Page 30

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

KAMRYN

I haven’t moved an inch since he walked away. He’s right about everything. He gives, and I take. No matter what we are and aren’t, that’s not fair to him.

I can’t manage to make myself leave, so I pace some more with my mind spinning on every axis possible. The past year plays in my head like a movie.

Every single thing we’ve been through together. Every tear. Every laugh. Every intimate moment. Every thoughtful thing he’s done. There are too many to count.

He’s right. He gives and gives to me. Pushes me. Loves me . What have I done for him? Nothing.

I’ve never hated myself more than I do at this very moment, and that’s saying something because I’ve spent a good part of the past eighteen years hating myself.

Tears freefall down my face. What the fuck have I done? I feel like I’m losing my best friend. The agony is nearly unbearable. I feel it in my heart. I’ve never felt pain like this before. Real physical pain in my chest. This must have been what Bailey felt when Tanner hurt her all those months ago. What Ripley felt when she moved away.

I eventually get to the point where I realize the truth. It’s been staring me in the face for a long time, but I didn’t want to see it.

He’s right about the fact that he’s always the one fighting for me and for us. Maybe it’s time for me to return the favor.

Fuck this, I’m going into the locker room. There’s nothing in there I haven’t seen before.

I push through the doors and see a handful of guys standing by their lockers in a half-dressed state. They’re staring at me like I’m crazy. Maybe I am.

I walk through the massive space until I hear the sounds of the showers and loud chatter. I poke my head in and see almost the entire team in a huge communal shower. There must be twenty showerheads. Guys really use communal showers? I thought that was a movie-created thing. So fucking weird. Girls would never do that.

I see Cheetah at the very end, slightly removed from the group. They seem to be giving him a little space. His back is to me, and his hands are on the wall with his head down. The water runs down the strong muscles of his bare back.

I pace again for another minute or two as I wait for him. My hands are practically twitching. Once again, I think, fuck this. I’m not waiting for another second.

CHEETAH

I can hear all the guys engaging in their normal banter in the shower. At least they’re trying to normalize things for me, but I’m a million miles away.

My hands rest on the far back tile wall as I let the scalding hot water beat down on me. Have I been spinning my wheels for a year? On some level, I’ve always known I was, but the problem is that I love her, and I can’t imagine being with anyone but her.

What do you do when your perfect match doesn’t want you?

Where do we go from here? You don’t just propose to someone, they say no, and you go back to what you were. You can’t love someone who refuses to ever love you back. I don’t ask for much, but I have enough self-respect to know I deserve at least that.

I’m running through a million different scenarios in my mind when the steady stream of voices suddenly goes silent. I hear a few people breathe, “What the fuck?” and a few others whistle and snicker.

Without even having to turn around I know that Kamryn has stepped into the showers. I can feel her presence. After taking a calming breath, and without turning around, I break the silence and grit out, “I swear to god, Kamryn, if you’re naked, I will kill you, you crazy fucking bitch.”

I hear her voice, “You’re not the only one with big balls, kitten. A gang bang is on my bucket list.”

The shower area is suddenly covered in a sea of deep laughter from all the guys. I hear Jimmy say, “Look at her jugs.”

Another teammate replies, “You probably don’t know the difference between jugs and balls.”

Jimmy lets out a laugh. “Well, I know I wasn’t touching your mom’s balls last night.”

There’s another eruption of laughter and cheering. Fucking neanderthals. I’m too old for this shit.

I hear Kamryn’s voice again. “Boys, relax. You’ve all seen a naked woman before. At least I hope so. It’s good to see that none of you are hung like Justin Timberlake. ”

As the guys all cackle like a bunch of old ladies, I turn my head to Trey, who’s next to me, and whisper, “Is she completely naked?”

The corner of his mouth raises slightly as he subtly nods.

I shout, “Everyone get the fuck out! Now!”

It quickly goes silent. After a brief moment of hesitation, I hear them all scramble to leave. Once I’m confident they have, I turn around. Sure enough, Kamryn Hart is standing in the communal shower of a professional baseball team, naked as the day she was born.

I cross my arms and stare at the lunatic standing before me. “You’re one hundred percent certifiable. You. Are. Nuts.”

She cracks a small smile. “Your nuts are huge.”

I shake my head. “No, sweetheart, no one has bigger nuts than you.”

She shrugs. “I needed your attention.”

I exhale a long breath. “There are other ways to go about it. Better ways than being naked in front of twenty grown men.”

She places her hands on her hips. “It was a bit of a community service. I felt like the two gingers on your team deserved to see their first naked woman.”

I have to bite back my smile. She loves her ginger jokes.

I’m not sure how she could possibly make me smile given how I feel right now, but Kamryn Hart always makes me smile. It’s one of the things I love most about her.

I ask, “What’s the difference between a ginger and a calendar?”

She immediately answers, “A calendar has dates.”

I can’t help but let out a laugh. There’s no ginger joke she doesn’t know.

After a short stare-down, my face turns serious. “There’s nothing left to say. I have nothing left to give. What is it that you want, Kamryn?”

“You.”

“You just rejected me in front of forty-thousand people. You don’t want me.”

Sincerity blankets her face. “I never said I didn’t want you. You know my feelings on marriage. We should have had a conversation about it before you proposed, especially in a setting like that.”

