Offside: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (52 page)

“Landon?”

“What?”

“Kiss me, you jerk.”

“That, I can do.”

I pull Tilly towards me and walk a little deeper into the lake so she can use the buoyancy of the water to lift her legs up and keep them wrapped around my waist. I’d love to fuck her like this, and just having her in such close proximity makes my dick hard in seconds. She feels it against her and shakes her head.

“That would be stupid.”

“Real stupid.”

I don’t know who does it first, or whether we do it together, but a few moments later, without even discussing it, without even helping it along the way, I’m back up inside her. It’s not to fuck her, it’s to feel it, inside her, without a condom on, the risk, the danger, the need of it too much for either of us to resist, and for a long while until the cold of the water finally beats us back to the car, we are one, Tilly’s legs locked around my waist, my entire length up inside her, fixed together and frozen in time.

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T
illy

I never thought perfection would come to me while standing waist deep in the crystal clear water of a freezing cold lake, but I guess I never thought I’d be doing it with Landon Maddox either, so maybe I thought perfection wasn’t ever going to come at all.

Still shivering, still locked together, I hug myself tightly into him and hold on for as long as I dare. Doing it without a condom on is fucking stupid and we both know that, but it seems like we both know too that trying to resist something when you want it more than anything else is pretty much impossible as well.

We’re not fucking either, I mean, he’s inside me, and I’m not resisting it, but neither of us are moving. Neither of us need to come. I’d describe this as an intimate hug rather than a form of copulation, and intimate hugs don’t end in pregnancy.

I rest my head in the curve where his neck meets his shoulder, nuzzle into the warm moist skin, and feel the sun on my back just hot enough in the fading light of the afternoon to keep me from wanting to move. I could stay here forever and be happy, at least while the sun stays out.

“You want to swim?”

“Not yet.”

This place is really beautiful. The lake gives way to a low line of hills that feed further back into mountains and disappear into a hazy horizon. There may be more rain on the way at a distance, but right now it’s sunshine and blue skies and we are the only people here to enjoy it. Perhaps the only two people in a fifty mile radius or more. There’s something special about that, something important, and the isolation we find ourselves in makes me think more seriously about the feelings I’m beginning to develop for him.

The Donkey. I’m actually fucking The Donkey. It’s happened. Landon fucking Maddox is my casual hook up that could turn into a serious relationship. He’s also my stepbrother, which seems to be bothering me much more than it does him. In fact, Landon seems to be taking this all in his stride. He’s undoubtedly more experienced than I am, but maybe he should be more wary too, I mean the things I’ve read about him. The one night stands, the relationships that never were, the string of women. The false starts and fuck ups, the effect it’s all had on his career.

This could all end in nothing when we go back home, and it could all end in nothing even if we both wanted it to continue if the wrong people found out about us. And then maybe I’m just getting ahead of myself. Maybe I just can’t believe I’ve really got what I always wanted just in case someone comes along and steals him away from me.

“Tilly?”

“Yeah?”

“I’ve got to move, I’m freezing my balls off.”

I pull away to look at him, my eyes narrowing theatrically.

“And here I was thinking you were going to say something romantic.”

“I don’t want to spoil you too soon.”

I’m not annoyed, I actually find it quite funny.

“Ass-hole.”

I struggle away, which he makes more difficult by holding onto my legs until I eventually manage to kick free, and swim a little towards the centre of the lake. The water is so clear I can see the bottom. It isn’t deep either, perhaps a metre or so at this point, up to three metres further out. Swimming feels good too, and swimming naked really liberating. Believe it or not, I’ve never done it before, but mostly because I’ve never had the opportunity.

Landon gives chase and I splash water at him just to let him know he has to keep his distance, which he does. I dive under, the cold water making my eyes sting for a moment, swim past Landon to pinch his ass on the way and break the water about twenty metres further up.

I can’t touch the bottom here, so I tilt backwards instead, to float on the lightly bobbing surface and look up at the thick spread of blue sky above me. That little swim has been energetic enough to flood my body with warmth, and lying here in the silence of the landscape that surrounds us feels like one of the best things i’ve ever done in my whole life.

