7. Trick

I'm sticky as fuck and I reek of champagne.

Everyone is talking about where we're going to celebrate, and all I want is my bed.

Ideally, I'd rather my own bed, a California king back home—I have matching ones at my estate in Florida and on my ranch in Wyoming—but the hotel standard king will do fine.

And some room service. A burger and an ice cream sundae. A beer. A cold shower that won't stop me from wrapping my hand around my heavy, aching cock while I think about Sinclaire glaring up at me in the shadows.

"What's the plan, big guy?" Jeff appears out of nowhere and crosses his arms next to me.

Stroking one out to the thought of fucking your daughter against a concrete wall.

"It's bedtime for me," I manage to choke out.

I need privacy with my cock and a fantasy of fucking Sin into the next century while she calls me Daddy. Maybe my hand squeezed around her throat, making her desperate to come before she passes out. Something truly twisted to make a clear distinction between real life and my secret desires.

"Yeah, me too." He nods at the rest of the team. "That could have been us, once upon a time."

Guilt pushes me to offer, "It could be us tonight."

Even though I don't want it to be, and I'm relieved when he shakes his head.

"Do you want to share a ride back to the hotel?" he asks. "They have cars waiting for us."

I don't want that, either. My skin crawls with a complicated heat whenever we talk. I've compartmentalized my desires and my professional obligations and my personal relationships up until tonight, but he's not going to be coaching me anymore.

I'm done. I just haven't told anyone yet.

That resolve—to be done with baseball, to retire and move on with my life—makes it harder to maintain the firewall around the filth my brain churns up than it has been every day before now, because I'm not keeping my need for Sinclaire locked down for the good of the next game.

I feel like a ticking time bomb, like any second he's going to see right through me and realize I'm lusting after his daughter.

I've lived my entire adult life doing what I should instead of what I want, because that's the trade off for playing pro ball.

So I have almost two decades experience shoving down my personal desires and stacking something heavy on top of them.

Once upon a time, it was my social anxiety.

This past year, it's been my obsession with her.

I didn't see them smashing into each other like freight trains tonight…I feel damned if I do, damned if I don't. Go back to the hotel with Jeff and risk running into Sin when I'm with him? Go out with the guys and feel like I'm crawling out of my skin the whole time?

Fuck. Me.

Jeff misreads my torn silence as tired agreement. He pushes me toward the showers, promising that there's a car immediately on the other side of me washing off the celebration.

* * *

It takes a while to actually get to the hired SUVs with the blacked out windows. We get caught up in the rest of the team also heading out of the stadium, and fans find us, so we pose for photos and sign autographs.

Once we're in the car, I lean back against the padded headrest and close my eyes.

Immediately, I see Sin pushing up on her toes as I pin her against the wall. My cock thickens and my brain spools out a fantasy, completely uncaring that her father is sitting a foot away from me.

I shift myself so my arm presses down hard on my dick.

My brain substitutes that pressure for a mental picture of her tight, off-limits cunt grinding against me in the shadows of that alcove as I praise her for being Papa's pet, such a good girl…

"How are you going to celebrate?" Jeff asks from beside me.

I grunt. He means in the off-season. Unloading a playoff's worth of seed into your daughter's bare little pussy is the wrong answer.

"Will you head home to the ranch after the parade?"

Because winning tonight isn't the end of my job for this team. The fans will want to celebrate with us back home. There will be a parade and maybe a visit to the White House. Appearances on late night talk shows, although I'll go with a teammate who can do most of the talking.

And then it would be a reasonable assumption that I would head home to Wyoming.

The joke on the team is that I hibernate all winter, chopping logs for my wood stove and packing on weight. I show up at spring training every year like a furry bear who just lumbered out of his den for the first time in months.

"Might go there," I say, noncommittally.

The truth is, I have no fucking clue what I'm going to do. I feel desperately at loose ends, and the ideas spinning through my head aren't fucking possible.

Like moving to Sinclaire's college town in California, just to be nearby. In case she needs anything. Or in case I need a secret hit of her sunshiny laugh. I can see myself hulking behind the library stacks like a pervert.

So, Jeff, I'm actually thinking of stalking your daughter in my retirement.

