His to Win (The Alpha Soccer Saga #1) (5 page)

Patrick’s hand was pumping steadily now, his mind filled with a scenario in which he pushed Ellie up against the wall at the airport and kissed her deeply. In his mind, their hands explored each other’s bodies as they fell through a door into some sort of conference room.

Clothes disappeared, and soon he was inside her. It was her body clinging to his pulsing cock rather than his hand. He was kissing her neck, her mouth, tasting every bit of the flawless skin that had tormented him all the way across the Atlantic.

He braced himself against the wall, water relentlessly crashing down on him, hand frantically stroking himself, eyes pressed shut, mind filled with that smile of hers,
Ellie, Ellie, fuck, oh Ellie . . .
and he finished. In great spurts and ragged breaths, he emptied himself against the wall of the shower.

The phone was only in the way now, her need was too great, nothing Google could show her, no matter how high-definition, could surpass the image of Patrick seared into her brain from having stared at him, listened to him, smelled him, all the way across the Atlantic.

In seconds, her bra was gone, her panties atop the suit on the floor, and she’d rolled onto her stomach.

Both hands were between her legs, the position in which she treated herself to the strongest climaxes.

In her mind, she was back in the airport, reliving their good-bye moment. Only this time, Patrick took her hands and pulled them up over her head and pressed her against the wall.

She was shamelessly rutting on the bed now, hair tousled around her head, messy bun just messy.

Her wrists held high above her head in his firm grip, he kissed her hard on the mouth. A kiss of passion, of control. He knew she was his.
She
knew she was his. Everyone walking by knew he owned her body. This tall, powerful, impossibly handsome man was doing what came naturally to men like him—claiming what was his.

Her mind raced with thoughts of women walking by and stopping in their tracks, gasping, staring, wet with envy, his one hand controlling both of hers, his free hand groping her lewdly, her every breath captured by his mouth . . . she was so close . . . Grinding down on her hands, she couldn’t help but say his name out loud through her climax, “Patrick. . . ”

Patrick staggered to his bed and collapsed, exhausted, softening cock laying against his muscled thigh. He slept that night just like that, his wakeup call ending a dream of taking Ellie in his arms and swinging her around in celebration after winning the Champions League with Celtic.

Ellie managed, somehow, to get herself turned around on the bed, to find a pillow, and to pull the comforter around her naked body. Her wakeup call ended a dream of sitting on a porch swing somewhere in the Smoky Mountains, watching a herd of elk pass by on a hill in a clearing across a stream. With Patrick by her side.

Ellie’s wakeup call shattered her deep, jet-lagged sleep like a sledgehammer. She clumsily fumbled the phone back onto its cradle, then rolled over in bed to find an empty spot where her dreams had her convinced Patrick would be found.

A long stretch and she sat up in bed, looking around at her scattered clothes and then at her neatly packed, unopened suitcase, and she cursed herself for what were surely horribly wrinkled—or, at the very least, deeply wrinkled—clothes inside. In any event, they’d need work before she could meet her associates for breakfast and start a long first day of work in Scotland.

She checked her phone, finding three missed calls and half a dozen texts from her clearly drunk best friend, Meg. Meg’s date with Trent had gone well, she’d gotten lucky, and she was dying to hear about Glasgow and whatever news there was to share about Patrick.

Ellie calculated the time difference and knew Meg would be asleep back in Georgia, so she decided updating Meg would wait until after work.

She opened her suitcase, hung up some of her work clothes, and padded to the shower.

As the water cascaded down her body, she felt energized. The orgasm she’d enjoyed the night before, good as it was, hadn’t satiated her need in the least. Patrick had her on a razor’s edge for most of the previous day, and she needed to take herself off the boil if she was going to be able to focus at all once the actual purpose of her trip began, much sooner than she’d have liked.

A removable shower head would have been a wonderful thing this morning, she thought to herself, but her hands were more than capable of doing the job.

