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“Zoey.” This time, my name is a rasping, breathless sounds of his lips.
When I look up at him, it feels like my heart leaps into my throat. His brow is low and intense, his deep-set eyes stormy, his nostrils flared. A new intensity radiates from him, and I can feel the tension from his coiled muscles. His chest swells with a deep, unsteady breath.
“I haven’t been able to forget that night. Not for a fucking second.” His words light me on fire in an instant, a blazing heat roaring from the soles of my feet to the top of my head.
“Liam, we can’t …” I say, but my body’s reactions are warring against the good sense of my mind. My thighs are clenched, my core warm, my nipples hard nubs, my cheeks flushed, my mouth dry with anticipation.
“I know we can’t,” Liam says. He takes a step closer. Nothing more than the thickness of a sheet of paper keeps our bodies from pressing together—our bodies that have missed and yearned for each other desperately for three months. “But I can’t stop wanting to, either.”
“Neither can I,” I admit, feeling the warmth and wetness of my arousal between my legs. Every part of me is crying out for him, like I’m dehydrated and he’s my only water, starving and he’s my only food.
Ever since he admitted why he never texted back at the library, I’ve let myself think about Halloween night more than ever. I’ve let myself think about every muscle on his body, every groan that ripped from his throat, every curse that fell from his lips as he filled me like I’ve never been filled before.
“This is dangerous,” he says, and I see his gaze fall to my lips. Suddenly, they buzz with the remembrance of his mouth crushing against mine, how he took control and drank in my moans.
“Too dangerous.” I say the words, but my body ignores their meaning. I feel myself gliding towards him, like a magnet being pulled to its opposite charge. That’s just how it was with us the first time—a magnetic, primal pull that neither of us could control.
His face dips down, our mouths on a collision course, slowly displacing the dense, hot, crackling air between us; soon nothing will separate our slick, hungry lips …
The sound of a door opening is like the sound of glass shattering, thrusting us back into reality. We jump apart, both of us realizing just how much we put on the line by almost kissing—at the arena no less, ground zero of all the reasons why we can’t be together.
If the wrong person walked around the corner at the wrong moment, both of our lives, everything we’ve worked for, would be at risk.
“Hey, Liam, you’re still here?” I recognize the person who steps out of the door that just opened as one of the physical trainers.
“Yeah, just talking with Zoey. We’re in the same Psych class.”Just talking. A half-truth if there ever was one.
“It’s good you’re still around. I’d actually like to do one more test on that knee of yours. Can’t be too careful with another game coming up in two days. You have time?”
Liam nods. “Yeah, I have time.” He turns to me; his gaze is like a firepit the night after a roaring bonfire—spent and cindery, but still glimmering with red-hot embers, and so hot that you’d burn your finger if you dared to touch it. “See you later, Zoey.”
A shiver wracks my body at the way he says my name. “Yeah. Later.”
I breathe a sigh of relief when he walks into the trainer’s room and the door shuts behind them.
This game we’re playing is way too risky.
The worst part? I’m not sure I trust myself to stop playing.
12
ZOEY
“Well, when that wanker told me he was going to shag my mumandthe Queen, the gloves had to come off and the fists had to start flying. Penalties be damned.”
“Understandable,” I laugh. That’s one story that’s definitely going to make for a successful post.
I’m attending a Hot Shots practice, and right now, I’m sitting in the penalty box.
Not because of anything I did—I’m working on a new social media campaign where I interview the players about some of the more memorable reasons they’ve been sent to the Sin Bin. We’ll be posting a photo of the player sitting in the penalty box, with their most memorable Sin Bin Story as accompanying text.
Oooh, Sin Bin Stories! That’s what we can call it!
My dad’s whistle cuts through the air.
“That’s my cue to get back to it,” Grant says. He’s their giant of a defensemen, hailing from across the pond in Britain. I don’t doubt that any post featuring him is going to have fantastic engagement. “Nice to meet you.”
“You too, Grant,” I reply, cheeks still rosy from laughing so hard at his stories.
