Offside: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (13 page)

It’s Topher’s responsibility but I do it anyway. I pull the team together and I bang helmets like Harrison has just done to mine, punch arms and slap chests hard to animate them. I tell Hunter I’ve just seen his Mom getting gangbanged in the locker room by their whole offensive unit, and Sparks that his Mom was queueing up to be next. I tell every single one of them that if we win, I’ll take them all out for dinner and if we lose they’ll be joining me on a twenty mile run.

Just before we are ready, I wrap my arm around Topher’s neck and pull him close.

“A grand for every pass you throw that gets caught, by me or anyone else. Every time you get sacked or a play ends without a point you owe me the same. You can handle that, right?”

“Fuck you.”

“Come on Topher, don’t tell me you really are a pussy. I thought you had way more confidence than that.”

Topher eyeballs me. “You drop the ball, you fucking owe me, English.”

“Alright. Just don’t throw me a hooky ball.”

“I’ve never thrown a hooky ball in my life.”

“Then let’s fucking do this and make sure we do it right. Penny’s watching after all.”

“Just get the fuck into position and concentrate on what you do best. Keeping your mouth shut and your limp dick in your pants.”

“According to Penny, I’m not the one with the limp dick.”

“Fuck you, English.”

“You keep saying that, I’ll begin to think you mean it.”

It takes a while, but eventually we manage it. Hunter stands up tall, Sparks takes number forty-eight out of the game for just long enough, Topher sidesteps a sack perfectly and passes the ball to me confidently enough and quickly enough that I’m already up to nearly full speed after half a dozen strides. The looks I get from their defensive line as I tear it into shreds are priceless.

“Too slow”, I shout. “Far too fucking slow.”

I’ve always been blessed with speed, even with the size of my frame, and once I get going, very little can stop me. I’m like that in other areas of my life too, if there’s something I want, there is very little that can stop me from getting it.

There is one player between me and the end zone and there isn’t time to go around him. To be fair, he gives as good as he’s probably got, and to a lesser man it would be enough to stop them. He doesn’t stop me. He does little else than rebound off my chest and end up banging his head in the dirt. He’s still there, flat out, while I’m holding the ball up into the air, leaning against the goal post and waving to the one girl in the crowd who I know will appreciate it ten times more than anyone else. I can’t see her, but I know she’ll be looking.

Harrison’s still working through a list of curse words when we join him again on the bench.

“You took your fucking sweet time about that.”

“Sorry, Harrison. Topher was fucking around.”

“Fuck you.”

“That’s a grand you owe me.”

“I’ll pay you if you do it again enough times that we win.”

“You keep pretending you know how to throw properly and that might be possible.”

Guess what? By the end of the game, Topher owes me three grand. We fucking win. Nobody can believe it, least of all Harrison. He does a victory lap around the field and then fist pumps the air so hard I think he’s having a heart attack. I get two touchdowns in total, that catch and then a rushed play that nets me over sixty yards. Our wide reciever Benks gets the other, from a plumb pass out of nowhere by Topher who finally remembers how to play.

Everyone’s fucking ecstatic. Nobody can fucking believe it. The game ends 27-24 in our favor with three touchdowns and two kicked field goals to three touchdowns and a single field goal. It was tense, nail-biting at the end but we fucking did it.

“You remembered how to play.”

Hunter throws his helmet to the ground grabs me by the waist and lifts me up into the air. I don’t know whether he’s going to kiss me or squeeze the life out of me but after a while he puts me down.

“You're something else.”

“You know, that’s exactly what your mom said to me.”

I see Topher coming over. “That was wild, English. Fucking wild.”

“I told you we could do it.”

“Shit, brother, I never doubted you.”

There is one person missing from this and I look for her and wait for her but she doesn’t come. Eventually, after Harrison has finished saluting the fans, the team have carried Topher and I both on their shoulders half the length of the field and Hunter’s made sure his mom’s not still sucking the opposition team’s cocks, we file back into the locker room where talk turns to celebration.

“Where the fuck are we going tonight?”

“Ask Topher, he’s paying for it.”

“Three grand”, Sparks whistles. “That’s a lot of money for someone who isn’t even getting a paycheck this month.”

