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“It wasn’t.” My smile dips into one that’s secret. Something I’m not ready to share with anyone else yet. “He said I deserved better than nice. And I do.”
NINE
SHAWN
The intercomin my living room buzzes—again—at half past seven on Monday night.
“I don’t want to talk to the press, Arthur,” I tell my doorman for the tenth time today. I lean against the wall and scrub my hand over my face. “The answer is still no comment. And if they want more than that, they can go through my publicist. Haley is in charge. I’m not saying another word.”
“It’s not the press, sir,” Arthur says. He pauses, and I hear a muffled conversation followed by a laugh. “It’s Ms. Daniels.”
Lacey.
“Send her up,” I say, and my heart drops to my feet.
I pace in front of the door, and I’m practically vibrating with nerves. With anticipation. With fear. With… with a whole slew of other emotions I’m not sure how to process, because I’m delirious, I’m hungry, and I’m in desperate need of a shower. And a good night of sleep after spending last night tossing and turning.
Today has been a fucking mess. I fielded calls from my publicist and family all morning. I ignored the stream of messages the players sent to me, three hundred emails piling up in my inbox before noon.
They’re nothing substantial. Stupid GIFs and memes of a wedding chapel. A dozen hearts and links to engagement rings. A screenshot of an order placed for an industrial-sized box of condoms with the caption,wrap it up, Coach.
I turned my phone off for good around three, wedging it between my mattress and bed frame and refusing to check it again. I shoved my laptop in there, too. I might keep them there forever.
They’ve been distracting, hours of mindless scrolling on gossip sites that think they have all the facts. Glimmers of our lives thrust into the public eye. It’s scary how many strangers care about two people they’ve never met.
I’ve wanted to talk to Lacey all day. To reach out and ask how she’s doing, but I haven’t had a second to breathe. When I stepped outside to grab lunch with Aiden, bundled up in our hoodies and jackets in what I thought was a decent enough disguise, I was bombarded with microphones and a reporter from TM-fucking-Z asking if I wanted to talk about my “whirlwind romance.”
We went right back in and ordered takeout, but I couldn’t eat the sushi we had delivered.
It’s been hours of stewing, hours of thinking—knowing—I did something wrong.
In the moment, though, I wasn’t thinking. I saw Lacey hurting, and I did something about it. A quick fix and temporary Band-Aid that comes with colossal consequences but…
I wouldn’t take it back.
That was the best kiss of my fucking life.
I’ve gone twenty-one months without having any sort of attraction to Lacey besides acknowledging the well-known fact she’s a gorgeous woman with a wicked smart brain, a kind heart, and a sharp sense of humor that has me clutching my sides with laughter almost every time she talks.
I never wanted to fuck her or touch her, but there’s a physical component now.
I know what her mouth feels like against mine. I know how soft she is and how sweet she tastes. I know that when you bite her lower lip, she arches her back and lets out a little moan. I know too many things about Lacey Daniels, and I didn’t get a lick of sleep because of them.
I’m not sure I’ll ever sleep again.
She barely has time to finish knocking before I’m opening the door and she’sthere. I’ve never been so glad to see someone in my life.
“Hey,” I say.
“Hi,” she answers. She smiles, and it reaches every corner of her face. The little wrinkles around her eyes and across the bridge of her nose. Her rosy cheeks. The confident roll of her shoulders and the flip of her hair. “Can I come inside?”
“Of course.” I step back and gesture her in. We always hang out at Maggie and Aiden’s, but Lacey strolls into my apartment like she’s been here a thousand times. She surveys the foyer then heads for the living room, and I’m hot on her heels. “Can I get you a drink? Some water? Wine?”
She looks at me over her shoulder. Her hips sway from side to side as she crosses the floor and takes a seat on the couch. She kicks off her boots, leans back, and tucks her legs up under her. “I’ll take a whiskey,” she says.
“We’re diving in, huh?” I ask.
“It’s been a day.”
