Bonus Epilogue Part 2

My fingernails dig into the plush leather of the chair I'm sitting in as I lean forward, as if by looking down at Jack from the box seats, I'll somehow be able to see him better than I can on the screen. He must feel my gaze boring into him, because he looks up toward my usual seats at the Carolina Panthers' home stadium. My chin dips down in a nod of encouragement, even though I know there's no way he can actually see me.

I love you. You can do this.I mouth the words and get to my feet as the quarterback calls the play. The offensive line jostles around into a formation I'm not familiar with. This must be a new play they're trying, putting it all on the line in the last seconds of the game.

They're down by four points, and the only thing that can save this game is a touchdown. With only seconds on the clock, they're on their fourth down, with far too many yards between them and the end zone. This is their last chance.

Time slows. The ball is snapped, and the fist around my rib cage clenches tightly as I watch Jack's legs eat up the field, heading into the end zone. He cuts left, and then right, dodging the opposing team's defensive players as they try to take him down. He doesn't even seem to be looking at the ball, which is flying over his head at an impossible rate. The quarterback overthrew it, or dodging the players cost too much time. Whatever the reason, there's no way he can?—

"TOUCHDOWN!!! MAGIC HANDS JACK PERRY HAS DONE IT AGAIN! THE PANTHERS ARE GOING TO THE SUPER BOWL!!!"

The announcers are going nuts. The stands are absolute pandemonium, with fans breaking through security to run onto the field. The team rushes Jack, and I lose him in the fray until they lift him above their heads. He's still clenching the ball in his hands, lifting it above his head in victory before holding the ball out in front of him, pointed towards where I'm standing, both hands pressed against the glass.

He fucking did it.

It feels like hours later that I'm still pacing the sky box, waiting for him to come to me. I had to convince Troy and Luke to leave because they were making me more nervous, but I didn"t expect to be waiting for nearly this long. It's too warm in here, even after everyone else has finally filtered out, but every time I take my jacket off, I pull it back on, feeling the weight in my right-hand pocket as I pace.

He usually meets me here after home games. It takes a while to get through all the interviews, celebrating in the locker room, and showers, but not this long. Even with all the extra attention and time it would take to finish up after a major win—one that's secured their spot in the Super Bowl of all things—he's taken twice as long as usual.

Maybe he pulled something during that impossible drive, completing what the sportscasters are calling the ‘play of the season'. I didn't notice him limping at all when he was making his way through the press towards the locker room, but the highest-scoring wide receiver in the NFL isn't about to show any weakness leading up to the biggest game he'll ever play.

My phone doesn't show any missed messages from Jack or any members of the coaching staff. They'd let me know if anything was wrong. I can't handle it anymore. I'm too jittery and nervous to stay caged in here much longer.

The cleaning staff pokes their head in, probably waiting for me to leave so they can finish up for the night. Waving them in and handing off a generous tip for being so patient with me, I flip off the tv that's been showing game highlights and take the elevator down from the skybox, heading into the area designated for staff and team members only. The guard recognizes me and gives me a friendly nod as he packs up for the night. The stadium is empty, even most of the staff are gone.

"Your boy played well today," he says, and I accept his congratulatory handshake before he waves me through. "Most everyone's gone already, but I haven't seen Mr. Perry leave yet."

"I'm expecting to find him in an ice bath or getting chewed out for that penalty he incurred in the second quarter," I say with a chuckle as I walk into the dark hallway that leads to the team facilities.

"It was a bullshit call anyway," the guard says before I'm too far down the hallway to not be able to hear him.

Nearly all the lights are off, and none of the offices seem to be occupied. I head toward the locker room, hoping I'm not about to find him neck deep in an ice bath with an injury he might not recover from.

A memory jolts through me as I walk into the empty locker room to search for him, and I find myself walking towards the showers. Steam billows out of the open door, and my lips quirk.

Stepping into the haze, I find Jack leaning into a stream of hot water. His back is to me, muscles rippling as he leans with one arm on the wall, stroking himself with his free hand. I'm frozen to the spot, locked in the visceral memory of the first time I saw Jack in the showers. My cock fills and presses painfully into the back of my zipper.

