Chapter 39
Chapter thirty-nine
Avery
And the award for world’s biggest cockblock goes to Noelle.
She hasn’t stopped teasing me about it since.
"I thought you and Olive were just pretending," she said.
I told her, "We are," even though my heart was pounding hard enough to make it a lie.
Then she smirked and hit me with, "So why is she calling you for actual phone sex?"
I shot back with, "None of your business," already sweating.
She just laughed and slammed her bedroom door, because of course, she knows exactly what that meant.
Probably too well.
I haven’t been able to stop thinking about Olive since that phone call.
We usually talk during the day on and off, just to check in, along with our nightly text questions.
I would like to say that I’m able to put her in the back of my mind to focus on work, but these days, it’s proving harder and harder.
I’m not the type who needs sex to feel fulfilled. I’ve never been one to chase hookups just to scratch an itch.
Maybe that’s part of why I didn’t fight too hard to get out of this marriage.
I knew I could be loyal even if she meant nothing to me.
But she does.
She means everything.
That much has become apparent.
And as much as I would like to tell myself that this is purely physical with her, I have a niggling feeling in my gut—one I've never felt before—that something is starting to stir up inside of me.
Something I don’t really see a point in ignoring. But given Olive told me once before that she never saw herself settling down, I don’t like my chances at this being more than something temporary. So, I shove that feeling way, way down, and don’t let it show itself to anybody.
It’ll be easier that way.
***
"So," my mom says, clearing her throat. "When do we get to meet your wife? I mean, I know I met her when I picked up Noelle from your game, but I mean like, a sit-down dinner, where we can get to know her a little more."
The emphasis she puts on the word ‘wife’ doesn’t go unnoticed by me, but I do my best not to let it show on my face. My parents had me when they were really young. They were teenagers in love who thought they knew everything there was to know.
Looking at them now, you would think they never spent a day apart. But, for a short while, I was a kid from a broken family, and I used basketball as the glue to piece it all back together.
At least, that’s what I told myself as a kid. Now I know it’s because the love they had for each other was too strong to keep them apart.
I wouldn’t be the basketball player—the person I am—without them.
But yeah, it kind of skipped my mind to invite them to my fake-slash-real wedding. I just didn’t see it as important at the time.
"She’s on a tour break soon for a few weeks.
Maybe then." I shrug, taking a sip of my protein shake as my mom watches me from my couch, where she’s made herself too comfortable.
Pillows are fluffed around her, and a duvet is over her legs as though we’re in the peak of winter.
I don’t bother to tell her that I’ll be meeting Olive’s parents after the award show next week.
If I do, she’ll insist on joining, and I couldn’t think of anything worse.
"Hmm," is all she says in response, turning the volume back up on the TV and ignoring my existence completely. I’m busy making myself some lunch, or at least I try to. My mom’s ‘hmm’ has me wanting to continue the conversation, no matter what direction it leads me.
"She’s a good person, you know? Just because we’re in a relationship for publicity, doesn’t mean you need to hound her with questions if you do get to meet her properly," I tell my mom, picking up my plate of food and bringing it to the table to sit down.
All she had to do was make a noise, barely even a word, and I was already jumping to my wife’s defense like my mom was some kind of journalist vulture, not the woman who birthed me.
But my mom should’ve known to expect it. She raised me, she knows the type of person I am. Protective to my core.
She looks over her shoulder at me, her blue eyes—the one feature I got from her—softening when she sees the firm set of my expression. The one she’s seen a million times before.
"It’s not her I’m worried about, Avery. Well, I guess it kind of is." Her face softens as she sighs, pulling the blanket higher up her chest like it’s some sort of armor to protect herself.
"What’s that supposed to mean?" I ask, swallowing my food as I look at the side of her face, catching the flush in her cheeks.
"I don’t want you to break her heart. She seems so…
innocent. And I know you’re not. When she inevitably falls in love with you, let her down gently, okay?
" I push my plate away with a sudden loss of appetite.
"Unless, of course, you fall in love with her too. Then at least we’d get a real wedding out of it someday.
" She snickers to herself, finding her little joke all too amusing as she turns the volume even louder than it was.
"Now let me finish this movie before your father gets back. "
Conversation, over. Thank God.
I had nothing to say that wouldn’t make me sound like a total asshole, or like I was actually falling for my fake wife.
None of those would’ve been beneficial to me.
If only she knew.
***
I’ve got a week off. No games, no training, nothing on the schedule.
Which, to Orlando, can only mean one thing.
If it were up to me, this week would be spent doing absolutely fuck all. Just me, in my boxer briefs, eating whatever I wanted, binge-watching the entire John Wick franchise, and Olive… completely naked by my side.
But nope.
Orlando has me following Olive to her latest stop on the tour—Florida—before the two of us present an award at some television ceremony in California.
Timing wise, it works out well considering our next game is in LA against the Lions, but still. Home is so much more comfortable.
Besides, I don’t know what business an NBA player has at an award show, but it’s now something I’m apparently contractually obliged to do. The moment I signed my marriage certificate, I apparently signed a new contract for my job, too.
Be where she is, do what she does, don’t ask questions about it. Be affectionate, but not overbearing. Be obsessed with her, but not in a creepy way.
That is, word for word, Orlando’s last text he sent to me before telling me what time my jet flies out.
So now, I’m sitting on AirJones with headphones in, listening to Olive’s music without interruption from the outside world, and it’s the first time I’ve really listened to her lyrics now that I know her in the way that I do.
