Chapter 40

CHAPTER FORTY

Riggs

"Your dad is going to stay here tonight," Nova tells me as she deals the next hand of UNO .

I freeze, my beer halfway to my mouth, and stare at her.

Then Lake.

Then my dad.

What the actual fuck?

I push my chair back, stand, and meet my dad's eyes. I tilt my head to the door. "Outside," I growl.

"The deck's sure getting a lot of use tonight," Lake quips.

Nova smacks him on the chest but I ignore both of them as I march to the door, push it open, shaking my head at Ella when she starts to push up out of her chair, as if to follow.

My dad lumbers out in front of me, looking completely at ease despite my friend's woman just declaring that they're having a sleepover.

What's next? Face masks and manicures?

I shut the door firmly. Okay, maybe it edges into a slam.

But…what the actual fuck is going on right now?

I lean back against the railing, cross my arms, and lift my brows, silently asking that question.

My dad answers without preamble. "She needs help lugging her gear up for a shoot." A shrug. "Lake has a meeting with a prospective sponsor and I'd like to learn more about photography."

"Like you want to learn about cosmetology?"

He's gone into the salon at least once a day since Ella cut his hair almost a week ago. Hell, last night at dinner, he was discussing the merits of something called 40-volume over 20-volume.

Jesus.

I need to do more Googling.

My dad crosses his arm. "I like to learn new things, son." A beat. "You know that."

I inhale. I do know that. It's what he did when I was a kid—dive into hockey, learn all of the small parts, help me put them together into something that means I'm now playing the sport professionally. Then moving on to the next subject that interests him—car engines and geocaching, painting and rowing.

He's always taking a new class in something.

But that's at home.

That's not here , not in my town, with my friends…my family.

"None of that explains why you're still here at all."

He lifts an eyebrow. "Doesn't it?"

"No," I mutter.

He sighs, mirroring me and leaning back against the railing. "I don't know how to go back."

I frown.

"I just know that these women are important to you"—he nods to the window, through which the game of UNO has gone on in typically rowdy fashion—"I know that Knox and Lake are too, and I know…that if I keep going like I have, that I won't be."

"And what?" I ask, thinking back on what he told me at the rink, that Ella's like my mom, that Ella made him realize he fucked up. "And now you've just decided to turn over a new leaf?"

I sound bitter and I hate it.

"Yes."

Laughing, I shake my head and stare up at the sky, at the stars, at the faint gray streaks of the clouds crawling in over the mountain. "It's just that simple?"

"I know you don't believe me," he says. "I know it's going to take time?—"

That his words echo what I told Ella about her situation with Kit, about us moving forward together doesn't escape me.

"—but I don't know what else to do aside from telling you again that I fucked up, that I'm sorry I was so damned hard on you and pushed you away and took out the gaping hole in my heart on you." He exhales. "You didn't— don't —deserve that and I'm sorry I ever made you think that you did."

I don't know what to say, what to think.

"So, I'll help the people that are important to you," he says, nodding at the table full of friends who've become family. "And I'll help you if you'll let me. But mostly, I've decided that I'll be here, like this, without the asshole bullshit, and I'll stay here until you're ready for us to do something different."

"And then what?"

He pushes off the railing, claps a hand on my shoulder.

"And then I'll be different."

"Are you okay?" Ella asks a couple hours later as we drive home.

My dad is staying in Lake's guest room.

Something my teammate just shrugged at when I tried to apologize and give him an out. "Nova," he said by way of explanation and then proceeded to start washing dishes.

Millionaire Lake Jordan, captain of the Sierra, face of many a brand—from watches to underwear—washes dishes.

The TikTokers would enjoy that snippet of his life.

Blackmail material, I suppose.

"I'm still stinging from Evie kicking our ass in Phase 10 ," I tell Ella, not wanting heavy, not after our various conversations on the deck and my woman not drinking.

I know it's because of me…and I know it also has nothing to do with me.

"The student has surpassed the master," she says quietly.

I glance over at her, mouth quirking, knowing she sees right through me. "Are you okay?" I can't help but ask, despite my pledge of lightness.

She reaches across the console, squeezes my thigh. "I'm as okay as you are, I think. My head is in a constant state of flux. Things are great and yet all twisted up and…" She sighs and I glance over at her again. "And I have you," she says, reaching an invisible hand into my chest and grabbing on to my heart, "so it can't be all bad."

I brake hard, pull onto the shoulder.

"Um—"

But I don't give her a chance to finish that statement because I'm throwing my SUV into park, shoving my seat back, and unbuckling her seat belt.

"Riggs— eek!"

I tug and a second later, she's in my lap.

A moment after that, my lips are on hers, my tongue is in her mouth, and my hands are on those gorgeous curves.

"What—" she begins when I give her a second to breathe.

"I'm going to finish what we started all those weeks ago?—"

Her eyes go wide as I yank at the zipper of her coat, dragging it down, pushing it off her shoulders. I grip the edge of her sweater, tug it up so that I can get at her tits.

"Fuck, I love these things," I mutter, burying my face between her breasts, then turning my head and dragging my beard over the sensitive flesh. She gasps as I suck her nipple deep, flicking my tongue over the sensitive peak.

Nails in my hair, hips grinding down against me.

But I don't stop suckling her breasts.

The horn goes as I reach for the button on her jeans and flick it open. "Push them down, chérie ," I say, working the zipper, our hands tangling as she does as I ordered, getting her jeans down her hips, past her knees, low enough that she can straddle my waist and get to work on my own jeans.

" Fuck ," I growl when she all but tears open my pants and grips my cock.

"I want to suck it," she demands, stroking hard.

"No room, chérie ," I say, even though I would love to push my dick past those plump lips, would love to fuck her mouth until I come.

That'll have to be later.

Right now I need to be inside her.

"Climb on, baby. Climb on and ride me."

Thankfully, she doesn't delay, just shifts up, notches me at her entrance, and…sits right on my cock.

"Fuck," I growl again, the slick, taut heat of her surrounding me, driving me crazy. I grab her hip, dragging her down as I stroke up into her, using my mouth on her breasts, her throat, fucking her with my tongue to the same rhythm of my dick.

Fast and hard and deep.

Rapidly launching us toward the edge.

Already, I hear it in her voice, in the way her moans are hitching.

And I feel it.

"Your tight little cunt loves this, doesn't it, chérie ?" I rasp, nipping at her earlobe, feeling that pussy flutter around me. "Loves thinking about someone driving by and catching us, thinking they might see you coming on my cock."

She bucks, but I don't let her stop, just keep yanking her down as I thrust up.

Until I feel it?—

"Riggs!"

I don't even try to hold back…

I just let my orgasm come.

"Fuck, Ella," I groan. "Fucking hell ."

We move together in nothing that approaches gracefulness, but I don't give a fuck, not balls deep, not as her orgasm peaks and begins to ebb, as she collapses against me, the aftershocks of her pleasure milking my cock again and again and again .

Not as I hold her close and headlights flash behind us.

I get one glimpse of Knox's concerned face through the steamed-up back window before I see he understands what's happening.

He spins on his heel, and a minute later those headlights disappear.

Probably scarred for life.

But I don't give a fuck.

I go back to holding my woman.