Chapter 39 Hayes
Hayes
One month later . . .
“Benny. I have a surprise for you!”
It’s Saturday. I’ve got film in an hour, a game tomorrow, and a knot of nerves that feels dumber than any playoff pressure, because this isn’t about yards or stats.
This is bigger.
This is our life.
My daughter doesn’t come busting out of her room the way I expect her to, so I go to the bottom of the stairs and shout again.
I move to the bottom step and cup my hands around my mouth. “Bernadette. Are you listening?”
A beat. Then a muffled “I’m doing something!”
I glance toward the kitchen. Layla’s there in one of my old team tees, sleeves rolled to her shoulders, hair in a knot that’s losing the fight because she took the first flight out and beelined here from the airport. No makeup. Sleep in her eyes.
Nerves everywhere.
My chest does that dumb squeeze it’s been doing for a month—ever since we picked a date and booked her airfare and paid a company to pack up the shit in her apartment and haul it to a storage unit for the winter.
The plan came together in pieces: a lot of late-night calls, one spectacular fight that—thank God—we didn’t let turn into a breakup, her job being the big hurdle.
She hadn’t wanted to quit—of course she hadn’t. The city hall’s rec department owes her a favor after the Fall Fest miracle; they signed off on a seasonal flex employment so she can finish winter programming from here and fly back for a couple of weekend events.
She’s nervous as hell. Hiding for the big reveal we’ve been gearing up for for a month.
I grin up the stairs again and increase my volume. “Too busy for a surprise?”
That gets Benny’s attention.
Thudding footsteps overhead, a door flung open. She appears on the landing in mismatched socks and wild hair, eyes narrowed with suspicion. “Did you finally buy me a hedgehog?”
A hedgehog? What the fuck. “No hedgehog.”
She groans like I just canceled summer. “Then what?”
“Stop being sassy.” I can’t keep the stupid smile off my face. I tip my head toward the kitchen. “You’re gonna wanna come down so you can open it.”
She barrels down the steps, takes the turn, yanks the door wide—
—and freezes.
“Whoa. Holy crap. Layla? What are you doing here?”
“Surprise!” Layla and I shout together, throwing up our arms as if we’re throwing Benny a birthday party.
My daughter spins to face me, eyes wide. “Is she the surprise?”
“Yeah, kiddo.” My throat is tight. “She’s the surprise.”
Layla crosses the threshold and folds Benny into a hug—tight enough to say I missed you, not so tight a nine-year-old has to pretend she hates it.
“I was hoping you’d help me figure out where to put my toothbrush,” she says into Benny’s hair, kissing the top of her head. “Because I’m staying. If you’re okay with that.”
Honestly? We were really fucking nervous to tell Benny. Not because we thought she’d hate it—my kid is nine going on diplomatically thirty—but because news like this comes wrapped in a thousand what-ifs. Caution.
Never having done this before, I’ve second-guessed myself and our decision almost daily since Layla boarded her plane, worried I was going to fuck my kid up if things with us didn’t work out.
I never worry about myself; I worry constantly about her.
“Okay with that?” Benny’s head snaps between us so fast I’m worried about her neck. “Like, staying staying?”
“For football season,” I say. “She moved all her stuff into storage and she’ll . . . visit Washington sometimes, but will be mostly here. With us.”
“I think my brain is going to explode,” Benny says. “Am I dreaming?”
“Nope.” I reach out and tug the end of her ponytail. “Tonight we’re having dinner with Nana and Grandpa so they can meet Layla—and tomorrow she’s taking you to the game.”
Benny fist pumps. “This is so cool!”
I pull them both into my body and wrap them into a hug just as the doorbell rings.
Benny jolts out of the hug. “That’s Madison! I forgot about gymnastics!”
Shit, that’s right. I forgot today’s the day she gets launched into the foam pit for two straight hours.
Timing: perfect.
“Go, go, go,” I clap, and the house turns into a tiny relay. We hit our marks like a seasoned crew: Benny sprints upstairs for her leotard; I grab the duffel from the hall closet. Water bottle, hair tie, outfit for afterward.
Snack. Backup snack. Emergency backup snack. Kisses, a flurry of see-you-laters, and she’s out the door. We watch from the window as she does a shimmy down the walkway, then launches herself into the minivan. Skylar gives us a thumbs-up and pulls away.
Ahhh, alone at last.
I turn to Layla, giving her a once-over, determined to get her naked. “Have I ever given you an in-depth tour of your new bedroom, Ms. Monroe?”
Layla blushes. “Why, no, sir, you haven’t.”
“Now seems ideal.”
She’ll soon learn we have to sneak moments when we can. Living with kids is like living with someone out to ruin your privacy. I can barely take a shit alone; Benny kicks the door open to report on lost hair ties like it’s breaking news.
Layla steps closer, hands sliding up my chest, teasing my collar of my shirt. “Is this one of those tours with a gift shop at the end?”
