CHAPTER 30 Maverick Jennings
Emotions
I bounce on the balls of my feet as I pull my arm back and throw a football five yards to my first target.
I get another ball and repeat the drill to my second target.
My aim is on point today, and I’m ready for this. The stands are starting to fill with fans as we finish our warm-ups. Some have been outside for hours drinking and grilling in the parking lot, while others just arrived and grabbed their first beer.
I don’t care about any of them. I only care about the woman watching from the owner’s suite wearing a red Aces jersey with Jennings 1 on the back.
It’s a surprise when I see that, and I can’t seem to take my eyes off of her. Goddamn, she looks good with my name on her back.
It pulses an unexpected warmth in my chest.
I haven’t seen her all day. Game days aren’t like practice days.
She isn’t allowed on the field, and I stayed at the team hotel last night.
I left the hotel earlier than the rest of my teammates so I could get into the locker room and do some deep breathing.
I needed to get into the right headspace.
We run a few team drills, and then we head into the locker room.
And here I am with less than an hour until game time.
Coach Nash gives us a pregame pep talk. I meet with Coach Richards and my O-line.
We line up in the tunnel.
We run out onto the field to the loud cheers of a stadium ready for their starting quarterback to finally take the field.
The National Anthem is played. We win the coin toss and defer to the second half.
Adrenaline courses through me as I watch kickoff.
I glance up at the owner’s box, and I see her.
Even from here. Even from this distance.
It’s like a light is shining down on her, and I realize it is.
She’s sitting in a seat in the sun, probably not on purpose, as it angles over her through a window on the opposite side of the stadium.
It’ll move in a few minutes, and she won’t be in that beam of light, but somehow it feels perfect for the moment.
She raises her hand in a little wave, and I take my right hand to brush off my left shoulder.
I watch as her face seems to light up even more at the inside joke, and then I return my gaze to the field.
I keep it there for the remainder of the game. She’s here, and I know that. I acknowledged that. But I need to keep my focus where it belongs during the game, and that’s on the field.
The Eagles are forced to punt, and we take over at the twenty-three. I draw in a breath in my first regular season play at my new home stadium. I hear the chants.
Mav-er-ick! Mav-er-ick!
I’m fucking ready.
Jeff Tyler, the Aces’ center, snaps the ball to me, and I fall right back into my old rhythm. I drop back, scan the field, and execute the play Coach Nash just called. The ball sails into the arms of Asher Nash, who runs down the field to catch a few more yards before he’s taken down.
The crowd goes wild at our gain, and we line up again.
This is it. This is what’s in my blood. This is what I live for.
I feel more myself than I’ve felt in a long time—longer than the last time I was on the field. And I suspect it’s because a part of me that I’d written off forever has started to heal.
When my wife died, a part of me died along with her.
But when I found out she’d been cheating on me…
well, that was a cruel sort of pain I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.
To be mourning someone, full of grief, and to learn she wasn’t at all who I thought she was made me feel like I lost her twice.
I was mourning her death, and then I was also forced to mourn the fact that she didn’t love me enough to be honest with me.
On top of that, I had to mourn an unborn child I thought was mine for a few days until I found out it wasn’t.
It made me feel like I was unlovable. That does things to a person. I didn’t even have her here to have it out with her. To yell at her that I hated her. That I felt broken and betrayed because of her. I yelled at her ghost. I hated her memory. It’s when I was forced to shut off my emotions.
But Everleigh is tapping back into them. It’s still new, but I feel it on the field.
I soak every single emotion in as deeply as I can.
I feel the rush of adrenaline that I was missing for far too long.
I feel the excited respect of my teammates as they slap my helmet to tell me my throw to Asher was perfect.
I feel the nerves twisting through me as I play my first home game with the Aces.
I feel the pressure to get this win, but I also feel the pride in my teammates, in our preparation, in our shared vision to win this game.
We pull out the win. Easily. Handily. Maybe because of those feelings.
I feel that unfamiliar tug on my mouth as my lips turn up into a bit of a smile when I walk into the press room after the game and the first question is fired at me. “How’d it feel to be back on the field?”
“It felt like I was right where I’m supposed to be.”
They ask more questions, and I think Everleigh will be proud of my answers.
I want her to be waiting for me outside the locker room when I exit, but she isn’t.
She shouldn’t. It’s not like I can rush up to her and take her in my arms and kiss her the way Dex is doing with his wife, or the way Asher is doing with his.
She’s not my wife. I’m not exactly sure what she is. My brand strategist. The woman I’ve slept with a few times. The woman I can’t stop thinking about. The woman some kid said I was the boyfriend of. The woman who made me call my mom.
I should call her again.
I’m riding a high after winning the game despite having nobody to greet me afterward, and I jump into my stupid silver and blue truck, pull up the number to my mom’s facility, and make the call as I back out of my space in the parking lot.
“Floor unit, this is Susan,” Susan answers.
“Hi Susan. This is Maverick Jennings. How’s my mother today?”
She clears her throat, and my chest tightens with a bit of anxiety. “She’s having a bit of a tough day. The doctors diagnosed her with pneumonia, and she’s been more confused and agitated than usual. We just got her comfortable enough for sleep.”
“Oh, I see. Okay. Can you let her know I called and have her call me when she’s awake?” I ask.
“Of course. Great win, by the way. We had the game on for her, and we all cheered you on.”
“Thanks,” I say softly. It’s nice to hear, but it doesn’t mean as much if it isn’t coming from my own mother’s mouth.
We hang up, and I head home with a bit of the wind knocked out of my sails.