She pictured Patrick sharing the shower with her, soaping each other’s bodies and kissing hungrily. Her lust sent her mind careening in an out-of-character direction, and in her fantasy scenario she leaned back against the wall of the shower, hot water washing over her, as Patrick dropped to his knees and brought his mouth to her pussy.

Ellie had only once in her life received any sort of oral attention from a guy, and it had been a rushed, halfhearted effort, performed as if out of a sense of obligation. Over nearly as soon as it began, completely unfulfilling.

The Patrick of Ellie’s innermost desire wasn’t lazy, or quick. He was thorough, full attention to detail, his tongue exploring every part of Ellie’s sex carefully. She bit down hard on her bottom lip, bringing herself off again and again at the image of Patrick’s crystal blue eyes looking up into hers as he coaxed orgasm after orgasm from her with his mouth.

All day she could have gone on that way, but the angel on her right shoulder finally convinced the devil on her left that being late on the first day wasn’t the best way to handle a new assignment, so she reluctantly ended the best shower she’d had in her entire life and pointed herself in the direction of the lobby and planned work breakfast.

More accustomed to international travel, Patrick accepted his wakeup call and began the stretching routine with which he greeted every morning.

He’d acknowledged, years ago, that age and flexibility could be bitter enemies if he wasn’t vigilant.

The muscular, naked form of Patrick Sievert endured a series of increasingly erotic contortions at the foot of the bed, the hybrid yoga covering his body in a light sheen of sweat.

His mind wandered to Ellie, wondering how she’d slept, if she were yet awake, what it would be like to have her watching him go through his stretching regimen. Or for her to have been there in the shower the night before.

He felt himself stiffen at the thoughts, at remembering everything from the day before. He reached down and took hold of his growing cock with a reverse grip, thumb pointed toward his body, and began to have himself another wank.

Being celibate lo, these many years was never easy, although counting his money and polishing his trophies made it more tolerable.

He missed different aspects of having a woman in his life, but especially, recently, the physical. Running fingers through hair, holding hands, all the different ways to kiss. Kissing was a personal favorite. A certain kind of kiss was what he thought of most often when he gave himself pleasure.

Playing her body like an instrument, eliciting all sorts of wonderful whimpers, tremors, gasps. He thought of that now, thought of Ellie sitting on the edge of his bed as he knelt on the floor. Thought of her reclining on a sea of pillows, beckoning him to taste her.

Soon, the towel on which he knelt was soaked with his seed. He growled through his climax, the image of Ellie so vivid he felt genuine disappointment when he opened his eyes and saw his bed empty.

A shower later, he was on his way to the lobby to meet Tom Borchers for their breakfast and strategy session.

Famished though she was, Ellie barely touched her breakfast. Eating in public, especially in front of strangers, was something with which she had never been entirely comfortable, but an incident during her freshman year at Ohio State almost turned her off to the idea entirely.

She was taking a large course load, and against all advice she’d scheduled four classes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, erroneously thinking that since she’d gone to full days of school her entire life, that college would be no different and the transition would be smooth.

The first few weeks hadn’t been awful, she was able to catch up on rest and study a bit on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but by the end of the month, she was dragging. The day in question started with her oversleeping and being late to class for the first time, then between Intro to Sociology and Standard Calculus Sequence, she ran into Jack.

Jack was the first college “man” she’d met. They bumped into each other at the library, and small talk led to meeting at Starbucks a few times. She’d begun to think of the junior business major from near Chicago as something of a boyfriend, although they hadn’t even kissed yet.

He was into some of the same eighties music she was, bands like Duran Duran and Depeche Mode. He was easy on the eyes, always had something funny to say, and made her feel not quite so swallowed up by the huge Columbus campus and student body.

It was a student’s body that stopped Ellie in her tracks. The body of a skinny blonde in yoga pants that, rather than hiding anything, seemed to accentuate her ass, hell even her labia—everything. The fact that she had a face like a bulldog didn’t change her bikini-ready body, something Ellie hadn’t had since second grade.

The blonde, by herself, wouldn’t have been offensive or out of place. It was who she was holding hands with, strutting across the quad like she owned it. Jack. Smooth, charming, by all accounts unattached Jack.

