Chapter 4

4

Pippa

Twenty minutes later, I’m still coming down from the most intense physical experience of my life. I’m not sure I’ve been able to string one sensible sentence together between now and our time in the hot tub of wonders. That was an orgasm? I don’t know what I assumed it would be like. Definitely not that mind blowing. Definitely not life changing.

I doubt I could pull it off alone. It was the whole package that pushed me over the line. It was Cort’s voice in my ear, the intensely personal words he said to me, the feel of his thighs and lap and chest. All of those things combined brought me to a fever pitch I never could have imagined and…

I’m having a very hard time remembering the fact that I’m here for an exclusive interview. Like, I’m standing in Cort Mulloy’s kitchen, wearing one of his massive T-shirts. My attire—and the fact that he can’t seem to stop touching me—make it very hard to be professional. But I cannot let this opportunity pass. His past is so much more interesting than anyone knows. And I very likely don’t have a job anymore to fall back on if I can’t pull this off.

That means I have no way to pay bills. Pay rent. Eat.

I can’t completely lose my senses here, let this man overwhelm me and regret it later.

Besides, he’s a famous, handsome athlete.

And I’m a naïve virgin with zero experience with men.

For all I know, he has spun a sensual web around countless other women. Maybe he’s been discreet, unlike his teammates with their headline-making exploits. Haven’t I been told by fellow females all my life that men will say whatever it takes to get a girl into bed? Maybe he likes me, but the spell could be broken when we have sex. He could lose interest. And then I’ll be left without my virginity and without a career-making story.

Cort walks past me on the way to the coffee maker, dragging the calloused palm of his hand along the slopes of my bottom and I cinch my thighs together, heat rolling through me like a summer storm. I’ll never forget the power behind that orgasm. The way it picked me up, owned me and shook me, the confidence in his touch, the ownership.

Do I want to be owned by this man?

A hot shiver snakes down my spine remembering some of the things he said to me. In a perfect world…yes, I think belonging to Cort Mulloy would be incredible. My body already feels the stamp of his possessive touch. But if I’m going to be a journalist, I have to live in the real world. I can’t let my head float up to the clouds and miss the opportunity in front of me. Even if the idea of exposing Cort’s personal story to the world is already beginning to make me feel…guilty. Really guilty.

I chew hard on my bottom lip and consider the man across the room, standing shirtless in sweatpants, making us coffee. Reporters aren’t supposed to feel guilty. It’s not in our DNA.

Right?

I swallow past the lump in my throat. “So, um. Back to my questions.”

“Three.” He holds up a trio of fingers without turning around. “You know what happens after that.”

“Yes…” I close my eyes and take a deep breath, painfully aware that I’m not wearing underwear or a bra underneath this T-shirt. Being that I didn’t have time to plan this interview, I have to think on the fly. What would I want to know about Cort Mulloy?

Where he lives. I would want a picture of his life to be painted to really bring his story to life. “Would you give me a tour of the rest of the house?”

He’s on his way back to me, a mug of coffee extended in his hand, those blue eyes watchful beneath black brows. “One question down.” He gives me a slow once over. “Come on.”

I accept my coffee and follow Cort out of the kitchen, through the living room and down a wide, carpeted staircase. It’s dark, but when we reach the wooden flooring at the bottom, our footsteps begin to echo, so I sense a large space ahead. I’m frowning when he flips on the light, awe quickly blanketing my curiosity. “You…you have a baseball diamond in your basement.”

Cort nods, sips his coffee. “It’s not full size, but the distance between the mound and home plate is accurate.” He nods at the state of the art pitching machine. “I don’t get up to bat much, but when I do, I like to make it count.”

“You do,” I murmur absently, turning in a slow circle, taking in the high ceiling and the net hanging down from the far wall. “You have the best batting average for a closer in history.”

He chuckles into his coffee. “You know more about my career than I do.”

I give him a prim look over my shoulder. “I do my homework.” I step onto the soft, artificial grass, enjoying the feel of it between my toes. “Is your mindset different when you’re pitching, as opposed to when you’re batting?”

