Page 239 of Faking the Goal

Which would already be dangerous enough if being this close to Kentaro all the time wasn't also wreaking complete havoc on my brain and my raging hormones.

I've been staying at the hockey house for a little over three weeks now, but since my fall last week, I've basically been confined to it. My ankle is still strapped into a walking boot, my ribs complain whenever I move the wrong way, and I haven't been back to class since the fall. Thankfully, my professors have been surprisingly nice about it and have been sending me notes, readings, and a few assignments I can do from the house so I don't fall too far behind. It's not exactly enough to keep me busy all day, but at least I won't return to campus academically deceased.

So I've spent an obscene amount of time stuck here.

There are only so many volumes of manga I can read before my eyes begin to cross, only so many times I can scroll through my phone, and apparently, when a woman is confined to a house full of hockey players with absolutely nothing productive to occupy her, she starts developing strange new hobbies.

Mine happens to be staring at Kentaro.

More specifically, staring at Kentaro when he works out shirtless in the backyard.

It is not my fault. I would like that formally recorded.

The man walks around with the kind of body that practically demands prolonged observation. His shoulders are broad, his chest solid and sharply defined, and every movement makes the muscles across his stomach shift beneath smooth skin. He has six perfectly carved ridges that disappear beneath the low waistband of his sweatpants, followed by that deep, indecent V that has absolutely no business being visible anywhere within my line of sight when I haven't had an orgasm in so long that my body has apparently forgotten how to behave around attractive men.

And because I'm a complete masochist, I keep watching.

Like today, for instance.

It is early Sunday morning, and Kentaro is outside in the backyard while I sit on the deck with another volume of Genbu Kaiden open in front of me, pretending to read the same page I've been staring at for the past ten minutes.

He is shirtless, of course, wearing nothing but a pair of gray sweatpants hanging low on his hips, and he is currently on his third set of push-ups as though this is a perfectly normal thing for him to do while I'm sitting fifteen feet away fighting for my life.

Every time he lowers himself toward the grass, his arms bend and his biceps swell beneath his skin before flexing again as he pushes himself back up. His back tightens with every movement, the muscles shifting across his shoulders, and my gaze keeps wandering down the long line of his torso before catching on that ridiculous V again.

My mouth goes dry.

My thighs press together beneath the book.

And when he lowers himself one more time, slow and steady, sweat sliding down the center of his chest and disappearing beneath the waistband of his pants, I have to bite the inside of my cheek to keep an actual sound from escaping me.

This place is not a safe house.

It is Temptation Island.

Actually, no. Torture Island.

A hot, shirtless, sexually frustrating torture island where my fake boyfriend flashes me that sexy little grin every few minutes while I slowly lose what remains of my sanity.

I have been horny almost constantly since I got here, which is both embarrassing and deeply unfair. I haven't had an orgasm in far too long, and I certainly can't give myself one while I'm staying in a house with twenty-six men and Kentaro sleeping only a few feet away. Not when every creak in the floorboards makes me paranoid someone is about to walk in. Not when I know he could appear at any moment, catch me with my hand between my legs, and leave me no choice but to throw myself off the roof out of humiliation.

So instead, I suffer.

I suffer while he stretches shirtless in front of me. I suffer when he catches me staring and smiles like he knows exactly what he is doing. I suffer when he walks past me smelling like soap and sweat, his hair damp and his skin still warm from working out.

And the fantasies are getting worse.

Much worse.

Because now, instead of simply appreciating his remarkable physique like a normal, respectful friend, my brain keeps supplying me with images of him pinning me down on the grass, holding my wrists above my head, and fucking me six ways to heaven while I forget every reason this is a terrible idea.

I would climb that man like a tree if I knew he wanted me to.

That is the worst part.

If I knew for certain this wasn't one-sided, I wouldn't have any problem making the first move. I am not shy. I am not delicate. I have never needed a handwritten invitation before going after something I wanted.

But Kentaro is different.