I figure I’ll just call it a night, but when the elevator doors open on my floor, I’m surprised to see Everleigh Bradley standing next to her door, leaning on the wall as she scrolls her phone. When the elevator doors slide open and she spots me, she slips her phone into her pocket.
I stare at her for a beat. Jesus, she’s pretty.
That long, dark hair tumbles in waves past her shoulders, curling down by her tits.
Her lips are cherry red to match her nails—maybe in homage to the colors of the team she cheered for today.
My team. While she wore my number, and she’s still wearing it.
And her eyes, those dark brown eyes with the long lashes and a bit of mystery or mischief or something behind them, they pin me to my place.
“Good game,” she says quietly.
“How long have you been standing out here waiting for me?” I ask.
“I asked Milton to text me when you got in,” she admits.
“Why?” I grunt, narrowing my eyes at her.
“Because I haven’t seen you all day. Because I…I—”
I raise both brows. “You?” I prompt. There are a million and one ways she could end that sentence, but the one she chooses sort of stuns me.
“I missed you.”
My jaw slackens a little. I can’t remember the last time someone told me they missed me.
I don’t get close enough for anyone to even think those words, let alone say them aloud. And after they register and swirl around in my head for a beat, I realize something. I take a step toward her. “I missed you, too.”
Hope seems to blossom in her eyes as they meet mine. “You did? You just seemed so…”
“Focused? I was. When I was on the field, I was focused on the game, but make no mistake, Ev. I was feeling every emotion that I’ve pushed out for a decade.
I was in the moment. The adrenaline rushed like it used to.
The celebration after scoring was genuine.
I’ve been slaughtered by my coaches for returning to the sidelines without giving credit where it was due and instead discussing what we could’ve done differently, but not today.
Today was…I don’t know. It was filled with something I lost a long time ago. ”
Her voice is small and tentative when she makes her suggestion. “Joy?”
I stare at her as I let the word register. Joy. Is that what Everleigh is bringing back to me?
I remember smiling with that little girl at the Hope Gala. Wanting to spend time with Everleigh. Feeling everything on the field today.
I think she might be right.
I can’t bring myself to repeat the word in fear that it’ll slip away again, but I do know one thing that’ll bring it to me—or will bring me satisfaction, anyway.
I move toward her and wrap my arm around her waist to haul her into me, and my mouth crashes down to hers.
She doesn’t hesitate a single beat as she lifts herself up and wraps her legs around my torso.
Her hands are on my jaw as she kisses me back with all this pent-up energy that we’ve both had to put on the back burner all day. For the last couple days, really.
But now? The game’s over. I don’t have practice tomorrow. We’ll spend the day together either way—and I’d much rather spend it naked than working on my brand.
My brand will work itself out with her by my side. This is more important.
This hallway is ours, but that doesn’t mean those elevator doors won’t open. People could see, and that’s not something either one of us is ready to risk. With that in mind, I walk her over toward my door. I manage to fish my key out of my pocket and unlock my door, my mouth never leaving hers.
She grunts into me as I walk her into my condo, slamming the door behind us. I can’t make it to the bedroom. I need her here, now. I need to be inside her. I need to continue this high of feeling.
I turn and push her back up against the front door.
She’s still straddling my waist, and I start to thrust my hips up.
I’m humping her right against my door, and I wish we were naked so I could be fucking her instead.
She’s tender as her fingertips move from my jawline to thrust into my hair, and I’m the opposite of tender as my animal instincts kick in.
I push her down off me so she’s standing against my door.
I make quick work to yank her jeans and panties off, leave the jersey on, and reach into the shorts I changed into after my post-game shower.
I pull my cock out, stroke it a few times, and lift her back up into my arms so she’s leaning against my front door again with her legs straddled around my waist.
I reach down under her leg to position myself, and then I line up with her body and thrust into her.
I still for just a beat, and her eyes open mere inches from mine. A hot, intimate moment passes between us as our bodies still, our eyes still, everything seems to still except for the beating of our hearts.
It’s a connection unlike any I’ve felt before, and when I start to move, that connection only seems to intensify. My mouth slams back to hers, and somehow I’m also perfectly content just fucking her right here up against my front door.
I focus on the feel of her hot cunt as it surrounds my cock, of the slip and slide in and out of her as I pump away. I focus on the feel of her legs as they tighten around me, as her kiss starts to get more frantic, more chaotic, more urgent.
And then her mouth breaks from mine, and she whispers in a plea, “Oh, God, Mav. I’m coming. I’m coming so fucking hard. God, this is what you do to me.” She claws at my back, leaving scratch marks with her red nails over my shirt, and I fucking love it.
Just hearing those sweet words drop from her lips pushes me into my own climax.
My release is long and hard as I pump into her, my face buried in her neck while I growl out some curses.
And once my body starts to come down from the high, once I start to move back from that sweet edge of pleasure, I carry her over to the couch.
I’m still inside her when I lay her down and hover over her.
I’m not ready to go again quite yet, but I’m still hard enough that I don’t fall out.
I pump in and out of her, enjoying the sensation of extra sensitivity after just coming inside her.
I pull back, and our eyes meet again. Her eyes search mine, those big brown eyes moving back and forth between my blue ones, and I wonder what she’s thinking. I wonder what she’s feeling.
When I see the way her eyes are so pure on mine in this moment, I have to believe she’s in this for far more than just her career.
She feels it, too. Something is growing between us, and it’s not something I’m going to be able to just set aside.
Because I opened myself up to feeling again, and that means I’m opening myself up to heartbreak again, too.