The All-Star Antes Up (Wager of Hearts #2) (15 page)

He hooked one arm around her shoulders and slid the other one under her knees. “Oh, no,” she said. “I’m not going to make it worse by letting you carry me.”

She felt his arms tighten.

“Do you want an elbow in your ribs?” she said. “Because I’ll do it for your own good.”

In one motion, he swung her off the table. “I’m betting you won’t carry out that threat.” He started walking.

“You called my bluff.” Miranda looped her arms around his neck to try to take her weight away from his injured side. The rock-hard muscles of his arms against her bare thighs and back made her skin tingle.

He brushed a kiss on the top of her head as he lowered her feet to the ground in the corner of the gym. “It’s not as good as my bed upstairs, but it’s better than the floor.”

At her feet was a pile of exercise mats, neatly covered with sheets and a blanket that must belong to the massage table. He’d rolled up two white towels into tidy cylinders to use as pillows. Something about the care that went into fashioning those pillows made tears prick behind her eyelids.

He wasn’t bundling her off to the limousine; he wanted her to be comfortable. With him. The makeshift bed, the way he treated his fans, his slouching posture in the theater—all the small, thoughtful gestures made her fall a little in love with him.

“That’s the nicest bed I’ve ever seen.”

He looked surprised, and she realized she’d been too emphatic. He gave her a wink. “If you get in, it will look about perfect to me.”

She knelt and pulled back the blanket so she could wriggle under it. Luke stripped off his briefs and jeans, the flexing muscles in his legs riveting her gaze as he knelt to slip in beside her. He rolled her on her side and spooned himself against her back, his arm lying heavily around her waist. He was so large that she felt engulfed by his body, soaking in the warmth of his bare, sweat-dampened skin pressed against her almost everywhere. Tucking her head under his chin, he let out a long breath. She could feel his muscles go slack in relaxation and wished she could see his face.

Was he falling asleep? Did he expect her to stay here all night?

“You comfortable, sugar?” His voice seemed to vibrate through her where his chest was fitted to her back.

“Comfortable might not be quite the right word.”

“Give me the right word so I know if it’s good or bad.”

“I might need several words.” She took an inventory of the happy glow still radiating through her insides, the warmth of him infusing her skin, the feel of his cock nestled against her bottom, and the solidness of his long legs intertwined with hers.

“Would three do it?”

“I’ll try.” She hummed for a few seconds before going with honesty. “Blown away. Amazed. Uncertain. I guess that’s four.”

His arm had tightened when she said
uncertain
.

“I’ll go with the first three,” he said, “but I’m
certain
this is a good thing.”

“What do we do next?”

“Well, sugar, we take a little rest, and then we find a better use for these machines than weight training.”

She glanced at the nearest contraption. It sported a padded seat with two upright cylinders attached to either side. She was pretty sure you were supposed to put your knees outside the cylinders and squeeze them together to lift the weights cabled behind it. The thought of herself in that position made liquid pool between her thighs. She shifted her gaze away.

His breathing slowed, and she found her eyelids drifting closed, her sated body dragging her down into sleep like an exhausted swimmer.

She came awake to the feel of his cock hard against her bottom. “Am I dreaming?” she asked as her nipples went tight and sent an arrow of arousal zinging downward.

He skimmed one hand over her stomach to where her thighs began, sliding his fingers between them. “If you are, it’s the best dream I’ve ever been in.”

He hooked his fingers inward so he could push two partway inside her. His touch against her clit made her gasp and twist in his arms. His cock jerked between the cheeks of her behind. That sent more liquid to bathe his probing fingers, and he pushed farther into her. She lifted her thigh to give him more space.

“You see that weight bench over by the mirror?” His voice rasped in her ear.

She nodded and moaned as he worked his fingers in and out.

“You see that cylindrical cushion at one end? I can adjust it higher, so the bench slants down from it.” He flicked her clit with his thumb.

She gasped and jolted against him, tension winding tight, low, and sizzling.

His voice dropped low. “I would sure love to bend you over that headrest and come into you from behind. The padding is thick and cushiony, so you’ll be comfortable, I promise. But you can say no and it will be fine.”

He slid his fingers inside her and stopped.

She imagined the bench tilted and herself folded over the end of it, feeling the power of Luke driving into her. Nerves sent butterflies fluttering through her stomach. She would be completely exposed and at his mercy. Her body clenched around his fingers.

She nodded.

“I need you to say it, sugar.”

She could barely find the breath to speak. “Yes, I want that.”

He withdrew his hand. She found herself propelled upward as he pulled her to her feet and led her to the bench. He leaned down to give her a long kiss, their bodies pressed skin to skin from knee to shoulder.

“Hold that thought,” he said before he bent to move various pins. She watched the ripple of his back muscles as he changed the position of the bench, and thought again of the sculptures in the museum. Except this one moved from one pose to the next with a gorgeous fluidity that made her toes curl.

When he straightened, his face was incandescent with desire, and he wove his fingers into her hair to give her another slow, sensual kiss. Then he turned her so the tops of her thighs brushed the rounded cushion at the end of the bench. He skimmed his hands around to knead her breasts, snugging himself up to her back. His mouth was on the side of her neck, gently sucking, and his cock was once again nestled against her behind. There was nothing for her to do but dissolve into desire under his hands.

And then he began to press her forward, his chest hard against her back. The nervous butterflies gave a few more flutters as he used his body to bend her over the bench so her bottom curved farther and farther up. But when his cock dragged across the swollen, aching spot at her center, a sun flare of yearning ripped through her, and all reservations evaporated. “Oh, yes,” she breathed. “Like that.”