“Good question.” He stares off into the distance, as if he’s never considered it before. “Yes. Pitching is second nature. My body does what it’s supposed to do. I don’t think. When I’m up to bat, I’m thinking about the mechanics of my swing.”

“Hmm.” I make a mental record of his answer. “I can’t believe I’m already on my third question.”

His breath coasts over my neck and I gasp, because I didn’t even hear him approach. “I’ll let you ask an extra one if you kiss me.”

Inhale. Exhale. “That…that sounds agreeable.”

I’ve barely turned when our mouths lock and wind into a slow, toe-curling kiss. One that wakes up every one of my senses and turns them into wild little sparkplugs. His free hand slides down my hip and squeezes, drags up my stomach and kneads my breast. A rush of wetness travels downward and coats my feminine flesh, my blood humming with anticipation.

“God,” I breathe, trembling. “Your hands are so big.”

“You haven’t even met the biggest part of me yet, Pippa,” he rasps, licking at my upper lip and scrambling my brain, his hips rolling against mine, letting me feel his thick erection. “It needs you.”

I need it, too.

I want to drop my coffee and cling to his sturdy body. Wrap my legs around his hips and let him pull me all the way into this sensual world to which he’s introduced me. Be strong, woman. Be stronger than that. Where is my professional drive? I haven’t even made it to my third question yet. And I can’t completely allay the fear that if I sleep with Cort before I get my story, he’ll lose interest and I won’t get it at all.

My heart weighs down over that possibility.

Oh no. My heart. It got involved before I could stop it.

The way his blue eyes bore so intensely into mine, like I’m a treasure he’s just unearthed, is getting to me with every passing second.

“Um…” I swallow and step back, even though every one of my nerve endings is alive and buzzing. “I-is there a specific player you hate pitching against?”

Cort doesn’t let me back away. He sets down both of our coffee mugs on a nearby bench and prowls back toward me, that protrusion in his sweatpants turning my flesh damper. “Yeah, the fuckers who lean into my breaking ball because they’re too afraid to swing.”

“Can I quote you on that?” I ask, breathlessly.

“Yes—and that’s your final question, baby.” Cort reaches me then, his touch searching my neck and scalp, his fingers digging into my hair, his mouth coming down on mine. “I need your pussy. And I need it right the hell now.”

“But…” Oh God, I’m losing any semblance of rational thought. Desperately, I look around the huge lower level, searching for a stalling tactic, even though my body is screaming at me to keep going. To let him obliterate my resolve to get this story. “I…I haven’t even tried the batting cage,” I blurt, my face swarming with heat.

Cort pulls back with a grin tugging at his lips. “You want to take some swings?”

“No. I didn’t mean that.”

He tucks his tongue into his cheek, clearly amused. “Why did you say it?”

“I don’t know. I’m terrible at sports. I’m only good at reporting on them.” I’m beginning to ramble. “Or I would be. If I could remember why I’m here in the first place.”

“I’ll take it as a good sign that I’m making you forget.” He kisses me on the forehead and pulls me toward the batter’s box. “Come on, Pippa, you can’t be all that bad.”

“Oh yeah? I hold a record, too. For letting go of the bat after a swing and giving the pitcher a concussion. It happened three times before I finally quit little league.”

To his credit, he manages to hide his smile. “You just didn’t have the right coach.”

“Tommy Lasorda himself couldn’t help me.”

“Goddamn, baby,” he groans, reaching over to pick a bat out of the holder. “You’re making me so hard with these baseball references.”

A quick glance down confirms his statement. “I’m…sorry. I can’t help it.”

“Baseball is as big a part of your life as it is mine, huh?”

Distracted by his question, I barely notice I’m being turned around beside home plate, the bat placed in my hands. “My father brought me to an Astros game when I was a kid. I thought I was in heaven. Everyone in the stands was so…happy. The sport makes people happy. There is something uplifting about winning, yes, but even mourning a loss is magical. It’s…”

“It’s an escape.”

“Yes.” He tugs my butt back into his lap, tilts my upper half forward slightly and starts to position my arms. I’m so stuck on our conversation that I don’t bother trying to stop him. “You might hate your job or have a relative in the hospital. But as soon as the game comes on, anything is possible. If magic can happen on the field, maybe it can happen in real life, too. There’s hope in every play.”

