Sawyer (Carolina Reapers 2)

Her cheeks flushed, and I saw eyebrows raise at the table next to us, despite my hushed tone.

“And that isn’t a string?” she asked, pointing to the key.

“That was me not kicking you out before practice. That was me respecting you, not asking you to move in for fuck’s sake.” Did she really think that I was just going to forget everything we’d said the night before and key her the next morning?

“Oh,” she whispered.

“Oh,” I replied, and cut my steak with a little more force than necessary.

“I thought the key was, you know, a key,” she admitted, looking more than slightly guilty. “And then you asked if I wanted to go out to dinner, and this place is totally a relationship place. I live here. I know.”

My jaw dropped.

“Okay. The key was for exactly what I told you it was for, and the restaurant was because Lukas recommended the steak. I figured I’d feed us with minimal effort, and then I’d get you home and bend you over my dining room table until you came a few times. Or does that have too many strings for you?”

Her lips parted, and she shifted in her seat. Good. At least I hadn’t killed off her sexual attraction to me while fucking up whatever it was we had going on.

“So this is just...dinner,” she said quietly.

“Yep.”

She ran her tongue over her lower lip. “And the key was just to lock the door.”

“You got it.”

“So I may have overreacted?” She scrunched her nose, and it took everything I had not to pull her across the table and kiss the shit out of her.

“Maybe a little.” I gestured with my thumb and forefinger.

“And you’re still on board with this no-strings thing?” She smiled hopefully.

“All about it,” I confirmed as relief slammed into me with the force of a freight train. Maybe we were just friends who fucked, but I wasn’t anywhere near ready to lose that yet. I liked her too much. “Are you?”

“God, yes!” Her eyes swung to the tables on either side of us before she continued, lowering her voice. “I’m incredibly on board.”

“So can we finish our dinner? Because I wasn’t kidding. I really do need to eat.”

She laughed.

“What?”

“You don’t have to give me the puppy dog face.” She shook her head. “Let’s finish dinner. And if it’s not too many strings…” She bit her lip for a minute, and I waited, knowing if I pushed her, she’d never open up. “I missed you. I watched your games of course, but it wasn’t the same as being around you.”

Fuck my life, I was crazy about this girl. I cleared my throat and took a drink of water. “You could always come tomorrow night. It’s a home game.” I shoveled my food in quickly.

She smiled, and my heart clenched. She was so insanely beautiful.

“You don’t think that’s...string territory?” The hope that lit her eyes hit me hard.

“I think friends come to games. Come on. My mom will be there and everything. You’d be doing me a favor if you kept her company.”

“I love your mom!” Her face fell. “I can probably make it, but I don’t know if I have time to grab any Reaper merch after my shift tomorrow, though.”

“I’ll drop something off for you,” I promised, barely containing a grin. I had an extra jersey in the closet that would swamp her, but I’d be damned if she was going to wear anyone else’s name on her back.

Whoa, possessive much?

“Sounds like a deal. Now what about this key?” she asked slowly.

“Up to you.” I shrugged. “Give it back if you think it’s a string. Keep it if you think it’s the easiest way to get me naked.”

She picked it up and studied it like it might give her the answer while I polished off my dinner.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” I assured her.

“Oh for God’s sake, either you take the damned key, or I will!” the woman sitting next to us snapped. She had to be in her early seventies.

We both burst into laughter, and Echo slipped the key back into her purse.

“What do you say we take dessert to go and eat it at your dining room table?” Echo asked, her voice innocent, but her eyes stripping me bare.

I motioned to the waiter and cleared my throat.

“Check please!”

12

Echo

Sawyer wiped down the bar as I locked up for the night. He’d shown up after practice and stayed throughout closing. Not to drink or eat, but just to be around me. We were still firmly agreed on the no-strings-attached deal—especially after my overreaction at dinner the other night—but I couldn’t deny just how much I enjoyed his company.

When he was in town, that was. They were smack in the middle of the second round, two games up and two more to win before they could move onto the conference finals. His playoff schedule didn’t allow for a ton of downtime, which would normally be my jam, but seeing as how I liked the son of a bitch so damn much…