Page 30 of A Follow-Through in Faking

Catalina

I always knew kissing Santi would be heaven. He has these full lips that make my knees a little weak every single time I look at them, but I never thought it could be this amazing. Especially after he’s been so honest with me again.

It feels too good when I part my lips and he slips his tongue into my mouth, exploring me, tasting me, worshipping me. When he slides his hands over my back, resting them on my lower back.

“Santi, I don’t want your respectful touches right now. I need you to touch me,” I say against his lips, and he wastes no time dropping his hands to my ass and squeezing it. A content moan slips out of my mouth, making him grin against me as he keeps kissing me.

“Don’t worry, carino , I’ll be as disrespectful as you want me to be.”

I know it’s wrong, that this will complicate things even further. We’re faking a relationship. We’re playing doubles for the next few weeks. This can only end in chaos and drama, but I couldn’t care less. This feels good. So good I might die if he stops touching me, as dramatic as it may sound.

“Fuck, Cata,” he moans when I run my nails down his neck and abs. I bite down gently on his bottom lip, earning another groan before he lifts me into the air. I wrap my legs around his hips, never breaking the kiss, even as he fumbles with the handle of the door to lock it.

He sits down on a bench they have in the corner of the bathroom with me on his lap, his fingers digging into my ass as he drags me forward. I rub against him, my swollen clit sending a bolt of pleasure through me at the contact with his hard cock.

“Fuck, we can’t repeat that. I’m going to come in my pants if we do,” he says, but the mere thought of the power I hold over Santi has me rolling my hips again.

“But I haven’t given you permission to come yet, Santi. Don’t you want to be my good boy and do what I tell you to?” His reaction is visceral. His whole body shudders, his grip on me tightens, and his eyes fill with even more lust.

“I want to be your good boy, Cata. I want to be everything you tell me to be,” he says as I slide my hands into his hair and tug, pulling his head back ever so slightly.

The column of his throat is exposed to me this way, and I take full advantage of the position as I lean down to kiss along the length of it.

He tastes like he smells, and a bit salty from playing for a little over an hour, but I can’t get enough.

I nip at his skin while he keeps rolling my hips for me, rubbing me against him.

“Cata, fuck, carino , I need you to stop if you don’t want me to make a mess of myself,” he says, panting when I trail my lips over the side of his throat.

“Make a mess of me, Santiago,” I say as I lean back, arching my back when he adjusts to thrust up and against me. My breasts are in his face then, and he wastes no time nipping at my nipple where it’s covered by my sports bra and shirt.

“I want to see these piercings without any clothes, Catalina. I want to admire them, play with them,” he says, raking his teeth over the same nipple before moving onto the next one. “Have I earned that yet, mi mariquita ? Or will you make me beg for it?”

“Beg,” I say, even if right now I can’t think of anything better than Santi removing my shirt and bra and playing with my nipples while I rub against him.

“Please, Cata. Please give me more. Please, I’ll be your good boy.” I shudder on top of him, the sound of his begging so fucking sweet, I roll my hips faster, chasing my pleasure.

“Remove my shirt,” I instruct, never stopping my movements. I’m so close, just like him, and if I just—

“Santi? Catalina? Are you in here?” a familiar voice asks as they knock on the door of the room we’re in, forcing Santi and me to stop our movements.

“Don’t say anything,” Santi replies, reaching for the hem of my shirt even with his father still knocking on the door.

“I saw you two go in here,” Carlos says next, and I cover my mouth to hold back a laugh.

“Go away!” Santi calls back, but when I chuckle, his irritation with his father turns into amusement.

“I can’t. Catalina, you have to get out here right now. Sage hurt herself during her match. They’re taking her to the hospital right now.”

My heart drops all the way into my stomach.

I jump off Santi’s lap, rushing toward the door without a second thought. Panic has infiltrated every part of me, and I won’t be able to get rid of it until I hear that Sage is going to be fine.

She has to be fine.

“I need you to tell me exactly what happened,” I say to Carlos when I open the door, picking up my bag before I follow him down the hall.

I look over my shoulder to ensure Santi is coming too, which he is.

There’s concern on his face, the same I feel deep in my chest, and it’s almost a relief to know I don’t have to be alone while I worry about my friend.

