Page 25 of Battle Scars

Then I take a deep breath and roll my shoulders back before walking out of the locker room.

The air immediately changes. It feels heavy and carries with it a charge I can’t place until I turn my head and see Gabe. His face is a mask of barely concealed rage that I don’t understand. Sure, he’s made it abundantly clear he doesn’t like me, but I still don’t get why. I haven’t done anything to him. I know he calls me a brat when he thinks I’m not listening, but I couldn’t be farther from the moniker. I work for everything in my life. Nothing but a name has been handed to me.

Over the last two weeks, we haven’t shared another meal. We do not talk.

He drives me to and from the track and my various other obligations. He shadows me at the grocery store and home again.

But we don’t talk.

We do not bond.

We are not friends.

The magazine’s photographer poses the girls and me this way and that. We laugh and giggle like friends do the whole time, and I feel light. They somehow manage to chase away my nerves and fears, and it becomes fun.

And then the photographer reaches over to me and yanks the zipper on my suit down to my navel, exposing more than just a sexy hint of cleavage—more like the whole thing. That dangerous energy fills the room again, and I’d be lying if I said I’m totally comfortable with what just happened, but then again, I’m not comfortable with a lot of what’s going on in my life right now, so who am I to complain? I suck it up and move on like I always do.

The girls and I keep going for another thirty minutes, but now it feels less fun and more forced.

I breathe a sigh of relief when the photographer shouts, “That’s a wrap!”

I turn to smile at my friends, but before I can, a strong hand wraps around my upper arm, and I’m hauled toward the locker room. I have to run to keep up with Gabe. My legs are long, but his are much longer, and his angry strides eat up the ground to the doorway.

He shoves me through the door and slams it behind me, the sound of the lock flipping over as it’s thrown echoes through the dark locker room.

“W-What’s happening?” I gasp. Somewhere in the back of my brain, I take in that he’s not turning on the lights.

“You get off on that?”

“Get off on what?” What the fuck is he talking about? I’ve been so focused on putting one foot in front of another, just trying to get the job done, clear another hurtle on my way to earning my place as top dog of DHR. Anything other than that goal has not really been considered because I don’t have the emotional or mental bandwidth to tackle it. So I have no idea what he’s on about.

“Yeah, baby,” he drawls. It’s the first time he’s let more than a tiny hint of his Texas twang show through. “You like teasing men? Making them hard for you?”

“Don’t be gross,” I snap as I turn to walk away, but he grabs me by the back of my neck and hauls me around until I’m flush against his hard body, and he is hard everywhere.

Then he crashes his mouth to mine.

I gasp, and he does not hesitate to take that opportunity to invade my mouth as he thrusts his tongue between my lips. His kiss is as hungry as it is harsh, and I hate it as much as I want it.

When he rips his mouth away from mine, my breath saws in and out of my lungs.

“B-B-But you don’t like me,” I stammer as I stare with wide eyes at the beautiful man.

“Baby, I don’t have to like you for you to make my dick hard.”

“And do I?” I ask breathlessly. “Make your dick hard?”

“You wanna find out, I’m not gonna stop you.”

God help me but I do. I want to find out if he’s hard for me, if Gabe is as turned on as I am right now. I don’t know what possesses me, because I damn well know I shouldn’t. But I do.

Slowly, with a shaky hand, I press the flat of my palm against the front of his jeans and find him hot and hard and so very thick. The long, thick ridge of his erection calls to me and emboldens me, and I press firmly as I stroke with my open hand down the covered length of him. When he lets out a quiet but rough groan, I grip him tightly through the soft, worn denim. And the true size of him is overwhelming.

I want it.

I want him.

Then it’s gone in the blink of an eye, and my wrist is gripped in his tight fist as he hauls it over my head. His hazel eyes burn my skin everywhere they track down my body.