Full Court Press

FULL COURT PRESS

By

Lolah Lace

Kindle Edition

Published by Lolah Lace

Copyright ©
2013 by Lolah Lace

Cover Image by Dash & Soldem2

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead are entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved.

*
EXPLICIT ADULT CONTENT*

WARNING

This novella is considered romantic fiction with erotic elements or erotica. This is for mature audiences only. This book contains adult profane language, mild violence and strong sexual content.

Dedications

To all the readers who love cliffhanger endings and serial books
.

Acknowledgments

I would like to send a speci
al thanks to the Amazon and Kindle readers that gave me rave reviews for Line Of Scrimmage. Thank you so much, first for your honest reviews and second for making me write faster and longer books. I would like to acknowledge and thank: CARAMEL, Avid reader, mz.magic23, liketoread, Denise Gardner, Cody, Booklover, amanda, cozimfree, Denise, Almost a former T-Mobile Customer, Shemika Bailey and Salina61.

I also want to thank my F
acebook friends for your wall posts and feedback, thank you: Denise Townsend, Patrice Harrison, Eloise Jackson, Barbara Smith, Tee Robins, Lashawn Williams, Denise Williams Cherry, Sophia Christine, Kim Wright Barnum, Laura Kuta, Adima Eugenia Aniteye, Monica Freeman, Tanya Metcalfe and Simone Thaxton-Taylor.

Special thanks to the Goodreads and Amazon reviewers of LPB: Ann Luke, Rocajo, Sheena Binkley, Shaneshia C,
JJB, readmuch, Meek, Ren, Angela Allen, Danielle Hernandez, chris Charlton, Rinda, L. Wilson “Admete” and Kimberly. 

I would also like to thank Linden Hughes, Pat
rice-The Soap Seduction, Shanta Jackson, Jeanette Alcorn, Tracy Washington, Darlene King and Alisa Anthony for your words of encouragement. A special thank s to all I forgot to mention in the rush to get this book published.

***

PROLOGUE

It kills me
to see the man I once loved in so much pain. I wish I could wrap my arms around him and console him, hold him, comfort him, love him. His mother died. They were close. He loved her and she loved him enough to overlook his misdeeds. She even did his bidding.

Seeing him in pain is painful for me. I still love him and I know that I always will. I have nev
er loved any man the way I love him. He doesn’t have to be in my life for me to ache and yearn for him. It’s clear that we have both moved on. The pressure to do the right thing is a heavy load for any one man or woman to carry. I felt the pressure and I was single. His pressure had to be ten times the size of mine.

It’s like when you have the basketball in your hands and you’re dribbling down the court with five seconds left on the clock. You have one shot to make the game winning point. Do you take the shot? Do you pass the ball? Do you crumble under the pressure? It hurt
like hell the day he left me. He was going to make his marriage work. There’s this huge gaping hole in my heart and I don’t know what to do about it. He didn’t pass the ball. He didn’t make the game winning shot. He fouled out the game. He left me standing here all alone holding the ball.

I wish th
ings could have been different but there was nothing I could do. I had to go play for another team. I want to go an entire day and not think about him but his loves haunts me in my waking hours and in my dreams. Now that his mother has died he really needs his family. He doesn’t need me. It hurts just to say it. He doesn’t need me.

CHAPTER 1

Seriously, this was the second time one of Mason’s
siblings showed up at my door, first his asshole brother and now his sister Karen.

Karen
stepped into my house and I was beyond shocked. What is the proper decorum for this unbelievable situation? Karen didn’t really look like Mason or Mike. She looked pure Italian with her long raven colored hair. She did have those familiar extra blue eyes. She was really pretty and about the same size as me. She was squeezed in tight black jeans paired with a cream colored cable-knit sweater with a silver down winter vest over it. She was rocking black suede heeled Jimmy Choo booties. I had seen the boots in the Neiman Marcus Fall catalog. Check out Miss new bourgeoisie. She was clearly into fashion. She thought she was cute or did I think she was cute? We both probably thought that. She looked like some tough guys little mafia wife. I had to give it to her she was jazzy. She had to be somewhere around forty but she looked about my age.

I closed my front
door behind her and watched her eyes dart around the room. She was overtly being nosey. When she was done admiring my décor she spun in a complete circle and her eyes landed on me.

“I saw you at my mom’s funeral.”

“Yeah I was there with my son.”

“You have a really nice place.”

“Thank you.” Thank you is what I said but I really meant, what the hell do you want.

“Did my brother ever mention me?”

“Yeah, Mason said he had a sister.” No need in me playing around, at this point everybody in Mason’s nosey ass family knew about me and Mason. I was just glad Jack wasn’t home from work yet. I hate having to lie to him about anything. I was trying to be good to him like he had been to me.

“This is really awkward.” Karen smiled
but it was a nervous smile.

“Yeah, it is. You want to sit?”

“Okay, thanks.” Karen took a seat on the couch, the same couch where Mason decided to invade my ass. Why was I thinking of anal sex with Mason? I sat down next to Karen and shook off the images of bouncing my ass back and forth on Mason’s hard dick.

“
This is weird right, me coming here. I know it is but I was running out of ideas.”

