Page 51 of Offside

She made a sound that was soft and involuntary and my hand moved to my forehead.

“You in that parking lot,” I continued, quieter now. “The way you came to me. You closed the distance. I’ve been thinking about how you pressed yourself against me. What you want.” I paused. “I want to learn it all exactly.”

Her breathing had changed. I could hear it, shallow and unsteady. “Ryan.”

“Is this too much?” The last think I wanted to do was push her away.

“No.” Her reply was immediate, quiet, certain. “It’s not too much.”

Her words settled between us and my dick started to take notice.

“I’ve been in a hurry every time I’ve gotten near you,” I said. “I’m done being in a hurry. The stolen moments. I want all of you. I want to hear every sound you make when nobody’s about to walk in.” Another pause. “I’ve been thinking about that since Cole’s kitchen.”

The silence on her end was full and unsteady. I heard her exhale slowly.

“I—” She stopped. I heard her try again. “I have thought about that. A lot.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” A breath. “The part where nobody’s about to walk in especially.”

I let out a sound that was almost a laugh, warm and low. “One more day.”

“One more day,” she echoed, low and a little rough, like a countdown she was already feeling in her body—would settle into me unhelpfully for the next forty-eight hours.

“Get some sleep, Maren.”

“That is not going to happen.” She let out a small laugh.

“No,” I agreed. “Probably not.” I’d certainly be getting in the shower and rubbing one out the minute we got off the phone.

She laughed, strangled at the edges, working to keep her voice even and not entirely winning. “You’re very good at this. For someone so…contained.”

“I’m not contained with you.”

A silence. I heard her exhale again, slow and careful, and my mind went somewhere I hadn’t expected. I wondered if she was going to touch herself after we hung up. Whether she was already thinking about it. Her in the gray sleep shirt, her hair down, alone in her house in Scottsdale with her hand sliding between her thighs, thinking about me. The sounds she might make. Whether she’d let herself be loud when she was alone.

I pressed the heel of my hand against my eye.

“Good night, Maren.”

Her voice, when it came, was barely above a breath. “Good night.”

Then, because I meant it, I said, “Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“Think of me.”

“It would be impossible not to.”

I lay in the dark for ninety seconds before I got up and went to the shower, and I did not think about anything except her for the entire duration.

The charter home was scheduled for Thursday afternoon. It left Wednesday evening instead. A rebooking nobody had flagged—new team, new travel staff, someone had misread the game schedule when they’d built the itinerary and then quietly fixed it without telling anyone. I found out when the revised departure time appeared on my phone at noon while I was going over tape.

I texted Griffin.

Ryan: Heads up, we’re leaving today