“It’s a lot for the amount you earn.”

“You two miserable motherfuckers can celebrate at home with soda. You’re banned remember? I don’t want a repeat of what happened two weeks ago.”

Harrison’s mood seems to have soured again.

“We just won for the first time in two years. Against the Patriots. Are you fucking kidding me?”

“I’m warning you, Topher. You’re on thin ice already.”

Topher waves his hand dismissively. “Whatever.”

He turns to me and lowers his voice. “You’re coming right?”

I smile. “Of course I’m fucking coming. I’m leading, remember? I thought you’d worked that out already.”

I’m the last to leave. I tell Topher it’s because I want to savor the moment out on the field for as long as possible, even though that isn’t the reason why. I don’t know if Topher realizes it either, but he leaves me to it. I tell them I’ll meet up with them later on, for them not to start the party without me and for Topher to put his card behind the bar. I tell them to make sure they buy good champagne, and I tell Harrison he’s got nothing to worry about. I’m going home, straight to bed, not a foot out of line.

I’m walking through the parking lot when I hear her voice, the sky already threatening to get dark. It’s what I’d hoped, but hadn’t entirely expected and when I hear her, my heart skips a beat.

“Where do you think you’re going so soon?”

When I spin on my heels to face her, I’m not the only one with a smile across my face that could light up the darkest of winter’s nights.

Penny. And boy does she look every bit a million dollars.

Penny

Jasper drops his shoulders, puts his hands into lightly closed fists in the hip pockets of the jacket that hangs so beautifully on his perfect frame he could be modelling it, and leans casually against the car behind him.

“You just can’t keep away, can you?”

I smile innocently, looking away momentarily and then back at him. This is that scene from a million romance novels and a million more film adaptations. I’m looking for reasons but I can’t find them. What am I doing here? I’m here because I can’t be anywhere else. Jasper pulls me magnetically towards him as though by divine right or inescapable force.

“Thought you might need a lift home.”

“Is that what this is?”

I nod. Jasper looks like he knows exactly what this is. I know that cocky fucker is playing with me. I don’t even know what this is, not yet. I mean, it’s me asking him but what I’m really asking him, I just don’t know yet.

“And Topher?”

I watched Topher leave the ground, get in his car and drive away. “Topher doesn’t give a shit about me.”

“He thinks you’re going to take him back.”

“I’m done with football players.”

Jasper’s eyes go wide. “Really?”

“Yeah. Football players, rugby players, big strong men, I’m over it completely.”

I’m stepping closer to him.

“Maybe you just had some bad luck.”

Toe to toe, I have to crane my neck to look up to him. I like the way my feet look at least half the size of his. I shuffle them closer until they are touching. I want to climb on top and have him fly me away somewhere.

“Maybe.”

“Not all sportsmen are like Topher.”

“What are you like?”

It’s been a week since I kicked him out, but a lot longer than that since I should have done. My relationship with Topher was in the dying stages at the start of this year. Somehow we’ve been keeping it alive, but most of the time we’ve been lying to each other. Topher to me, me to myself. Maybe I’m rushing into things, letting Jasper see me like this, letting him in, asking for a something I can’t even yet define. Maybe I just need to hold myself back from harm and then maybe, just maybe, I need to rush at this full blooded, forget about danger, and just have a bit of fun. It’s been so long since Topher and I fucked. So long since I felt like I had a boyfriend at all. Watching Topher play made me feel even more distant from him, like the last three years were crystallizing together in a way that made me see things clearly for the first time in the whole of the weird depths and twists and turns of our relationship. And then seeing Jasper run with that ball, the freedom he showed out on the field made me want that too. Plus, if I’m being absolutely honest, his ass looked way better in that lycra. Fuck Topher and what he did to me. If this is a revenge thing, so be it. I’m a big girl, I can handle myself. If I’m going to get kicked to the curb again, which something tells me I won’t with Jasper - even though I’ve clearly been wrong before - It’s better that I’m already on the curb when he does it, so there’s less distance for me to fall.

“I’m trouble, Penny. You know that. I’m a bad boy.”

“Maybe you just need to be tamed.”

“It’d have to be by the right girl. Someone special, unattached.”

“Who did you have in mind?”

