Hendrix: A Raleigh Raptor Novel Read online

  And speaking of Hendrix…

  I stepped onto the wooden porch, ducking under the opened entryway.

  Hendrix looked immaculate, the tight black speedo shorts hugging every inch of muscle along his legs, and the speedo shirt? It did nothing to hide every ridge of his abs. His golden blond hair was drenched with sweat, his cheeks glistening with exertion as he hauled his rowing boat up into its proper place inside the house.

  The dock jostled slightly from his movements, and my heart stuttered against my chest. The sight of him ratcheted up every emotion and need and craving I had since our kiss four days ago.

  Hendrix spun around and jolted at the sight of my presence. "What are you doing here, Savannah?"

  I raised my hands in an innocent, pleading gesture. "I came here to apologize," I said, and Hendrix crossed his arms over his chest, his chin tipping up slightly as he surveyed me from a safe distance across the dock.

  "How did you know I'd be here?"

  I furrowed my brow as if the answer was obvious. "It's Tuesday morning," I said just like I had to London. "You row every Tuesday morning."

  The slightest, tiniest smirk shaped his perfect lips. "Careful," he said, his voice going low, “or you'll sound like a groupie."

  I rolled my eyes. "Please," I said. "We both know I'm the furthest thing from one of your fangirls. Just because I happen to know a few details about your schedule, thanks to being surrounded by your friends and family all the time, doesn't mean I'm a stalker."

  Hendrix took one step closer, but still far enough away not to touch. "You said something about apologizing?"

  I blew out a breath and nodded. Why was it so easy to get off track when Hendrix irked me? "I did," I said. Sucking in a sharp breath to regain my bearings. Focus. "I am sorry that I didn't tell you who I was at the party."

  Hendrix swallowed hard.

  "I should have told you, but…" How could I possibly explain it to him? "Look, it really sucks being me sometimes. Being Coach Goodman's daughter. It makes people either too afraid to get close to me or only want to get close to me for one reason. Status. Fame. Whatever. And I thought Trevor was different. But he wasn't. Turns out that he and just about every other frat house boy of his had a bet going.” I sighed, shoving down the pain that came with my admission. “Whoever could get into Coach Goodman's daughter's pants first." My words were gritty as I admitted the truth, as I revealed that open wound to him. Laid myself bare before him. The biceps crossed over his chest flexed, but I hurried to continue. "And I don't ever want to be put in that situation again. I don’t want people bartering over me because of who I am. Because of what they can gain from me."

  "So, who do you want me to kill?" he asked, the question so easily rolling off his lips like it wasn't even a second thought.

  And I could see it there in his eyes—those gorgeous, stunning sky-blue eyes. He would, without hesitation, turn Trevor into a walking hospital trip. All I had to do was ask. And I let out a sigh, smacking my hands against my thighs. "Why is it easier to contemplate murdering somebody for me than it is to do this one little thing —"

  "What one little thing?" Hendrix cut me off. His arms fell to his sides. "Savannah, I didn't know who you were. You deceived me—"

  "You said it didn’t matter!” I fired back, then took a steadying breath. “But still, I’m trying to apologize for that," I said. "Hendrix, you have no idea how freeing it felt. To just be wanted on the most basic and primal of levels. You may experience that all the time, but me? I don't. Because everybody only sees me as the coach's daughter—untouchable or attainable only for gain."

  Understanding flashed in his eyes, but it was gone in a blink.

  "I don't know what you want me to do here," he finally broke the silence. "I'll happily talk to these assholes for you. They had no right to do that to you. And trust me, I'd be more than willing to teach them the error of their ways."

  "I don't need you to do that," I said, raking my fingers through my long hair. Could he really not see what I wanted? Was he really so blind by the untouchable filter my father had put on the entire team?

  Hendrix raised his hands in the air, genuine, unfiltered confusion flashing across his face. "Then what do you want me to do?"

  I swallowed the nerves tangling a knot in my throat and walked across the dock separating us. Hendrix moved back a step as if our close proximity terrified him.

