Payton’s back bowed off the bed as she spread her legs even farther, reached down and grabbed his butt. Cedric hissed as her fingernails sank into his flesh. The mixture of pleasure and pain was so erotic. He gripped her hips and pounded into her, over and over and over, plunging into her hot, moist flesh. With one final thrust he came with a blinding rush of white light and pure pleasure.
His body suddenly weak, he fell onto Payton, his cheek finding a soft place upon her breast.
Cedric wasn’t sure how much time had passed before he lifted his head. He’d thought she was sleeping by the even movement of her chest, but when he looked up he found Payton staring back at him, a glow of satisfaction surrounding her.
Cedric scooted a few inches up, needing to touch her at all times. He rested his head on a pillow, facing her. The moonlight coming through the sheer curtain cut an ethereal swath across her face, making it even more beautiful, if that were possible. For untold minutes, they lay face-to-face. Words were unnecessary. Cedric saw everything he needed to know staring back at him in her liquid brown eyes.
After some time, Payton captured one of his hands and brought it to her lips, brushing a featherlight kiss across his knuckles.
“Tell me about your brother,” she said. “Please?”
Cedric’s first instinct was to change the subject, but as he stared into her eyes, the concern and understanding staring back at him was enough to lift the shield on this part of his life he kept hidden from so many.
“Derek was born just two and a half minutes after I was, but we’re as different as night and day. He was born with cerebral palsy.” Cedric shut his eyes tight and shook his head. “I ask God all the time why him and not me.”
“That kind of questioning will drive you crazy,” Payton said. “It’s like me asking why my dad had to die so young. Who knows why these things happen?”
“Well, I know why it happened to Derek,” Cedric said. He looked away, not wanting to see the dismay on her face when he spoke his next words. “It was my fault,” he revealed. “Doctors said while we were in the womb I consumed most of the nutrients, not leaving enough for Derek to fully develop.”
“It’s not as if you did that on purpose.”
Cedric’s eyes snapped up at the incredulousness in her voice. None of the disgust he thought he’d see was there. “If it were not for me, my brother would be healthy. Normal. Because of me, he’s going to be in a wheelchair his entire life.”
Payton squeezed his hand and brought it back to her lips. “Cedric, please tell me you haven’t blamed yourself for this your entire life? You have to know this isn’t your fault. It’s nature.”
“Doctors tried to tell me that over the years, but how can I not feel guilty, Payton? Here I am, healthy, strong, living my dream, and all because I stole what should have belonged to my brother.”
“You can’t blame yourself for your brother’s condition. Think of all the children who are born with cerebral palsy who are not twins. The same could have happened to Derek.” She kissed his forearm and hugged him closer to her. “It wasn’t your fault, Cedric.”
He’d researched the disease for years and knew there were a number of different things that could have caused his brother to be born the way he was. He’d shouldered the guilt for so long, Cedric had not allowed himself to consider that he wasn’t the cause of Derek’s condition.
Cedric shook his head. “He looks up to me as if I’m some kind of hero. Nothing makes him happier than telling people about his big brother, the NFL star.”
“Sounds as if he’s an even bigger football fan than I am.”
“I’m not sure anyone is as big a fan as you are.” Cedric chuckled, then he sobered, the moment of lightheartedness replaced with grim determination. “I’m done jeopardizing my career.” He grasped her hands and held on tight, needing her to understand the depths of his resolve. “Everything I do on that field, I do it for Derek. I now realize that what I do
off
the field can have just as big of an effect on him. I can’t risk losing my career. It’s all Derek has.”
“Your career isn’t all your brother has,” Payton whispered, her eyes covered with a sheen of tears. “He has you. But if it’s your career with the Sabers you’re worried about, then don’t. This is my personal guarantee, you’re going to be with the team for many years to come.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him in for a kiss. Before he could utter the words
I love you,
Payton covered his mouth with her own, thrusting her tongue inside. Even though he didn’t say the words, he felt them in every fiber of his being. And as he slowly made love to her again, Cedric was determined to show her with his body the words he didn’t have a chance to say with his mouth.