Ellie watched them walk together and stop near the student union, where he swept her up into his arms and kissed her. Not a peck, a long, lingering kiss. The kind of kiss boyfriends give girlfriends, Ellie guessed.

Not that she’d ever been kissed like that. Guys in high school were scared off by her brothers and her dad. At least she hoped that’s why four years of homecomings and proms went by without her being asked, even once, to attend a dance. It had to be the intimidation factor. Had to be.

Ms. Yoga Pants disappeared and Jack pulled out his phone. Ellie had blended in with some trees as she tried to compose herself, tears stinging her eyes.

And, of course, she felt her phone buzzing.

Hey Ellie want 2 grab coffee later?

What a fucking asshole,
Ellie thought to herself. The text was from Jack, with the taste of that tramp still fresh on his lips.

I’m free all afternoon just hit me up if U want to. Miss U

Rage boiled inside Ellie as she read the second text, but she managed not to reply, just as she struggled—but managed—not to completely lose it and just burst into a sobbing mess right there in front of everyone.

Fuck calculus, fuck Jack, fuck my life,
Ellie thought.
Oh yeah, and fuck yoga pants. And girls who look like bulldogs.

Lacking the age, fake ID, or friendship with anyone old enough to supply her with needed alcohol, Ellie set off in search of the next best thing—food. A dining hall was nearby, so she set out in search of pizza. Pizza and ice cream.

If you’re upset about a boy, definitely the best way to attract a new one is by carrying a tray with three slices of pizza, a bag of Ruffles, a Snickers bar, and a Diet Pepsi across the dining hall. Hell, you’ll probably have half a dozen marriage proposals before you reach an empty table. If the chub rub doesn’t kill you first. Is it too late to transfer to the University of Antarctica?
Ellie recognized what she was doing, it was same thing she’d done all too often in high school when things didn’t go her way. Eating her feelings.

She found a table not quite as isolated as she’d hoped to, but she was near enough to the corner that she could almost face away from everyone and stuff her face in relative solitude. The first two slices disappeared before she even tasted them, and she was working on the third when she heard the first snippets.

It was from a table over her right shoulder, three sorority girls, probably eating twigs, sprigs, whatever sorority girls eat, and talking about whatever bubble-headed girls with Greek letters on their T-shirts and too much makeup talk about.

“Forget freshman fifteen. Freshman fifty.” Amid their ditzy laughter, Ellie put together enough of their conversation to know she, Ellie, was the topic. “Don’t they teach first years how to chew? Do you think that’s, like, a perm? Did she do that to her hair on purpose? Lesbian by the summer, guaranteed. After she completely blows up and not even the horniest Sig Ep will touch her.”

In the process of making her weepy retreat from the dining hall, Ellie managed to spill her drink, drop her books, and knock over two chairs, so instead of a stealthy exit, everyone stopped what they were doing to look. And stifle laughter. Or in the case of her sorority girl fan club, to laugh like they were at a comedy club.

To top it all off, two more texts from Jack:

Guess UR in class I was on campus I’m heading to my apt

U should come over tonite. My roommate is out of town

Ellie made it back to her dorm room just seconds ahead of the meltdown. Racking sobs were swallowed up by her pillow.

From that day forward, Ellie ate either in private or only when in the company of trusted friends. Even then, she never ate as much as she’d have liked.

So after a day of travel with little to consume except the Lebanese food at the airport, a series of beyond intense climaxes, and a breakfast more pushed around the plate than eaten (Blood pudding? Really?), no amount of work could distract her from the growing pit in her stomach.

When they took an afternoon break, Ellie begged off the planned group lunch, saying she needed to return to the hotel for something, that she’d rendezvous with them back at the conference room in the convention center that served as their base of operations.

Walking briskly down a Glasgow street, trying to keep up with the crowd, Ellie looked at her phone for the first time in hours. Nothing from Meg, who was probably still sleeping off Trent and Applebee’s, but she did have a text message from somebody she’d entered into her phone as “Blue Eyes.”