4th & Girl

I put my head down and steadied myself for the onslaught of reporters that would be waiting outside. So dedicated was my newfound focus to avoiding every-fucking-one, I almost didn’t see her as I made to walk by.

“Leo,” she called simply—hesitantly.

I knew that voice, and never, in my whole life, could I forget that voice.

I mean, it’d only been haunting me for the past three days.

Honestly, it’d been haunting me since the first time I’d heard it all those months ago.

I pulled up short and turned back, squinting into the darkness to see all the hallmarks come to life.

Blond hair.

Killer body.

Sweet blue eyes.

It was her, all right, gilded within the shadow of the dark hallway or not. My emotions weren’t playing tricks on me.

“Gemma?”

“Ha. Yeah. It’s me,” she said and worried her teeth against her lip.

“How’d you get back here?” I asked, knowing the security to get into the hallway with the players was Fort Knox kind of tight.

“I, uh, kind of told the security guard I was your sister and I had your medication.”

I narrowed my eyes. “And he believed you?”

She shook her head. “Not even a little. But I think he felt bad for me. Maybe it was the pathetic pout or the black circles under my eyes, but I think it was clear I haven’t slept properly for a few days.”

I tilted my head with a little laugh and made a note to watch out for psychopaths. Apparently, the security around here wasn’t as tight as I’d once thought.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, going straight for the question that mattered.

She nodded then, shuffling her feet slightly and self-consciously. Gone was the vibrant woman I’d brought out to drag clubs and karaoke bars, and back was the one who’d been nervous even to look at me. I hated seeing her like this, but seeing her in general? I didn’t hate that at all.

“Yeah, I can see why’d you’d ask that. Abby says I was a bitch to you.”

“Abby?”

She laughed. “Yeah. Big shock.” Her shoulders bumped up and dropped again in a shrug. “She apparently heard our fight.”

I shook my head at her crazy friend and set it aside. Abby wasn’t what mattered, as weird as her behavior was. What mattered was the shit that had gone down between Gemma and me. The absolute wrong move I’d made—and the shitty way she’d handled it.

I knew, when it came to our first official fight, we’d both been in the wrong.

I should’ve talked to her first before booking that gig.

And she should have tried to understand the only reason I’d done it was because I was fucking crazy about her and I only wanted the best for her. Instead, she’d pushed me away and let me go three days of thinking the absolute fucking worst.

“What do you think?” I asked. “Were you a bitch?”

She flinched at my use of the word in the context of her, but in the end, she shrugged. “I was upset. And I know I didn’t handle it well, nor did you deserve that kind of awful reaction. Truthfully, I would have gotten in touch sooner, but…I knew it had to be in person. And you’re really hard to keep up with this late in the week.”

I nodded. Game weeks were always a push in preparation. If she’d have called, I would have answered, but it didn’t feel right to put any more blame on her than there already was.

“What did I deserve?”

She smirked. “A polite decline?”

I laughed, relieved to have just a hint of her cuteness back. “And what else?”

“A hug?”

Stepping closer, I pulled her body against mine and pushed us both against the wall. The contact soothed my entire body immediately. “And what else?” I asked again, this time much more softly.

“Hmm. A kiss?”

Leaning forward, I took her mouth with mine and swept my tongue inside. She gasped as it united with hers, and my gut finally unclenched.

Hours, days of agony, all released at once.

Quickly and discreetly, I stepped back and grabbed her hand before guiding her down the hall and behind a door that read Service Closet.

She smiled as we stepped inside, but I didn’t give her time to blush, even loving it as much as I did. Instead, I pushed the door shut and her up against it, pulling a leg up onto my hip and pressing our lips together again.

One kiss, two, I worked her mouth and then her neck and all the way down to her collarbone before coming up for air.

“I missed you,” I breathed into the little hollow spot at the center, and her hips pushed up and out toward mine.

“Me too,” she gasped as I ripped open the buttons of her shirt and put my mouth to the lace of her bra.

Delicately, one nipple at a time, I sucked and plundered until she was writhing against me in agony.