  Defeat threatened to silence my words, but I pushed past that internal wilting feeling and stood my ground.

  “I want you," I said, wetting my lips as my mouth suddenly went dry. "I want you to take what they were wagering for. I want you to give me my power back."

  Hendrix tilted his head, understanding at the edge of his narrowing eyes, but not fully there.

  So I popped a hand on my hip and said without any hint of shame or embarrassment or hesitance, "I want you to take my virginity, Hendrix."

  5

  Hendrix

  “You’re a virgin?” My eyes just about popped out of my head before I could school my features. Savannah Goodman was one of the most confident, intelligent women I’d ever met, and she held herself like she owned her sexuality in every aspect.

  How the hell was she still a virgin? I’d felt her under me, tasted how passionate she was. If I’d ever been lucky enough to call Savannah Goodman my girlfriend, I definitely would have given us both reasons to explore the depths of her inherent sensuality.

  But no one had.

  Say yes. Say yes. Say yes. The devil on my shoulder was practically dancing.

  “That’s the point you’re hung up on?” She rolled her eyes.

  “It’s a pretty big point.” I grabbed a towel from my locker and rubbed the sweat off my neck. Rowing was my favorite workout—full-bodied, quiet, and came with the incentive that if I stopped before it was complete, I was stuck in the middle of the river. That’s where I should have stayed—in the middle of the river. Where I was safe from my overwhelming need for Savannah.

  “It’s really not,” she argued. “It’s just a technicality.”

  “No, it’s not just a technicality.” I grabbed two bottles of water out of the case I kept stored in my boathouse locker and tossed one at Savannah, who caught it easily. It was second nature to look after her—I’d been doing it for years, but her request was…enticing, intoxicating, maddening.

  Ludicrous. It was ludicrous, no matter how loudly my body argued her way. Speaking of my body, I did not need to give her any more encouragement, so I slipped on a pair of loose athletic shorts over my rowing gear to cover the rising evidence of my very real interest.

  “Why? Because some man decided thousands of years ago that his penis had the right to magically transform women from maidens to mothers…or whores?” She folded her arms under her breasts and arched an eyebrow, leaving her water unopened as she stared me down with those gorgeous brown eyes.

  Fuck, I’d always loved her eyes. Warm and deep, with little flecks of gold and green—I used to think they were the only thing soft about her. Unfortunately, I now knew her breasts were even softer, especially when they swelled beneath my mouth.

  Stop it. If only I could get the memories out of my damned head.

  “You know I don’t subscribe to that bullshit.” I twisted the top and downed the entire bottle of water, wishing it could quench my thirst for her.

  “You don’t?” Savannah watched me, her gaze tracking the movement of my throat.

  “No. Your body is yours to do whatever you want with it, Savannah.” Shit, her name slid off my tongue with a caress. I threw the bottle into the recycling bin I kept in here for exactly that purpose and turned back to my locker. If I could just keep my eyes off her, we’d both make it through this encounter with our clothes intact.

  “Well, I want to use it…with you.”

  “No, you don’t.” I shook my head, then yanked a clean shirt from my bag, and hung it over the locker door. “You’re pissed at your dickwad ex, and you have every rig
ht to be.” Which fucking frat was his, anyway? I needed to pay him a visit. Maybe I’d even bring whatever Raptors were in town with me, just to see the little bitch piss his Abercrombie pants. I ripped my shirt off and threw it into my bag.

  “Uh…”

  I shoved my head and arms through the clean, cotton shirt, then tugged it down my bare torso, which had all of Savannah’s attention. “Like what you see?” I snarled, just to snap her out of it.

  Her gaze flew to mine, and though there was a slight flush on her cheeks, there was no apology, no embarrassment in her eyes. “Well, yes. Every woman in America likes what I see.” No coy flirtation, just…Savannah. Honest and blunt, as always.

