CHAPTER 29 Archer Bradley
Flippers
Our coffees are long empty by the time we wrap up work for the day, and I’ve sent an email off with details to my lawyer, agent, and publicist.
It’s perfect.
She is perfect.
We have a foundation name: The ARCH Initiative: Athletes for Responsible CHoices. We have a campaign name: Game Plan. We have a slogan: Train hard. Game smart. Choose responsibly.
It only took one afternoon for me to wonder if there is some way I can ask her to partner with me on this thing. She could quit her bartending job and spearhead this foundation.
Fuck, I know I’m getting ahead of myself. But I haven’t felt this sort of excitement over something in a long time, and it’s all because of her.
It makes it feel like together, we can do anything. It’s us against the world.
As I was drafting my email, I glanced over and saw her concentrating on her phone, and for the first time, it hit me why it bothers me so much.
It’s partly because she exists in a world I’m not a part of, but so much more of it is when I see the crease in her brows or the frown on her lips as she studies whatever metrics she’s looking at.
Traveling makes her happy. She was in her element as she threw out amazing idea after amazing idea. I think she even likes taking photos and editing them, crafting captions, and talking about the highlights of this resort—or whatever other resort she’s trying to sell her viewers on.
But the engagement? That brings her down, and that’s the thing that she thinks is most tied to her worth. I don’t care so much that she’s always on her device. It’s her job, and I’m working hard to understand that.
I saw her eyes light up as I told her how impressive her ideas were. I saw the way her hunched shoulders stood a little straighter. I saw her transform before my eyes.
Social media pulls her under.
She’s bright and sparkling when it’s just the two of us, but it dulls the moment she checks how many comments her post from this morning got or how many views her story is at.
And somehow it feels like it’s my job to help her see that. To help her stay sparkling all the time. Her worth is so much more than those goddamn numbers, and maybe she couldn’t find an open table on her first night here and plopped down at mine because I was sent here to save her.
Christ. I’m not sure where these intrusive thoughts are coming from, but this doesn’t feel like me. I haven’t even known this woman for two weeks, but given the amount of time we’ve spent together, it feels like I know her better than I knew Tatum.
And it feels like in a lot of ways, she’s starting to know me better than I’ve ever allowed anyone to see. Including Tatum.
“Let’s go have some fun,” I suggest.
She glances up at me. “Doing what?”
“Get your swimsuit on. I’m taking you on an adventure.”
She narrows her eyes at me, but she relents. A half hour later, I swing by her room to pick her up for our afternoon date.
She’s in that red bikini with white polka dots again, and it takes every ounce of my willpower not to strip her naked and throw her on the bed.
I mean…I said I wanted to have some fun. That would count.
But I have a different idea.
We head down to one of the outdoor excursion desks after she grabs her waterproof lanyard that’s already holding her phone.
“How can I help you?” the man behind the counter asks.
“We’d like to rent some snorkel gear,” I say.
Millie snorts beside me. “Snorkel gear?”
“I thought you wanted to snorkel.”
“No, I told you to go snorkel, remember? The idea of fish brushing against my legs is…” She shivers and pulls a face.
I laugh. “The lagoon here is supposed to be incredible. Brightly colored schools of fish and your chance to explore the coral reefs,” I say, reading off the brochure counter mat with the information for this particular excursion.
She grits her teeth together as she glares at me.
“Come on,” I goad. “It’ll be fun. And then you can pick what we do next.”
“What’s the one thing you most don’t want to do?” she asks.
I laugh. “Like I’d really confess that to you.”
“It’s the vertical slide drop, isn’t it?”
It’s my turn to pull a face. I’ve heard that if you don’t cross your legs on that slide, there’s a situation where the water pressure goes straight up your ass. “I don’t need an enema today, thank you very much.”
The dude behind the counter laughs at my assessment.
“Then cross your legs, you goose,” she teases.
“Goose?” I ask, and I goose her by pinching her ass. “That’s what goose means to me.”
She jumps, startled, and she laughs. “Oh, it’s on now, Bradley.”
I turn to the guy at the desk. “See what I have to deal with?”
He chuckles and hands over the gear with instructions on where to go, and we take off in that direction. A few yards away from the water is a little station to get our gear on, so we leave our slides there and pull on our flippers and masks.