“My mind’s gone totally blank. Do you know anyone?”

“Perhaps.”

“Oh, really? What are they like?”

“Shy, introverted, independent. Hot.”

I giggle a little when I say that.

“She sounds incredible. When can I meet her?”

I shrug my shoulders.

“You have to be careful with her. I think she likes you, but she’s fragile too.”

“What do you think she likes about me?”

“I don’t know, maybe the way your nose creases up when you smile. Maybe how your sensitive inside even though you don’t like to show it.”

Jasper smiles, creasing his nose up for me. “Sensitive inside?”

I nod.

“She sounds like she knows me really well.”

“She’s been watching you a bit, checking you out.”

“Naughty.”

“She’s just split up with her boyfriend. Maybe she’s just looking for a bit of fun.”

Jasper lets the words hang and there is nothing I want to do more than press myself against his powerful chest.

“What would her ex-boyfriend say to that?”

“He doesn’t get to.”

“I like you, Penny.”

“Are you a love them and leave them kind of guy?”

“You mean do I hit it and quit it like you’ve read about me? Sometimes. Sometimes I do that but it depends on the girl, the situation. I don’t fuck people around, and I don’t get involved if I’m not serious.”

“Like I said, this girl-.”

“She’s fragile.”

“Heartbroken.”

“You have to be in love first to be heartbroken afterwards.”

I look away for a moment. Maybe he’s right. Maybe what I’m feeling isn’t the sensation of having my heart broken but maybe the sensation of being lied to, trampled on and utterly deceived time and time again.

“What do you know about that?”

Jasper shrugs. “I’m sensitive inside.”

“You want to come home with me?”

Jasper’s mouth goes wide in mock surprise.

“Penny Grace Locke.”

“I know, right? Didn’t expect that, huh?”

“You’re full of surprises.”

“Nice ones?”

“If I kiss you now, in an empty parking lot in the middle of our training ground, someone might see us. Your dad’s probably watching us from the window of his office upstairs.”

“I thought you liked taking risks.”

“I like getting paid too. He might dock my wages another month.”

“He might even give you a black eye.”

“Maybe you’re the kind of trouble I need to avoid.”

“I don’t think you’re able to resist me.”

I step inside his embrace, the warmth of his chest snug and inviting. I can’t resist pulling myself as deeply as I can into him and together we lean against the car, tightly wound.

“I’m not the one asking you home.”

“You don’t have a home to ask me to.”

“A hotel room is still a home.”

“Shut the fuck up and kiss me. For a player, you move like an iceberg.”

“I was waiting for the moment, and besides which I’m not your average player.”

“I’m not your average girl, either.”

“Exactly.”

“Kiss me.”

I’m playing with fire but I’m done looking at the sticks. I want to gather them all together, throw them into a pile, pour gasoline on the stack and set them alight. I’m horny. I’m really fucking horny and as much as I know I should I can’t hold myself back. I know Jasper’s playing it cool, and I know why too. He’s doing it because he wants me to admit that I like him. That I’m the one that’s not been able to resist, that he’s the best, the winner, the almighty and unstoppable.

I can feel his cock swelling against my leg even before he leans into me to press his lips against mine.

With his hands cupping my cheek, my neck tilted up and my whole body inclined towards his, tip toes and tightened muscle, he lowers his lips towards mine and my heart skips a beat in the seconds he leaves it before he slowly presses them against me.

He tastes of magic. Of salt and sex and the possibility of endless moments like this, of stolen kisses in empty worlds of just us two and nobody else. His tongue waits until invited and I gather it with mine and pull it into me, teasingly, lovingly, recklessly. I bite lip and muscle and drag my teeth over his tongue to suck and open up to him a little bit more than I probably should, the intimacy of the kiss overwhelming me, the gap in the passion of my previous relationship driving me on. In the half a minute or so we are connected, I feel alive in more ways than I have done at any other point in the last three years. I feel waves of desire ride through me I’d long since forgotten I was capable of experiencing. My lips tingle with pins and needle's numbness and goose pimples break out on the skin of my forearms. Where Jasper his his hand cradled still at the back of my neck, the hair there stands on end and I have to hold onto the thick muscles of his arm just to steady myself.