The Baller (33 page)

“You running late?”

“No. You’re early.” I was wrapped in a fuzzy bathrobe and had my hair up in a ponytail.

He looked at his watch. “You said three.”

“No, I said four.” I took a play from his book. Did he really think I would believe I constantly got the pickup time wrong? He thought he needed to be sly to spend an extra hour in my apartment. But today, I was the one being sly.

I rolled my eyes and stepped aside. “You seriously have an issue with time.”

“I could swear you said three.”
That’s because I did.

“Well. You know the drill. Make yourself comfortable. I’m just going to take a quick shower.” I disappeared into the bathroom, and my quick shower turned into a marathon grooming session. I shaved every last hair from the waist down, except for a thin line between my legs. Afterward, I rubbed moisturizer on the entire surface of my body and brushed out my damp hair. Initially, I thought I would traipse into the living room buck naked, and he would figure the rest out. But I decided to do things Brody-style. I wrapped a plush, dry towel around my body and prepared to cross a line there would be no coming back from.

“Change of plans,” I yelled from the bedroom as I primped myself in the full-length mirror. “Would you mind if we did the interview here?”

“Sure. Whatever you want.”

Brody was watching TV, his back to me, when I walked into the room. I took a deep breath, rounded the couch and stood in front of him. He was slouched down but perked up the minute he saw me standing wrapped in a towel.

“Think I can ask you a few questions, Mr. Easton?” I spoke into my hairbrush.

He furrowed his brow but played along.

“How does it feel to be a two-time Super Bowl MVP?”

“It feels pretty damn good. But I’ve been asked that question about a thousand times, Ms. Maddox. Don’t you have any original questions?” The first time he’d asked me that, I wanted to kick his ass. This time, I loved that he remembered our early encounter.

I arched an eyebrow. “I do have an original question, actually.” Nonchalantly, I reached up and tugged at the knot of the towel wrapped around my body. It fell to the floor. “If I told you I loved you more than anything in this world, would you give me another chance?”

Brody stood. His response was serious, and he spoke directly into my eyes. “I’d give you every fucking chance I own to be with you again.”

We collided, closing the distance between us. Brody kissed me long and hard, wrapping his thick arms so tight around me, it was hard to breathe. But nothing had ever felt better. He lifted me up into the air and cradled me against his chest. Before I realized what he was doing, he was carrying me into the bedroom. “I hope that’s the only interview I really have to do. Please tell me we don’t have to go to your office to do another one.”

“The only thing you have to do for the next few days is
me
.”

He set me down next to the bed and began stripping out of his clothes. He shook his head as his eyes caressed my body. “So you finally admit you love me, but I can’t make love to you yet.”

“Why not?”

“Because I need to fuck you hard and come inside you in a way that makes me feel like an animal right now.”

“I want that, too. God, I want that, too.”

He lifted me, guiding my legs to wrap around his waist, and turned us toward the wall. “We’ll save the bed for making love. But I’m going to take you up against that wall right now.”

He kissed me until my lips bruised, and I gasped for air. The restraint he had been clinging to finally snapped, and the way he stared at me like I was his next meal was the most raw and sexually arousing thing I ever saw in my life. My back securely pinned against the wall, Brody’s hand slid from my ass to my opening, and he dipped two fingers inside. “Jesus, you’re soaked.”

He gripped my hips and thrust inside of me. My eyes fluttered closed; it felt so good to be filled by him, so right.

“Delilah, open your eyes.”

He pumped into me harder as his gaze held mine. “Tell me. Tell me again.”

“I love you.”

He whispered over my mouth. “Again.”

My body began to build toward climax. My breathing became more labored, and my words turned hoarse. “I love you, Brody Easton. I do.”

He told me he loved me over and over again as he thrust deeper and deeper. “I fucking love you,” he groaned as he came inside of me.

We stayed up against that wall for a long time with our foreheads pressed together. A moment of utter clarity struck me as we looked into each other’s eyes, our chests rising and falling in unison. For the last seven years, I had been searching for peace. I had thought peace was a place where there was no turbulence or fear. Where there were no highs and lows and where happiness was found in the calm at the center. But at that moment, I finally realized peace wasn’t about avoiding things. It was about making the choice to live life with all its chaos around you, and in the midst of it all, having calm in your heart.

Brody Easton, the man who’d entered my life like a storm, had turned out to be my calm. How was that for irony?

Delilah

I left the house while Brody was still sleeping so I could sneak in a doctor’s appointment before heading to the office.

I hadn’t expected them to do a sonogram today. My blood sugar had been a little high with my first pregnancy, so they were keeping a close watch. Brody was a nervous wreck about anything that could indicate a problem for the baby or me, so I’d stopped in for my urine test alone so as to not cause him stress on today of all days. It was our anniversary. Or anniversa
ries
, to be exact.

“Your sugar looks good, Delilah. Since you’re here, why don’t we also do a quick sonogram? Check your fluid level.”

That was new with this pregnancy. Oligohydramnios—low levels of amniotic fluid. Mine wasn’t a cause for alarm, but just like my glucose levels, the doctor wanted to keep an eye on it. “Sure.” I felt bad for having a sonogram without Brody—the man teared up every time he looked at the screen, even when it was early, and the fetus only looked like a big ol’ tadpole.

I changed into a gown, and the doctor came into the testing room. After squirting cold gel across my growing belly, he began to swirl his magic wand around. I heard the strong heartbeat the minute he switched on the sound. After a few minutes, the doctor told me the fluid level had increased, and everything looked good so far. He focused on one area in particular. “Do you want to know the sex today?”

