He looked at me like he planned to strip me down.
Like he wanted me.
A couple more seconds under his dominating stare, and I might’ve let him.
Why the hell did I face him instead of yelling at him over the phone? I wasn’t prepared to confront a man as handsome or frustrating as this trouble-maker with his wandering, mischievous eyes.
“So…you came here…” His voice lazily murmured, as though he knew the shivers it’d cause. “Because you’re concerned? You think I’m going to get tossed out of the league?”
“Yes.”
“And here I thought you were paid to worry about me.”
Bastard. “My career depends on your career, Jack. On your behavior.”
“Why?”
“Because if you get thrown out of the league, I’ll lose my chance to be fast-tracked to a partner in Jolene’s firm.”
“Well, sorry I nearly killed myself in a car accident last night, Kiss.”
He made me sound heartless. I took a breath. “Look, Jack. I know you like to play these games, but that’s over now. You told the president you were a changed man because of me. If you get expelled from the league for doing something stupid or immoral now, I’ll lose more than my job. You’ll ruin my reputation too.”
Jack didn’t understand, didn’t even try. “Why do you care what people think of you?”
“It’s my job?”
“No. You’re supposed to care what people think of me. So what if people call me a jerk? So what if I go out to a party?”
“It matters because it’s going to reflect on me as a person. I’m supposed to be your long-term, committed girlfriend.”
“Then break it off.”
He tried to leave again. I followed, taking two steps to his every stride.
“Then Frank Bennett has every reason to force the Rivets to cut you. This relationship is the only way you stay in the league.”
“That so?”
“Yes. And that means you have to calm down and lie low for the duration of…whatever this is. Do you understand? This is your last chance.”
He stopped, deep in the tunnel separating us from the action of the field. His arms crossed. Every tattoo practically pulsed with the heat coursing under his skin. It radiated from him, pressing into me, stealing my breath. I looked up to meet his gaze as he stepped closer.
His voice lowered, a deep, grumbling promise of suppressed wildness. “Don’t worry about me.”
“I’m not. I’m protecting myself.”
“This is a dangerous game, Kiss.”
“But it can work.” Was I really trying to convince him of his own stupid idea? “People will believe we’re a couple if you behave yourself. I mean…we have a close, professional relationship already.”
Jack laughed. “This isn’t my definition of close.”
“Because we work together while fully clothed?”
“Takes the fun out of the meetings.”
“Well, there’s our story. It’ll make sense that, over time, our relationship developed into something…more.”
“Like booty calls?”
“Like love, you freak.”
He grinned. “Right. Love. I can buy it.”
I rolled my eyes. “Have you ever even told a girl I love you before?”
“Have you ever fucked a stranger without exchanging names?”
“No!”
He shrugged. “Guess opposites attract.”
I’d grind my teeth into dust before the day was out. “I’m setting ground rules.”
“Kiss—”
“First, you don’t call me Kiss.”
He shook his head. “Nope. Pet name. I like it better than Darling.”
I was losing the big picture. I exhaled. “Fine. Call me whatever you want. But you will follow these rules.” I pointed at him. “You are going to behave at all times. You will not embarrass me. No acting out, no late night parties, no womanizing, no doing anything that would constitute cheating.”
“What?” His eyes widened. “So I can’t go out with my friends. I can’t meet women. I can’t have sex with anyone…” A sly smile encouraged every thought I didn’t want him to have. “Unless you plan on fulfilling those needs?”
I ignored the implication. “That was my next rule. No screwing with me—literally or figuratively.”
“Why the hell would I agree to this?”
Did he have any blood left in his head? “Because you want to keep your job. You want to win a championship and make that hundred million dollar contract. This is the only way. Get through this season without incident, and we’ll see what happens.”
He set his jaw, the hard angles clenching as tightly as the muscles in his chest. “Fine.”
“It’s for your own good. I’m keeping you on a leash.”
“Only if you promise to toss a collar on me too.”
I didn’t trust Jack’s tone, as if the arrogant trouble-maker already lured me to his bed and had his way with me.
Wasn’t going to happen. No way, no how.
And I hated myself for even imagining the briefest of fantasies.
“Will you promise to behave?” I asked.
He stepped closer, his voice low, tightening everything deep inside me. “You promise to punish me if I don’t?”
“Be serious…” This was never going to work if he got me so flustered.
Jack edged me close to the wall, his gaze hot and entirely too familiar. “I’ll agree…with one condition.”
“And what’s that?”
“I want to see if we have chemistry together.”
“I…” My hands pressed against the cool cement, the only relief I had from the heat suffocating me in Jack’s oppressive shadow. “We can pretend.”
“You can’t pretend a connection. It’s gotta be real. We gotta feel it.”
His body moved close. Too close. I might have reached out, touched the sweat-dazzled muscles that he’d worked and pumped and strained in practice to build a body of utter perfection. I wished he had a shirt on. It was too difficult to focus on him while his feral form raged inches from my own.
I took a harsh breath, sinking deeper against the wall. It didn’t protect me from him. It didn’t stop the twisting heat in my belly. Low. Raw.
God, why did he have to be an attractive jerk?
Jack’s voice heated like caramel and burned just as hot. “If my job rides on this, and your reputation is at stake…we gotta make sure it’ll work, right?”
I accidentally licked my lips. “How do we do that?”
“Kiss me.”
Panic.
I couldn’t kiss this man. I couldn’t even breathe. He was an arrogant, cocky bastard with the most beautiful body I ever saw and eyes that seared through my common sense.
I parted my lips.
Made a joke instead.
“I…I can’t bill you for that time.”
“I’ll consider it a signing bonus.” Both of his arms straddled the wall to my sides. He had me pinned without a touch, and I wasn’t going anywhere. “One kiss. And we gotta make it realistic. People have to believe I’m wild about you, that I’d do anything for you…” The act seemed to drop. His voice turned solemn. “They have to believe that I’d give up everything to spend one night with you.”
My stomach flipped. He didn’t mean the words, but I hadn’t heard anyone promise something so lovely since before my heart was crushed and broken by Wyatt.
“Let me kiss you,” he whispered. “Earn that nickname so it doesn’t just mean how dark and tasty your skin is.”
This was out of control.
Way beyond where anything was meant to go.
I intended to storm the field. Yell. Berate. Punish.
Not part my lips and tilt my head.
“One kiss,” I said. “And then you do as I say.”
“You hold the leash, just tug on it a little and I’ll come…”
This man was absolute trouble.
And I knew it.
So why did I nod?
Jack gripped me close, pushing his body into mine and pinning me against the cool concrete. The wall became the only thing grounding me to the world besides his strength and the fierce grip of his hands.