Chapter 14
P
ayton sat with one leg folded underneath her while she used the other to push the rocking chair into a gentle sway. She wrapped the crocheted afghan more securely around her shoulders as she stared at nothing across the lawn. Her mind was a thousand miles away—or however many miles it was to Baltimore, where the Sabers were playing today. But her mind wasn’t on the team, just their star running back.
What was she going to do?
She’d defied her number one rule. She’d fallen in love with her client.
There was no denying her feelings for Cedric, not after the love they’d shared while wrapped in each other’s arms. Now she had to decide what to do about those feelings.
Payton knew she didn’t really have a choice. What happened three weeks ago could be labeled a mistake—a slip in judgment. But she’d known exactly what she was doing last night. And if she had her way, she would continue doing it every night for the rest of her life. How could she and Cedric ever go back to the way things were?
It was simple. They
wouldn’t
go back. She needed Cedric in her life, and not just as her client. Somehow, they would have to figure out a way to make this work.
“What are you doing out here? The game’s about to start.”
Payton tracked her mother’s steps as she made her way across the porch. She came bearing gifts, a tray with hot tea and a plate of the shortbread cookies she’d baked earlier that day. Her mother sat the tray on the small table dividing the two rockers.
“You mind?” her mother asked, perched just above the other rocker.
“Please. Sit.” Payton gestured. She took one of the mugs and sipped her tea, a small smile lifting her lips at the familiar taste of honey and cinnamon.
“I should ask what you’re doing out here when there’s football on, but I think I know,” her mother said, staring out over the lawn. She lifted a cookie from the tray and took a bite. “He’s a nice young man.”
“‘Young’ being the operative word there.”
“He’s not that much younger than you are,” her mother chastised.
“I know,” Payton said, exasperated. The couple of years age difference hadn’t worked as a good excuse when she’d tried it on herself. “It has nothing to do with his age. But he
is
my client.”
“And?”
She looked over at her mother. “And? How would it look if I fell in love with my client?”
“First, I don’t think there’s any
if
about it. I can tell by the way you look at him that you’re already in love with him, or pretty close to it.”
She shut her eyes in an attempt to block out the truth of her mother’s words.
“And, second,” her mom continued, “why does it matter what people think?”
“It just does.” Payton shoved her fingers through her hair. “I’ve spent all this time trying to present myself as a professional who is no different from any other sports agent. The worst thing I could do is fall in love with my very first client. Talk about girlie.”
Her mother reached over and covered Payton’s hand. “I can list about a thousand other things you could do that would be worse than falling in love with Cedric Reeves.” Her mother sat back and took a sip of her tea. “I’ve told you how your grandfather felt about your father when he started to court me, haven’t I?”
Payton’s lips lifted in a smile as she remembered the story. “You said Granddad wouldn’t let him in the house.”
“The house? He wouldn’t let him on the porch steps. He didn’t want his baby girl dating one of those Mosely boys from the east side of Manchac.”
“As if the west side of Manchac is all that different,” Payton snorted.
“It was back then, but it didn’t matter to me. I fell in love with one of those Mosely boys and I didn’t care what anyone else thought about it. You can’t let other people decide who you’re going to love, Payton.”
“But what if people no longer take me seriously as an agent?”
“You make them,” her mother said. “They didn’t take you seriously before Cedric became your client, but you made them stand up and take notice. No one said this agent business was going to be easy. You knew it was going to be a fight from the very beginning. But you’re doing it, and you’re going to keep doing it.
“But you also have to do what makes you happy.” Her mother squeezed her hand. “And Cedric makes you happy. Every time I saw the way he looked at you I wanted to give him a hug, or a kiss, or another slice of pie, or something.”
Payton laughed at that. “I think Cedric got out of here just in time. He probably gained five pounds over these last two days.”
“I’m sure he’ll burn it off during the course of that game today. Which we are missing sitting out here on this porch.” Her mother tugged her hand. “Come on. You and your father made me watch games every Sunday during football season. No use breaking the tradition.”
