I don’t like that idea. I thought just a minute ago that I didn’t have any strength left, but I actually think I could get a second wind here pretty soon. Gray surprises me, however, when she sits up and inches backward, causing me to slip out of her. I can’t help the groan that pops out just from that slight sensation.

With slender but sure fingers, Gray takes me by the base of my dick and pulls the rubber off of me. I’m still half erect when she releases me, my shaft coming to rest along my leg. She rolls of the bed and pads into the bathroom where I assume she disposes of the condom, then she’s walking back toward the bed. Her breasts sway gently and her eyes are warm and mischievous as we stare at each other.

She crawls onto the end of the bed, right in between my legs, nudging them apart until she’s kneeling before me. Gray slides a finger over my cock, which leaps at her touch, and then looks at me with one of her eyes obscured by a brilliant red lock of hair falling forward.

“Why did you have a condom in your wallet?” she asks, and I’m stunned by her question for a moment.

That’s the last thing in the world I thought she’d ask. While I’m not necessarily comfortable telling her the reason while she’s kneeling in between my legs, I go ahead and give her the truth.

“About three months ago…during preseason, I went out with a bunch of the guys after one of the games. Ended up getting drunk and a little intimate with one of the bartenders in the men’s bathroom.”

Gray wrinkles her nose up in distaste. “So you bought some condoms from the machine in the bathroom?”

“No, my tale is much sadder,” I tell her with a dramatic sigh, reaching out to take her hands. I lace my fingers with hers and rest them on my stomach. “We were…um…you know to the part where a condom is needed and I didn’t have one. She didn’t have one. The bathroom didn’t have one. I basically struck out because I didn’t have protection, so I went out the next day and bought some and tucked a few in my wallet, promising myself I’d never be without again.”

Gray strokes a thumb against mine, staring at the union of our hands. She asks me quietly, “And do you make it a habit to have sex with random women?”

I give her hands a hard squeeze until she looks at me. “No I don’t make that a habit. That was the first woman I touched since I separated from my wife. I was drunk, but I don’t make any apologies. I was horny and hadn’t been laid in months. You’re the second woman I’ve touched since then, and the first I’ve had sex with since my separation.”

She lowers her face slightly, but I see the curve of her lips, pleased with that part of my answer. When she looks back up at me, she whispers, “It’s been awhile for me too.”

I squeeze her hands again and then pull on them so she leans over me. I lift my head up and kiss her. “So, Big Bang…what is your oversized brain telling you right now?”

She laughs and flops over to the side of me, turning on her side to face me. “It’s telling me that researchers have vastly underrated the common orgasm as a means of relaxation.”

“So we should probably do this again…and soon?”

“Definitely,” she says, and then with a tentative hand, she lays it on my chest. “But we have to be careful. No one can know about this.”

I knew this. It’s not a surprise, but now that I’ve been balls deep inside of Gray, it suddenly doesn’t set well that I have to keep her a secret. It means I’m not going to be able to see her whenever I want or even talk to her. I’ll have to practically ignore her when we are around each other.

And this is exactly what I mean by the fact that I don’t do flings. I’m the guy that loves relationships and everything that they mean. I like the comfort and solidarity of a partner. Even though Hensley betrayed me, I’ve never once given up on the idea of love and monogamy.

Can I have that with Gray?

I’m not sure, because while this is more than just sex, it’s far less than a real relationship.

“And Ryker,” she says as she looks at me with a hard glint in her eye. “I’m fining you a thousand dollars for that fight with Claude. You should have walked away.”

I want to laugh. I really do, but I force myself to give her a serious nod of acceptance. “Understood.”

But if she thinks I’ll let him get away with talking that type of filth about her in my presence again, she’s got another thing to learn about Ryker Evans. He does what he wants in protection of his own.

Chapter 12

Gray

For the very first time in my life, I can’t concentrate.

I’ve never had a problem with it before, always able to put singular focus on any task I attempted. Even though I have an amazingly high IQ, I would never have accomplished what I have so far in life without the ability to funnel my thoughts with the precision of a drill team.

And yet this morning, every time I turn my attention to an order of business, I think of Ryker.

And what we did last night.

Oh, God.

The things we did last night, or rather…that was actually very early this morning. He fucked me for the third time around 4:30 A.M., and by 5 A.M. I was making the walk of shame on wobbly legs back to my hotel room. I had barely enough time to get a shower—where I washed his smell and feel away, relishing the soreness between my legs—before I took a car service to the airport to meet the team plane. I never ride the bus with the players, just as I always sit up in the first-class section with the rest of the execs who travel to the road games.