Total pages in book: 133
Estimated words: 128156 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128156 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
She makes this sound—soft and shattered—and I swear I lose my goddamn mind. I don’t ease up. I take more, and that seems to be exactly what she wants. To give.
Her hands lock tight around me, nails pressing into my scalp. It’s not pain; it’s the rush right before the snap. The kind that coils in your gut and steals the breath from your lungs, and mine are fucking starved but only for her. For this.
When we pull apart, her lips are swollen, her breath shaky, and her eyes?
Wrecked. Just like mine.
For a moment, everything fades away, the noise, the pressure, the questions—gone. All that matters are the two of us and the utter rightness that swells in my chest at the feel of her in my arms.
But the longer I stare into her beautiful, blue eyes, the more those barricades begin to tumble at my feet. She’s literal perfection and staring down the field with something bigger than me waiting in the end zone—a gold-plated future. And me?
I’ve got nothing in my hands but her and a thousand reasons she should walk away from me.
She deserves something solid, a sure thing, a plan.
Not this.
Not me and my mess.
Proving she can see me like no one else, her soft, little hand reaches up, pressing into my cheek, and I soak in the contact, desperate for it.
“What is it?” she asks, worry in her tone.
I place my hands over hers.
“I have nothing,” I admit. Shame sweeps in like a hand around my throat, squeezing tighter with every word until my voice comes out even quieter than before. “No money, no plan, and maybe not even a future worth dragging you into. It’s messed up, beyond selfish, really, and I told myself I wouldn’t be that way anymore, but I want you to take a chance on me anyway. To see if I’m worth the risk, even though I’m not so sure I am.” A bitter scoff leaves me, and I swallow hard. “Even though I’m almost positive I’m not.”
Her features soften but not in a way that weighs like pity. It’s tender. Warm.
It’s all Paige.
Her free hand joins the other on my cheek and she raises onto her tiptoes. “You’re wrong.” She speaks so damn sweetly, so softly that something in me cracks, a hard shell deep inside giving way and revealing something underneath. Something raw.
“The only thing I have to offer you is me, and that’s not saying much.”
“Chase…”
My hands slide down, fingers wrapping around her wrists. “I make a lot of mistakes.”
“We all do.”
My forehead falls to meet hers. “I don’t want to make one with you. You deserve more.”
“And you are more.”
“Can I be yours?”
“That depends,” she whispers, sliding her lips across mine and leaving me chasing the feeling as she pulls back.
“On what?”
“If I get to keep you.”
My hands find their way under her thighs, and I hoist her up, holding her to me. “I might beg you to.”
“I might like that.”
I might already be falling in love with you…
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Chase
“So.” Brady drops down on the bench, pulling his leg up to tie his cleats. “Cammie and I compared pics.”
I grin, tucking my shirt under my chin so I can tie my practice pants. “Is that supposed to mean something to me?” I cut a quick glance at Mason, who smirks in return.
“Oh, fuck yeah, it is.” He ties his other cleat, then hops to his feet, snagging his phone from the shelf in his locker. “Check this out.”
He holds out the screen, and I lean in, Mason popping his head in between our shoulders.
It’s a screenshot from Life360, the app we use to share our locations, zoomed in to my picture. I lift a brow, waiting.
“This is you.” He states the obvious, then scrolls to the next picture, this one zoomed in the same, but showing Paige’s photo in the little bubble. “This is Paige.” Again with the obvious statement. “And this right here, my boy, is my photo on top of Cam’s. She put it in some app and faded it or some shit and look at that!” He points to our pictures, mine blended over hers. “Look. At. That.” He elbows me and steps back, grinning from Mase to me.
The two of us chuckle, and I shake my head.
“And what exactly are you trying to show me? You were clearly there when I called her yesterday. You know I went to her dorm.”
“Yeah…but you’re in the same spot as her, and we zoomed all the fuck the way in. You’re literally on top of her…or she was on top of you.” His gaze snaps over my body a moment and he shakes his head. “Nah, I’m pretty sure you’d be the icing and she’d be the cake.”
“Jesus Christ.” Mason laughs, pulling a hoodie over his head. Must be nice to be the quarterback. He only has to wear his shoulder pads a couple days a week.