Lance
twenty-seven
Present
Cold water rains down on me as I rinse off in the shower. I’m normally a hot water guy, but if I plan on making it the entire night without touching my dick while Gwen is in bed beside me, I need to freeze the fucker off.
Today was the hardest day of my life. Pun intended. I’ve been reminded what it’s like to be a raging hormonal teenager again. Every little thing Gwen does turns me on.
I watch her eat; I’m hard. I hear her laugh; I’m hard. I smell her perfume; I’m hard.
My balls have never been so blue.
I knew it was going to be a task being around her all the time, but living with her might be torture. I’m going to have to implement another plan that will keep me and the tool in my pants too tired to get up.
Twenty laps in the pool before breakfast?
That will work.
Plan in place, I turn off the water and dry off. As quickly as I can, I rub on lotion, brush my teeth, and slip on a pair of boxers and a pair of gym shorts. I usually sleep in only boxers, but I don’t think that will fly with Gwen. But I’ll be damned if I wear a shirt; I’ll sweat myself to death.
Once I’m done, I exit the bathroom to find Gwen standing beside the bed, with her hands on her hips, looking cute as hell in a pair of pink and white striped pajama shorts and a matching tank top.
The horny bastard in my shorts stirs.
Forty laps.
Her long, curly hair is piled high on top of her head in a thick bun, and my fingers twitch to let it loose. All that hair has got to feel heavy by the end of the day, and I want her to feel good and relaxed.
A strangled sigh draws my attention. Gwen’s shoulders are by her ears, wrought with tension from worry as she looks down at the bed and mumbles something too low and unintelligible for me to understand.
If I had to guess what she said, it’s probably that I’m an asshole for making her sleep in my room and in my bed. It was definitely a dick move on my part, but I didn’t see any other way around it. Not if I want my plan to work.
And to get the girl, a guy’s gotta do what a guy’s gotta do.
Don’t judge me.
It’s not as though Gwen doesn’t like me. She’s just a little pissed. I can work with that.
“Are you going to keep staring at it or get in?” I ask.
Gwen jumps and spins around to face me. Her eyes are comically wide with fear and worry. “Geez, you scared me.”
“Sorry.” I chuckle.
Her eyes shift between me and the bed as she traps her bottom lip between her teeth, gnawing on the poor piece of flesh. I close the distance between us and, with my thumb, I pry her lip free.
“Relax. We’ve shared a bed before.”
“That was different. You didn’t ask me to stay the night; we just passed out after . . . you know.” She circles her finger in the air for emphasis, and it might as well be a damn magic wand helping her cast a spell on me and my dick.
Behind my boxers, my cock perks up.
“Oh, I know.” My voice drops unexpectedly low as I’m reminded of all the ways I had her in my bed that night.
“Nope. None of that.” She pokes my chest with her finger, and it doesn’t help the situation below my waist stirring to life.
“Watch it, little witch,” I warn, grabbing her finger.
Her touch alone drives me crazy with lust.
I watch her aqua eyes darken from blue to a deeper shade of green as she swipes her tongue across the seam of her lips. As much as I want to wrap my arms around Gwen and kiss the hell out of her, now isn’t the time.
She has some things to work through before we go down that road. Because the next time I kiss Gwen, I won’t stop.
“Time for bed.” I press a soft kiss to her forehead and spin her around. “Which side do you want?”
She looks up at me over her shoulder. “It’s your bed, so you chose.”
“I sleep in a hotel bed half the year, so it doesn’t matter to me.”
“True.” The sound of Gwen’s giggle sends my heart jumping.
“In you go.” I lift the duvet, and without a fight, she slides under the covers to the far side of the mattress and rolls onto her side, facing me. I switch off the light and slip into bed, facing her. A gap of space separates us as we stare at one another.
“Is it weird?” she whispers.
“Is what weird?”
“Sleeping in different hotels all the time?”
I can’t help but chuckle. No one has ever asked me that before. “It used to be. But now I have a … routine to help me settle in.”
Even in the dark, I can see her smile at my answer. She had the same smart-ass smirk on her face during dinner when she asked me about the television again.
If she only knew.
“Routine? You mean superstitions. Typical baseball player,” she says with a teasing scoff.
I shrug. “I’m not as bad as some of my teammates.”
“What’s your little superstition then?”
I bite back a laugh at her emphasis on little.
It’s not that I’m embarrassed about so-called superstitions and other rituals, but I’ve also never said them out loud. All of us guys keep that type of stuff to ourselves.
“I promise I won’t tell a soul,” she says, eyes pleading.
There’s not a single cell in me that doesn’t trust her. Gut instinct, I guess, but from the moment I met her, I knew she would never share something I told her.
“I bring my own pillow. I can’t sleep with my face on scratchy cotton,” I admit.
“That’s smart, actually. All hotels, even nice ones, have scratchy, unscented bedding. It’s kind of bizarre how they have no smell. How do we know for sure they got washed if you can’t smell laundry soap?”
She gets it.
I grin. “Exactly.”
“What else do you do?” She slips her clasped hands under her cheek, looking like sweetness and innocence personified.
“Nope. Your turn.”
“What do you want to know?” she asks.
We’ve never spoken about the morning after. Her disappearance. I can’t ignore it anymore. Especially not after the little comment she made before we got into bed.
We didn’t just pass out in bed.
“Why did you leave?” Her breath hitches at my question as my pounding heart beats against my chest like a bass drum. Her curious eyes search mine for answers. I tuck a fallen curl behind her ear. “You have to know I didn’t want you to go.”
“You didn’t?”
I shake my head. “Hell no. I thought I was pretty clear I wasn’t done with you.”
“I didn’t want to go. I had to.”
Her confession changes everything and nothing all at once.