Chapter 23 #2
“My first Christmas in Boston without my family would have been tough except Tammy paid me a surprise visit. Showed up at my door without telling anyone, barely fourteen years old. And because she was too young to be gone—the rest of the family hauled ass after her, arriving a couple of hours later. We all camped out, overflowing the place.”
He snorted a laugh at the memory.
“Didn’t they stay at a hotel?” She sounded surprised.
“Hell no. No one even thought of a hotel. What would be the point? We wanted to spend the holiday together as a family.”
“What about the rest of the Christmases after that?”
“Depended on the schedule. I got home for a few. Family came up here for a couple. Then they all started having their own families and it was easier for them all to stay at home in ‘Bama.” He shrugged. He missed those big family gatherings when he couldn’t make it home.
“And this year?” Her voice was quiet, tentative, like she was scared of the answer. Truth be told, he hadn’t thought of it.
“I suppose there’s a window in the schedule this year for me to go home for Christmas day.” He locked eyes with her, studied her emotions. The mix was stunning, but mostly he saw wariness and he wasn’t sure what the hell to make of that. Did she want to go home with him or not?
It would be expected. She was supposed to be his goddamn fiancée. But with her mother’s condition he doubted anything could drag her all the way down to Alabama, not even for a couple of nights.
But maybe one night.
Before he got up the nerve to ask her, she blurted out, “Let’s make love out here in the living room, under the tree.”
He laughed, but the tightening in his gut gave rise to his cock, making it jump, shocking his balls into aching for her.
“Anything for you, Doc. Hell, I’d make love outside on the balcony in ten-degree weather and snowfall if you wanted—and I’d love every last freezing minute of it.”
She laughed and took on a spark of mischief in her dark innocent eyes.
“I’m not so sure your cock would be up for the cold.”
“For you, my cock would be burning up even if we made love on the polar ice cap.”
“I’m tempted to make you prove it—”
He didn’t hesitate a beat. Sweeping her into his arms, he took her to the sliding door to the balcony, flipped the lock and shoved the door open.
She shrieked, but he wasn’t finished playing games yet.
Her resistance was weak, probably because she was laughing now as he lifted her outside into the frigid air.
A gust of wind burst around the corner and he automatically shielded her as he pressed her against his hot hard cock. He hadn’t been making empty threats.
“Oh—” She looked up at him, her eyes wide, impressed, and then glazed with that look he knew.
She had a lusty heart underneath her Snow White doctor facade.
He enjoyed draining all the rational logic from her overworked brain.
He watched her heart-wrenchingly beautiful face change, flush pink with desire as she stood on her toes and tilted her face up to his for a kiss.
“I don’t need to push my point—no pun intended—so let’s go back inside before my ass freezes off.”
He dipped his head in a quick kiss, catching her laugh with his mouth, feeling his heart tumbling, hammering out of control.
As he lifted her through the door and shut the glass door behind him, he felt something more in his gut, more than a need to bury himself inside her—which was urgent enough—but something else.
A need to swallow her whole, to possess her, have her for his own, a wanting deep down to his soul for her to be his alone. Forever.
A shudder ran through him and he shut it down. Can’t go there.
She tugged on his hand as she lowered herself to the floor.
“You were serious?”
She nodded and he accepted the invitation in her eyes because it was impossible to resist. She was his siren. He hoped to hell she wasn’t his Achilles’ heel.
Grabbing the plush throw and a couple of pillows from the couch, he joined her on the floor in front of his Christmas tree. Holding her in his arms as she snuggled into him, the warmth overwhelmed him.
“I could stay like this forever,” she said.
The words should have scared him, but he knew what she meant.
He didn’t dare admit it to her. He could barely admit it to himself.
Instead, he stroked an arm down her side to the hem of her skirt and lifted it, watching the smile form on her lips while she kept her eyes on the twinkling lights of the tree.
He would enjoy undoing her concentration, her focus on the tree.
He wanted to hear her scream his name now more than anything.
