12. Chapter 11
Josie
"So, did the Bears pay for this too?"
I slide into Declan's Range Rover and immediately feel underdressed for it. The seats are soft leather, and everything's blacked out and gleaming, the dashboard a constellation of soft lights.
It smells like Declan's cologne, too, which is surprisingly comforting tonight.
Call me when you've grown up a bit.
"It came with the mansion. So yeah, technically the Bears paid for it."
"Of course they did." I exhale, ignoring that rattle of my mother's voice still circling my head.
I try to focus on the drive instead, watching as the Rover hums along the coastal road, our windows cracked just enough that the salt air sneaks in and tangles through my hair.
The town blurs past in streaks of neon lights, with Breakers shrinking behind us and the boardwalk lights fading.
Declan's hand rests on the gearshift, big and rough and warm, close enough that I could reach over and lace my fingers through his.
I don't.
But I think about it. God, I think about it.
I don't say much. I can't. My mother's voice is still rattling around in my skull like a coin in an empty jar, and every time I try to shake it loose, it just clatters louder.
Your father filled your head with so much nonsense.
I stare at him across the dim cabin of his stupidly expensive SUV, and I swear the man is carved from stone. He doesn't rattle. He never seems to second-guess himself.
How does he do that? How does he just... exist without a worry?
Is his life really that perfect?
The quiet stretches as we drive further down the darkening road. And my brain, desperate for anything other than the echo of that cruel voice, latches onto the first thought that'll shut my mother up for sure.
His mouth. The way he'd groaned.
His cock.
My body heats, remembering how it felt to take him in my mouth for the first time. That heavy weight on my tongue, his fingers twisting in my hair, the shock of how much I wanted it.
I'd never made a man lose control like that.
"Nearly there," Declan says, his deep voice catching my thoughts off guard.
The mansion appears at the end of the gated drive like something out of a glossy real estate ad, the big cream stone walls reflecting the moon as we approach. He pulls into the circular drive, next to Beck's primer-spotted Bronco and Mason's sleek Audi.
"Wait," I say as he looks across at me. "Are your brothers—"
"Still at the bar. Beck was challenging Finn to a drinking contest when we left, so they'll be a while." He kills the engine. "Diego is there too. He texted me a photo of himself doing a tequila shot off Mack's bar with the caption don't wait up, mama's celebrating."
A laugh bursts out of me. "So we're—"
"Alone." His blue eyes find mine in the dark, and my stomach flips. "We've got hours."
Hours. Alone. In this house.
My pussy clenches like it's been waiting all night for permission.
I follow him to the front door, and he taps the smart lock, the huge wooden doors swinging open into a foyer drenched in moonlight. The whole house is hushed, and the endless windows frame the ocean like the most expensive painting I've ever seen.
Then I hear a soft scuffle of nails on hardwood, and then—
"Oh my God." Biscuit comes trotting around the corner, tail wagging, looking deeply unimpressed at being woken. I crouch down and scratch behind his ears. "Hi, baby."
"Oh yes," Declan murmurs, watching me. "There's the man of the house."
"You said you didn't want him."
"I don't."
He scratches the dog behind the ears anyway, and Biscuit melts into a puddle of devotion at his feet.
"You could have fooled me," I say, giving him a raised brow. "Looks like he's growing on you. You're actually being nice to this little cutie."
As if on cue, Biscuit flops dramatically onto his back, all four paws in the air, exposing his belly to Declan with adorable puppy eyes. His tail thumps hopefully against the hardwood.
"Growing on me like a fungus," Declan grunts, snapping his fingers so Biscuit stands back up.
"You're a terrible liar."
"Go on, buddy." He nudges Biscuit gently back down the hall. "Go to bed. The grown-ups are talking."
He leads me into a living room that makes the foyer look modest.
"You want a drink?" Declan asks, already moving toward the kitchen before I can deflect.
"God, yes."
"Don't get too excited. The options are limited."
He trudges towards the kitchen, and I watch his perfectly toned backside all the way. Yum.
"Alright," he calls out. "Your choices are as follows. We've got Beck's pre-workout, which tastes like blue raspberry. We've got Mason's celery juice, which I wouldn't feed to my worst enemy. And we've got approximately nine hundred Gatorades in a color I can only describe as radioactive."
"Wow. Living the glamorous athlete lifestyle, I see." A real laugh slips out of me. "Maybe some water will do?"
"Smart girl. Oh, wait." I hear some more rustling and the clink of a glass. "Give me a second."