  I sighed, fighting off the smile that tugged at my lips. “Look, even if I wanted to—” Which you do. Right here. Now. On that bench. In the backseat of your car. On the dock. Wherever. “—your father is my coach. The first rule of being a Raptor is that you’re off limits. He’ll kick me off the team. And as much as I’d love to assist in the whole revenge-sex plot you’ve got going on, I’m not risking my career over it. People depend on me.”

  Her eyes flew wide as she shook her head. “Oh, no. You have the wrong idea. This isn’t…revenge sex.” She finished those words quietly, leaning against the wall. “I wasn’t going to tell anyone. Especially not my dad.” She dropped her gaze and twisted the bottle in her hands.

  “Savannah.” Okay, now I was confused. I closed the distance between us and took her chin between my thumb and forefinger, tilting her face toward mine. I loved how tall she was, how easy it would be to dip slightly and kiss her. Hell, I loved everything about her body. That was the problem. “You said this was about taking your power back.”

  “It is.”

  “That power doesn’t include telling your ex to shove his bet up his ass because you scored with me?” My thumb stroked her jaw gently. Fuck, my control was so shattered when it came to this woman that I couldn’t even hold her platonically.

  “I don’t care what Trevor thinks.”

  I never wanted to hear that name again.

  “Explain this to me one more time.” I bracketed my hands on the wall on either side of her, holding on to the supports so I didn’t hold on to her.

  “Okay.” She swallowed but held my gaze just like she always had. She’d always pushed and poked at me, got on every single one of my nerves, but she’d never hid from me. “I deserve to control who I have sex with for the first time.”

  “Agreed.” Anything less would have me burying bodies.

  “I didn’t know he had a motive.” Her shoulders dropped slightly, taking my stomach with them.

  “Every man dating you is going to have a motive to get you naked, Red. It should be lust, desire, need, love…anything but a fucking bet.”

  “I know.” She tucked a loose strand of her red hair behind her ear while the rest lay in a braid down the side of her breast. Not that I was looking at the deep cut of her blank tank, either. That way lay madness. “But at least if it’s with you, I’d know there’s no bet. No bragging. No request for sideline passes.”

  Fuck. Now that was something I understood. “You want someone to want you for you and not what you can give them.”

  She nodded.

  “I get that.” My chest tightened. We were more alike than I’d ever realized, and it was dangerous, this connection.

  “Simply put…I trust you, Hendrix.” There was a vulnerability in her eyes I’d never seen before, a crack in her infamous, tough-as-nails armor and it hit me straight in the heart.

  “You shouldn’t.” She was twenty-one. A woman fully grown. Legal and responsible for herself in every way. She was beautiful, passionate, and so fucking sexy my dick was cursing the spandex of my rowing shorts. But more than any of that, she deserved way better than me. “I’ve fucked so many women I can’t remember their names or their faces.”

  She looked away, and I cupped the back of her neck. God, she smelled good. I deserved sainthood for not immediately taking her up on her offer.

  “Look at me.”

  She did.

  “Is that really what you want? To be added to a list I can’t even number?” That was the ugly truth of it.

  “Yes.” She tilted her chin.

  “Fuck that.” I pushed off the wall and put some much-needed space between us. “You deserve better. Go find some college boy who will love you.”

  “Did you love the first girl you slept with?” Shit, the hand was back on her hip. She was digging in.

  “No. I was fifteen.” I’d never loved anyone, but I wasn’t about to lay that one on her.

  “So, why do I have to love my first?”

  “Okay, you have me there. Find someone who won’t get fired for touching you.” I’d break the guy’s fingers one by one, but it couldn’t be me.

  “My dad will never know!” She walked forward, and I stepped sideways, then back, putting my boat between us. “I can keep a secret. I’ve never told a soul that you and Weston are best friends. Please do this for me.”

  “Do it for you?” Like I wouldn’t enjoy every single minute? “This isn’t a favor to ask like catching a ride home, Savannah. This is my career. This is your first time.”

  And damn if I wasn’t the selfish prick who wanted it.