When her mother went to extract her hand, Payton held on to it.
“Thank you,” she said.
Her mother nodded, giving her hand another firm squeeze before letting go.
They spent the afternoon watching the Sabers beat up on Baltimore. With that win, which was capped off by Cedric’s twenty-yard highlight reel-worthy run into the end zone, the Sabers earned themselves a spot in the playoffs. And Cedric’s standout performance would give Payton more ammunition when it was time to renegotiate his contract in a few weeks.
The next morning, Payton awoke to the smell of coffee mingling with her mother’s homemade cinnamon rolls. Her stomach rumbled in anticipation. She joined her mother in the kitchen and headed straight for the coffee and pastries.
“Don’t touch that,” her mother said. “I just drizzled the icing on them. They still need to cool.”
Payton waited until her mother left the room before she ignored the warning and scooped up a gooey cinnamon roll. The first bite seared the tip of her tongue.
“I told you not to touch them,” came the call from the living room.
Payton rolled her eyes as she grabbed an ice cube from the freezer. She would eventually learn to listen to that woman.
“Payton, come here. You need to see this.”
The urgency in her mother’s voice caused Payton’s heart to pump faster.
When she reached the living room, her mother pointed to the television where an ESPN anchor sat behind a news desk. The shot changed to a shaking, low-quality video—like something shot with a cell phone. At least five people jockeyed and wrestled, a medley of elbows and fists colliding with chests and jaws. In the midst of the melee, Payton recognized Cedric. The picture blurred as it zoomed in to his face, then cleared just as another man shoved a hand under his chin.
“No, he did
not
get into a fight,” Payton said through clenched teeth.
She ran to her bedroom and grabbed her cell phone from her purse. There was a text message from him that came at eleven-fifteen last night.
I need u. In B-more. Plz come.
Payton punched his number into her phone, but it went straight to voice mail. She stuffed her clothes into her travel bag with one hand and dialed the airline with another. She had to leave in ten minutes if she wanted any chance of making the next flight out of Midland to Baltimore.
Her mother came to stand in the doorway. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Try to convince me not to kill him when I see him,” Payton said.
“Killing him would be a bad thing,” her mother said in a calm voice.
Payton crammed her cosmetics clutch into the bag. “He’s been on thin ice all season long. And now at the very end of the season, just when everything is going great, he gets into a barroom brawl.”
Payton could actually feel the blood boiling in her veins. Everything they’d worked for was shot to hell. How was she going to convince Sabers upper management that Cedric had changed? She wasn’t all that convinced herself.
A half hour into the eighty-mile drive to the airport, Payton received a text message from Cedric. He was on his way back to New York. The Sabers were planning a two o’clock press conference to address last night’s incident.
It took the rest of the drive to Midland International Airport and the entire flight back to New York for Payton to calm herself down. When she pulled into the parking lot at the Sabers practice facility, Payton sat behind the wheel of her car for several long moments, going over the plan she’d devised while on the flight. She only hoped her spin on whatever had happened last night would fly with reporters.
The building was busier than she’d anticipated. The team was usually off on Mondays, but with just one more game before the start of the playoffs, it looked as if players and coaches were trying to gain an edge with extra preparation. Payton was led down a hallway that was an offshoot of the wide corridor that led to the locker room.
Seated around an oval table in the meeting room were Cedric and two of his teammates, Jared Dawson and Randall Robinson, along with the Sabers head coach, Dave Foster, the team’s general manager and another man in a suit Payton had never seen before.
Cedric pushed from the table and rushed over to her. “Thanks for coming,” he said.
“What were you thinking?” Payton seethed.
His eyebrows shot up. “You think last night was my fault?”
“It’s hard to deny video evidence,” she retorted.
Cedric grabbed her arm and pulled her into the hallway, closing the door behind them. Payton jerked away from him and railed, “How could you be so irresponsible? You know what happened last year in Baltimore, yet you deliberately put yourself in a position to land in trouble. And even worse, you get caught on video!”