Winter Miracle Page 32

  Colton wags his finger. “Actually…”

  Hunter kicks me. “Where have you really been, by the way? Where’s Indy?”

  I shake my head. “You wouldn’t believe me even if I told you.”

  “We heard there was some fucking gunfight or some shit west of campus. You’re not telling us…”

  I nod. “Oh, yes. I was there.”

  Hunter turns serous, sitting up higher. “Shit. Not…”

  “No, Indy’s fine.” I debate whether to tell them about her story or not. I was given explicit instructions not to by the Feds, but screw it. “She was in witness protection. That’s why she was transferred here. Someone recognized her, tracked her here to Abbotsleigh, a shit-storm ensued, and now she’s gone. They took her away.”

  “Where?” asks Colton.

  “They wouldn’t tell me.”

  Hunter falls back onto the bed, breathing out. “Fuck, man. That’s heavy.”

  “You’re telling me. I was shot at… with real fucking bullets.”

  Colton shakes his head. “So, what? You’re never going to see her again?”

  I turn and look out the window. “I don’t know.”

  But that’s just it. I don’t know where she is, when or if I will see her, but I do know I’m never going to find someone like her again.

  So I’ll wait.

  It’s all I can do.

  EPILOGUE

  SEVEN MONTHS LATER

  CAYDEN

  A shock of awareness runs through her body as I run my hand down her back. I pass over her scarred flesh. I don’t even notice it any more. I love it, because it is part of her.

  There was a time when she would have flinched, tensed up whenever I drew close to this patchwork of former pain, but now she remains relaxed, mewing for more.

  She spreads her legs apart, the glistening valley between them ripe and ready. I run my hand over her ass, let it slip between her ass cheeks, the tips of my fingers resting against her lips.

  She places her own hand against my chest, smiling when she feels my heart pounding against it.

  I take her side and roll her over on the jetty, the space between the slats sparkling like diamonds as the sun hits the water.

  She nuzzles her nose against mine when I slide over her. I brush my fingers down her cheek, marveling at how impossibly soft her skin is there, the same as that on the insides of her thighs. I can’t decide whether I want my tongue or cock inside her right now.

  I bend forward to take her mouth. She pulls back and licks across my parted lips. The kisses come softer today. There is a tenderness in our actions I’ve never known before. It tells me I still have things to learn, and god am I eager to start this new chapter of our lives.

  Almost seven months — that’s how long it took for the trial to start, for Indy to testify. The first time I saw her, the first time I got to hold her in my arms, I almost cried. She looked tired, weary, but she was mine again, and I was never going to let her go.

  She moved back into the house at Abbotsleigh. With Colton having left for Canada and Hunter in LA for treatment, it was getting awfully lonely in that place. I avoided The Lab and concentrated on football, much to Coach’s pleasure. I kept my grades up enough to pass, to shut up the Dean, but no more.

  She sits up on me. “How’d you even find this place?”

  “It belongs to one of guys on the team, formally his grandparent’s property. We all have keys to the gate.”

  “So any one of your Trojan buddies could swan in and catch us like this?”

  “I suppose so.” I take hold of my cock and place it against her. She sinks down on it with a purr.

  We make love slowly, grinding against one another in the heat.

  She stops, smiling. “I can’t believe what happened that night, in the closet. You do remember it, don’t you?”

  I smile at the memory. How could I forget? “You know, I still don’t know who it was, though one of our receivers sounds a lot like that when he takes a tackle, like,” I try to imitate the sound as best I can, “uhhhhhhh.”

  Indy slaps my chest. “I hope to god that’s not his come face.”

  I grab her ass and roll us over, lifting her leg up against my hip. “And how about my come face?”

  “It’s beautiful.”

  “You’re beautiful.”

  Remarkably, Indy was still able to study when they took her to Texas. I guess they thought the biggest state in America was the best place to hide her. I certainly couldn’t find her, even though I found Agent Matherson again, begged him to help, even though I ran the one picture I had of her through every search engine there is. I was lucky I wasn’t locked up.

  I sink deep and draw back, speaking softly into her ear. “What was your name, in Texas?”

  She laughs. “Does it matter? I’m Indy again, aren’t I?”

  I grind harder against her clit. “I’m curious.”

  “Daisy.”

  I laugh. “No, come on. What did they call you?”

  “I told you. Daisy.”

  I draw back, looking down at her, her nipples pink and glossy. “Jesus, the entire FBI and the best they can come up with is ‘Daisy?’”

  She shrugs below. “I don’t know. I kind of like it, though nothing will ever replace my first name.”

  “You never told me what it was.”

  “Evie,” she says, a sudden sadness there. “But I’m Indy. I’m your Indy and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

  “Maybe we can call our kids after states. Alabama?” I offer.

  “Ohio?”

  “Montana?”

  “Virginia.”

  “Sold!” I pronounce.

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because any daughter of mine is going to be a virgin for life. I’m telling you that now.”

  The thought of starting a family isn’t as ludicrous as it once was. I can picture them now, a little part of us. It would be fucking beautiful.

