Page 108 of Playboy Pitcher

But it’s too late. As soon as her walls tighten around my cock, I slam my mouth onto hers, and she swallows my groan as I come with her, spilling the last remaining pieces of my soul inside her.

We lay like that for what seems like hours, tangled together without speaking of what just happened. We both know the risk of what we just did. The evidence still lingers on her thighs.

Isn’t that what love is…risk and fear?

“The cake wasn’t your only surprise, you know,” I finally say, breaking the silence.

Lazily lifting an eyebrow, she rolls over to face me. “Yeah?”

“I’ve done a lot of thinking since meeting Emma. Seeing you with her and knowing now all you’ve gone through and all the sacrifices you’ve made to give her a life she would’ve never had otherwise made me realize something.”

“What?”

“You always say no one sees you, and I keep telling you I do; that I’ve always seen you. But you were right. Nobody does, especially me. Until I met Emma. That’s the real you, Willow.” Trailing my finger down her face, I lift a lock of hair off her shoulder and roll it between my fingers. “That’s the one hiding underneath a layer of blue hair, tattoos, and dark clothes.”

She pulls back, her voice unsteady. “Ben, don’t.”

But I don’t stop. Tonight opened a door I can’t seem to close. “For weeks, I’ve tried to figure out how the hell I found myself having feelings for any woman, much less one who didn’t check any of my usual boxes. But that night at your place, I realized it was never about the package; it was about what it was designed to protect.”

Her face tightens again. Just like it did in the kitchen. Rolling onto her back, she stares at the ceiling and swallows hard.

“I’ve asked a lot of you, Willow. I know I’m demanding and occasionally hypocritical. I’ve constantly pushed you out of your comfort zone, and you’ve surprised me every time.” I have no idea what the hell I’m saying because I’m not in control of my mouth anymore. Words are spewing from a place I can’t find, much less close. “So, here I am, so far outside of my comfort zone, I can’t see the fucking ground, but I don’t care because I—”

“I want an annulment.”

“What?” I ask, because I know I didn’t just hear what I thought I heard.

Throwing back the sheet, she drags her clothes off the floor and begins dressing as if she just placed an order at the damn drive-thru. “Ben, don’t make me say it again, please.”

“What about us?”

“There can never be anus.” Pulling her shirt over her head, she stands, her movements stiff and awkward as she pinches the bridge of her nose. “I have to go. I have a—”

“Don’t you dare say headache,” I growl. “You’re not getting away with that fucking excuse. Not this time. Now answer my question.”

She drops her hand and sighs. “It was always going to end, Ben. That’s what we agreed on, remember? Twenty-eight days.”

My mind spins in circles, trying to figure out how, in the span of an hour, two and two somehow ended up equaling five.

“We also agreed on a divorce. An annulment voids the prenup.” And leaves me with nothing. No career. No team. No purpose.No wife.

“Yeah,” she whispers, bowing her head. “I guess it does.”

Ripping the sheet halfway off the bed, I climb to my knees, not giving a damn that I’m still naked, my half-hard cock bobbing between my legs. “Was this your plan all along, Willow? To get me to go along with your little plan? To make me fall for”—I grit my teeth before I give any more of myself away—“thisact, and then screw me over? To take everything, and then let me walk away with nothing?” Then I consider something even worse. “Or is this not even about me? Was I just a vehicle for revenge? Is this my punishment for being a goddamnpitcher?”

Willow doesn’t say a word. She just stands there with her head hung like an accused criminal awaiting her sentence.

“I ended my career tonight!” I roar, punching the air.

She flinches, choking back a sob. “I know. I wish you hadn’t. You have no idea how much. But I warned you the day we met that I don’t date pitchers.”

I bark out a harsh laugh. “No, you just marry them and ruin their lives.”

Willow just brushes a hand under her eye and absorbs my verbal darts, which pisses me off even more.

Why isn’t she fighting back?

“So that’s it. You’re just leaving?”