When Landon unexpectedly breaks the water between my legs, replacing that silence with a volley of splashing and screaming, I nearly have a heart attack. I’m ready to berate him, kick him hard in the balls or force his head under the water until he screams a stream-of-water apology, but he doesn’t give me time. As soon as I’ve opened my mouth, he’s closed it again with a kiss and then gathered me up in his arms, to lift me up into the air above him like a trophy.

Up here I feel on top of the world. Up here, the sun now warming my back, I feel better than I did in the water. Landon has his hands on my hips, placed perfectly not to cause me any discomfort, and I’m light enough for him to be able to lift me all the way over his head, and balanced enough to be able to hold my arms out in front of me and pretend I’m a superhero.

“You planning any more shocks for me?”

“Come on, we both knew that was going to happen.”

“Just because I lie down on my back doesn’t mean I’m giving you an invite to put your head between my legs.”

“I’ll remind you of that later.”

“I don’t care what you do later, as long as you don’t make a sound.”

“Our sex life is so restrictive.”

“At least it’s less restrictive than it was two days ago.”

“I can’t wait until we get home.”

“Why? What are you going to do then?”

“If you lie down again, I’ll show you.”

“I’m going to need a bed.”

“I’m sure that can be arranged.”

“Maybe a jacuzzi.”

Landon shakes his head.

“Come on, I was about to get into it with you before Mom and Marvin showed up.”

“I wish we could have.”

“What we did was way better.”

“Tilly?”

“Yeah?”

“You look great from down here by the way.”

“Shut up and hold me steady.”

“I’m not the one wobbling about.”

“I guess you’re just not as strong as you thought you were.”

“Maybe you’re just having more of an affect than I thought you would.”

“You can put me down if you like.”

“You won’t tell anyone I had to?”

“It’ll be our secret.”

“Good, because my arms are fucking killing me.”

Landon half lowers half drops me to the water. To be fair, he has been holding me up in the air for a while, much longer than I expected. I’m impressed, even though I’m not going to tell him so. We tread water a little, spinning slowly in a neat little circle.

“What else do you need?”

“Not much. A bed and a jacuzzi is a good start. Somewhere to art.”

We both smile at that.

“A studio?”

“A space. I’m not a professional yet remember.”

“You will be soon though, right?”

“That’s the two year plan. Although who knows what will happen? If someone told me i’d be skinny dipping with my stepbrother in a lake in the middle of nowhere after knowing him for five days, I would have told them they were mad.”

“Where else are you going to go skinny dipping if not in a lake in the middle of nowhere?”

I have to splash water at him for that.

“What do you do when this is all over?”

“The same thing I always do. Play football.”

“And chase girls?”

“I’m hoping I won’t need to do that.”

I get water splashed back at me for that.

“You’ve got to look after me.”

“You don’t seem all that difficult to please.”

“Artists are complicated people.”

“Don’t sell yourself too short now.”

“Just a warning, you know, for when the honeymoon period is over and you start getting bored of me.”

“You seem to have a clear picture of a future that hasn’t even happened yet.”

“I’m thinking about that jacuzzi.”

“Finally.”

Landon begins to swim towards me.

“I just don’t want to be used up and tossed away like an old football, that’s all.”

I allow him to gather me up in his arms again, so I can press myself against his chest and lose myself in his body warmth. I feel stupid for saying it straight like that, without even hiding it in a mask of subtext, but I feel like we’re at the point where I need it to be said.

“Don’t worry, Tilly. I wouldn’t do that to family.”

“When are you going to stop being a smart-ass?”

“When I know you don’t enjoy me doing it anymore.”

“You know, that cockiness is going to get you into trouble one day.”

“I think it already has.”

Landon notices me shivering a little now that we’ve stopped swimming around.

“Come on, let’s get back to the car. It might take us a while to find somewhere selling condoms, and the last thing we want is for your mom and my dad to get concerned about our whereabouts.”

“They’re probably just as happy about the time alone as we are. They are newlyweds after all.”

“That’s gross, Tilly.”

