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At that moment, I didn’t care about the team.
Didn’t care about the rules.
Didn’t care about the media circus we were about to be thrown into.
All I needed was her. Needed to make sure she really was okay.
“Are you alone?” I murmured into the crown of her head.
Wren nodded.
I didn’t ask for permission. If she were going to kick me out, she would have done it by now. I scooped her up and carried her through the shoebox living room. Laundry was piled up on the couch. Dishes covered in water droplets were chaotically thrown into the drainer in the sink. Take-out boxes sat on the coffee table between tile and carpet samples.
I kicked a door open. Broom closet.
I turned and kicked another open. Bathroom.
“Next one,” Wren said.
I opened the door and found her inner sanctum. Reds gear was piled up in a chair. She had tossed the comforter over the bed in an effort to make it—probably in a rush to get to the stadium this morning. A stack of paperbacks sat on the edge of the bedside table. Receipts and random scraps of paper were used in place of bookmarks. I tossed a pair of Red Cocks sweatpants off the foot of the bed and laid Wren down. For the first time since I’d barreled inside, I took her in.
Her blonde hair was no longer in bombshell curls. It was damp from the shower and tied in a sloppy knot on top of her head. Her face was pink and warm—partially from scrubbing her makeup off, and partially from the kiss. A smattering of freckles danced across her nose and cheeks. A pair of thin cotton joggers in a soft gray hung low on her hips. RED COCKS was emblazoned along the left leg.
Her red tank top had the cartoon mascot logo printed between her breasts. Beneath, it read Cluck Yeah.
The fuzzy slippers on her feet were the only thing she was wearing that didn’t have a damn thing to do with Rhode Island football. I pulled them off first.
Her toenails were painted bright red, but the menagerie of Band-Aids streaking across her feet made me cringe.
She closed her eyes as I skated my hands up the sides of her legs. I hooked my fingers in the elastic waistband of her joggers. “Lift for me.”
Wren obliged, raising her hips so I could work her pants down. The fabric snagged around something on her knee. Carefully, I worked it around the bulge and pulled them off. With her in just a pair of cheeky blue panties, the ice packs held in place around her knee by tight layers of plastic wrap were exposed. Dark contusions had formed on her thighs and hips. Probably from my knee drilling into her thigh when I tackled her. I grimaced as I took her in.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispered with her eyes closed. There was no truth behind her statement. She wanted me to leave as much as I wanted to.
I leaned down and pressed a kiss to the bruise that marred her right thigh. “I’m sorry,” I whispered against her skin. “I’m so sorry, Little Bird.” Gently, I lifted the hem of her tank top and raised it over her head. Wren relaxed on the bed. She wasn’t wearing a bra—her small, perky tits were bare and waiting for me.
There was slight discoloration on her abdomen, but her shoulders had taken the brunt of the fall when they collided with my pads. I moved over her as I kissed a line up the flat plane of her abs. It wasn’t lost on me that the first time I got to see her completely naked was after an event that could’ve had a completely different ending.
There was a reason we wore pads and helmets. Wren had taken a hit at full speed, wearing nothing more than a few scraps of fabric.
“Fuck,” I exhaled as I rested my forehead on her clavicle. The adrenaline and terror I had been running on bled out of my body in a single breath.
Beneath me, her thighs squeezed together as she shifted her hips.
“Can I… Can I just hold you?” I asked softly. I needed the connection to stay calm. Wren nodded and started to sit up. I piled pillows against her headboard and sat against them. Wren crawled into my open arms, careful of her knee. I pulled a blanket over our tangled bodies as I asked, “How does your head feel?”
She closed her eyes, cheek pressing against my chest. Her steady puffs of breath tickled my skin. “Better now.”
