Hockey With Benefits(36)

“Who was that?”

Cruz was still here.

Fifty grand? She was blackmailing me?

Blackmailing her daughter?

What was the fifty grand for? Was she in trouble? Again?

My walls were rattling. They were threatening to explode, and I tried bringing up the house imagery again. Everyone had their own room. I could walk freely through the hallways, but it wasn’t working. I couldn’t focus on envisioning a house.

I was so fucked.

My mom was blackmailing me, and if I gave in, she’d keep doing it. “This is payback for ignoring her.”

Right? Or was she really in trouble?

My chest was starting to hurt.

“Ignoring who? Who was on the phone?” Cruz was at my side, and he lifted my hand. “Jesus, Mara.”

He pulled back my fingers. I saw the blood trickling down.

I’d sunk my nails into my skin and hadn’t felt a thing.

Huh.

I looked at my other hand, wondering if I’d done the same with that one, but no. It still had the phone.

That’s when I lost it, throwing my phone.

A deep and primal scream ripped from me, and I couldn’t stop.

“Mara!”

I couldn’t.

I couldn’t.

I couldn’t.

My mother.

I couldn’t–

Cruz picked me up and ran.

I was still screaming.

I wanted to puncture my own ears.

Pain. Something. I needed to feel something other than what she was doing to me.

Cruz was fumbling, reaching into my pockets. I didn’t know what he was doing. I didn’t care. He was searching his own pockets. He tossed something in the corner, and then I was being shoved underwater.

I choked off, the water cascading inside my mouth, but no. That was even better.

I could drown.

Could I drown?

Would that make it stop?

“Fuck!”

I turned, starting to fight off whoever was there.

“What–Mara!” Cruz was yelling in my face.

Cruz.

It was Cruz.

I looked down, in a daze, seeing he was soaked, his chest heaving and his eyes blazing.

“Baby, stop screaming.” He moved in, huddling over me since I was starting to shake from the cold.

I felt that. Why was I cold?

He pushed back some of my hair, cupping and framing my face. His forehead rested on mine. “If you don’t shut up, your neighbors are going to call the cops. I have no idea why your roommates aren’t up here yet.”

Shut up?

Screaming. I’d been screaming.

My throat was hurting.

I whispered, “You hate me.”

His eyes flashed. “I don’t know about that, but yeah, I’m still pissed.”

“I need you to hate me.”

He frowned, not saying anything. But the need was too deep, too now.

I reached for him.





17





CRUZ





I didn’t know who this Mara was, and the thought didn’t sit right with me. She was lying on her stomach, stretched out on the bed, and I was moving inside of her from behind. I ran a hand down her back, over her ass, and she curled her back for me. She was always so responsive to me.

I loved that.

Did not love whatever was going on with her, but there was an extra frenzy to her. It was addicting. I felt it in my blood, this voracious need to keep going, keep tasting, keep fucking, just keep keep keep.

I’d only felt this on the ice. The hardest games, when you just inch out the win, get that last score or get past their last line of defense. It was the same feeling. Man, the rush. It was like ecstasy, but you’re in the zone.

I was feeling it now, this new demand to dominate her, as if I could fuck myself into her body, get under her skin where she’d never not feel me there. Every guy after, she’d be feeling me and not them.

A growl erupted from me, and I started fucking her harder. “Fuck, Mara.”

Leaning down, my body over hers, I reached for the top of the backboard and began ramming into her. “Fuck, you’re tight.”

She went crazy, meeting me just as hard.

Fucking her was like tasting heaven normally. This one was like needing to conquer it or heaven wasn’t going to let me in again.

She’d already come for me twice so this time was for me, and I felt myself coming. The pleasure that spilled out.

Goddamn. I had no words.

I had no energy either. We were at midnight and had been going for the last three hours straight. I had an early skate, so I needed to head home.

I waited a little longer, until the last of the rolling eased up before I eased out of her and tossed the condom in the garbage.

I moved to the edge of the bed and sat there a moment. I needed to catch my bearings.

She sat up, the sheets rustling behind me, and skimmed a hand down my back. Coming up, her legs rested on either side of me, and she leaned against my back. I could feel her cheek on my spine and her arms went around me, resting on my stomach.

She could be such a bitch and times like this, so sweet.

That scream earlier. I’d only heard a similar scream once and it gave me nightmares for years. Hearing that coming out of her, my blood went to ice. We’d definitely shifted, but knowing Mara how I did, she’d try to deny it. It was useless. I was addicted to her, and it was becoming more. Same for her or she would’ve kicked me out in two seconds tonight.