“Better.” I hook a finger in the hem of her T-shirt. “Comes with complimentary hands-on demonstrations.”
She laughs. I steal the sound with my mouth, kissing her slow for one heartbeat and then deeper, not nearly as polite. She melts into me, and I’m tempted to haul her up and carry her.
“Upstairs,” I murmur against her lips. “We have two hours.”
She stumbles, giggling when her hip bumps the banister, quick, clumsy, unwilling to waste a second. Halfway up, she fists my shirt again and I press her into the wall at the landing, mouth on her throat, hands braced on either side of her head.
Pulse, sweet and frantic, beats against my lips. She rolls her hips into mine, and there goes my plan for a gentle tour . . .
“Show me my new room,” she whispers, dragging her mouth along my jaw, sucking a mark that will have me mocked in the locker room by my teammates tomorrow afternoon.
“You’ll get the premium package.” I press my erection into her joggers, hard as a rock. “All inclusive.”
“I’m such a lucky girl . . .”
Fuck yeah, she is.
By the time we reach the doorway, we’re both breathing like we ran a mile and half of our clothes are gone, down to our underwear. Her bra and panties.
I get the door shut with my heel and flip the lock, because I am a man who learns the hard way, having suffered through experiences like a preteen barging in to ask where the glitter glue went.
“And here’s where the magic happens.” I hope.
“Two hours,” she reminds me, voice shaking. “Don’t be cute.”
“Baby, I’m efficient.”
I slide down her belly and catch the band of her panties in my teeth, and she laughs—a shocked, delighted sound that punches heat through my chest. I peel them slow, kissing every new inch, and she’s already trembling by the time I toss them and spread her under my hands.
“New room, new rule,” I murmur, shoving my boxers down. “We christen everything.”
“Everything?”
Everything.
Two strides, and her back meets the dresser; cologne bottles rattle as I set her on top. She’s laughing into my mouth until I angle my hips and the laugh turns into a gasp.
“Hold on,” I murmur, spreading her legs, one palm splayed at the small of her back, the other guiding me inside. “There you go—”
I push in slow, the kind of slow that makes us both swear, and then we’re locked—her heels digging into me, my forehead pressed to hers, both of us trying to remember how to breathe.
“God,” she whispers, eyes glassy, smug smile tugging at her lips.
She tips her hips, and it’s game over; I find a rhythm—deep and deliberate—until she starts to pulse around me and beg for faster. I oblige, bracing one hand beside her head, the other hooking behind her knee to open her up for me.
“I’m gonna love fucking you in this house.” Another thrust, deeper. “On this dresser.” I tip my chin at the bed. “Against the closet door with your hands over your head. Bent over the boxes you haven’t unpacked, fucking you from behind. On the rug.”
She shivers so hard the cologne bottles rattle again. “Keep talking.”
“In the bathroom.” I kiss her throat, her mouth. “In the shower, your moans echoing against the tile. I’ll put you against the wall, soap on your skin, my mouth everywhere the water can’t reach.”
Fucking you good and hard . . .
Her nails sink into my shoulders; she’s panting now, greedy. “Yesss . . .”
“In the closet,” I promise, rolling my hips just right. I nip her lip. “Every room. Every surface.”
“Mmm,” she moans.
Suddenly, I want to watch her watching us.
“Field trip.” I hoist her again, carrying her toward the walk-in closet with built-in shelves. An island in the middle. Bench in front of the window.
A full-length mirror along the back wall . . .
I position us so we’re facing the mirror, her hands pressed against the glass, positioning myself behind her.
She braces, gasping loudly as I spoon her from behind, kiss the back of her neck, and slide into her in one long, claiming stroke.
The reflection gives us everything: her hair a mess, her cheeks flushed, the lazy swing of the chandelier above us, my hands spanning her waist so I can bury deeper still . . .
Our skin glistens.
“Look at you,” I rasp in her ear. “Look at how gorgeous you are.”
Those tits. I drag my thumb over her nipple and pinch, a shocked, breathy sound leaving her mouth as her gaze locks on the mirror.
Her gaze stays locked on the glass like it’s a live feed of her undoing, and I set a rhythm—deep and deliberate—one hand climbing so it’s at her throat, thumb lazy at her pulse.
“Harder,” she begs.
“Ask nicely.” I grind where she needs it just to feel her shiver.
“Please.”
I give it to her.
The mirror shows us everything: the sharp lift of her breasts when I drive in, the way they bounce when I snap my hips, the insatiable way she rocks against my cock for more.
I cup her tits and tease a thumb over a tight peak, and her knees wobble.
“That’s it,” I whisper, holding her up. “Good girl—keep your eyes on us.”
She does, biting her lip, wrecked and triumphant. “God, Hayes . . .”
I’m gonna jizz. I can feel my balls tightening as the sound of our bodies slapping together fills the closet, our eyes meeting in the reflection.
Layla’s lips part in an almost pained expression when she comes; I bury my face at her neck, and we fall apart together.