Cort has gone still behind me, but after a moment, his lips climb the side of my neck. “You are hope and magic, Pippa.”

My heart does a dizzy little dance in my chest and I become more aware of the athletic, muscular body molded to mine. Neither one of us is wearing shoes, which puts the crown of my head in the vicinity of Cort’s chin. My backside is curved into his lap, that hard bulge nestled between my cheeks intimately. His heart raps swiftly between my shoulder blades, his breath coming faster and faster above me. “Well…” I wet my lips. “If you manage to help me hit a pitch, I’ll know magic really does exist somewhere.”

His chuckle is jagged. “We’re already making magic. You don’t feel that?”

“Oh, I feel it,” I whisper, shifting my hips and making him groan.

The exhale he lets out moves my hair. “I need you to choke up.”

My spine straightens slightly. “Excuse me?”

“On the bat, baby.”

“Oh.” My face flames, but I do as I’m told, repositioning my grip higher. “Like this?”

“Yes. Now lift your left elbow. When I tell you, that left foot is going to step forward into the pitch.”

My pulse is going a hundred miles an hour. “I can’t believe the greatest pitcher of our time—arguably—is going to witness my humiliation.”

“Arguably?”

“Everything is arguable in sports.”

“True. Okay.” I sense him digging around in his pocket and a moment later, his phone is in his hand, thumb tapping on an app. It must connect to the pitching machine. I want to ask him a million questions about it, but I’m too nervous about the upcoming test of my athleticism. What athleticism? You have none. “I’ve slowed it way down. No ninety mile an hour fastballs for you. Yet. Don’t worry about this first pitch. Just watch the way it travels.”

“You should really be wearing a helmet, Cort.” My fingers flex anxiously. “I don’t want to be responsible for concussing you. You’re pitching tomorrow.”

“Stop worrying.” He breathes a laugh. “I have quick reflexes.”

A nervous whine slips out of my mouth.

The pitch sails by, nice and slow, and I do my best to watch the trajectory, the invisible path it leaves behind in the air before it smacks the rubber wall behind me.

“Okay, Pippa. This time you swing,” Cort says. “Remember what you said. If magic can happen on the field, maybe it can happen in real life, too.”

Taking a deep breath, I renew my grip on the bat and wait for the pitch. I have nightmarish flashbacks to little league, the bat flying out of my hands and clocking unsuspecting children on the head. But I banish those memories and focus, ordering my pulse to slow down. There’s a click and the ball is lobbed from the machine in my direction. I pick up my left foot and step into the pitch, close my eyes and swing the bat, forcing myself to hold on to it.

There’s a cracking sound, a vibration through my wrists and forearms.

I open my eyes to find the ball sailing into the net.

Shock grips me first, followed by a flood of satisfaction. Joy so powerful, tears form in my eyes. And I don’t even hesitate to turn, toss down the bat and throw myself into Cort’s arms, because there’s no one else I want to celebrate with.

With a rasping laugh, he scoops me off the ground, crushing me to his chest. Automatically, my legs wrap around his hips, our foreheads meeting, his blue eyes sparkling so close to mine…and I guess…oh, God, I guess it is possible to fall in love this fast. My heart is hammering, frenzied in my chest, and his body feels so incredibly warm and right against mine. There’s an overwhelming sense that I’m in the exact right place, with the exact right person.

“You did it,” he says, kissing my mouth softly, then with more insistence. “You’ll be ready for the major leagues in no time.” His breath comes faster, one hand tunneling through my hair, intensity blazing in his eyes. “Right now, though, Pippa…I just need you ready for me.”

“I am,” I whimper, no idea if I’m speaking the truth. “I…think.”

His chest heaves against mine. “Is your pussy wet?”

I nod vigorously.

“I’m so fucking hard for you, little girl,” he grits, our lips touching, his steps taking me somewhere. “It’s going to be over in two pumps so I have to lick you off first.”

