First to Fail (Unraveled #3) - Marie Johnston Page 0,32
many others. I liked the subtlety of his interests.
“Hey, what can I get you?” His sleep-roughened voice was deeper. Instead of being tired and wanting to go back to bed, I wanted to hear him talk more.
“I just wanted some acetaminophen and maybe a glass of OJ if you have it. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
He started for the kitchen. “I’ll grab it and bring it up.”
I watched his broad back as he puttered through the kitchen. Giving myself a mental shake, I turned and went back upstairs. The bed was still warm, almost too warm with my sweats. I stayed sitting up but left the covers off.
He appeared down the hall and headed my way, a glass in each hand. The flutter in my stomach was undeniable. My own superhero in basketball shorts. He had nice legs. The muscles in his quads and calves bunched and flexed with each step. Basketball does a body good.
Did he still play, or had he traded the ball and hoop for comics and capes?
Playing probably didn’t hold a place in his life while running a business and raising a kid. Yet he’d gotten a full ride at Preston. What good did that do him? Had he gone to the same college he would’ve gone to without his Preston Academy pedigree? Had he gotten a full ride for all four years because of his time at Preston?
He approached the bed and held out the glass of juice. “How was the sleep?” He dropped a pill bottle on my lap that he’d been holding with his glass and drained his drink.
“Good.” I downed half of mine before getting two capsules out. “Thanks.” A word I’d been saying around him a lot. I swallowed my pills and polished off the cold drink.
He lifted my glass out of my hand and set it on the nightstand with his. I froze when he reached over me to grab the covers. “What are you doing?” With him so close, memories from our evening together bombarded me and my body said to hell with the aches and pains. The pleasure he could bring me was much more desirable.
He frowned. “Just tucking you back in. Don’t you want the covers over you?” Drawing away like he’d finally noticed his proximity, he released his handful of comforter, but I curled my hands into his shirt.
“I don’t know if I can go back to sleep.” Really? That was the best I could say when I was preventing him from backing away? Not that he was putting up any resistance.
“Doesn’t your head hurt?” His voice had dropped low, and even with his face shadowed from the hallway light behind him, his gaze simmered with barely restrained heat.
Pulling him closer, I whispered, “Not if I’m properly distracted.” When had I sounded so needy?
His lips landed on mine and I continued tugging him toward me as I lay back. He kept his weight on his hands and knees as he captured my mouth.
We both groaned into the kiss. It’d been too long since the last time we’d been together. His weight was a welcome burden and I wore the anti-Valaria equivalent of clothing—baggy sweats.
He kissed me slowly, as if he were waiting for me to shove him off at any moment. But I wouldn’t. Unless he objected, I had no plans to back out. It had been a shitty workweek of arguing with righteous parents and their entitled children, followed by slogging home to an empty house, topped off by getting strong-armed off the track during what was supposed to be an entertaining, lighthearted scrimmage.
No, the real topping was staring at the asbestos-filled ceiling of the community center, squinting at the low-hanging lights, and wondering how the hell I was going to manage if I had a concussion, an injury that required someone looking out for me.
Enter Chris. He’d come to my game. It was his weekend without Jaycee, and he’d been thinking about me, too.
I broke from his scorching lips to whisper, “Take my shirt off.”
He rocked his hips forward, the hard length of him barely restrained by the flimsy shorts. His gaze drilled into me like he was assessing my ability to make such a decision. The blow to my head hadn’t knocked the desire out of me. But resolve must’ve been obvious in my eyes because he sat back on his knees and rolled the hem of my sweatshirt up.
I lifted enough to get the sweatshirt over my head. His breath whooshed