“I’m just saying.”

Wrapped around his back, Landon carries me out of the water and back up towards the car. It isn’t raining any more, but the sun is disappearing quickly across the horizon and tonight feels like it’s going to get cold.

“Do you think they know?”

“About us? No way.”

In the car, Landon starts the engine and turns on the heater. We huddle together in front of it trying to get dry.

“Mom was acting weird this morning, she might have heard us last night.”

Landon shakes his head.

“No-one heard us last night. I think you’re just being paranoid. She didn’t seem weird when I got up.”

“Maybe we should hold off tonight, I don’t know whether I can be that quiet again.”

“I don’t know whether I can hold off.”

“I knew it.”

“Knew what.”

“You wouldn’t be able to resist me.”

“What can I say? You’re an attractive girl, you’re smart too, well balanced. You even like jacuzzis.”

“Maybe we would make a good couple.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Because I seem to be immune to your bullshit.”

“Now you’re just being nice.”

It takes so long for the heater to get us dry, we give up in the end and pull clothes back on over wet legs and arms.

“Next time we’ll have to bring a towel.”

“What will your mom say when she finds out we’ve been swimming?”

“She’s not going to find out, it was raining when we left remember?”

“Good thinking, Tilly.”

“Not just a pretty face.”

“No, I hear you’re training to be an artist too.”

“Shut up and get us back home.”

“Bored of me already?”

“I’m hungry. If we’re going to fuck again tonight, I’m going to need some more energy.”

“See?”

“What?”

“You really can’t resist me.”

“Then we are just as bad as each other.”

Landon pulls the car around and guides it back onto the road.

“I knew we wouldn’t be able to stop once we started.”

“You or me?”

Landon doesn’t answer that one. He just gives me one of his panty melting looks instead that tells me the question is rhetorical.

“Think we can get away with it tomorrow as well?”

“Maybe your dad will be well enough to go for a long walk, while we finally sit in that jacuzzi.”

“You wouldn’t prefer doing it on a bed instead?”

“There’s plenty of time for that, Landon. I don’t want to spoil you with comfort too soon.”

“I might get bored.”

“Or complacent.”

“Exactly.”

“Where are we going to buy condoms?”

“Tilly, you’re insatiable.”

“I’m just planning ahead. As much as I like the idea of fucking you without them, until I’m on birth control or you get a vasectomy, it’s a risk I’m not prepared to take.”

“We’ll find them, don’t worry. I’m not ready to go under the knife just yet. Of course, there’s always anal.”

“And I didn’t have you down as the bisexual type.”

“Funny.”

“I try.”

We find our way to a highway service station out on the main road, at which we fill up with gas, buy chocolate, a magazine that has a new advert of Landon in it and a large pack of condoms. This is the first time that Landon and I have been together with someone else who isn’t Mom or Marvin, in a public place doing something ordinary, and I know we aren’t it yet, but I can’t help imagine us as a normal couple in a normal relationship, doing something normal people do.

For just that briefest of moments, I forget completely that Landon is my stepbrother, and it feels absolutely incredible. At one point, I catch myself touching him in a way only two people who have been intimate would touch each other, and pull my hand away as soon as I realize as though the thing has caught on fire, just in case someone spots us.

We’re not anywhere near that moment yet and I have to be careful. The last thing I want to do is scare him off. The line between being clear about what you want and coming on too strong is a thin and murky one and I desperately don’t want to fuck it up.

Today, yesterday, tonight, tomorrow, it’s been so amazing already, it feels like a lot longer than only two days, and I want to make sure it turns into a lot more than that. I’m fairly convinced that Landon feels the same way too, but I’m not going to know for sure until we’re back in our normal lives doing that normal shit that makes us who we really are on a day to day basis. Landon’s inability to hold down a relationship, his track record, mine too, the fact that we are stepbrother and stepsister, all of those things conspire against us and if the feelings we have for each other aren’t strong enough, and our situation is too complicated to overcome, it’s all going to fall flat on it’s face before we’ve even begun, and these two days, will seem like the most distant point of a long journey we gave up on after only a few steps.