“Ideas?”
I wasn’t following. I wish she would tell me what was up before Jack came home.

“Mason
, he is falling apart. Ever since our mom died he has been a wreck. He’s drinking heavily. I’m worried. Everybody is worried. We have never seen him like this before.”

“Death is a hard thing to come to turns with.
It takes time to heal.” I sound like a grief counselor. “It takes some people longer than others.”

“Mason is my brother. Both of our parents are dead. I’m afraid Mason is going to lose control.
I’m actually afraid he’s already lost control. I have tried everything I could think of. Then I thought of you. I thought that maybe he doesn’t want to hear a lecture from his family members. Maybe you could talk to him.”

“Me?”

“Yeah, if you could talk to him that would be great. Maybe he would listen and pull himself together. I’ve run out of options.” Karen’s eyes were glossy.

“Why would he list
en to me? We don’t talk anymore, at all.” What the hell was I going to say to a grown ass man?

“Kari, I don’t know.
If I knew what to do I wouldn’t be here.”

“I don’t know that I can do anything.”

“
Mason is really drinking. He is out of control. I haven’t seen him sober since the funeral. He left his home. He is living in his office at the construction site. He hasn’t been home in three weeks.”

So what? Am I supposed to get involved in his mess? “
Karen listen, I think you’re giving me more credit than I deserve. Mason and I had a brief affair and then it was over. If you guys can’t make him stop drinking I know I can’t.” Besides this is none of my business. I have my own stuff going on I can’t deal with this extra drama.

“I’m desperate. Mason is my brother. I can’t sit back and let Mason drink himself to death. I love him. I don’t want to lose him... I
really thought you cared about Mason.” She rolled her eyes at me in my house. Well damn.

“Did you ju
st try to guilt trip me into talking to him?” Seriously bitch?

“I sure did.”
She kind of rolled her neck like she had some black in her.

“Well I’m seeing someone. I have a boyfriend. He wouldn’t like me going to see my ex
.” My ex-lover that he hates with a passion.

“It’s a friggin’ conversation. Don’t tell your boyfriend.”

“I don’t keep secrets from my boyfriend.”

Karen frowned. “All women keep secrets from their boyfriends, husbands, lovers whatever. It’s a friggin’
conversation Miss Kari. I didn’t say go bang my brother.”

“That would never happen
.” I gave her a real Westside eye roll not that watered down Italian shit.

“My mother led me to believe
you were a nice person.”

Did this bitch just throw her dead mother in this conversation to make me feel bad?
“Fine, fuck it. I will go talk to him.”

Karen couldn’t contain her smile. I was so tired of these pushy Italians interfering in my life. “Great.” Karen started
happy clapping.

“
Please don’t come back to my house. I have a boyfriend that lives here with me.”

“Okay
fine, I didn’t have your number. I got your address from Mike. Mason would kill me if he knew I was here talking to you.”

Mason needs to tell his family to step off.

She was still smiling. “Give me your number and tell me how he is after you go see him. He won’t talk to his family.” Karen stuck out her hand. “Give me your cell.”

I stood and grabbed my cell phone off the
dvd stand across the room. “What’s your number?”

“Give me. I’ll type it in.” I handed the phone over to Mason’s bossy ass sister. She started typing in her number. She handed the phone back to me and stood. “Are you going to go see him soon?”

“Yeah, tomorrow probably.”

“Good.” She looked genuinely relieved. “I swear I wasn’t trying to cause any trouble but
I heard Mason really loved you. I think maybe you can get him to grieve and get his act together. It can’t hurt. Anything is worth a try.”

“I don’t know why you think I have some magical power. Mason does whatever he wants to do.”

“Yeah but he’s different now. He’s kind of scary. Maybe seeing you will shock him or something. I don’t know. I don’t want him to lose everything because he feels alone.”

“Karen, I will do the best that I can but Mason is a hard
nut to crack.”

“Yeah but from what I hear you cracked his nuts.”

Oh no she didn’t. “Excuse me.” Look at the mouths on these Rizzas’.

Karen shook her head. “
Mason may be hard on the outside but he is so soft on the inside. If anybody should know that it would be you.”

I had to admit, s
he was right. Under all his macho bullshit Mason is this loving caring man who wanted to please. Remembering him the way I knew him, he was strong in more ways than one. I hope she’s exaggerating and Mason isn’t this drunken disillusioned bastard she has made him out to be. It would hurt me to see him like that. It would hurt me to see him period. Hurt my heart and my nether region. I really don’t want to do this. It’s a bad idea. I’m with somebody else now, Jack.

“I will call you when I see him to tell you how it went.”
I told Karen that to reassure her. She truly seemed concerned for Mason.

“Okay thank you so much, really thank you.” Karen grabbed me into her arms an
d embraced me like it was cool to hug a stranger. She was a lot like Mason, hard on the outside and all fruit filling on the inside.

“Seriously
Karen, it’s not a problem. I said I would see him so I will.”

Karen pulled away. “Okay great, thank you. I’m leaving now. I won’t bother you
at your place again.”

Karen backed her way to the door. “Okay then bye.” She was
much too happy. Calm down chick.

“Bye.” I raised my hand.

Karen opened the door and left my house with a little kick in her black suede Jimmy Choos.