She’s seems so sad in every fucking song.
One is about a toxic relationship. One is about letting love go. And one is about sleeping with a football player? At least, that’s what I can gather from the lyrics I’m listening to.
The version of her I know doesn’t seem like she would break easily, and maybe the person behind these songs is the reason why. Maybe he or she hurt her so badly that she just refuses to show anybody who she really is.
Her songs are on a loop the entire plane ride to Florida, where she’s spending the next few nights, with me joining her there.
She says she hates surprises, so I made sure to tell her before I hopped on my flight, but I haven’t heard back from her yet. Even though my intention is there, she might still see it as an ambush of sorts.
That’s why I had Orlando book a hotel room for me, right next door to hers. Just in case she replies and says she isn’t up for the visit, or is too tired.
Or she has someone else over.
I shake the thought—and the stab of jealousy that comes with it—out of my head.
Then I swipe my key card, push open the door, and toss my bags to the floor.
"Somebody order room service?" Her voice hits me first, low and raspy, then the scent of her vanilla-coconut shampoo hangs in the air.
I round the corner, and there she is, lying on the bed like sin in silk.
My dick twitches against my waistband, fully aware of what’s about to go down.
"What are you doing here?" My voice comes out more like a croak than anything else, my mouth salivating at the sight of her.
She’s completely naked, save for a thin white sheet draped loosely across her chest.
"I have friends in high places," she whispers, her eyes dark in the dim lighting.
"Orlando?" I ask, stepping in closer.
She nods.
I pull my shirt over my head in one smooth motion, and her teeth catch her bottom lip.
"Booking you a room was my idea," she says, smirking. "A woman has needs, you know?"
She slides one leg out from beneath the sheet, tanned, slow, intentional, and I groan, because I have no self-control around Olive, and I don't care if she knows it.
"And what exactly are those needs…Wife?"
I move to the side of the bed, leaning in until my lips hover just above hers.
My hand slides up the inside of her thigh. Her body trembles at my touch.
Her lips part. "Why don't you kiss me and find out?"
She sucks her bottom lip between her teeth, biting down as she stares into my eyes.
I climb onto the bed, and she parts her legs for me. Kneeling between her thighs, I grab her hands, threading our fingers together.
And just when she’s about to lean in to kiss me, I slam her arms over her head.
She laughs, and it makes my chest tighten.
Before I dwell on how it feels, I kiss her. Slow, and deep, our tongues sliding together in synch.
Olive pulls away, her breath is warm against the side of my mouth, coming fast and heavy as she pants. She attempts to wriggle free from my hold, but I’ve got a firm grip. She sighs in frustration when she can’t move.
I release her hands, and she fumbles for the waistband of my pants, gliding her fingers along my lower stomach.
I shudder beneath her touch. "Remind me to thank Orlando next time I see him, Mr. Jones. It’s like you’ve just stepped right out of my most wanted fantasy.
" She pulls her hand away from me, dragging her fingers down her chest, her hand parting her lips as she reaches her pussy.
"Touch me, Avery. Find out just what you do to me. "
My hand follows hers, and I hiss when I feel just how wet she is for me.
"I have one rule while we do this, Olive.
" I lean down, my body hovering over hers, before I take her mouth in a deep, desperate kiss. I lean back, staring right into those doe eyes. "No other man’s name leaves your mouth when I’m about to be the one to fuck you.
When it's me who gets to make you come."
"So dramatic," she teases, nipping at my bottom lip, her mouth curving into a smile as she kisses me back.
Her hands find my hips, sliding my pants down and over my thighs. "I thought I had time to stop by the drug store before seeing you."
"I came prepared." She rolls over and rummages through the drawer in the nightstand, pulling out a gold-foiled wrapper. A smile pulls at the corner of her lips.
"I hope you brought more than one, because I don’t see us leaving this bed unless we have to."
"A man after my own heart."
I never like to admit things like this, but I fear she might be right. And I fear, even more, that she doesn’t care how those words just made me feel.
Because, fuck it, I am after her heart.
I need it to belong to me more than I’ve ever needed anything.
I drag my mouth over hers, slow and desperate, claiming every inch like I’ve got all night to taste her.
My hand slips between her thighs, fingers gliding over the soft heat of her, and I feel her breath catch against my lips as I circle her clit.
She arches beneath me, welcoming my touch.
Her hands scramble for my shoulders, my back, my neck—anything she can hold onto while I press a finger inside her.
She gasps, her eyes fluttering shut, and I don’t let her look away.
Not tonight. Not when I need her to see what this is.
"Songbird?"
"Yeah?"
"I want your eyes on me while I fuck you." Her gaze flicks to mine, her body shuddering beneath my touch.
"They're always on you, Avery."
Tonight, we don't kiss like strangers, and we don't fuck like we'll never see each other again.
This is so much more than that.
It feels like the first night of something more.
When I slide inside of her, she claws at my back with her fingertips, and kisses me with meaning.
When she rides me with her grip locked on the headboard, her perfect tits bouncing in my cupped hands, I can't take my eyes off her.
And when she unravels, she isn't embarrassed or ashamed, she just…let's it happen.
To me, Olive Herring can do no wrong. And while I can't admit how I feel without her running scared, I need to do something to make her want to stay.
But, I don't.
Because I'm a coward, and I would rather have whatever time we have left together, than have this whole thing end before I'm ready to say goodbye.