Jack looks over his shoulder at the sound of my clothes dropping to the floor and smirks. Even after almost five years together, I'm still obsessed with every inch of him. I'm hypnotized by his skin, pulled in like a magnet until my fingers are lightly caressing down his spine and over the curve of his muscular ass. He shudders as my tongue traces a path up the middle of his spine and over the back of his neck.

"Finally, you show up," he rasps. "I was just about to give up and take care of this myself."

With barely more than a rumble deep in my throat, I smack his hand away from his cock and turn him around, crowding him with his back against the tile. The hot water has nothing on the temperature of my skin. I"m so hot all this steam could be coming directly from my body.

My skin fuses itself to his as I take his mouth in a searing kiss. He gasps, and my tongue plunges inside, stoking the fire that builds between us. My cock, hard and desperate to be closer to Jack, rubs his as we grind against each other. I break from his lips to kiss and nip at his jawline, his stubble sending a spark of electricity down my spine.

Jack groans when I suck at his Adam"s apple, pulling his pliant flesh between my teeth. He gasps and bucks his hips when my mouth closes around the tight bud of a nipple, biting down just hard enough to not break the skin. After soothing the pain with my tongue, I continue my path downward, thinking of how much I"d wanted to touch him like this the first time I saw him in the locker room showers at Groveton. How much I wanted to possess him. I still do.

I look up at him as I reach my knees and take his cock in my hand. It twitches and drips for me. Gathering the pre-cum, I spread it over the tip and down his shaft, languidly stroking him while I run the flat of my tongue over his sack. I pull his balls into my mouth, one at a time, rolling my tongue over them and reveling in his heavy-lidded gaze as he watches me worship his cock like it"s my own personal deity. Jack lets out a long breath when my mouth closes around the tip of his cock, suckling it, savoring the feel and taste of him on my tongue. I can tell he"s close by the way his cut abs clench and his ass flexes. I bring him right to the edge before I release his cock with a wet pop, holding it firmly at the base to stave off his orgasm.

"Bryant," he growls, none too pleased with my game. I ignore him and grip his hips, turning him to face the shower wall.

"You made me wait," I say, justifying my cruelty. "Don't worry, baby. You know I"ll take care of you."

He moans as my hands knead his ass, spreading the supple flesh. The water from the showerhead streams down his back, pouring through his crack. I lick, suck, and slurp him loudly, drinking the water right off his ass like I"ve been traveling through the desert, parched and desperate for it. Jack pushes back against me when my tongue breaches his hole. He stiffens when I growl low in my throat and points to the shelf built into the tile wall, where his favorite butt plug has been abandoned.

"I was wearing it while I waited, but I kept getting too close and you were taking too long."

I retract my tongue and bite him on the underside of his round butt cheek.

"I like to be the one to stretch you out," I remind him, sounding more irritable than I actually am. Truthfully, this man can do no wrong. And the idea of him getting prepped and ready for me to fuck the daylights out of him right here in the locker room showers has me harder than steel. But he gets off on testing me, and we both get off on the punishment.

His response is cut off when I push two fingers into him at once. He hisses at the burn, and my cock twitches. Hurting him so good will never get old.

I let him relax into the intrusion before I move my fingers, slowly pumping them in and out, just barely skimming over his prostate. He pushes back against me, being the demanding little brat he is, and I press a third finger inside his tight hole.

"Fuuuck," he moans, pressing his forehead to the tile. "Bryant, please. I"m sorry, okay? I left my phone in my locker. I thought you"d come looking sooner than you did. You aren"t usually so patient," he says. His attempted chuckle at his own humor is interrupted by a choked moan as I massage his prostate. I bring him to the edge again, and he cries out when I pull my fingers out of him before he can come.

I stand up and grab the small bottle of lube that sits next to the rest of Jack"s toiletries, pouring some into my hand and smoothing it over my straining cock. Dripping some of the liquid between his cheeks, I rub my cock back and forth over his hole until he"s whimpering and pleading for me to just fuck him already.

Leaning forward, I bite gently at the straining tendon on the side of Jack"s neck before rumbling out a short list of commands.

