Dating the Defensive Back (The Nash Brothers Book 1)

You Have a Guest

Nerves tackle my spine as I get closer and closer, and once I’m there, I pull into a spot at the back of the lot.

I look up at the large buildings sprawling out in front of me, and I pull up a map to try to figure out where I’m going.

He told me his room number when I asked about the hotel. He has no idea I’m showing up tonight.

I count buildings, and then I count windows, and rather than go inside where I might get caught, I toss a little pebble at the second-story window when I think I’m in the right place.

The curtains slide to the side a moment later, and oh shit, it’s Patrick Harris.

I duck behind a bush as he glances around, and then he pulls the curtains shut again. I look at the map on my phone and back up at the windows, and I pick up more pebbles to try the one next to Patrick’s.

“What are you doing?” a voice behind me says, and I whip around.

“Lincoln!” I gasp.

“Are you trying to sneak in to see my brother?”

Heat rushes to my cheeks. “No!”

“Really?” he asks. “Because if you are, I can get you in. If you aren’t, you’ll probably be arrested.”

My eyes widen. “Fine. Yes. He doesn’t know I’m here, and I don’t want him to get into any trouble. But I need to see him. I need to tell him I love him.”

Lincoln blows out a breath. “Finally.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Finally. I can’t deal with his lack of focus another second, so get in there and do what you have to do to get him on track for tomorrow.”

“He’s not focused?” I say. He’s seemed fine to me during his games.

“He’s in love, and the woman he’s in love with has been holding back. Trust me when I say I know what that’s like. Now do you want to see him, or do you want to stand out here talking to me?”

“Him,” I say immediately. He looks a little offended, and I laugh. “As lovely as it is chatting out here with you.”

“Of course,” he scoffs, and then I follow him through the complex and toward Grayson’s room…which, by the way, is in another building entirely.

“Gray, it’s me,” Lincoln says as he bangs on a door.

The door swings open. “What the fuck do you wa—’ Grayson’s jaw drops, and his eyes widen as they land on me. He draws in a sharp breath.

Lincoln steps aside and urges me in. “You have a guest. Don’t stay up too late.”

Grayson’s eyes don’t leave mine as he murmurs, “Thanks.” I step into his room, and the door closes behind him. “What are you doing here?”

“It felt like we left some things unsaid, so I figured I’d swing by so we could talk.”

“Some things unsaid?” he repeats, and we walk into the room. He perches on the edge of his bed, and I sit on the couch right across from him.

I nod. “You go first.”

“I miss you,” he says quietly. “I loved being with you last night. It felt so good and right, and I’m trying so hard to give you space and time, but I just…I miss you.”

Heat pinches behind my eyes as I have the urge to rush into his arms. I don’t—yet. I stay where I am because we need to clear the air before anything else happens. “I miss you, too,” I admit. “Last night was good. Really good. Having you right next to me felt so comfortable. You just fit. And being with my mom and Thomas, it all sort of came crashing down on me—the reality that life is short and unexpected and scary and beautiful.”

His eyes move to mine. “I love you. You were the one who was fighting for me to see that we belong together, and now somehow those roles have reversed. We belong together. I’m fighting for you. I love you. Can’t you see that?” His tone is riddled with frustration that we aren’t together even though we should be, and I’m finally feeling it, too.

We’ve been apart long enough.

“Of course I see it, Grayson. And I love you, too. I never stopped, and I never will.”

He’s silent for a beat, and then he finally asks, “Then why are we apart?”

“Because I’m scared.”

He stands, and he closes the short distance spanning between us. He reaches out, and I set my hands in his as he pulls me up off the couch.

“I don’t know what else to do to prove to you that you don’t have to be scared. I’m not going anywhere. It’s been months since we were together, and I haven’t stopped thinking about you. I haven’t so much as looked at another woman. My chest aches all the time when I think about you and us and how good we were together before I fucked it all up. I’m so sorry, and I will never run scared again. You are it for me—any way I can have you, even if it’s just as a friend like it has been for the last few months. You’re my future. No one else. Before, the thought of kids and marriage scared the hell out of me. But it’s nothing compared to the thought of not having you in my life. I promise you, Ava. I won’t run again. I won’t leave you. I won’t hurt you. Because doing any of those things would kill me.”

The heat pinching behind my eyes forms into a tear that drops onto my cheek. I brush it away. “I…I don’t know what to say,” I admit. “I want to be with you, too.”

“That’s exactly what I’ve been waiting to hear for three and a half long months,” he says, and his mouth crashes down to mine.

He kisses me like he’s trying to make up for lost time, his fingertips diving into my hair as the urgency of his mouth on mine intensifies and deepens. We’re both crazed with need and lust, but overpowering all of that is this deep love spanning between us. He pulls my body against his, and I wrap my arms around him as I give in to the feel of having him in my arms again.

It’s where we belong.

But before we can seal this with more intimate promises, I pull back.

“I do have a couple conditions,” I warn.

“I would expect nothing less,” he says, his eyes hooded when they meet mine.