  “Are you seriously hiding again?”

  “With good reason.” My jaw ticked, and I crossed my arms over my chest.

  Surprise flared in her eyes, and a slow, wicked, sexy-as-hell smile spread across her face. “You want me.”

  “I’d say that’s pretty obvious given what happened in that gallery.” My dick pulsed, hardening to near-pain at the memory.

  “I wanted it to happen.” She swept her tongue over her lower lip, and I wondered if she remembered too. My mouth watered. I’d been so close to tasting her, to eating her in that very public space. Not some stranger in a butterfly costume—Savannah.

  Coach’s Savannah.

  My Savannah.

  “You’re killing me.” I laced my fingers over my head.

  “I should have told you my name, but I knew if I did, you’d stop. And it felt so good. So, so, so good. And I just wanted to live in that moment where you wanted me because I’ve always wanted you. Always wondered what it would be like to spend a night with you. Always wondered what it would take for you to look at me like a woman instead of the seventeen-year-old kid whose jaw-dropped when Dad brought you home for dinner.”

  The admission nearly broke me. I blew out a long, slow breath, but this wasn’t some candle to huff out. This was a fire, and she’d just fanned the flames.

  “You were never a kid to me.” I’d been a twenty-two-year-old rookie who’d known better than to look at teenage girls. She’d been Coach’s daughter, someone to look after, to care for, but never to touch.

  Then she turned twenty, and I’d looked, cursing myself the whole time.

  Now she was twenty-one, and I’d touched, and couldn’t bring myself to regret it, but that didn’t mean I was going to dirty her up with hands that had no business on all that alabaster skin.

  “Then don’t treat me like one.” She squared her shoulders but tugged on the star pendant of her necklace that hung just beneath the space in her collarbone. The star that had given her away at the gallery and did the same thing now. It was her nervous tell.

  “It should be special. Your first time.” My hands fell to my sides. “It should be candles and roses and long, long hours that leave you limp and satisfied—”

  “Then give me that.” Her gaze turned hot.

  “—and it shouldn’t be because of an arrangement you make. It’s not a business transaction, Savannah.”

  “I’ve heard the first time can hurt,” she said softly.

  Just thinking about sliding deep inside her, feeling her tighten around my cock— I swallowed. “Not for everyone, but yeah. Especially if your partner doesn’t know what he’s doing.” Shit. Had I even known what I’d been doing in college? Would some
non-experienced idiot fumble his way into her panties? Push her before she was ready? Take her without making it good for her? Without getting her off once, let alone twice or more?

  “I somehow think you know what you’re doing.” Her eyes flashed with victory as if she could read my thoughts.

  Hell yes, I did. I’d lick her to her first orgasm before I even thought about stretching her with my fingers. That would be for the second. The third? You have to stop.

  “You wouldn’t hurt me,” she said, finally twisting open her water and taking a long drink. “You’re too good at taking care of me to hurt me. Not emotionally or physically if it can be helped. I’d be safe with you.” She put the water down on the windowsill like punctuation—like it had proved her point.

  Fuck my life, she was right. “Savannah…”

  “I’ll give you a few days to think it over.” She tucked her thumbs into the pockets of her very tiny shorts. The damn things were so small the pockets hung beneath the hem, exposing her incredible thighs. “I want it to be you, Hendrix. But make no mistake—this is a decision I’m making for me. I’m done carrying around my virginity like some designer purse for someone to steal like it’s a trophy. If you don’t want it to be you, that’s okay. I’ll just have to choose someone else.” She turned and walked out of the boathouse.

  A few moments later, I heard her car drive away.

  “Fuck!” I shouted to the heavens, to my own demons, to whomever was willing to listen.

  I wanted it to be me, but that didn’t mean it could be.

  * * *

  “Holy shit, you almost took my head off with that one,” Weston cursed, winding up and throwing the football back at me.

  “Sorry.” I caught it easily—that was my job, after all. A job he paid me millions a year to do with as much accuracy as possible.