In fairness, she’s not wrong. I know she’s dead set against marriage. We’ve never discussed otherwise. Not only did I propose, but I did it publicly. On national television.

I throw my hands in the air. “What can I say? I love you and want to spend my life with you. You looked so happy and so beautiful. I was swept away in the moment.”

“You know full well that I’m about to pay the price for that moment of yours.”

I shamefully nod. She’s right. She’ll be crucified. Vilified. It will probably negatively impact her modeling career. “I’m truly sorry about that. You know it wasn’t my intention. I have no excuse other than the fact that my heart was bursting with love for you. I know you told me not to, but I fell in love with you, Kamryn. I love you.” I throw my hands up and let them fall. “There, I said it. I can’t take it back. I’m madly in love with you.”

She tentatively walks toward me as if I’ll retreat from her touch, but I don’t back away. “I don’t care about the backlash, Cruz. I care about you.” She moves within an inch or two of me and fidgets nervously. “I didn’t get to answer your question on the field.”

“I’m pretty sure your silence implied that you were rejecting my marriage proposal.”

She shakes her head. “Not that question.” She nervously chews on her lower lip. “You asked me if I love you.” She takes my hands in hers as the shower water now pelts down onto her too.

Without flinching in the slightest, she says, “I do love you. I fell in love with you too. You aren’t alone in your feelings. You know what a big deal it is for me to say that.” Her eyes are wary, but she doesn’t look away.

I nod.

She continues, “I’m just not the marrying type. I’m a work in progress, Cruz. But I’m trying. I am. I’ve changed so much over the past year. Being around you has changed me for the better. I’m working on me, but I’m just not comfortable with marriage. Maybe that day will come, and maybe it won’t. If you can’t live with it, then I’ll let you go for your own sake. If you can be patient, I want to try to be with you. No more caveats. No flingationship . No more pretending that we’re just fuck buddies. No more avoiding deep conversations about us. I want to be your girlfriend. I’m going to fuck up sometimes. I freak out. It’s who I am. But for you, and only you, I want to try.”

Now it’s my turn to be silent as I absorb the enormity of her words. This is her way of giving.

She continues, “Tell me what you want, Cruz, and I’ll try to give it to you without compromising myself.”

I swallow down the large knot in my throat as I think about how to answer her. “I want to be your sounding board, and I want you to be mine. I want to build you fires, build you forts, talk for hours, and feed you dark chocolate in the middle of the night when you can’t sleep. I want you to drag me to your terrible fondue restaurant when you need your comfort food, but I equally want you to go with me when I need mine. I want to watch the movies you love, but I need you to watch the movies I love too. I want to be the man who brings you coffee in bed in the morning because I’m the reason you can’t walk there yourself. ”

After a few deep breaths, she nods. “I want all those things too.”

I slowly take in both her words and her physical beauty. There’s no denying it. She’s my everything. My body floods with warmth for her.

Her eyes move down my body until they land between my legs. “I can’t believe you’re hard right now.”

“Kamryn, if the day ever comes where your naked body doesn’t make me hard, take me out to pasture with all the cows.”

She looks back up at me. “Did you know that cows have a three-hundred-and-thirty-degree field of vision? Can you imagine how great that would be for playing ball? I wish I had that.”

“No, Kamryn, I didn’t know that super relevant piece of information. Thank you for shedding light on how cows see. I had been wondering about it my whole life.”

A giggle bubbles in her throat. “You’re welcome.”

I slowly move the wet strands of her hair now stuck to her face. She simply stares at me through her thick, wet eyelashes. My heart beats for this woman. I can’t be without her.

I look into her gorgeous face. “I love you, Kamryn. I just want to be with you. Whatever form it takes is fine by me; all I ask is that you consider my needs at times. I’m sorry I put you in that position today. We’ll figure something out for the impending fallout.”

She runs her hands over my chest and brushes her lips across mine before whispering, “I don’t care about anything but you. Fuck everyone else and what they think. I want to be with you too.”

Her hand moves down until it grips my cock, but I shake my head. “I’m not having sex with you in this shower with all the guys within listening distance. Hell, half are probably watching. ”

She begins to stroke me and peppers kisses along my jawline. “What if I told you that we don’t have to use a condom? Would that change your mind?”

I suck in a breath. Shit. Shit. Shit. She knows how much I want this and what it means to me.

Her strokes over me get faster. I manage to breathe, “You’re a crazy bitch.”

She nods as her lips and hands continue to roam my body. “I know.”

“I wouldn’t want you any other way.”

“I know.”

“Where should I come?” Does she want me to pull out? Come inside her? I’m not sure why this is running through my mind at the moment, but it is. I’ve never had sex without a condom. I’ve never considered the logistics, but suddenly they’re all I can think about.

She looks up at me with a bemused grin. “Now that we’re officially going steady, we’ll have to learn how to compromise. I’ll pick dinner. You pick where you spew the goo.”

I chuckle as I lift her into my arms and enter her completely bare while she wraps her legs tightly around me. We briefly did this once before in Florida, but I never got the chance to move inside her before she freaked out and pushed me away.

This time, I freely slide inside my woman and manage to make love to her in the communal shower of the Cougars’ locker room. It’s slow and sweet, full of intense eye contact and deep kissing.

As soon as she comes, I let go inside her. I love the feeling of possessiveness, but I love that she allowed it even more.

Your walls are crumbling down, Kamryn Hart. It might be slow, but it’s happening.