"Hands on the wall, Jack, and don"t you dare move. I"m going to fuck you so hard you"ll be feeling me for days. Your ass is going to be so sore you'll beg me to let you fuck me instead."

"You know I like it when it hurts," he grunts out as I tease my cock through the first ring of muscle.

His breath catches as I thrust all the way inside, his ass clenching around the base of my cock, pulsing with the oncoming orgasm I've been denying him.

"Don't you even think about coming until I tell you to," I tell him as I bite down on the back of his shoulder before digging my fingers deeper into the flesh of his hips, driving into him fast and hard.

The room echoes with the wet slaps of my skin against his, and Jack's guttural moans as I abuse his prostate until he's begging me to let him finish.

I'll never be finished. I'll never get enough of him. He'll always be the drug that I'm addicted to, the fix I can't live without. There is nothing more euphoric than being wrapped up in the pleasure of his body. Just being in his orbit has changed my life.

We're happy, and we're whole, which is something neither of us had before. However forbidden our relationship was in the beginning, there's nothing wrong about the way we feel about each other or how we make each other better.

And no one, and I mean no one, can tell me that something that feels this right is wrong.

Every muscle in my body flexes with each thrust and roll of my hips, until electricity is shooting out from every nerve ending of my body and I know neither of us can hold back any longer. My hand reaches around his body, and I grip his cock.

"Come for me, Jack."

The way he cries out in pleasure and the feel of his body tensing, squeezing my cock without mercy, has me following him over the edge. I pull his head back, taking his mouth in a rough kiss when he turns his face to meet mine. We kiss and writhe until I soften inside him, but I continue to press my body into his, relishing in the heat of his ass around my cock. I don't pull out until we've caught our breaths and I'm in danger of getting hard again. For all my tough words, I don't actually want to hurt him. Not too badly, at least.

My fingers trail down his crack, massaging his hole and pushing my cum back up inside him until I feel his cock twitch against my hip.

"Come on," I say, pulling away from him with a last passionate kiss. "Let's get you home so we can celebrate properly."

I'd initially planned to take him home, cover his chiseled body in massage oil, and rub him until he begs for my cock. I see no reason to change my plans now.

Jack tosses me a towel and we walk through the steamy shower room hand in hand. My clothes are stuck in the doorjamb, preventing the door from closing all the way. Chuckling at the evidence of my impatience, he bends down and lifts the bundle of clothes. A box falls from the bundle, clattering loudly in the otherwise quiet room.

Jack picks up the box before I can reach it, staring at it curiously as we step into the locker room. He hands it to me, his eyes questioning the small, black, velvet-lined box that would be obvious to anyone else. But he has no idea, He has no spark of understanding or expectation other than curiosity. I've been carrying it around for the past month. It's been burning a hole in my pocket, waiting for the right moment. The stress of the playoffs had me second guessing every plan I made. Then I thought I'd do it tonight, win or lose. Now I'm thinking it might be better to wait until after the biggest game of his career, because I don't want to put any more pressure on him, and it could be a great way to celebrate or soothe the ache afterwards.

But now that he's looking at me with that quirked eyebrow, covered only in a towel and dripping with water and my cum, I can't think of a better moment.

I clear my throat.

"Jack…"

Jack's eyes go round as I drop to one knee and open the box.

"I'll never take for granted all the ways you've stirred up my life. You make me whole in ways I never thought possible. You piss me off on purpose, annoy the ever-loving shit out of me, and make me laugh harder than I ever have before. You make me feel everything. You make me a better man. Will you?—"

"Yes."

His answer is clipped and matter-of-fact, and comes out before I can even ask the actual question. I have to bite my lip to refrain from asking an entirely different question just to fuck with him.

The glassy look in his eyes when he drops to his knees on the floor in front of me wipes that thought away immediately.

"I fucking love you," he says, his voice choked with emotion that has me wanting to tear up, too.

"I love you, Jack," I whisper against his lips.

The box clatters to the floor again as we lose ourselves in the kiss. Towels fall and are forgotten as we show each other—right there on the floor of the Carolina Panthers' team locker room— just how much we mean to each other.