Page 36 of Center Ice
“Hey,” he whispers, his eyes opening just enough to see me. A small smile plays across his lips, and his arm snakes around my back, pulling me flush against him. I want to close my eyes and go back to sleep, but with every part of my body touching his, I’m on fire. My nipples are pressed up against his chest and his fingers are gently massaging my lower back again.
Desire courses through my blood. My heart is pounding like it’s going to explode and the muscles in my lower abdomen contract involuntarily as yearning pulses through my core. That motion has my body pushing right into Drew’s dick, whichis already getting hard, and he groans and pushes his knee forward, between mine.
“Don’t do that,” he says, a note of warning in his voice, “unless you want more than a back massage.”
My brain is screaming at me to stop, to show him the door and go upstairs to my bed—alone, like always. But the hard ridge of his thigh is settled right against my clit, and my hips move forward against it, giving in to the need. The friction as I rub myself against him like that has me stifling a moan of pleasure so that it almost sounds like I’m choking.
Drew looks down at me, the question written clearly across his face:Is this really what you want?
Yes. No. I don’t even know. I feel so needy and out of control, but also like I’m tired of always having to maintain an iron grip on everything. I’m certain this is a terrible idea, but in this moment, I don’t really care. I just want to feel good, and IknowDrew can make me feel good.
I reach over, wrapping my hand behind his neck and intending to pull his face closer. He beats me to it, bringing his hand to the base of my skull and crashing his lips into mine. The kiss is needy and rough and passionate right at the first brush, and my lips part, inviting him in. He invades my mouth like he’s intent on conquering me, his tongue tangling with mine, his teeth grazing my lower lip as I continue to grind myself into his thigh.
He trails his fingers down my neck, across my shoulder, down the side of my ribcage, and to my waist. There, his thumb strokes the strip of skin that’s exposed between my t-shirt and my sweats. When he pulls back from the kiss, I want to push forward, chasing his mouth, but he looks at me and raises an eyebrow as he flattens his hand against my skin under my shirt and slides it up.
“May I?”
“Well, since you’ve asked so nicely…”
He pushes my shirt up at an achingly slow pace until my breasts are exposed, but I hate the feel of the shirt wadded up under my armpits, so I reach behind me and grab the shirt, lifting slightly as I pull it over my head and drop it on the arm of the couch.
Drew stares down at me with raw lust, and when he lifts his eyes to mine, his pupils are huge, making those brown eyes nearly black with need. I’ve never had anyone look at me with the longing I see reflected back at me right now.
His palm skims the underside of my breast, his thumb stroking across my nipple as I arch into his touch. He leans down to kiss me, gentler this time, his lips toying with mine like he’s taking his time while his thumb continues to circle my nipple. This achingly slow pace is driving me crazy. I want more of everything. I want to lose myself in these feelings until there’s nothing but pleasure racking my body.
Drew’s hips move forward, pressing his hard length into my lower abdomen. Raising my knee to his side, I wrap my leg around his lower back and line myself up with him, sliding my center along the hard bulge in his pants. The way his thumb is stroking across the hardened peak of my nipple has me groaning into his mouth, which in turn seems to light him on fire. His kisses are more insistent, and his pace is faster, until it feels like he could make me come just from the intense pleasure of his kiss and the friction of his dick pressing into my clit through my sweats.
He rolls to his back, holding me so that I end up completely on top of him with my knees on either side of his hips. My hair has fallen forward over my shoulders, mostly covering my breasts, so he sweeps his hand behind my neck and twists my hair into a rope that he releases down my back. “My God,you’re so fucking beautiful,” he says as he gazes up at me in the darkness.
The way he’s looking at me makes mefeelbeautiful, because there’s more than just lust in his gaze. I don’t know how to quantify it, but he’s looking at me with some degree of affection and understanding and respect, which doesn’t even make sense. I barely know this man now, and I never knew him that well in the first place.
“Audrey, I want you so badly. But you have to know that I’m not in a place in my life where I can be in a relationship. Not because I don’t want that with you, but because hockey and my mom have to come first. And I need to prioritize getting to know Graham. I’ve thought about this a lot, actually.” He sighs. “And you deserve more than to be fourth in line for someone’s attention.”
It’s nothing I didn’t know—it’s what I’ve been telling myself about him all along—but him verbalizing it in this moment is enough to give me pause. I know that he means what he’s saying. This isn’t just sex. But it also can’t be more than that right now.
“Are you not available for a relationship right now, or ever?”
His shoulders relax, and one corner of his lips turns up. “You’re the only one I’d be interested in having a relationship with, when I am able.”
I rest my forehead against his, reminding myself that it’s okay to have this night with him, even if it can’t be more. It’s okay to let him make me feel good, and to make him feel good in return. We can do that for each other, without having to put a label on it.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” He sounds surprised, but then his hands skim up my sides to cup my breasts, and I lean into his touch, eager to be closer to him. And just as he slides his thumbs across my nipplesagain, we hear Graham’s voice, sleepy but laced with a little worry, from the top of the stairs. “Mom?”
My head snaps up, and Drew and I lock eyes, my panicked expression meeting his amused gaze. And the way he’s not taking this situation—the fact that our son might walk down those stairs and see this—seriously pisses me off.
I reach down and scoop my t-shirt off the arm of the couch, dragging it on as I call out, “I’ll be right there, Graham.” Then I’m climbing off Drew and rushing up the stairs to find out what’s wrong.
“I didn’t know where you were,” Graham says when I hit the top of the stairs.
“I haven’t gone to bed yet. Why are you up, anyway?” I ask as I run my hand across his head, smoothing the hair off his forehead, which is warmer than it should be.
“My head hurts,” he says. “So does my throat.”
I feel guilty that my first thought isOf course.Of course he gets sick when Jules leaves and I don’t have anyone here to help me, when I have my period and feel like crap myself, and when I have a hot guy downstairs who was about to do unspeakable things to make my body feel better.At least it wasn’t the middle of the night, I remind myself. I’m trash at dealing with things like this when I’m woken up from a deep sleep.
“Okay, let’s get you back into bed and I’ll go get you some medicine and something to drink.” I walk him from the hallway back into his room, and tuck him into his bed. “I’ll be right back,” I say, giving him a kiss on top of his head.