“For starters, you don’t run. If you get scared, you come talk to me like an adult, and we work it out.”

“Deal. Done. What else you got?” he asks.

“No more secrets. No more lies. On either side of this.”

“Deal,” he agrees. “I have a condition, too.”

“Oh, you do, do you?” I ask, my tone full of sass. “What is it?”

“That I hear your voice every single day.”

“Agreed,” I say softly.

“Anything else?” he asks.

“Just that you take me to bed and rock my world.”

He grins. “Now that I can do.”

And he does.

He lifts me into his arms as if I weigh nothing at all, and he tosses me down onto the bed. I giggle as he climbs up over me, and his eyes find mine. His are dark with desire, and I feel it too. This time apart has shown me that I never want to be apart from him again.

His fingertips trace my jawline then dip down, tracing a line down my torso to my belly. He moves his hand to my hip as his lips fall to mine, and this kiss still has the same urgent undertones, but it’s slower—as if we have all the time in the world.

We don’t. He has to get up early, and he needs his rest ahead of tomorrow’s game.

But tonight…he’s all mine.

He reaches under my shirt, and he yanks down my bra to expose one nipple. His thumb brushes over it, and my hips jerk toward his.

It’s been a minute since I’ve had a man’s touch, and this feels so…different.

Sure, we were in love the last time we were together like this, but there wasn’t the undertone that it was meant to last forever.

Now there is.

We’ve been to hell and back. We’ve been broken. But now we’re piecing it all back together, and the intimacy of this moment is heightened by the emotional connection that’s stronger than ever before.

He breaks the kiss to trail his lips down my neck, and then he pulls back to pull my shirt off. I yank on the hem of his, too, and he pulls it over his head. I run my fingertips along the abs that are even more cut than they were the last time we were together. His body is different. It’s all muscle and hard planes. This is in season Grayson as opposed to the offseason Grayson I was with before.

He sucks a nipple into his mouth, and I moan my approval as I feel his tongue flick against the tight bud. I grab onto the back of his head, urging him to keep doing exactly what he’s doing, and he drops a hand down. He pushes past my jeans and dips into my panties, and then his finger slips right inside me.

He grunts as my hips jerk again, but it doesn’t stop him from the work he’s putting into my nipple. He only stops to start trailing kisses down my body. He pulls his hand out and works my jeans down my legs, tossing them on the floor. He pulls my panties down next, and he gets naked, too.

Then he dives headfirst into my pussy.

He shoves two fingers in while he sucks on my clit, and I love it. I love every second of it. It’s hot and intimate, but I’ve been waiting too damn long for him. I need him inside me like I need to take my next breath. I can’t take not having him there another second longer.

I grip his shoulders as I murmur, “Grayson?”

“Yeah?” he whispers against my hot, wet pussy. His breath is warm, and it nearly pushes me into an orgasm.

“I need you inside me.”

His eyes are so dark with lust they’re nearly black in the dimly lit room. He shifts up the bed until he’s hovering over me, and his eyes fall to mine as he reaches between us and pushes himself inside.

“You can take it, baby,” he murmurs as he pushes all the way in, and I clutch him to me as my body stretches again after too long apart.

But it’s like our bodies were made for this. I adjust to his size as my body squeezes him inside me, and he stays still for a few beats as we both relish the feel of each other.

I wrap my legs around his waist as I urge him to start moving, and he groans as he starts to fill me with his heavenly, deep strokes.

“Oh God,” I gasp as he starts to pick up speed.

He grunts as he rocks into me, pushing my body to its limits as I fight the urge to give in and come. I’m not ready for it to be over. It feels like it just started, and I want to lie beneath him forever as he continues to drive those deep strokes into me.

Trying to stop my body from giving into the pleasure is like trying to stop a freight train with my bare hands. “Oh yes, yes, yes,” I cry out.

“You like that?” he asks as he starts to move even faster.

I arch into him as I claw at his back, my orgasm within reach as he pushes me to some new, sublime state I’ve never experienced before.

It’s that land of love, where I’m skipping through the forest with his hand in mine, and at the same time, the land of pleasure where I’m teetering on the edge of my entire body exploding.

It’s the heady combination of the two that pushes me over, and the tidal wave plows into me.

“Fuck, baby, fuck, I’m coming, fuck,” he grunts as he crashes into his own release.

Our bodies move in perfect synchronization as we rocket through the pleasure together, pushing the boundaries of our emotions and our love and our intimacy.

It’s sexy and sweet, and a little forbidden since I’m not supposed to be here, but we’re finally free and clear of the lies and the secrets, and nothing stands between us any longer.

“God, I love you,” he says, his voice emotional when our bodies start to come down from the high. His lips drop to mine, and he doesn’t pull out of me right away. I feel his cock twitching inside me, and my pussy seems to squeeze him inside, trying to hold him there forever.

He kisses me slowly, luxuriously, as if we have forever.

And maybe we do.

It’s not something I ever believed before…but I sure as hell believe it now.