24. Chapter 21
Mari
“ T here she is!” one of the older guys, Wazza, called out when I walked through the gym doors.
I’d taken half an hour in the bath. Half an hour was all I’d allowed myself to think on the events of last night that still had my legs shaky and my mind hazy.
Chance’s lips trailed down my neck, across my collarbone, all the way to my fingertips.
With his teeth pressing slightly against the delicate skin on my fingers, he murmured, “God, Mari, you taste every bit of incredible I’d imagined you to.”
I groaned .
The strain contained in his jeans brushed briefly up against my spread legs.
I subtly spread them wider, using my fingertips in between his teeth to bring his mouth to mine.
His hand cupped my neck, tilting my head back as my lips parted for him.
His tongue swept through as I willingly, so eagerly, flavoured the taste of him.
Clearly half an hour was not enough.
The gym was buzzing with people, some hungover, some utterly wrecked, but everyone with huge grins on their faces.
“How you going, Wazza?” I bumped him as I passed him to go dump my bag in the office.
“Absolutely fantastic after that banger of a party you threw last night!” He beamed.
I nodded my thanks and continued on my path to quiet.
Where I can process the sex scenes of last night currently playing on loop in my mind.
I shut the door behind me and dumped my bag beside my desk, not bothering to hide the loud thunk it made.
Blinds closed, lights off, I slumped on the coffee-stained couch in-between mine and Chance’s desks. Resting the crook of my elbow over my eyes, I let out a hot, traitorous breath. Every part of me felt tingly, glittering with warmth.
Chance had awoken something inside of me, a part of me that had predominantly lain dormant. He’d awoken it to a hot, oozing fire that had me wanting to jump his bones—
Pull yourself together, horn-dog.
I breathed slowly, deeply, trying to settle the spike in desire that somehow hadn’t been fulfilled by last night’s activities. I just wanted more . Each breath brought a new memory back.
Inhale.
Chance’s tongue traced intricate patterns up the lines between the muscles of my inner thighs.
Exhale.
He nipped lightly, almost teasingly at the skin beside my wine-red G-string, as if teasing himself with the proximity of what sat so close, so slick and eager.
Inhale.
A skittering electric sensation filled my nerves in anticipation at the slowness of his goddamn teeth as they removed the delicate fabric.
Exhale.
Nothing could have ever warned me—ever prepared me for the other-worldly sensation of Chance Riordan devouring me as if I were his own personal feast.
The door opening dumped cold water all over me. I could practically feel steam coming off me when the man himself entered the room, all six-feet-three-inches of sex-on-legs.
He looked at me; a burning gaze that I was sure was actually about to set the office on fire.
Two lines formed between his eyebrows as a mask slid over his face.
A perfect facade of boredom and indifference, as if I was nothing but some shit he’d accidentally stepped on.
He held eye contact with me, those blue eyes as hot as the centre of a flame, as he dropped his duffel bag on his desk before he turned and strode out.
The hell?
“Five minutes! Wrap your hands. No excuse to miss warm-ups!” The authority in Chance’s voice, sexy as it was, had me up and out of the office. I grabbed a set of my favourite blue wraps from the shelf, not missing the way my brain instantly recognised them as the same colour as Chance’s eyes.
The gym had almost silenced itself at Chance’s sudden reveal of his bad mood. A few people were muttering, talking quietly and avoiding looking anywhere near where he stood. I tucked one wrap in my bra as I unfurled the other. A few guys—JJ, Franko, Jonesy—had already started shadowboxing.
I tried to catch Chance’s eyes as he watched them warm up. Dread found a new home and pitted itself in the bottom of my stomach.
Does he regret last night?
More and more questions and imaginary scenarios were spinning around my head in a whirlwind by the time I finished wrapping my first hand. I hadn’t taken my eyes off Chance. My fingers tingled slightly, telling me I’d wrapped my hand too tightly.
“Two minutes!” he shouted, not taking his eyes off the now extended group of people shadowboxing. The increasing stiffness of his body, of those sculpted muscles, told me he knew I was watching him.
“Time’s up! Everybody on the wall!”
My jaw dropped. Two minutes my ass …
I fumbled with my last wrap to get it down, pulling it tighter than the last without thinking.
Thirty of us stood on the wall. The tension was palpable.
These were my people. I knew them so well I could feel their exhaustion, the alcohol their bodies were still processing.
“Shoes on. Run down to the Murray and back. For every thirty seconds you miss the time limit, it’s twenty burpees for the team.”
“What’s the time limit?” I asked, the apprehension now rippling like a wave through the group.
Chance clenched his jaw but still didn’t meet my eyes. “Ten minutes.”
You could hear the crickets. To get there and back in ten minutes would be hauling ass on nearly a full sprint.
“But that’s—” I started.
Chance’s eyes finally snapped to mine.
“For every word of bitchin’, the burpee tally starts,” he said coolly. None of that warmth from last night in his eyes. None of that tension-based mocking we’d been teasing each other with for the past few weeks. Nothing but pure ice.
I narrowed my eyes at him.
You wanna play, Riordan? I can play. Game on .
“Go,” he said, almost sounding bored.
With a shared mutter of curses, people scrambled to get their shoes on.
JJ ran past Chance, smacking his ass on the way through. Chance scowled, that annoyingly beautiful face scrunching.
“Fifty burpees on your tally, Jones!” he shouted.
“I look forward to it, Coach!” JJ saluted and caught up with Wazza to lead the group.
I found one of the quieter dads who trained with us and buddied up with him for the run of doom, knowing he would at least leave me to my own thoughts for the duration of it.
“Nine minutes, ten seconds, Trevino,” Chance interrupted, staring out at everyone leaving. Though, through that mask of stone and faux boredom, something was locked up tight beneath a swirling storm.
“The hell is your problem, Riordan?”
His eyes flickered down to mine for a beat, as if I was nothing but a goddamn fly buzzing by. “That’s ‘Coach’ to you, Trevino,” he growled. “Now get moving.”