How I want it to be when we’re together again.
No limits. No barriers. Everything on the table. Just him and me. Me and him. Skin to skin, touching, exploring, discovering more of each other.
I want him inside me again.
I want to be inside him again.
I want to taste him everywhere. Want him to fuck my mouth. Want him to come on me.
Shuddering, I stroke harder, faster.
Images flicker past my eyes.
He flips me over, fucks me hard, rides me to the edge. Then stops. Leaving me there, right there.
So I can get behind him, do the same, drive him crazy too.
Fuck him like I love him.
Let him fuck me the same damn way.
A charge races down my body, and it doesn’t take me long till I’m coming hard in my hand, picturing us.
I pant, breathe out hard, and let the filthy bliss of my release spread through my body.
Then it’s time to clean up.
After, I check my phone.
No reply, but that’s cool.
He’ll write back when he can, and I’m going to learn how to be the best damn long-distance boyfriend there is.
A stupid grin takes over my face as I get back into bed, and I think of him as I slide into slumber.
I swear I can still smell him on the pillow.
I clutch it closer and fall asleep.
I wake in the middle of the night to take a piss, then check my phone when I return to bed.
Ah, there’s a reply from him.
Bring it on.
What did my guy say? I bet it’s sexy. I bet it’s supportive. Just like him.
I click open the text.
Read it.
And blink.
Is this a joke?
* * *
Declan: This is killing me, Grant. You have to know. But making plans was a mistake. We can’t do this. Any of this, including November. Miami is a bad idea.
* * *
For a long stretch, I can’t move. I can’t think. I read it again, and the same awful words mock me.
Once more, and my head spins. A spike of adrenaline jolts my senses into high-def as the room whirls around me, and I set a hand against the wall for balance.
Is this real?
I heave a breath against the tightness of my ribs, but I’m swallowing sand. Shock and anger make a fist, viciously squeezing my heart until I think it might burst.
Declan broke up with me via text message.
Are you fucking kidding me?
I’ve never had a boyfriend. But I’m pretty sure you don’t break up with one over a text.
I want to believe it’s a mistake—a wrong number or a drunk text.
But Declan doesn’t drink. This note is meant for me and can only be from him because it’s about us. About the end of us.
With a death-grip on the offending phone, I read the message again, but the words are still on the screen in cruel black and white.
The man doesn’t even have the guts to call me and shatter my heart in real time.
Holy fuck. I can hardly keep hold of the cell. I’m shaking because I’m so fucking hurt. I’m trembling because I’m so fucking angry.
I shove my free hand through my hair.
This can’t be happening.
He didn’t mean this. No way this is real. I know Declan.
Better to check—to give him that much credit, at least. Better to follow up and find out.
Better to know.
I don’t care what time it is in Florida. I dial his number, jaw clenched, fists tight, and I swallow my pride as the phone rings and rings and rings.
“Pick up, Deck,” I mutter. “Pick up the fucking call.”
Another ring.
One more.
Then voicemail. “You’ve reached Declan Steele. Leave a message.”
I stab the end button.
The chicken-shit asshole doesn’t answer his phone after he dumps me?
Who does this?
Who is he?
I take a few deep breaths to settle the stabbing pains in my chest, but emotions explode in me.
Without thinking, I hurl the phone at the wall, putting all my arm behind it, like it’s game seven in the World Series, bottom of the ninth, and the winning run is trying to steal a base.
Like fucking hell he is.
The phone hits the wall with a loud crack then falls to the carpeted floor with an anticlimactic thud.
No flying shards of glass or pinging aluminum case.
Seething, I stalk over to stare at the carcass. The glass is spiderwebbed and the screen is black. I try to turn it on, but nothing happens.
Fuck.
I don’t feel one bit better. Instead of a jackass who got dumped by text, now I’m just a dumped jackass with no phone.
After our morning workout the next day, I do my damnedest to avoid my teammates, but as I’m leaving the locker room, Crosby calls me over.
“You want to grab some lunch with Chance and me?” He nods to our closing pitcher, who’s just shutting his locker.
Any other time I’d say yes, but not today. Not now. “Raincheck?”