He wanted badly to see her squirm and beg to have him inside her, wanted to see pure pleasure spasm through her, across her face until she went limp, emptied of all tension, all worries.
Then he would take his pleasure, she would give what she didn’t know she had, and they would rocket to the moon and back, lose themselves together in space and time, utter nothingness, with nothing but each other and the shock of pure physical joy, peaking and paralyzing the world around them.
When they weren’t able to do anything more than sleep, he would hold her all night long in his arms and lose himself.
Trent realized immediately that it had been a mistake to sleep on the floor all night. Not that he’d been in any shape to get up and go to bed after their exhausting lovemaking. Now he had to pay the piper.
The ache in every part of his body assailed him as he got to his feet, reminding him this was why he’d always kept away from women at the end of the season. Too much wear and tear on an already beat-up body.
He noticed that she was skittish as he put a steak in the broiler and started putting together his veggie and fruit shake for breakfast.
“Charlie, can I ask you something? Why aren’t you thrilled with the results of my treatment so far? All the tests have been positive.”
“All except your blood pressure, I would agree. That makes me nervous.”
She studied him and he smiled, not knowing what else to do.
“I’ll monitor you very closely. Trent, I swear I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
He was surprised at her vehemence. Charlie was clearly still nervous about what could go wrong. Thinking about what he could say or do to reassure her, he absently picked up the salt shaker.
“Put that down—no salt.” She ripped it from his fingers. He tried to laugh it off.
“Sorry—momentary lapse.” He saw her pale, looking really worried. “What is it, Charlie? Talk to me.”
“Things can go wrong, Trent.”
“I’ve known the risks all along. You told me from the beginning. Has anything changed?”
How could she tell him it was her feelings about him that had changed? Changed everything. She couldn’t tell him. Instead she shrugged.
“It gets scarier the more you play football.”
“I know. But things could go right, too. Let’s focus on that.
Our team could win the Super Bowl. Your research could get approved for the second larger drug trial.
Eventually the serum could get approved for general use and help your sister and mother.
” He gave her a relentless smile of fortitude. She smiled back, but it felt sad.
Nowhere in his scenario did he mention that when his season ended, his participation in the drug trial would end too. Ending their relationship, whatever it was.
“That’s all true. But if things go wrong—”
“You mean if someone finds out about me being John Doe? I get thrown off the team. No Hall of Fame. You get fired and we both potentially get charged with crimes. Worst case scenario is we get thrown in jail—”
“No. Worst case scenario is that you suffer side effects.”
“No. It would be worse if your mother suffered side effects.”
She shook her head and forced herself to say the words rattling in her head. “I think . . . I’m afraid my mother is lost.” She looked away from him. “Now it’s more about keeping her as comfortable and as well cared for as possible. Providing the best quality of life possible for her.”
“I’m sorry, Charlie.”
Refusing to allow her tears to form, she said, “Speaking of my mother, she wants to meet you. She would love to have you come for our Christmas Eve celebration. We decorate the tree and drink eggnog and have small sandwiches and festive Christmas cookies.” She rushed her words.
He said, “Small sandwiches? Can I eat a bunch of them?”
She laughed and her heart melted a little bit more for her big football player, the most unlikely man she thought she would ever fall for.
“I’ll be there with bells on.”
In spite of Trent trying to tempt her with his breakfast, she managed to leave with only a cup of black coffee. He promised to be at her house with a limo to pick her up for the Shriners Children’s Hospital Christmas party and ball later that evening.
As she drove home she thought about the best and worst outcomes of their risky venture together.
It had always been about the same thing—or it was supposed to be.
Somehow she’d lost sight of the larger goal, her goal to find an effective treatment for debilitating diseases like the one her sister and mother had.
The worst thing that could happen would be if her research was terminated and a potential wonder drug lost.
Trent had been such a distraction that she’d allowed herself to forget. Either way, nothing good could come of their relationship getting real. It was all temporary and it had to stay that way.