Page 77 of Hate the Game (Playing Dirty #1)

***Jax***

Seeing Savannah tug at her t-shirt for the hundredth time was driving me crazy.

Each time she tugged at it the neck pulled down enough to give a hint of her cleavage and the material stretched across her tits so tight that my jeans tried to mimic the effect.

It was a sweet, sweet torture that was so damned distracting that I went to my room as soon as we got to our dorm and grabbed one of my shirts to pull over her head.

Hurt flashed in her eyes and she seemed to make herself smaller right in front of me.

My gut twisted at seeing how deeply we’d hurt her and I couldn’t let it go.

I grabbed her and tugged her into my chest, letting her feel how much I wanted her.

She stiffened at first but eventually relaxed in my embrace.

“I can’t think when you’re pulling that tiny shirt over your chest constantly and I need to be able to think to have the conversation we need to have.”

When she pulled back, I let her go and saw that she was bright pink. She slipped her arms inside the shirt and a few seconds later managed to pull the other one over her head without flashing an inch of skin. She quietly folded her shirt while staring at the floor. “Y’all moved the mattresses.”

Cole snorted from where he sat on the edge of the couch, perched as if ready to run for Savannah at any second. “Yeah, without you we’re just three dudes cuddling on their living room floor, Sav. Not a good fit for us.”

She gave a little smile at that and then took a deep breath. I think we all held ours as she slowly blew hers out. “Can we start from the beginning?”

Ryder took her hand and pulled her to the couch. He surprisingly let her sit beside him instead of on his lap. “You mean can we start from the time you were acting like Texas Barbie?”

Savannah huffed. “I thought if I seemed like an airhead it’d be easier to get the three of you to be yourselves around me. It was before I knew anything about who you were, really, as men. It was a dumb idea. But it would’ve worked on any of the other guys on the team. Just…for the record.”

I scowled and sat on the coffee table in front of her. “They don’t even exist, Savannah. They can’t or I’m going to lose my shit and drag you off to a cave.”

She looked up at me with her eyes as wide as I’d ever seen them. “W-what do you mean?”

“He means that we want you. Just us. The three of us. And the idea of any other man getting close to you makes us want to fucking go on a rampage.” Ryder gripped her inner thigh as he said it and I held my breath as I waited to see if she’d shove his hand away. She didn’t.

She did seem to shake her head and force herself back to what she’d started saying, though.

“I was wrong to come here to hurt y’all.

I was blinded to the truth of that game against Texas.

I expected y’all to suck. I thought it would be easy to gather information that reflected how awful y’all were and then I’d write this big article.

I’d get back at you for my brothers’ injuries and I’d get my career back. I’m sorry for plotting against y’all.”

Cole gave up the edge of the couch and sat next to me on the coffee table. We all ignored the creaking wood, too focused on saving things. “Were you plotting when you kissed me?”

Savannah’s reaction was so horrified that it told of her honesty when she answered.

“No! No, of course not. I never meant to get close to any of you like that. I’d made a big deal to my brothers about staying away from y’all and I’d assured Marla I could do the job without getting sucked in.

I just… I couldn’t seem to help myself. No matter how many nights I went to bed hating myself for doing things with the men who’d hurt my brothers, I couldn’t stop. ”

“Cass told us who you were after we realized that we were attracted to you. When we made our stupid fucking plan, we were under the impression that you’d been doing the same thing to us.” I searched her face, looking for even the smallest sign that she understood and would forgive us.

“Were you pretending when you did things with me?” She looked so vulnerable that I wanted to tear my hair out.

“Fuck no.” Ryder barked the words at her. “Nothing was ever pretending. I wanted to fuck you that night in the ring. The only thing stopping me was that I thought you were trying to play us and I didn’t want to just roll over that easily for you. I thought that I couldn’t trust you.”

Cole nodded along. “The night on the lookout it took everything in me not to replace my fingers with my dick. The same way you felt like you weren’t supposed to get involved with us, we felt we couldn’t give in to our desires with you.”

I leaned forward and gripped her knee. “Everything between us was real. Including our feelings.”

She looked between the three of us and sucked in a sharp breath. “You want me?”

Ryder growled. “Woman, we want you. We’ve been fucking awful without you around.”

“H-how? What is this? All three of you a-and…me?” She stood up then and paced behind the couch.

“This is nuts. If you expect me to be able to pick between the three of you, you’re insane.

I can’t. I won’t. Maybe talk amongst yourselves and figure out a way to determine who comes out on top, or something.

That is, if you even mean that you want me that way.

Oh, god. Do you? This is humiliating. This is why I’ve been hiding.

Are you sure you meant the things we did together?

I wasn’t even angry when I found out everything from Cass.

Just heartbroken. I don’t want to feel that way again. Ever.

“I mean, I was thinking crazy things, like maybe I’d fallen for y’all. If you don’t mean you want me like I need to be wanted I need you to tell me and let me go.”

I stood up and pulled her into my chest, holding her tight. “Of course, we want you, Savannah. Have you missed all of this? I’m fucking obsessed with you. We got Marla here today to try to fix that problem first and then we were going to figure out a way to get past my sister to get to you.”

She started to soften and then froze. “Wait. Did someone mention hacking my email earlier?!”

Cole stood up and pressed into her back. “Let’s worry about the details later.”

Her breathing grew quicker. “What does this mean?”

Ryder stood next to us and cupped her cheek in his hand to turn her face towards his.

He rubbed his thumb over her bottom lip and slowly brought his mouth down to hers.

There was a moment when none of us breathed.

We’d talked about being with Savannah together but seeing it for the first time would make or break everything.

I glanced over Savannah at Cole and he took the same deep inhale I took as we both looked back and watched Ryder kiss Savannah. Her hands gripped my t-shirt and there was something in that movement that brought me a sense of peace. She was kissing him but she was reaching for me.

Ryder pulled back slightly and we all collectively exhaled. “It means we all want you. We don’t want you to choose.”