I can honestly say that I’ve never found swim masks attractive, but Millie Monroe in a mask is somehow still sexy.
She pulls her lanyard off and hands it over to me. “Can you take a picture of me ready to snorkel?”
“Only if you promise to text it to me after so I can beat one out while I stare at it.”
She gasps. “Archer Bradley!”
“What? Can’t a guy flirt a little?”
She rolls her eyes. “I mean, sure, but you’d have to actually give me your number first.”
I laugh and snap the photo. “Remind me when we get back up.”
“Like you’ll answer even when it’s me calling,” she mutters.
See? She knows me already.
“You’re right. Don’t call. Text, and I’ll get back to you when I can.”
“You’re so annoying.”
“Back at you.” I poke her in the ass one more time for good measure. “Goose! Race you to the water!”
I take off in my flippers, which isn’t exactly easy, but I happen to have athleticism on my side. Once I hit the water, I turn around and see that she’s still standing by the snorkel preparation station.
I walk back over toward her.
She’s glowering at me. “You do realize that I can barely walk with shoes on and keep my balance, right? And you expect me to run through sand on these godforsaken flippers to beat a pro-fucking-athlete to the water?”
“My deepest apologies.” I can’t help but laugh as I say the words, and then I scoop her up into my arms and jog us both back to the water.
“God, I hate you,” she mutters.
I lean down to press a kiss to her lips—no easy feat considering we both have masks on that come down below our noses.
I take the opportunity to wade into the water with her still in my arms, and then I toss her into the water.
She screeches as she goes under the cold ocean water, and when she gets back up, she’s glaring behind her mask as I laugh.
She rushes toward me and plows into me, knocking me down into the water.
I grab onto her so we’re in much the same position as we were in the pool yesterday when I fucked her, and I’m tempted to do that now, too.
The only reason I don’t is because we’re right next to the snorkeling lagoon, and there are probably other people down there wearing masks who will see something they can’t unsee.
So I keep it in my pants. For now.
“Come on,” I say with a smile, and I grab her hand. We both put our snorkels into place and swim out toward the lagoon, and I stop when I see some coral to explore. I swim down a little closer to it, and she’s right beside me.
I’m about to swim over toward some fish I see when she thrashes in the water, and her flipper connects directly with…yep, that’s my nuts.
A shot of pain lances through me at the connection. She didn’t kick hard, but she was thrashing, and that sickly feeling like I’m going to vomit rises up from the spot of the attack.
This is the part where if I wasn’t underwater, I’d be doubled over in pain.
I can’t even really draw in a deep breath since I’m underwater, so I float up to the surface and spit my snorkel out. I pull my mask off so I can take a deep breath in through my nose and blow it out.
She bobs up to the surface a second later. “Oh my God, I am so sorry! Are you okay? Do you need me to rub it?”
“No,” I grunt. “I just need a second.” The pain is already starting to pass, and I take a few more deep breaths in. Once I regain my composure, I look her square in the eyes. “Yeah, I’ll definitely need you to rub it later. With your tongue.”
I pull my mask back on and shove the snorkel back in my mouth, diving back under the water before she can respond.
I can’t help a little laugh to myself as I realize despite the shot to the nuts, I haven’t had this much fun since…
I’m not even sure I can pin a date on that.
Since before Tatum and I started drifting, I guess.
But even back then, there was always this sense that I was with her out of convenience and obligation rather than out of actual want.
I love her, don’t get me wrong. I will always love her. But she’s the one who chased me down.
When we were in college and it looked more and more like I’d get the opportunity to play professionally, she was my safe haven, someone who loved me for me rather than the fact that I might go pro. She was the easy choice because she knew me. She understood me.
Sometimes we think we’re in a situation where we’re with the right person, but that doesn’t mean they’re the right person forever…just for now.
Maybe that’s why this thing with Millie feels so easy. There’s no pressure of what the future might hold for us since we’ve already agreed to the end date.
But as each day that passes brings us closer to that end date, the sense of dread that this is all going to be swallowed up by the past seems to bear down more and more.
I thought I’d be ready to get the hell out of here after a month, that I’d be ready to get back to training so once my suspension was over, I could get back out on the field and back to doing what I love most in this whole world.
Now…I’m not so sure anymore.