Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 97882 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 489(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 326(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97882 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 489(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 326(@300wpm)
Football was everything to me. It always had been.
I couldn’t throw that all away.
I tried to cement that into my thick skull as I swam, and finally, my arms and legs burned enough that I stopped and came up for air.
I was in the deep end, and I hung my arms over the edge of the pool, chest heaving with every breath I struggled to take. My heart was racing, body on fire with the intensity of the workout. But I felt good — sated in the way only a brutal cardio session could warrant.
“Impressive.”
I startled, whipping around at the unexpected voice that nearly made me jump out of my fucking skin.
And there she was, Julep Lee, sitting on the edge of the other end of the pool in a thong and sports bra with her bare feet swinging idly in the water.
I couldn’t help the way my eyes trailed slowly up the length of her, over her exposed thighs and abdomen, the lines of her collarbone, all the way up to her eyes that were watching me just as carefully. She held my gaze for a moment before quickly tying her hair up in a knot on top of her head, and then she pressed her palms into the tile on either side of her hips, carefully lifting.
And she slid inch by inch into the water.
I swallowed, watching her legs and waist disappear under the surface before she began walking toward me, her fingers skating along the top of the water as she did.
“How does your shoulder feel after that?”
I wiped a hand over my face, still holding on to the edge of the pool. “My shoulder isn’t an issue anymore.”
“Oh?” she asked, pausing at the edge of the pool once the water hit the top of her chest. She stretched her arms out over the side. “So, what’s the issue, then? What has you swimming laps at almost five in the morning?”
I let out a breath of a laugh, looking away from her. “I think we both know the answer to that.”
She didn’t respond, but when I looked back at her, all hints of a smile were gone. She swallowed under the weight of my gaze, her eyes flicking between mine.
I took a breath, disappearing under the water and kicking off the wall. I swam toward her, her legs and hips a blurred vision through the chlorine that burned my eyes until I stopped just a few feet away from where she stood. I popped up, inhaling a breath and running my hand over my hair to get it out of my face.
She tilted her chin a little higher, like she was trying to prove something, but I didn’t miss how her breath caught in her throat for a moment before she was able to exhale.
“Why are you here?”
“I couldn’t sleep either,” she confessed, her voice as low as a whisper.
I slowly walked toward her, and again, she angled her jaw up, chest puffing, fingertips pressing into the tile where she had her arms outstretched like everything inside her wanted to flee and they were the only thing rooting her in place.
“Why couldn’t you sleep?”
My voice was low, husky, a question and a dare all in one.
Julep swallowed. “You know why.”
I pressed in closer, her chest heaving more and more as that distance between us vanished. I paused right in front of her, less than an inch between us under the water. Her eyes fell to my lips, and I swore I could hear her heart beating even over the pounding of my own.
“I’m tired of us asking questions we already know the answer to.”
She just watched me, waiting.
“Say it,” I demanded. “Tell me why you couldn’t sleep.”
Her eyelids fluttered, but she held strong, held them open, her mouth clamped shut like she refused to give me any satisfaction.
So, I pushed over that pencil-thin line between us, one hand under the water skating along the line of her bottom rib.
“Holden,” she breathed on a warning, but her eyes closed, her lips parting as chills raced over her skin.
“Tell me why you couldn’t sleep, Julep,” I said again, finger sliding up that rib to the bottom edge of her sports bra. I traced that, too, staring down at her chest as it swelled and deflated in rapid succession. The tip of my nose found the bridge of hers, but then I stilled, not moving another centimeter as I waited for her response.
Something like a whimper slipped out of her, like she’d die if I didn’t touch her fully, if I didn’t take her the way every cell in my body yearned to.
She swallowed, her eyes popping open and connecting with mine.
“I couldn’t sleep because when I undressed and crawled under those sheets, my body burned from the memory of your hand between my legs.”