All I can do is nod and cling as Cort falls to his knees, pitching forward and laying me down on the soft, fake grass. He presses me down onto my back, our mouths meeting and mating in a furious rhythm. In the brief moments we come up for air, I watch in breathless awe as he shoves down the waistband of his sweatpants, his erection bounding free, so large and broad. Thick from root to tip. Wrapped in veins and verging on purple.

He wraps a huge hand around the whole of his shaft, stroking it roughly as he walks back on his knees and pushes apart my thighs.

I thought baseball was magic.

I didn’t know about Cort’s tongue.

He slaps it down on the valley of my sex, working it gently until my flesh parts and he begins to lick me with long, relishing swipes of his tongue. His groans are animal in nature, his right triceps flexing gloriously as he masturbates himself. I want to watch. I want to watch every second of this act I’ve never been part of before, but the sensations are too strong and I end up flat on my back, whining and lifting up my hips for more. More.

Maybe I even say that word—more—out loud, because Cort lets go of his shaft and pumps his long middle finger inside me, drawing it in and out slowly, his tongue finding my clit and polishing it with rough circles. Every muscle below my belly button seems to contract in anticipation and now…now I know what’s coming. So my body races toward it with open arms, desperate for relief.

Gasping, I open my eyes long enough to marvel at the godlike flex of his back and shoulders, the slick movements of his wet mouth, the way his eyes glitter up at me and my fingers dig into the grass for purchase. For dear life.

“Cort. Cort.” I pant, a single word ripping up and out of some deep, secret part of me that only this man can touch. “Daddy.”

My orgasm has only started to peak when God’s gift to baseball pounces on me like a predator tackling his prey. I’m mid-scream, shuddering violently on a tide of bliss as Cort growls into my neck, shoves my thighs apart and thrusts his shaft several inches inside of me. It’s almost indescribable, this act of being conquered. Of having my body used for a man’s pleasure, right there on the ground, with him in such a frenzied state. And my God, he’s so big. So thick and pressing, his hardness stretching me almost to the point of pain. But there is nothing but an eagerness for more of him. More, more, more. More of this mating. More of him claiming me completely. My body clamors for it, my fingernails digging into his buttocks, my vocal cords straining with the call of his name.

“You call me Daddy, you get fucked down and dirty, horny girl. You hearing me?” With a grunt, he pushes the rest of his inches inside me and I wail incoherently, my climax pushed higher and further by the invasion. “Go on and shake. Get that cream all over me. I only got one more pump before I drain this thing all up in that tight ass pussy.”

“I want it,” I say, barely aware of my words or what they mean. Only that this man relieving himself between my legs is what nature intended. My blood pumps hot and wild, my thighs falling wide to urge him on. I can’t seem to find the bottom of my orgasm, it just keeps going, my flesh convulsing without cease around his thickness. Worshipping it. “Please.”

“Please, what?”

“Please, Daddy!”

Cort’s mouth stamps down on mine, holding me there with suction, his eyes boring down into mine with a fire I’ve never witnessed in another human being—and I scream into his kiss when those hips rear back and buck forward, driving me up the grass, his spend scathing the walls of my femininity, the blue of his eyes flashing and going blind, his huge athlete’s body jerking violently on top of mine. The cords in his throat stand out, his bellow releasing into the space between our sweat-slicked bodies.

“Oh, fuck,” he groans, his hips rolling against mine rhythmically, in perfect time with the hot, thick spurts that fill me up, overflowing and trickling down my thighs. “So soft and sweet. This hot little thing between your legs begs for come, doesn’t it? All tight and pretty.”

“Yes,” I whisper, still shaking beneath him. “Your come.”

“Pippa,” he groans, his body bowing with a final shudder. “You. Are. Mine.”

Those words of ownership seem to be what my body is waiting for to finally go limp. Satisfaction like I’ve never known spreads throughout my limbs and I collapse, boneless, my eyes lazily tracing the outline of Cort’s broad shoulders, his messy black hair. There’s an unspoken assurance that he’s going to take care of me—and he proves it a moment later when he picks me up, holds me close to his chest and carries me upstairs.

I’m drifting off to sleep when I remember the article I’m supposed to be writing.

Is there a timer ticking down on my time with Cort?

If so, when time runs out, will I have him? The exclusive? Both?

Or nothing at all?