  She giggles below me, laughing with her whole body, her muscles gripping me, milking me. “What makes you so sure it’s going to be a girl?”

  I kiss her again. “Because that’s how God’s going to punish me for my former indiscretions.”

  She rolls us back over. “Forget about God. It’s my turn to punish you today.”

  She slaps the side of my ass and starts to ride me.

  I’m not about to argue.

  We kiss, make love, rinse and repeat until the sun sets and the lights in the water turn from diamond to sapphire.

  Coach has a fit when I run into the locker room ten minutes before game time.

  He throws his clipboard down. “Mother Mary of all that is right, where the hell have you been?”

  “Pre-game workout, Coach.”

  “What?” he bellows.

  “Working on getting a little more penetration in the backfield.”

  He swipes up his clipboard and taps me on the head with it. “Gear up and get the fuck out there. It’s time to take home the dinnerware. Hell, you might even be up for the Heisman this year if you’re on heat tonight.”

  “Oh, I’m on heat, Coach,” I wink. “Trust me.”

  But I don’t need Coach’s tough-love routine to perform, or his usual kick in the ass. I see Indy in the front row where she should have been the last seven months and it’s more than enough motivation. The field might be turfed, but I’m walking on air out there, running so well even the opposition can’t work out what’s going on.

  We take it home, Ricky breaking from his usual, serious self to jump onto my back, the two of us running around the stadium like a padded Quasimodo. I help him off and spring to the stands, leaping up and kissing Indy, not giving a flying fuck who can see us now. Let them. Let them know.

  Waiting was the hard part, but staying true to her was easy. The same girls came out to every game while she was gone. There were the same propositions, but where once I would have jumped on them, I didn’t give such things a second glance this tim
e around because I knew none of them could possibly compare.

  I waited, dreamed — often with cock in hand — and the reward, now right here, is even greater than I could have hoped for.

  *

  A month since Indy’s return and things are starting to get back to some sense of normality. She came back here against the advice of the authorities, but they have no control over her now. She did her part.

  “You wanted to see me?” says Indy, walking to meet me in the center of the field. I had Hector leave the lights on tonight.

  It’s quiet. The stands are empty, a light breeze blowing. We’re the only ones in here.

  I nod in the direction of the scoreboard. “Quite a sight, isn’t it?”

  She squints. “The sunset?”

  “Ah, yeah.” I’m sweating up a storm here.

  She turns back to me with one eyebrow raised. “Sure. It’s nice, but since when do you drag me into the middle of Troy, alone, to watch the sunset?”

  I swallow hard, hoping she doesn’t notice.

  Concentrate on her, the reason you’re here.

  I take her around the hips, pulling her to me. “I just wanted to see you.”

  She smiles. “That’s sweet, but I’ve got my first shift back at The Lab tonight. I should get home, shower.”

  “Alright,” I nod. “I’ve got some things to pack up, but I’ll see you back there?”

  She winks. “You better, big boy. We’ve still got seven months to catch up on.”

  I hold her hand until it falls away, waiting until she’s the perfect distance away.

  Here we go…

  “Hey!” I call out.

  She turns. “Yeah?”

  “You’ve got something stuck to your butt.”

  She looks, craning her neck like a dog chasing its tail. She pulls the Post-It free.

  I watch her expression as she reads the note I just stuck to her ass, the one that reads, ‘Property of Cayden Beckett,’ and in parentheses, ‘Will You Marry Me?’

  When she looks up, I’m already on one knee.

  I’m so fucking whipped it’s ridiculous. I’m surprised there’s not a bow around my dick with her name on it.

  Yes, I could have done this when the stadium was full, the big, grand gesture I was so fond of at the start of the year, but I’m not that guy any more. I don’t want to share this moment with anyone else.

  I take the small box from my pocket. I’m tense, my stomach knotted with nerves. I wasn’t even this nervous before my first game.

  She looks up to me with pale eyes. “I…” She’s speechless.

  My back’s a swimming pool I’m sweating so much.

  I loosen my collar.

  “Indy,” I begin, the words I’d practiced so hard last night turning to mental spaghetti. I wing it. “Screw it. Indiana, I love you. I fucking love you and I cannot bear a single moment more without you as my wife. Will you marry me?”

  My words hang in the air.

  Come on. Come on. I’m dehydrating here.

  She runs forward, dropping the Post-It. I stand to catch her, almost dropping the ring as she leaps, wrapping her legs around me, driving us both to the ground, kissing me hard.

  “Yes,” she says, tears running down her face again, but this time with joy. “Yes, you lovable idiot. Yes.”

  I’m deliriously, break-out-the-champagne happy because I know this is the start of something incredible, a life I couldn’t have dreamed of a year ago when I was playing Jock King and generally pissing my life away.

  That guy is gone.

  It’s done.

  The Damage is a taken man.

  EPILOQUE II

  ANOTHER THREE YEARS LATER

  INDY

  I sniff my shirt. Poo or chocolate? Such are the existential questions I find myself dealing with post-pregnancy.