And I blame that as the reason for me taking his hand.

Carlos sent me the video of the moment when Sage hurt something in her back, but I’ve been too nervous to watch it. He told me she was serving when it happened, and I know Sage also suffers from back problems like me, but seeing it will make it all the more real.

I’ll think about her getting surgery right now.

That’s how horrible it must have been.

She’s getting emergency surgery.

Tears fall down my cheeks before I can stop them, and I drag my legs against my chest on the uncomfortable hospital chair.

Charlie went to get us some food, so I can’t even lean on them for support.

And Santi? He went to do our post-match conference so we don’t get in trouble, but I wish he was here.

I want to sit in his lap and let him wrap me up in his arms while he promises me everything will be okay.

My mother wasn’t sick for a long time. She didn’t have a disease that dragged over days and months and years, so I didn’t have to sit in waiting rooms as a kid.

But being here still brings up things I’ve been suppressing for years.

Because I did sit in a hospital room with Ori for a long time the night she died.

I held baby Sam in my arms, and Ori hugged Hernanda to her chest while we waited to hear any news.

Mamá had a heart condition that cost her her life.

She always knew it could, but there was nothing she could do to change that.

She had several surgeries to fix whatever was wrong with her heart, but they were temporary fixes.

The only thing that could have saved her would have been a new heart, but she didn’t get one before… well, before she passed.

Sitting here, I realize it bothers me that I don’t remember what heart condition she had. It bothers me that my trauma has taken that information from me, but at the same time, I’m not sure I want to know.

It wouldn’t change anything, after all.

More tears fall as I press a hand to my chest, right where the tattoo for Mamá is.

She’d be so sad if she saw that I’m still crying over her so many years after her passing.

It hasn’t gotten easier for me like everyone promised it would be.

Any memory of her saddens me deeply. Even if some of them bring me joy, it’s hard to think or talk about her.

“Cata, carino ,” Santi says, and I realize I’ve covered my eyes with my hands, so I lower them to look at him.

He’s standing at the end of the hallway, soaking wet from the rain outside, and I have so many questions.

Why does he look like he ran all the way from the post-match conference to this hospital? Why can’t I stop relief from filling every part of me at the mere sight of him? Why did he take so damn long to get to me?

But I don’t ask any of them at first. No.

I stand up and run all the way to him, straight into his arms. It doesn’t matter that my clothes are immediately soaking wet.

I need him, his touch, and even if the feeling doesn’t last because one of us finds a way to ruin it, right now it’s in my chest. And I can’t get rid of it, no matter how much I try.

Not that I’m trying very hard. Despite my best efforts and everything that’s happened between us, I care so much about this man.

I always have.

I’m starting to realize I always will.

“ Mariquita , I’m getting your clothes all wet,” he says, but he doesn’t release me either. If anything, he holds on tighter.

“I don’t care,” I reply, my fingers slipping into his hair. “Did you run all the way here?”

He chuckles as he holds me tighter, burying his face in my neck.

“Pretty much, yeah. Traffic was so bad, running was faster,” he replies, and I shake my head as I fight back tears because of how relieved I am that he’s here.

Because my feelings for him are more than reciprocated, they’re multiplied tenfold for him.

Because he’d run in the rain for me, the man who never wanted to be in a relationship.

“This is getting so messy, Santiago. What does any of this mean? We keep kissing when no one is watching. We keep touching when it’s not necessary.

You keep saying things you don’t have to.

This doesn’t feel so fake anymore, and that makes everything complicated,” I say, finally leaning back to see drops of water dripping from his hair and onto his cheeks.

He should look exhausted. We had a match earlier and he just ran I don’t know how many kilometers to the hospital.

But he doesn’t. He looks devastating. His heart is in his eyes, he’s been wearing it there for weeks, if not months, and I can’t decide if that terrifies me or settles the turmoil inside of me.

“It doesn’t feel fake because it isn’t fake, carino .

What I feel for you has been real since we met.

I keep touching you because I think I’d die if I didn’t.

I keep saying things that I don’t have to say but that are true in every way.

I keep kissing you because I’m catching up on the time I didn’t do so. ”

As if to prove his point, he leans down to lightly brush his lips over mine.