29. Callahan #2
Planning requires a composure I lost the second I saw the way her hands were shaking against that tablet.
I don’t think about the cameras tucked into the corners of the ceiling or the fact that my life’s work is currently hanging by a thread. I don’t think about the playoffs, the legacy of this team, or the shadow of her father.
I just look at her—at the way she’s trying so hard to be made of stone while she’s clearly bleeding out right in front of me—and the last of my restraint just… gives.
“To hell with the optics.”
It’s not careful.
It’s not some tentative, poetic exploration.
It is a wreck. It is the sound of professionalism snapping like bone. It is months of stifled words, polite nods in the hallway, and agonizing silence finally shattering against the floor.
When my mouth hits hers, it’s hard and desperate.
I crowd her back, the heels of her boots skidding until the backs of her thighs hit the laminate table with a sharp thwack.
I don’t give her an inch. I dive my hand into the hair at the nape of her neck, fisting the dark silk to tilt her head back at an angle that leaves her throat bared and vulnerable.
For a heartbeat, she’s a statue of shock.
Then, the dam breaks.
Ivy lets out a wrecked, needy sound—a small, choked sob that I swallow whole.
Her fingers claw into my shoulders, bunching the fabric of my shirt until I feel her nails scoring my skin.
She pulls me flush against her, her chest heaving against mine, her nipples peaking into hard points against my shirt.
My voice cracks into a low, raw sound that vibrates through both of us. My other hand slides down, my palm flat and heavy against the curve of her hip, pulling her upward until she’s grinding her pelvis into the demanding throb of my dick.
I want her to feel the wreck she’s made of me.
I break away just enough to drag my mouth along the pulsing cord of her neck, sucking at the sensitive skin right below her ear.
I want to mark her.
I want to leave a flush that her high collars won’t be able to hide.
She arches her back, her fingers tangling desperately in my hair, pulling me closer even as she gasps for air that feels too thin to support us.
“Cal,” she breathes, and it’s the first time I’ve heard her voice sound like that—stripped of the whistle, stripped of the authority, just a woman unraveling in the dark.
I pull back an inch, just enough to catch my breath, but I can’t let her go. I slide my hands up from her waist to frame her face, my thumbs smoothing over her heated cheekbones as I pull her toward me.
We crash our foreheads together, both of us shaking, our lungs straining for oxygen in the narrow, electric space between our mouths. The clinical silence of the video room has been replaced by the loud, rhythmic thud of two people who just realized they’ve set their entire world on fire.
Her eyes are black, her pupils swallowed by a craving so intense it looks like pain. She looks at my wet mouth, then back to my eyes, searching for a way to undo the last sixty seconds.
But my hands are still trembling against her skin, and her pulse is still racing against my thumb, and we both know the ice hasn’t just cracked. It’s gone.
“What did we just do?” she whispers, the words breaking on a jagged exhale.
I swallow hard, my voice sounding raw and foreign to my own ears. “Something we can’t undo.”
She shoves at my chest, a sharp, panicked movement that forces a few inches of cold air between us. She stays pressed against the edge of the table, her hands flying to her mouth as if to physically keep the confession from spilling out again.
I watch the fire in her eyes die out in real time, replaced by a shadow of regret that turns her gaze from liquid heat back into cold, hard stone.
The kiss was a confirmation of every headline, every rumor, and every fear her father ever fed her.
I want to reach out and pull her back. I want to tell her that we can fix this, that we can find a way, but my hands are paralyzed at my sides.
“This can’t happen,” she says, her voice regaining that terrifying, professional edge even as her lower lip trembles.
My chest tightens, the heat draining from my skin in a slow, spreading ache. I can feel the distance between us growing even while we’re still standing close enough to feel the warmth coming off each other’s skin.
“I know,” I say, the words tasting like ash.
“It shouldn’t have happened. We’re professionals, Callahan. We have a job to do.”
“I know.”
The truth hangs between us anyway—heavy and undeniable.
She fumbles blindly behind her for her tablet on the table, her fingers shaking so violently the device nearly clatters to the floor. She won’t look at me. She’s already busy smoothing her hair with a frantic, mechanical precision.
She finally slides past me, keeping her shoulder brushed against the table to give me as wide a berth as the small room allows.
“This changes nothing,” she says, her voice tight as she reaches for the door. “Do you understand? Nothing.”
We both know it’s a lie.
She pauses with her hand on the lever, her shoulders stiffening into that rigid, unbreakable line she uses to face the media.
“You can’t do that again,” she whispers. “Ever.”
My voice is a jagged wreck as I answer. “I won’t apologize for wanting you, Iveline.”
She flinches, just a small hitch in her posture before she pulls the door open. “Stop,” she says quietly. “Please. Just stop.”
Then she’s gone. The door closes softly behind her, the click of the latch sounding like a gavel.
I stand alone in the darkened room, my heart pounding against my ribs and my pulse high. The ache hits slow, then all at once, settling in the space she refused to stay.