Page 190 of Off Limits: The Firsts

“There’s not?” There’s a whole host of shit we need to talk about.

“Nope.”

Nope? What the hell? I slam the rental car into park, hop out, and jog up beside him, but he still refuses to look my way.

“Hunter? What the hell?” I grab his arm and he turns on me with confusion and anger etched in the lines of his face.

“You’re wasting my time, Kincade. I’ve got practice to get to. You know, my job. I haven’t been avoiding you, I’ve just been throwing myself into perfecting my game. As an agent, you should appreciate that in a client.”

His smile is tight and his words are cutting.

“I do, but I also know avoidance when I see it.”

“What am I avoiding?” he asks and takes a step back and crosses his arms over his chest, throwing the ball back in my court and of course now that he has, I just stare at him.

Answer the question honestly and sound like a needy female. Lie and sound like a flustering idiot.

“Me.” I choose honesty and feel so stupid saying it, but it’s true, and it’s better if we face this now rather than later.

“Bullshit,” he sneers.

“You’re not avoiding me?” I ask on the defensive.

“Nope. Don’t think so highly of yourself. I have a Cup to win. I have a team to lead. I have consequences if I let them all down.”

“You’ve always had a Cup to win.” I take a step toward him as he takes one back. “I don’t under—Hunter, talk to me.”

“About what? How we got drunk. How we had a laugh or two. Then how we fucked.” He throws his arms out to his sides and raises his voice. “Just like old times, huh? No harm, no foul—mistake made and realized until the next time.”

His words should hurt, but for some reason, they don’t. Maybe it’s because it’s been two days since we slept together and this is the first time I’ve been able to actually talk. It’s been two days of overthinking and wondering if the sex was just sex or blowing it out of proportion to second-guess every nuance of his and wonder if there could be more. But now that I’m standing here, he’s made it clear what the answer is, and I’m not exactly sure what to say.

“I—I just thought we should talk about it.”

His chuckle is raw and brutal. “About what? The snow angels? The shit I said in the bar? Or someone seeing us together?”

“Because it could affect my job.”

He chuckles and scrubs a hand over his jaw. “I expected more from you than that. I really did.” The disappointment in his voice is like a knife to my heart. Here he is handing me the key to the door I need. But I know the minute I unlock and open it, everything I want will fall out of reach.

“I can’t give you more.” It’s the only thing I can think to say as my professional world wars against my personal one.

“Why?” This time, he’s the one who takes a step closer to me. This time, he’s the one staring and demanding and wanting to know.

“Because I can’t,” I whisper.

“That’s what I thought,” he says and starts to stride off.

“Hunter. Wait.” He keeps walking. “Truth. Truth,” I shout, and this time he stops but doesn’t turn around. I stare at him, the bright lights of the arena he’s playing in tonight in the background. “I can’t admit to you why I’m here because the minute I do, whatever happened the other night can’t happen again. I can’t tell you what you want to hear, because there’s a blaring red line in the sand and once I cross it, all those things about you that made me want to come back to your room over and over once I left that night have to be buried and gone.” My breath hitches on what feels like a sob, but it’s really my fear in admitting the truth to both him and myself.

It’s the fear in admitting that I had fallen for Hunter Maddox before, and being here, sleeping with him, just reinforced that I never got over him. That I chose mediocre options in the interim who never dimmed his sparkle, but rather made it shine brighter.

He turns slowly and stares at me, eyes burning into mine in a way I’ve never seen or felt before. The muscle in his jaw feathers as if he’s trying to control any and all emotion from playing across his stoic face.

The hope I had that he might hear me drains away slowly.

I throw my hands up in a shrug and surrender whatever else I can’t express. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t. My dad sent me here to win you over to the agency because you’re you, and any agent would be crazy to not want you on their team. Now that I’m here, I don’t know that I can follow through with it. I know you’re struggling with something, and I would do anything to help you through it. But if I offer you that, you’ll always be wondering if it’s because I’m personally invested or because I want to profit off you professionally. The answer is I care, when it seems you don’t want anyone to. So you tell me, Hunter, what am I supposed to do?”

The first tear slips over and I shove it away with the back of my hand as I stand before him, intentions exposed, emotions on the line, waiting for him to respond.