“Really? I thought it was too early.”

“Sometimes it is. But this little one isn’t shy and is exposing itself to me right at this moment.”

***

I’d only worked part time since our baby was born last year. Two days a week kept my foot in the door and also gave me an excuse to travel with my husband for away games. I patted my belly. Things would get more difficult once this little one arrived.

“Stop feeling yourself up.” Indie planted herself in the guest chair in my office and turned the tape dispenser toward her. She unrolled a long strip of tape and stuck it to her face from ear to ear, pushing up her nose to resemble a pig’s.

“That’s attractive.”

A few minutes later, Mr. CUM walked in and did a double take at Indie’s face. She just smiled like there was nothing wrong. It made him flustered. “Preseason starts next week. Can I count on you to get that husband of yours in for an interview?”

There was nothing the man denied me. “I’ll see if he’s up for it.”

When Mr. CUM disappeared, Indie raised an eyebrow. “If he’s up for it? That man would eat shit for you. Literally.”

“Such a lovely analogy.” I began to pack up my desk. “I can’t let Mr. CUM think my job is that easy now, can I?

Indie’s phone buzzed, and her face lit up. I knew who it was without having to ask. A few months ago, she’d met her own baller at the barbecue Brody and I had thrown at our new home in Larchmont. The two of them had been inseparable ever since. It meant I got to spend more time with Indie, which I loved. They had even joined us upstate for the weekend two weeks ago at our newly finished cabin.

She looked up from her phone. “You leaving early?”

“Not early. On time for a change.”

“What would possess you to do that? Having a studly husband at home with a baby and carrying around a second one yourself?” She
pfft
at me with a smile. “You have your priorities all screwed up.”

“I have to stop and pick up something for Brody for our anniversaries on the way home, too.”

“You two really sticking to the traditional present crap?”

We’d been married on the anniversary of the day we met, so we had two things to celebrate each year. “Yep. The first year is paper. Second is cotton.”

“Sounds horrible. What did Brody get you? Cotton maternity bloomers and a napkin?”

I laughed. “No idea. We haven’t exchanged gifts yet.”

On the way home, I stopped at the store to pick up a last-minute gift. I had written Brody a love letter and bought him a cotton shirt that I thought would bring out the color of his eyes. But there had been a change of plans since this morning.

The house was unusually quiet when I walked in. Only Tank, our ridiculously large Neapolitan-mastiff, came to greet me at the door. “Alright, boy.” He wagged his tail, and I had to catch the small table near the door he almost knocked over. “Calm down. Where are the crazy man and your sister?”

Dropping my leather laptop case and bag on the floor in the entryway, I slipped off my shoes and headed into the kitchen. It was empty, but there were three yellow sticky notes on the fridge and a small box on the island counter.

Phrase,
the first note read in big letters. My husband had taken to watching game shows during the day in the offseason.

The second note read:
Hint (since you suck at games) What you are to me.

Underneath, on a separate sticky note, he had drawn an arrow, and below it read:
Go to the couch already.

Smiling, I walked to the living room. Brody had piled all the throw pillows on the tufted ottoman. I picked up each one and laid them out on the rug.

D
was embroidered in script on a red throw pillow. I used to have a matching M, too, for Maddox. But Brody had thrown that out and replaced it with the next pillow the week after we got married:
E
.

M
—This was one I’d never seen before. A new addition to our hodgepodge collection. It was a soft-pink pillow—stuffed with, of course, traditional anniversary cotton—and monogrammed with our daughter’s first initial.

Y
—Another new addition. Fluffy, pink and embroidered to match the new M. Both of our mothers’ names were Yvonne, which was why we had picked it for our daughter’s middle name.

B
—For Brody. I had added the red embroidered pillow when we moved in together.

LOVE
.
The rectangular brown pillow Drew had given to me when we were just teenagers. The pillow was tattered and patched and even though it reminded me of him, it also served as a daily reminder of the incredible man I’d married. After Brody and I moved in together, I’d tucked the pillow away in the closet. It felt odd to display a gift another man had given me. One day I came home and found it on the couch. When Brody found me looking at it, he’d wrapped his arms around my waist and told me Drew had helped make me into the women he fell in love with and that the pillow didn’t have to hide.

D-E-M-Y-B-LOVE

I rearranged each pillow to spell out the message Brody had left me until I solved the puzzle.

MY BELOVED

I seriously had the best husband in the world. The first time he told me that any man who bought me roses wasn’t worth my time because I deserved something unique, I thought he was being verbose. But the man had backed up all of his words with actions since the day I met him. His gifts had always been as thoughtful and unique as he was.

If it was even possible, my heart swelled a little more in my chest as I set out to find my family upstairs. When I arrived at our bedroom door, I heard Brody talking to the baby; he hadn’t heard me come up. I stepped back from the doorway and listened to him changing his daughter’s diaper.

“You stink, you know, baby girl. Your mother, she always smells amazing. That’s probably why you’re going to have a little sister or brother barely a year younger than you.”

I covered my mouth to stifle my giggle.

“What’s with this powder? I can never get this stuff to come out.” I heard him smack the plastic bottle a few times and then, “Shit.” I pictured him fanning away a plume of white talc.

The tearing of the plastic tape sounded on one side and then the other. Marlene giggled.

“What do you think is so funny, huh? You’re the one with no teeth.”

The rocking chair creaked, and I knew he had sat with her on his lap. The two of them spent a lot of quality time in that chair lately. He liked to tell our daughter crazy stories when he thought no one was listening. “You know, you look a lot like the lady you were named after with those big pink gums.”