“For me?” he asks, finally.
“Yeah,” you reply.
He tilts his head. Kai is barefoot and your Nike cleats probably give you an extra inch of height, but he’s still much taller. Youfeel every inch of that height difference as he makes a slow circle around you, examining the components of the uniform. It’s almost enough to make you jump out of your skin when he brushes the bare skin of your upper arm, testing the weight of the shoulder pads.
“I don’t think this meets Association dress code standards, rookie,” he says gravely.
You can’t help sucking a deep breath when he stops behind you. Even without seeing his face, you can feel the heavy weight of his stare against your back. On your ass, which is straining against the seams of the cheap pants. (You wanted them very tight, so you ordered a size down. Instead of “tight,” they landed on “pornographic.”)
“Aww, shoot,” you hear yourself say. Your voice comes out higher than you intended. “Think Coach is going to be pissed at me? I don’t want to get in trouble.”
He’s not touching you, but his laughter rumbles through your back all the same.
“I’ll cover for you,” he says. “But you’re gonna have to change. You get tackled in that getup, you won’t be alive when they scrape you off the turf.”
His presence is making your skin prickle. You find yourself breathing a little harder. He’s hardly laid a finger on you. “You could show me,” you suggest.
“Show you what?”
When you gulp, your throat feels thick and hot. “How to tackle.”
Kai’s hands settle on your hips, his fingers splaying over the polyester and Spandex of the pants. His fingertips knead the long muscles of your flanks. His breath is hot in your ear.
“You got drafted, but you don’t know how to tackle?” he says, amused. “Someone in the front officereallyliked you, kid.”
Today, Kai is 27 years old, which makes him over three years younger than you. Something about that insouciantkidzings through your nervous system like a live wire in a raging storm, however. Outside, the falling evening is a soft, pink-and-purple thing.
“I guess you’ll have to show me,” you murmur.
Kai huffs. Grabs you by one of the wristbands and pulls you closer to the bed.
“Feet shoulder-width apart. Shoulders back. Head up,” he tells you briskly. “Eyes on your target. Buzz those feet.”
“Buzz?” you repeat, confused.
He does the quick, light step-in-place that you’ve seen guys do on the field. Feeling unwieldy and heavy besides your 255-pound boyfriend, you try to match his movements.
“You’re gonna accelerate towards the ball carrier,” he explains. “Then you’re gonna shoot-and-rip. In and up against his body. Eyes on the sky, face-mask up. You’re gonna disrupt his momentum and make him lose his footing. Your legs are gonna do most of the work for you. Get him off his feet and into the ground.”
You haven’t been able to make sense of one word he’s saying. Lust is making your brain soupy and causing your heart tobeat in your ears. (Generally, you are very good at following instructions.)
“I think I need a demonstration,” you say sheepishly.
The wolfish grin on Kai’s face is the last thing you see before you’re flying backwards onto the bed, him atop you. You’re pretty sure that football players—even those who learned how to tackle before they knew their multiplication tables, like Kai—don’t have a proper form for tackling up onto mattresses, but he executes it all the same. He’s gentle enough, which you know from watching him absolutelydemolishmen twice your size on the field, but it still takes the wind out of you a little bit, the way he effortlessly sweeps you off your feet.
“You okay?” he asks affectionately, his big self pushing you down into the bedding.
“Put me in, Coach,” you say, gasping a little.
Kai’s laughing when he leans down to kiss you. You surge up when your lips meet, opening your mouth eagerly against his. He pushes himself up on his arms to give you some room to breathe, and frames your thighs with his knees. He’s all around you like this, and it’s more than a little heady. The cheap material of your pants slide against the high-thread count duvet cover, and your stupid, chintzy shoulder pads are riding up around your neck, tugging at the harness strapped under your arms.
“Can I take this off?” you mumble into his mouth, wrapping your arms around his neck.
He’s got one hand holding himself up, and the other playing with the end of your ponytail. Your neck is covered in goosebumps with the anticipation of him pulling itany second.
“No way,” he insists, the stubble on his chin scraping your neck as he angles his head to mouth at your jaw. “I want you wearing the whole uniform when you fuck me.”
Surprised, you pull away a bit. “That what you want? I figured you’d want to split your rookie in half.”
