Block Shot (Hoops 2)

I leave the room abruptly, suddenly feeling ill surrounded by couples who have the next fifty years all figured out. I haven’t seen the woman I want in six weeks, and she’s sleeping under the same roof with a guy who is madly in love with her. So in love he forgave her for fucking me. And dammit all if I wouldn’t do the same because Banners don’t just grow on trees. They burned the mold when they made her. I know. In ten years, I haven’t found anyone even close, and now that I have a second chance, it feels like I’m losing her again. This Stella won’t cut it. I need a real drink because if I think August is whipped, feeling this way, what am I?

35

Banner

Jared feathers kisses down my back, licking between the fine-boned links of my vertebrae. Barely there touches that tease my skin and whisper over my nerve endings. When he reaches the satin edge of my panties, he tugs them down with his teeth and presses his open mouth over the curves of my ass, suctioning the generous flesh into his mouth and moaning as he marks me. I match him moan for moan as my knees are wrenched apart and cool air hits me where I’m hot and wet between my legs.

I’m on all fours, my face buried in a pillow catching the guttural noises tumbling out of me. A heavy hand caresses my back, long fingers winding into the hair at the base of my neck. He spreads my cheeks, exposing me. I’m unprepared for the wet heat of his mouth at my puckered entrance. It feels too good for me to allow self-consciousness to interfere. Oh, no. I press back into the soft lips and greedy tongue lapping at me. He holds me in place when I squirm and takes his fill.

Pleasure curls around my spine, tightening and lengthening like a coil until the onslaught of sensations make me spring. It hits me like the morning surf, lifting me so high that I crest and soar and meet the sun. Then I crash, panting for air as the water washes over me, sure that I’m drowning.

“God, Banner.”

Jared’s voice. It pours over me like hot oil, singeing my skin, leaving me slick.

“Banner.”

“Oh mi Dios sí,” I mumble.

Oh my God, yes.

“Banner.”

Something’s off in his voice. It’s the wrong kind of desperate. The worst kind of urgent. I claw my way through layers of consciousness until I break the surface of my sleep, groggy and disoriented with a pillow between my legs. I really hope I wasn’t humping a pillow. That would be a new low.

“Banner.”

It’s faint, so faint, but Zo’s voice drifts down the hall. The tone is distinct, but I can’t place it, for once can’t figure out what he needs and have never heard this in his voice. I throw off the covers and the last of my dream and rush down the hall in bare feet and the clothes I fell asleep in.

When I reach Zo’s room, I leave my heart at the door, but my body rushes forward, and I think for just a moment I’ve lost my mind. He’s on the floor, motionless.

I’m still asleep. I’m still asleep. I’m still asleep.

I repeat it in my head, like that will make this a horrible dream, but it’s too real. The deathly pallor of his face. The pulse at his neck so faint it’s crafted from butterfly wings. His breath so shallow it’s barely there.

“Zo,” I yell and shake him. “Wake up.”

Unresponsive.

He’s fainted before, extremely low blood pressure is a complication of this disease, but never like this.

“Zo, please wake up.” Hearing the fright in my voice shatters my calm, and I’m screaming and shaking and trembling from head to toe. Hot tears, liquid sorrow scalds my cheeks and pools at my neck.

“Levántate,” I beg. “Por favor. Despierta.”

Get up! Please, wake up.

I look all around the room as if someone will suddenly appear to help me, but the room is empty. On his bedside table, I catch sight of the rosary my mother sent. The one that healed Aunt Valentina. And beside the rosary is Zo’s cell phone.

I race to the bed and grab the phone, dialing on auto pilot.

“Nine-one-one,” the operator answers.

“Ayuda!” I beg for help, my mind scrambled with panic and relief. “Por favor ayúdame.”

“Ma’am, no habla español,” the operators replies, her tone flat and calm. “Is there someone who speaks English?”

“I . . . I do. I’m sorry. I do. My friend. He’s unconscious.”