Chapter 25
ANNIE – MID-OCTOBER
A Near Miss
As Tanner drives us home in his Lexus, I’m contemplating if should I have crossed the parking lot to speak with Auston. He was right there, looking at me, asking me, I think, to talk. Or was he simply surprised to see me, propping up Tanner as he near hobbled out of the Alamo stadium?
He didn’t know I was going to be there because he never asked. He’s here in San Antonio, but he didn’t reach out. He didn’t plan to see me.
No. I made the right call. If Auston wanted to make a genuine effort to connect with me, with his son, he could.
Simultaneously, I’m having another train of thought that has no business click-clacking through my brain… Tanner wears this car like a fine accessory.
Those thick thighs spread on leather, one of those big hands commanding the steering, looooong fingers flicking those paddle gears.
I wish my own body would listen when I tell it, we ain’t interested in sportsmen, hun.
I know it isn’t receiving the message because watching Tanner out there on the gridiron had me clenching my legs together more times than I could count.
And not because of a nasty tackle or two.
I’m on a speed train to smitten and that is not a destination where I can afford anything worth having.
“You okay, Annie Bannie?” Tanner asks, stealing me back from the ride of my life.
“Hmm?”
“You’re quiet over there.”
I’m thinking about that thigh between mine.
“You’re not beating yourself up about not going to Auston, are you? You don’t have to go running to him just because he—”
“I know,” I tell him. “I made the right call. I’m fine. Really.”
He slows as we approach his gate, which opens after scanning his registration plate. We park and I scoop my bag as he gingerly climbs out and limps inside.
Betty has left the nightlights on in the lounge but the house is quiet. She and Nelson must be in bed already.
“I’m going to give Nelson a kiss goodnight,” I tell Tanner. “I’ll be back. I can make us a nice hot drink.”
He opens his mouth, as if he has something to say. I wait but it never comes. Instead, he gives me a barely there curve of his lips and I feel his eyes on me as I head upstairs.
My baby looks so peaceful. I stroke his hair, press my lips to his temple, then quietly pad back out of the room.
Downstairs, Tanner is taking a cold compress from the refrigerator and trying to navigate it onto the side of his waist, grunting as he does.
“Here, let me,” I say, positioning it where he took a heavy hit in the game.
“Thank you,” he says, his voice gruff, thick with discomfort. “I’m going to take a soak. It’s my post-game ritual.”
“Alright, soldier.” My hands physically ache to touch him, to rub down his muscles, to stroke his hair.
So I interlace my fingers behind my back.
The arching out of my chest is accidental but I don’t miss the way Tanner’s gaze rakes over my breasts, or the heat his hooded eyes generate in my panties.
“Can I get you anything?” I ask.
His focus lifts to my face and, call me crazy, but I think the man blushes. San Antonio’s most eligible bachelor blushes.
“I’m good,” he says, voice breaking.
Is he…? Are we… hot for each other?
Nah, course not.
“Alright, then. I’ll make myself a hot chocolate and head to bed. Nelson will have me up early in the morning and I have school.”
He nods but he isn’t moving, only staring at me. Then his gaze shifts to my mouth and I swear I want him to devour it. Me.
Good Lord, I’m a woman possessed by her libido.
He steps closer to me. I inhale and forget how to release it. He leans in. His chest gently grazes mine and my nipples could puncture him they’re so hard.
“Sweet dreams, Annie,” he says against my cheek.
I finally exhale as he walks away, and as I watch him limp up the staircase, I hold my hand to my cheek.
For the entire time it takes me to make my drink, I replay his expression, the way he stared at my lips. The way he fought on the field today and locked heads with my brother, the way he celebrated by driving a car in the end zone.
Maybe there’s something between us that’s more than my imagination.
Hands locked around my warm mug, chocolate that Tanner bought for me wafting under my nose, I head upstairs to my bedroom, where I’m pretty sure I’m going to sate myself picturing the man I couldn’t take my eyes off for the entire game.
There’s a tiny, miniscule feeling of something reminiscent of guilt for what I’m about to do, a sense of unease or wrong and a distant image of my ex lodged in my mind. But none of it is going to win over the lust burning through me.
The light is on in Tanner’s bedroom as I pass – a low orange hue of lamplight and the flickering of candles. I pause at the door, knowing that beyond it, Tanner is very likely naked, and wet.
“Lord help me,” I whisper into the hallway.
Then I hear… a groan? A grunt? Instinctively, I like it. Given my current state, I wonder for a millisecond whether Tanner is sorting himself out, too.
But when I hear the sound again, it’s more like a struggle.
“Tanner?” I say quietly, unsure whether I’m intruding.
There’s no response but the sound again.
I tap gently on the door, then open it. The bedroom is empty but the door to the ensuite is half open and I can confirm that Tanner is not having himself off over silly old me. Rather, he’s struggling to take off his shirt.
“Tanner? Can I help you?”
He hears me this time, looking up through the doorway to see me.
His shoulders sag. “I can’t get my shirt off.”
I step into the steamy room that smells of him. Warm, decadent, homey. The hot tap is still running, its waterfall an indulgent soundtrack alongside the low hum of music coming through speakers somewhere.
“Let me help,” I tell him, setting my mug on the tray table across his effervescing tub. “Sit down? You’re a little taller than me, stud.”
He scoffs. “I don’t feel like a stud right now.” He sits on the edge of the extremely long tub.
“My hands are warm,” I say, coming to stand in front of him. He parts his legs wider, until I’m between them and reaching for the hem of his shirt. “Are you often this sore?” I raise the top over his stomach, my fingertips accidentally grazing his skin.