I hear him moving around, and sink onto the couch. It's the kind of couch you fall into and never want to climb out of. I tuck my legs up under me, still wearing his jersey, and let my eyes drift back to the view.
A few minutes later he crosses the room carrying two tall glasses, condensation already beading down the sides.
He hands me one, and I blink down at it.
It's pale and golden, fizzing gently, with a wedge of fresh lemon perched on the rim and a few cubes of ice clinking inside. The smell of citrus hits me, and something else bittersweet and clean.
"Lemon, lime and bitters," he says, dropping onto the couch beside me, close enough that his thigh presses warm against my knee. "No alcohol. Figured we'd both had enough tonight."
I take a sip, and it's perfect.
"This is exactly what I needed." I lower the glass, genuinely stunned. "Thank you."
"Anytime." He grins and takes a sip of his own drink. "Diego trained me, actually. Apparently serving someone a drink without a garnish is, and I quote, 'an act of violence.'" He shrugs those massive shoulders. "Hence the lemon wedge."
"Diego's a gift."
"Diego's a thirty-one-year-old gay man who knows where I sleep." He chuckles a sound so deep, my skin prickles. God, even his laugh is sexy. "But yeah. He's a gift."
We settle into the quiet for a moment, both of us looking out at the water. The waves hush against the shore beyond the deck, steady and forever endless. The whole house feels suspended in this golden-blue glow, like the rest of the world packed up and left, and it's just us.
"It's beautiful here," I say softly. "At night. With all the lights."
"Yeah." He doesn't look at the view. He looks at me. "It is."
My cheeks warm. I take another sip of my drink to cover it.
"You know," he says, settling deeper into the couch, his arm stretching along the back of it behind me. "Last time you were here, we ended up out there."
He nods toward the deck through the glass.
"I remember." Heat blooms low in my belly. "It's hard to forget a kiss like that."
"Wanted to do something different this time." His blue eyes track over my face, slow and unhurried. "Get you somewhere more comfortable."
"Comfortable, huh." I arch a brow. "That your move? Soft couch, fancy drink, killer view?"
"It's working, isn't it?"
It is. God help me, it absolutely is.
But underneath the banter, I can feel the way he keeps watching me. Not undressing me, though there's plenty of that simmering between us.
No.
He's watching me the way he did on the beach an hour ago. Like he's reading everything I'm not saying out loud.
"So," he says, quieter now. "You gonna tell me what that was, back there?"
And there it is.
"Back where?"
"On the beach. And in the stands when we scored that first goal." His voice stays gentle, but it doesn't waver. "Tonight was the biggest night this franchise has ever had, and you spent it standing alone in the dark looking like somebody died."
I look down at the lemon wedge floating in my glass.
Somebody did die. And my life hasn't been the same since.
I feel him watching me. That patient, steady way he has.
But here's the thing… if I tell him, he's going to look at me the way everyone eventually looks at me. With that condescending, pitying tilt of the head.
Poor Josie. So much baggage. Such a sad little girl with daddy issues and a chip on her shoulder.
And then whatever this is, this electric, impossible thing between us, it'll curdle into something sympathetic.
And I would rather die than be an object of his pity.
"It's nothing," I say.
"Josie."
"It's stupid."
"Well lucky for you, I live with Beck Morrison. So I've got a high tolerance for stupid." He shifts to face me, and his knee brushes mine. "Talk to me."
I let out a long sigh, resigning myself to this moment I've created for myself.
"My mom called," I hear myself say. "At the game tonight. Right in the middle of the second period."
Goddammit, Josie.
But once I start, I can't stop.
"Rose answered it by accident. We were taking selfies, and her thumb just hit the button, and then my mom heard the crowd." I shake my head. "And she figured out exactly where I was."
"And that's a bad thing?"
"She doesn't know I work for the Bears, Declan." I let out a hollow little laugh. "She doesn't know I work in sports. At all."
There. It's out.
The pathetic, humiliating truth. A grown woman who can't tell her own mother what she does for a living.
"My whole life, it was the same thing. Why can't you be more like your sisters, Josie.
Why do you have to be so different." I do the voice.
That clipped, disappointed tone carved into my bones since childhood.
"And my sisters did everything right. Married.
Kids. Big fancy houses. Book clubs and Facebook posts with exactly the right number of exclamation points. "
I take a long drink.
Declan just sits there, listening as he shakes his head.
"Jesus, Josie."