He kept going until her face was turned and resting against the heavy padding that cradled her like a pillow. He gave her breasts a last squeeze and pulled his hands away, his callused palms abrading her nipples with delicious friction.

He swore. “Have to get a condom.”

She closed her eyes to shut out her surroundings, listening to Luke’s bare feet pad away and the clink of his belt buckle when he found his jeans. His feet thudded on the wooden floor, so she could tell he was jogging back to her.

A smile of gratification curled her lips. Then his hands wrapped around her hips, and the smile turned to an
oh
of shocked pleasure as he entered her without any prelude.

He also made a guttural sound of satisfaction as he seated himself within her. When he spoke, his voice was strained. “Seeing you like this, feeling you so wet, it’s going to make me come faster than I want to.”

He released her hips to stroke his hands over her back, the erotic massage making her inner muscles ripple around his cock. “So hot,” he growled.

He started slowly, but she could feel his control break, and then he was driving into her—his breath rasping, the bench shaking, and her own climax building and building as the base of his cock slammed into her over and over again. It was brutal and primitive and perfect.

And it came to a climax as he thrust into her so hard the bench scooted forward. He howled his release, his fingers like a vise on her hips. He stayed buried inside her, throbbing for a long time, before he folded down over her, sandwiching her between his big body and the bench’s cushion. His breath was coming in gulps, his chest heaving against her back.

She mewed a complaint as he slid out of her, driving her to the edge of orgasm without taking her over. She felt him work his hand between her thighs. He slid one finger inside her and used another to circle her clit. It took about three rotations to detonate the explosion in her gut. Held between Luke and the bench, she couldn’t move, only feel, as her orgasm wrung her muscles into a final delirious release.

Drifting down from the high, she became aware of his forearms braced alongside her shoulders on the bench. He was blanketing her with his warmth but not crushing her with his bulk.

She shuddered through a few more aftershocks, soaking up the full-body contact with him. When she began to feel guilty about the position he had to hold, she said, “I could stay like this all night, but you’re doing all the work.”

He cupped his hands under her shoulders and unfolded both of them from the bench. Turning her to face him, he brushed a strand of hair away from her face. “You trusted me.”

Miranda laid her hand against his cheek, feeling the prickle of stubble on her palm. “Because you can be trusted.”

He moved to close his lips over her fingertip, applying the tiniest bit of suction. “I want to devour you,” he said, his voice rough like gravel.

“And I want to touch every inch of you.” She pulled her finger away from his mouth to follow a tendon in his neck down to the hollow at the base of his throat and then across his clavicle. That’s when she noticed an array of scars on his shoulder. “What are these?”

“Surgical scars. Minor stuff to fix up my throwing arm.” He took her wandering hand in his and started toward the makeshift bed. “You collect those over time.”

She hated to think what a toll the violence of football took on his magnificent body.

He helped her down onto the piled mats and pulled the blanket over them. She snuggled against his chest, facing him this time. “How many times have you been sacked in your career?”

“That’s too much math for me to do when you’ve reduced my brain to pulp.”

A glow of satisfaction blossomed in her. She’d had as powerful an effect on him as he’d had on her.

He resettled them so his arm pillowed her head and one of his legs lay crooked over her hip. “I’m feeling mellow enough for another nap,” he said, closing his eyes.

Freed of his gaze, she let her eyes roam over the perfection of his face. This close she noticed small scars there, too: one cutting through the outer end of his eyebrow, one at the jut of his chin, and one near his ear. Instead of marring his beauty, they gave it a sexy edge.

In one day Luke Archer had gone from being a giant icon she admired on a billboard to a living, breathing human being. And the truth was, she was lying here naked with him after one day together because she knew this would be her only chance to be so close to him. He would go back to his fame and wealth and football, and she would go back to being an assistant concierge.

“There’s something I need to tell you,” she said.

His eyelids snapped open.

“It’s nothing bad.” She stroked her hand down his suddenly tense back.

“Go ahead.”

“I didn’t do, er, this because you’re a famous quarterback,” she said. “I did it because after spending the day with you, I liked you as a person. Well, more than liked.” She took a breath. “I don’t expect anything more, and I won’t tell anyone this happened.”

Ice formed in his eyes, and his smile turned hard. “So we’re back to the concierge code.”

Luke knew he should be grateful. The woman in his arms had just said everything he usually wanted to hear. Instead, he was pissed off that she thought he’d screwed her because he was a famous athlete. Or that she’d screwed him because he was a famous athlete. Or whatever she’d just said.

Because she gave him a sense of himself as something other than a football player. She’d said it: she made him feel appreciated as a
person
. But now she was treating him as the quarterback again.

This was ridiculous. Why was he getting bent out of shape because Miranda was making valid assumptions about his intentions?
No rings, no strings.
She was being realistic, and he was being an asshole.

“What if I expect something more?” he asked, using the leverage of his leg to pull her in closer to him.

“You want more from
me
?” The astonishment in her voice fanned the flames of his anger.

He slid his hand down to the luscious curve of her behind and squeezed lightly. “I’ve made it clear that I’ve enjoyed today. All of it.”

“Yes, but you could have any . . . well, I’m just . . .”

He let her stammer to a halt. “Do you think because you’re a concierge I would just screw you and send you home?”

He felt her flinch as though he had smacked her. He who prided himself on never hitting a woman had just lashed out at her verbally.

“I’m trying to manage my own expectations.”