Page 6 of Trick Play (Playing the Field #4)
CHAPTER
FIVE
Zeke
Then
I’ve got Micah in my arms, his mouth covered by mine and his body pressed tightly against me, both of us partially submerged in my outdoor hot tub, when over the music playing from the speakers surrounding my backyard, a wooden knock interrupts our evening.
When I texted Micah earlier, it wasn’t out of the blue. At least, not for me. I could have gone to a club or picked up someone from an app, but I don’t want someone else. Micah has invaded my every intimate thought since the Halloween party. I can’t get him out of my head. I can’t help but imagine how that night would have gone if we weren’t both drunk off our asses. Since Tahegin hasn’t told me off for hooking up with Hendrix’s best friend, I’ve decided to find out exactly how good a roll between the sheets can be with him.
But first, a night swim. I told Micah to bring swim trunks, but when he stripped out of his clothes to reveal a strappy one-piece in cotton candy pink that matches his hair, I wasn’t upset by the difference in attire. He looks sexy as fuck. I almost skipped swimming altogether.
Instead, we’d just slipped into the hot tub and gotten right to the good part.
“Los Angeles Police Department,” a voice calls through the slats of the wooden privacy fence surrounding my backyard. “Can we come in?”
Micah tries to move away from me, but I slip a hand around his waist and settle him between my legs, blocking my tented trunks from view. I call out the gate code for them, familiar with this routine by now. Two officers enter my yard. I recognize them from the last few times my neighbors have called in a noise complaint about my music. One walks over to my stereo and lowers the volume of my music; the other comes closer to my hot tub. “Do we need to tell you why we’re here?”
I huff. “My music wasn’t that loud, and it’s only eight in the evening. You can’t be serious. My neighbor calls if a loading truck is in reverse for more than thirty seconds.”
“You can still try to keep the music down.”
“It was down. I had my lawyer check after you guys’ first visit, and I’m not violating any laws or ordinances. My neighbors are just assholes.”
The female officer crosses her arms. “Your neighbors are parents trying to look out for their kids. They don’t like your punk music, and they believe the volume disturbs their child’s studying. I can’t tell you how often we get called out because a celebrity like you is being a poor role model for children.”
I grind my molars at that, wishing I could scream—to them, to the media, to the entire world—that I am a good role model. That everything I do is so that kids don’t have to be scared of growing up gay in sports organizations. That it isn’t shameful to kiss who you want when you want no matter what anyone else says.
Instead, I lift Micah onto the edge of the hot tub and climb out, grabbing us two fluffy, oversized towels from the heated rack. “We were going inside anyway,” I mutter to the cops who know nothing and will never understand. Not if this is how they approach the people they don’t think are worth their time. Helping Micah to his feet, I kiss his lips in plain view of the officers. “Come on, bunny. Let’s see what other kinds of noises we can make without the music playing.”
“That isn’t—” the officer begins, but I cut her off.
“You can see yourselves out, I trust?” Our gazes lock and hold for a moment before they reluctantly nod. “Write the code down for next time,” I call as they leave, and Micah stifles a giggle against my chest.
? ? ?
“Sorry about the cockblockers,” I pant as we lie side by side after a round of explosive sex. It was a hundred times better than our drunken flail on Halloween. My hand absently traces his body, every gentle curve and supple swell of muscle. His pink hair is a wild mess from my fingers, which can only seem to stray away to touch and explore other parts of him. There’s a tiny heart-shaped birthmark near his left nipple. I can’t stop staring at it.
Micah rolls his head to the side to cast me an odd look. “That’s your first thought post-sex before we’ve even caught our breaths? I forgot about those cops the minute you lifted me out of the water.”
I rub my hand over my mouth, fingers tracing the upward curve on one side to hide the evidence of just how giddy his words make me. “Yeah?”
“Mhm. There’s something incredibly hot about a man who can manipulate my body in all kinds of ways.” His voice has lost some of its sweet smoothness, probably because of how loudly he screamed his pleasure while digging his nails into my back earlier, and it now carries a sultry tone that has me preparing for round two.
I chuckle lowly, just a rumble in my chest. “ All kinds of ways,” I parrot. “You’re very flexible.” So, so bendy.
He tips his chin pompously. “You’re welcome.”
Needing to cover the smile still taking over my face, I turn and bury my nose in his strawberry-scented neck with a satisfied hum. “Thank you, bunny.”
“You know,” he murmurs, fingers carding through my hair, “Ezekiel is quite the mouthful to moan, and it isn’t fair that you have a nickname for me when I don’t have one for you. I was thinking . . . cherub? Keep the Halloween theme going?”
“No,” I groan into his neck, desperately not wanting a reminder of that part of the night. “God, that diaper rash was terrible. Took days for it to go away completely.”
“No shit?”
“Why do you think it took so long for me to hit you up?” I blurt without a second thought before realizing that might make me sound desperate. Oh well. I kind of have been.
A blush spreads across his cheeks at my words. I feel the warmth against my nose as I nuzzle his jaw and ear, nipping gently.
“Zeke,” he gasps and arches into my love bites. Hearing him call me that, something I haven’t heard in the years since I became Kiss, sends a burst of primal instinct through me—it’s the only explanation for why the single thought running through my head is mine, mine, mine like some kind of caveman. I suck a mark onto his collarbone as my hands explore his naked body for the second, but certainly not the last, time tonight. As long as he keeps calling me by that nickname, he’ll have my complete devotion.