Page 103 of Scoring Eden

“God, Eden, this isn’t gonna last long. You’re—fuck—everything. Everything.” He drops his forehead against mine, eyes pinched shut in reverie, sharp breaths tingling over my lips. “Leo was right. You’re a fucking riptide.”

I have no idea what he means, but I’m not in any position to ask questions right now. I don’t know how he’s able to talk when it’s taking everything in me not to scream from the pleasure coursing through my body and wake the whole damn building.

“Gonna need you to come for me, little riptide.” His fingers snake between us, finding my clit with expert precision and stroking until the flames of another orgasm start licking low in my belly. “Soak my dick before I embarrass myself again.”

He shifts the angle of his hips, his dick hitting a part of me I never knew existed. It has me keening and grabbing another handful of his hair. “Alex.”

“I’m right there with you, baby. Come on, you can do it.”

He pistons into me, and as the wave builds, my body—my soul—shaking, he drags his teeth to my neck and bites.

My pussy clamps down on him, fluttering like butterflies as I whimper through my release. His thrusts grow erratic, his words jumbled as he groans things like “Give it to me” and “That’s it, just like that.” When he comes, he does so with a roar buried in the side of my neck and my name on his lips.

And in the aftermath, as I lie panting on his chest, I finally let myself name the sensation that’s been holding me hostage for weeks.

I love you.

I hope he reads the confession in the softness of my kiss.

Please let yourself love me too.

I hope he feels my plea in the stroking of my fingers in his hair.

Please trust me enough to stay.

TEXT THREAD BETWEEN ALEX AND LEO

Alex: I’m drowning, man.

Leo: Did the riptide get you?

Alex: The riptide got me.

TWENTY-NINE

ALEX

Afterward, I carry Eden into the shower and wash the day out of her hair. We don’t have sex again, despite how hard my dick is as I lather her body with soap. We barely even speak. And when we’re dry, we climb into bed, and I fall asleep with her clutched in my arms, dreaming about doing it all over again.

In the morning, I wake before she does. It’s game day, and I’m heading to the stadium early because I have a public spectacle to plan, vis-à-vis shaving my head in front of seventy thousand fans and millions of others on social media. So, I pad silently out of the bedroom and leave a note for her beside the coffee machine I’ve prepped to be ready for when she wakes up.

I’ll see her at the game anyway, but I want her to know I’m still thinking about her. I’m not running, even if everything inside is screaming at me to do just that. Even if I still can’t make her any promises.

My friends are right. I’m an emotionally stunted idiot.

“Wait, what?” Leo blinks at me, standing in his cleats and no shirt in the locker room two hours later. “You’re seriously gonna cut your hair?”

Roman bounces in place like a toddler, which is an odd sight to behold considering the man is the size of a woolly mammoth. “This is the best day of my life.”

Coach agreed to the plan. In three weeks’ time, at the next home game, he will personally take a razor to my head and shave it. He’ll also brief the investors on what’s happening and is confident they’ll be fully on board, considering I’ll have managed to completely transform my media image from an out-of-control playboy to a settled-down family man who does charity work. The Strikers’ social media team will handle the livestreaming, the finance team will be all over the donations, and we’ll be doing it immediately after the game ends.

So, let’s hope we win. Because it will be a double kick in the dick for me if we don’t.

I shrug off my friend’s jubilation and take a long pull of water from my gym bottle. “Yeah, well, it’s for a good cause.”

Roman drops to the bench beside me and tilts his head. “And you’re still claiming you’re not in love with her?”

I think, after last night, that ship has well and truly sailed. Though, if I’m being honest with myself—which is not something I’m used to doing—the ship left the port a long time ago.