My lips part as I swallow deeply. It’s not as if Tanner and I haven’t touched before. We have. Every time we’re in each other’s company. But here, now, in this room, undressing him, the gentle caress of skin-on-skin hits different. I can almost feel my oxytocin skyrocketing.
I see his chest rising and falling with shallower breaths before his eyes close and his hands encourage mine to lift the clothing higher on his body.
“I don’t bounce back from a game the way I did when I was twenty-two, Annie.”
The tone of his voice is a reminder, a warning – there’s an age gap between us, I’m too old for you. I want to counter argue. He is older than me. Stronger, wiser. Great with Nelson. Confident in himself and his abilities. Surer of himself than I’ll ever be.
Which all makes me want him more.
“Tanner—”
He drags in his next breath as I peel off his shirt. “Tonight was a rough game,” he says as I flick his garment to the wash basket in the corner of the room.
When I look back, those heavy lids are back and his gaze rakes over me, from hips to mouth and lastly, my eyes. He almost reaches out, then brings his hands back to the tub.
I’m not crazy, there’s something crackling between us.
But he isn’t going to let this happen.
“Thank you,” I tell him. “For organizing for me to be there today, for getting Nelson and Betty here. For the way you played tonight.”
“For Tommy,” he says, hooking his index finger through a belt loop on my jeans. It’s absent-minded, I think. Or rather, his mind isn’t fully engaged by our conversation.
He doesn’t tug me to him or move away. He just sits, finger in my jeans, as if he’s having an internal battle of wills.
I know that feeling well. What my body wants but my mind knows it can’t have. Is that what he’s feeling?
“You can tell me you played that hard for Tommy and I’d have believed that was the only reason if every down and point earned hadn’t felt like a conspiracy between you and my brother. If it hadn’t been for that driving celebration.”
He lowers his hand and I ignore how that disappoints me because the way he’s looking at me says the exact opposite. He’s fighting. He battled for me on the field and he’s fighting with his own restraint now.
I run my hand down the side of his waist that’s already turning nasty shades of purple and blue. His eyes close.
“What did he say to you?” I ask.
He looks up to me, taking my hand off his body but holding it in his. “Whatever Auston said was heat of the game stuff.”
“Tell me. Please?”
He creaks his neck, runs his tongue along his teeth, anger still simmering. He lets go of my hand and reaches behind him to shut off the tap. “He said that if he asked, you’d go running back to him.”
He stands, gently moving me from between his legs as he goes to the vanity unit and takes out anti-inflammatory lotion, then he sits on a stool in front of the mirror and asks, through our reflections, “Would you?”
I take the tube from him, lathering my hands. He raises his arm above his head and hisses as I rub the lotion onto his side, slowly, methodically. In part, he took this hit for me.
My fingers glide through the moisture, over his skin. At some point, I forget to play nurse, as I enjoy the excuse to touch him, uninhibited. To feel his body as if I’m entitled to. I want him so much I’d be willing to bet my body is aching more than his.
I lower his arm and move my hands across his shoulders that are blotched with red, angry marks, despite all the padding he wears.
He’s watching me through the mirror but I daren’t look back for fear he’ll see right through me, to how much I’m desperate to have him touch me. To want to. To need to.
“I wouldn’t,” I tell him, noticing as I speak that there’s a defined outline of something sizable and masculine in his pants, next to his thigh. “Go running back to Auston.”
The moment his name leaves my mouth, I wish I could take it back. I can’t, but I do lower myself to my knees, bring my chest to Tanner’s back, and my lips to his scapular.
“Annie.” The way my name leaves him – strained, breathless – is exactly how I want him to say it. Like his desire is a match for mine. As if his mind is a blur of lust, like mine.
I rise a little, bringing my mouth to his neck. He leans into the touch.
“Annie,” he says, stronger, clearer this time.
I bring my mouth to the sensitive skin right beneath his lobe.
“Annie.” He stands and I mirror him, not fully understanding what’s happening. A little dazed, honestly. “This.” He motions between us, and I avoid looking directly but his arousal is clear. “This isn’t—”
Oh. That’s what’s happening.
“Right. I’m sorry, Tanner. I didn’t mean to—” He’s a baller, a player, another sports guy in the limelight.
He’s wealthy, he dates models. He’s my brother’s best friend and he’s the best friend I have in the world right now.
And I am… acting my inexperienced age, screwing this up. “Crap, I’m sorry.”
“Hey, hey, hey.” He takes hold of my face and pulls me into his chest. His dadgum naked chest. “Don’t even sweat it. I was here, too. I just think— Look, Annie, I li—”
Lord here comes another it’s not you, it’s me speech.
“Can we forget that ever happened? I lost my head for a minute. You’ve been so kind to Nelson and me and I—” I giggle, and it comes out all weird and high-pitched. “Did the Annie Quinn thing with a footballer again.”
I worm out of his hold and dart for the door, remembering my hot chocolate and making a no-eye-contact return to collect it, then rushing to the sanctity of my bedroom.
I’m pretty sure I hear Tanner whisper fuck, before I shut my door behind me, set down my drink and throw myself onto the bed.
I’m silently screaming into my pillow when my phone chimes with a text.
Auston
I’m going to show you that I’m serious
I stare at the message.
Is this him clicking his fingers, or is it genuine?
Me
How?
Auston
I’m working on it. I need you to trust me
Trust him. Auston?
My life is an absolute disaster.