing cartwheels. “Being your favorite customer is starting to pay off.”
She smiles as she uses a fork to cut off a piece of brownie. “I don’t know if you’re my favorite. Phyllis and Kitty are much more entertaining.”
Those are the words that came out of her heart-shaped lips, but the smile on her face is saying that I’m in fact her favorite. I’m claiming it as another win. “Have you ever had a day like this?”
She shakes her head and sits back in her chair. “Never. Not even the grand opening. And I thought that day was insane.”
Insane is an understatement. Normally, Gabi closes at five, and according to her, it’s usually so slow that she’s cleaned up and out of the door by five fifteen.
Tonight we had to stay open until six to serve all the customers in line, and that was after cutting off new guests at four-forty-five.
And even by that point, she was down to cupcakes, brownies, and a few cookies that made it through the day.
It was a sight to see. And I’m so damn happy for her.
“Well let me propose a toast.” I hold up my bottle of water, and she does the same with her can of Coke Zero. “To the first of many successful days at Sugar and Sweets.”
“Your mouth to God’s ears,” she says. “Thank you again. This… I don’t have words.”
“You’re welcome, but you never have to thank me,” I say. “I like to see good people—especially my friends—succeed. And if I can do anything to help make that happen, I make sure I do.”
“As easy as that?” she asks.
“Yeah. Easy as that,” I say. “There’s too much shit in the world and too many people bringing others down. So when I can lift something or someone up, or help someone out, I do it.”
She sits back, giving her head a little shake. “You’re something else.”
“In what way?”
“Oh let me count the ways,” she says as she sits back in her chair.
“You’re a twenty-four-year-old professional football player who eats bear claws.
You run a STEM program for kids and also take your free afternoons during a time when most football players are probably hibernating to work unpaid at a bakery. ”
“Whoa! I’m not getting paid!” I tease.
“Sorry. Should’ve told you that up front.”
“Can I work for baked goods?”
“Obviously.”
“Well then we’re just fine.”
We share a smile before she continues on.
“Then there’s your personal life. You’re insistent on being my friend even though I know you want more.
On the other hand you’ve been called the playboy of the Fury, have multiple videos of you singing karaoke on the internet, and were rumored to be dating a country star last year.
I’ve run the numbers and frankly, that math doesn’t math. ”
“Someone Googled me…” I add in a wink to go with my little tease. Also I don’t miss that she made mention about my feelings. I don’t know if it’s good or bad, but I’m going to go with the vibes that it was a good thing.
“It was a long plane ride home from Vegas,” she says, before a shocked look comes over her face. Oh I have a feeling she wasn’t supposed to say that quiet part out loud.
“Vegas?” I ask, suddenly very giddy about this new information. “You were reading about me on the way home from Vegas?”
Her face flushes into a color that rivals a cherry tomato. It’s cute as hell. “I might’ve… I was a little curious as to who you were.”
“Sure…” I tease as I lean in closer. “But the most important question, is were you wearing my clothes while you did it?”
My question was to push her a little more, or if anything she could give me one of her eye rolls that I secretly love. I wasn’t expecting her to bite her bottom lip. Or for her face to flush.
“Gabrielle…” I think it’s the first time in our short history that I’ve said her name first. It’s also the first time since we’ve been in Nashville that I feel the sexual tension this thick between us. And it's been thick. “Did you keep my clothes on when you flew back?”
She slowly nods. “I couldn’t take them off.”
“Do you still wear them?”
She nods, the blush coming back across her cheeks. “The T-shirt. To bed.”
I don’t mean to let out a groan, but I can’t keep it in.
The thought of Gabi wearing my T-shirt then—and now—has me fucking hard in an instant.
I know I told her to keep the clothes, but I figured because she was so adamant about giving them back that they were sitting in a drawer.
Never in my wildest dreams did I think she was wearing them regularly.
Great. Now I’m jealous of a piece of fabric.
“Maddox…”
“Gabrielle…”
Normally our little standoff comes when Gabi is trying to make a point. But this is different.
My name on her lips was breathy. A plea. She’s telling me to kiss her. Or to back away. I don’t know which. I don’t think she does either.
Fuck I want to. I want to take those lips and fuse them with mine.
I want to taste her sweet mouth. I want to hold her face in my hands and kiss her until neither of us can breathe.
I want to take her back to her place and have her put my T-shirt on only so I can take it back off—but not before I lick that sweet pussy while she wears it.
But I can’t. I won’t. She might want it, I for sure want it, but I want something more than that—I don’t want her to regret it when it’s over. She’s been adamant about being not ready to move on, and I need to respect that.
Which is why I’m going to pull away. I’m going to swallow my want—and tell my cock to calm the fuck down—and walk away.
And I’m going to hate every second of it.
I tap my forehead to hers and hold it there for the longest second of my life before I slowly pull away.
“I need to go grab my phone.” My voice cracks at my clear lie. "I left it in the back.”
She knows it’s a weak excuse, but she doesn’t call me on it. “Okay.”
That one word is barely a sad whisper as I start to walk away, my head hanging, before I hear Gabi call my name.
“Maddox?”
I turn back around before I push through the door to the kitchen. “Yeah?”
“Thank you.”
I slowly nod in acknowledgment, glad I made the right decision, but don’t say anything else as I walk back into the kitchen and immediately press my hands into one of the prep tables.
Fuck!
I want to scream it out but I don’t. I don’t want to freak her out more than she probably already is, and really, that shout would be at myself, not her.
Because what in the actual fuck was I thinking when I said that I could be friends with this woman?
What? Did I think because I was admitting that I still had feelings that I was beating the psychology of all of this?
I mean for fuck’s sake… the first thing I ever thought about her when she walked up on stage with me was that I loved her.
She’s still in my phone as “future wife.”
All I know is that I need to get a hold of myself.
Figure out how to either bide my time until she’s ready for the next step or navigate how to be around Gabi while respecting that we can only be friends.
All of this while also not dying from a combination of confusion, stupidity, heartbreak, and blue balls.
My head is down as I take a few deep breaths to try and calm myself down, when I hear the back door of the bakery open.
“Hello? Who’s here? Why are the fucking lights on?”
My guard immediately goes up when the sound of a booming male voice echoes off the walls.
As soon as he’s done screaming, I hear the back door slam shut.
I don’t say anything—you don’t tell the murderer where you’re at for him to come and get you—but my eyes are wide and my breathing picks up.
I want to warn Gabi that someone’s here, but I also don’t want to lead the would-be burglar and/or murderer straight to her.
So I do the next best thing I can think of—I look for a weapon to protect myself and the woman I’m mildly obsessed with.
I’m scrambling as the stranger keeps yelling out warnings for me to come out and show myself. Does he think I’m the intruder? He’s the one breaking in after hours, likely to either rob or murder me. Which is why I need something to protect myself with.
Yes. There it is. The biggest wooden dough roller I’ve ever seen in my life. I joked with Gabi earlier that she could knock someone out with this when she asked me to hand it to her. Little did I know I was foreshadowing the future.
I use both hands to pick it up by one of the ends, positioning it above my head so I’m ready to strike down whoever's about to come around the corner. I’m in a baseball stance, staring at the hallway when I see the figure slowly walking toward me.
“Maddox Gallagher? What the fuck are you doing here?”
It takes me a second to register who's looking at me. Because what the hell is one of the best golfers in the world doing walking into Gabi’s bakery?
“Beau Devereaux?”
I blink a few times, even though I know my eyes aren’t playing tricks on me. Because seriously, what the fuck is Beau doing at Gabi’s bakery?
Beau… Gabi’s brother is named Beau… what are the fucking odds…