  Chocolate. Definitely chocolate, I think.

  “If you need a shower,” says Cayden, cradling our baby girl in his arms, “I can put Evie down and join you.”

  As tempting as shower sex sounds right now, Naomi’s in town. I’m meeting her for coffee in fifteen. Keeping in touch with her has been nice—even if she refuses to drop the mother routine.

  But Cayden’s lost his train of thought, looking down at his daughter. She really is an Indy 2.0, a miniature carbon copy of me, which I guess is both good and bad in equal measure. I just want her to be happy.

  I love the way Cayden holds her, like he’s cradling the world’s most precious football, one he’s never ever going to drop. You should have seen him when the midwife handed her over. He started to cry, blubbered like a damn baby—the first time he’d shed a tear since the wedding. Not even the Giants taking home the Super Bowl, Cayden’s first NFL championship, managed to eke them out.

  I swoon thinking about our wedding day. There are no words to describe what a suit does to a man like Cayden. We walked down the aisle to the Ramones’s version of Baby, I Love You. Cayden even got his swing-dance game up for the event, the small group of friends we’d collected equally shocked at seeing Abbotsleigh’s biggest jock lindy-hopping it like a pro.

  There was one moment of panic. I had something old — my aunt’s broach, though my Cons looked equally antique — something new — a stunning pearl necklace courtesy of my man — something borrowed — Lucy’s earrings — but I was missing something blue. Superstitious me was freaking out, but Colton came to the rescue, handing me the blue Post-It Cayden used to propose. “Where am I going to put it?” I asked him, to which he replied, “Cay said to use your imagination.”

  And the wedding night. Do not even get me started… I think the whole hotel heard us.

  Craziest of all, I’ve managed to drop most of my former irrational ways, even managing to befriend a local black cat.

  Breaking my daydream, Evie gives a small cough-slash-fart. It’s hard to tell. “You’re worse than your Dada,” I joke.

  Cayden tickles her cheek. “Better out than in, baby. You do what you need to do.”

  “Feel free to clean up her little expressions of individuality then,” I call from the bathroom. “The wipes are in the drawer.”

  The gasp and splutter that follows tells me all I need to know. No amount of Febreze is going to fix that.

  “I don’t know whether to change her diaper or call an Exorcist,” comes Cayden’s muffled voice.

  It’s been nice to be back in New York. The ‘heat,’ as the police call it, has died down —died completely after the syndicate the men I put away were working for was broken up, half its members murdered in one night. ‘A power struggle,’ said the press. The threat has long passed, not that it would have done much good killing me after the fact, so I was given a choice —stay in permanent protection or go my own way. I chose the latter and they couldn’t do a damn thing to stop me.

  At first, I moved back to Abbotsleigh to continue my studies. Then the NFL came calling for Cayden. Whether it was luck or not, he was drafted to the Giants, his dream team. So, it was off to New York once more, the Big Apple calling.

  We don’t live on the East Side where Cayden grew up, but we’ve got a nice two-bedroom on Manhattan Ave on a tree-lined, airy street. Funnily enough, the kids living below us have started up a punk band, but we don’t mind the noise. In fact, it helps Evie sleeps.

  There’s an envelope on the desk in the study. It contains the details of Cayden’s birth parents. He still hasn’t opened it. I don’t know if he will, but it’s there. I think that’s enough for him right now.

  “She’s going to be a badass,” Cayden tells me, tucking Evie in with her Mr. Elephant for the night, its cotton nose half chewed away already.

  My big boy and his little girl. It’s a beautiful thing.

  My career is coming along, too. I found a law clinic just past Williamsburg that’s willing to take me on after I get my degree, a clinic that specializes in family law. The moment I stepped in, I knew this was where I wanted to be. There were no floor-to-ceiling windows or m
arble desks, no Harvey Specter — unfortunately. It was busy, simple, and alive.

  But I don’t need a fictional man. I’ve got the real thing, an honest, family-centered hunk of cock candy that is still happy to go down on me after what he was witness to in the birthing suite. I no longer feel my scars. I forget they’re there half the time, because when he touches me, when Evie and I are his world, nothing else matters — not his crazy brothers, both of which are off on their own adventures, not even football.

  The broken mirror didn’t bring the bad luck I assumed. No, it brought something entirely different.

  I took a chance on a jock — correction: the jock — and I won the jackpot.

  Because nothing worth having comes easy.

  Because the true test of someone’s character isn’t how they act on their best days, but how they act on their worse.

  And while hard times will come, though life with inevitably throw a wayward turn our way, I know one thing’s for certain: he’s in this for the long game.

  Stroker

  Teagan Kade

  * * * * *

  Published by Teagan Kade

  Edited By Sennah Tate

  Copyright © 2016 by Teagan Kade

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Sign up to my exclusive VIP newsletter and receive a FREE copy of my best-selling, full-length novel Burned: A Bad Boy Romance, plus special offers, ARCs, bonus material and more. Click here!