The car comes to a stop and the hotel doorman greets us. "Congratulations," he says, and then he hesitates.

"You want a photo, man?"

He gives me a wide grin. "If you don't mind."

"Of course not." I can take photos with fans all day. Somehow that's different than giving a speech.

Jeff takes the guy's phone to take the picture. "That's more words than he said to anyone else all night, you should feel honored."

"Yes sir, I do."

My first stop is the concierge desk, where I ask them to put in a room service order for me. Then there are few more pictures and handshakes in the lobby, and finally we're in the elevator.

"How about you?" I ask to fill the silence. "What are your plans to celebrate?"

Jeff shrugs. "Dunno. Hadn't let myself think it might actually happen."

"Yeah. I feel that." I scrub my hand into my still damp hair.

"Might spend a week on a beach somewhere."

"With Sinclaire?"

He looks surprised. "My twenty-four-year-old daughter doesn't want to go on vacation with me, man."

"Twenty-five," I correct automatically.

There's a pause. "Fuuuuck. Today's her—" He looks at his watch. "It was her birthday. I missed it."

"You were busy."

"You remembered."

I scrub my hand over my face as he pulls out his phone and sends her a text message. I read it out of the corner of my eye.

Jeff: Happy Birthday! I'm sorry I forgot to text you earlier. Was a little busy today. Your mom would kick my ass for forgetting, though.

He waits a beat, but she doesn't reply.

Jeff: Love you, kiddo. Trick says I should take you on vacation. Would you like that?

I laugh and he thumps me on the arm.

He sighs. "I should have insisted she come with me for this trip. But she's been busy doing her own thing, and I was relieved, to be honest. I don't like her being around the players, you know?"

I grunt. Yeah, I'm intimately familiar with that fucking stress. For multiple reasons.

The elevator slows, then the doors open.

"How many times have we done this?" Jeff gestures to the empty hall ahead of us. The thick carpet, the generic luxury hotel room doors.

Hundreds of times.

"I'm retiring," I say quietly.

He stops walking.

I exhale roughly. "Sorry. Wrong time to say that."

"Nah." He laughs. "I thought we might try again next year, that's all."

"I'm tired."

"Maybe wait a week to make that decision, yeah?"

I don't answer.

He slows at his door, but keeps walking. I'm at the end of the hall. Now I've done it. He'll want to come in for a drink and talk me out of this, thinking it's a rash decision.

Ah, well. It's probably better than getting drunk by myself and thinking about how good Sinclaire would feel bouncing on my dick.

I tap my card against my door, then lean against it without opening it. "Look, I don't want to talk about it tonight, okay?"

He holds up his hands. "Sure thing."

"You want a drink, though?"

He nods. "One. Why not?"

I tap my card on the door again and push it open. I pause for a moment, because the lights are on, and that's unusual.

Jeff laughs. "You expecting company, man?"

On the floor is a pair of black cotton panties. And ahead of that is a jean skirt and a pink tank top.

I turn around and plant my hand in his chest, moving him out into the hallway with more speed than he was expecting. "Change of plans."

He's still laughing. "All right, all right. I'd make the same choice if I w?—"

"Don't finish that sentence," I grind out.

Then I close the door in his face and lean back against it, now on the inside.

Fuck. Me.

I don't dare say her name, not while her father might still be in the hallway just outside.

But as I lean over and pick up her panties, I can't help but growl, "Okay, little mouse. Where are you hiding?"

Not a peep.

I prowl into the room. "Come out, come out, wherever you are."

The room stays completely still, but I know she's here. My gaze darts to the long, lush curtains that frame the window, but they don't touch the floor, and I don't see toes.

I check either side of the bed, then slowly lean over and lift up the bedskirt, but that's empty, too.

Turning, I look back at the closet, thinking maybe I'd missed her wedged behind the ironing board or something.

She's not there, either.

Then I hear a soft-as-can-be little inhale from the window.

My heart jumps into my throat, thinking for a second that she did something stupid like crawl out onto the ledge, and I cross the room in a flash.

But when I pull back the curtain, I don't have to yank her back inside. She's curled up on the inside of the window, bare legs pulled up in front of her chest—and she's wearing my jersey.

My jersey, and nothing else.