One More Shot (Hometown Players #1) Read online

  I push the heels of my hands into my eyes and will myself to stop crying.

  I have survived worse than Chance Echolls cheating on me. I know this, rationally, I do. But right now…it feels worse than anything I’ve ever felt in my life. I just wanted this…this one thing…to go right. My father left. My mom died. My grandmother was nothing but a bank account to me. I just wanted this…Chance…to love me, even though my feelings for him weren’t as strong as my feelings for Jordan. But I loved the idea that someone so perfect could love me. If Chance Echolls wanted me, then maybe I was better than my crappy life made me look. But clearly, that wasn’t the case. I couldn’t have Jordan, and Chance never thought I was special. The tears are pure self-pity and I know it, but that just makes me cry harder.

  I’m sobbing so heavily that I don’t even hear heavy footsteps moments later as they make their way up my dirt driveway.

  “Holy shit, you can run,” he pants. I scramble to my feet.

  I hastily dig the house key out from under the doormat and rush to unlock the door so I can disappear inside and lock him out. Lock the world out. But my shaky hands aren’t quick enough, and he climbs the porch and grabs the key from me before I can get it in the lock.

  “Go away, Jordan,” I beg, and rest my head against the lead glass windowpane in the door, refusing to turn and face him. “Go back to the party and your girlfriend.”

  “No way,” he replies, and wraps his arms around my shoulders, hugging me from behind. “Besides, we’re doing the off-again thing. She’s pissed about God knows what.”

  I wiggle wildly trying to shrug him off. “I want to be alone!”

  “Too bad,” he tells me firmly. “I’m bigger so I win.”

  He’s been using that argument since we were eleven.

  I choke on a sob. “Please.”

  I let him turn me around and put one of those big mitts he calls hands under my chin. He forces my head upward. I close my eyes, too embarrassed to look at him.

  “You have to tell me what happened,” he informs me softly. “You always tell me everything eventually, so just tell me.”

  “Chance and I are…done.” I open my eyes and sniff then shudder.

  He pulls me to him so my face is mushed up against his chest. I inhale deeply and my nostrils fill with his scent—Dove soap and Old Spice sport deodorant. It makes me feel slightly better. I wait for him to ask more questions. Why? What happened? Are you sure? But he doesn’t.

  “Do you want to know what happened?” I finally croak.

  “Nope,” he says simply, and runs a hand along the back of my head, smoothing my hair. “I don’t care. I just care that you’re all right.”

  “I’m not,” I sputter, and another sob shakes me again.

  “You’ll be fine,” he insists almost too casually. “You’ll be better than fine. You’ll be awesome.”

  “How can you say that?” I demand, pulling away from him.

  “Jessie, I have been your best friend since you were eight,” he reminds me softly. “You always get through things. You’re always awesome. This asshole isn’t going to change that.”

  “But…I thought he wanted me,” I whisper brokenly.

  He makes a bit of a face at that, like he swallowed something that tastes bad, but he doesn’t argue. Instead he asks, “Why do you think he doesn’t suddenly?”

  “He…” I swallow and shake my head. A whole new flood of tears threaten to flow down my cheeks. “He was with Amber.”

  I grab the key from Jordan’s hand and shove it into the lock, throwing the door open and charging into the kitchen. He follows behind me, shutting the door and leaning against it.

  “What do you mean, he was with Amber?” Jordan repeats, confused, his blond eyebrows pinching together. “Amber, our friend?”

  “Yeah, the girl I thought was one of my best friends.” I throw the key in the general direction of the fridge.

  “So, what? Like, he was talking to her and you got all delusional and thought—”

  “He was NAKED and she was NAKED. In his BED,” I scream, and the tears start spilling again. “I can’t believe…He said he was…He would wait…”

  “Whoa!” Jordan pushes off the door and grabs me by the wrist and pulls me in for another hug, but I push against his chest and pull my arm free from his grasp. I walk to the other side of the room.

  “Can you just go?” I beg again. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  He hesitates then nods and turns to the door. “Okay. I’ll go back to the party and beat the living shit out of him.”

  He pulls the door open and I rush to him and grab the back of his shirt. Luckily he stops walking. He could very well drag me all the way back there without much exertion, considering he’s a six-two pillar of pure muscle and I’m a weak little human.

  “Jordy, you can’t!”

  “I have to. Someone has to. The asshole can’t get away with that,” he rants angrily, thumping a fist on the wall beside the doorframe. “You don’t deserve that.”

  He reaches behind his back and grabs my hand, pulling it loose from his shirt. Then he turns and looks down at me, the anger in his sky blue eyes morphing into concern.

  “Oh, fuck…” He swallows and suddenly looks shy. “Did you…And him…Did you have…sex already?”

  “No.” I shake my head and pull away from him, turning and staring down at the counter. I’m too embarrassed to meet his gaze.

  I had mentioned it to Jordan. Well, he had asked me if Chance and I had. I had told him not yet, but soon. I wasn’t comfortable getting into too many details like that with him. I asked him if he and Hannah had and he said yes. I remember that made me feel angry. And sad.

  “Good,” Jordan replies quietly with a loud sigh of relief. “’Cause then I would really have to kill him. Like, for real. And then I wouldn’t get drafted because the NHL doesn’t draft kids in prison.”

  “He promised he would wait…he said he wanted it to be with me…” I start to cry again.

  Jordan walks over and forcibly turns me to face him. I dip my chin and snap my eyes shut, refusing to look at him. He bends at the waist, trying to get low enough to look at my face. When that is too awkward, he places his hands firmly on my hips. He lifts me up and plops me down on the counter so I’m higher—closer to his height by a little bit anyway—and then he sticks his hand under my chin again and lifts my face.

  My eyes flutter open. I don’t think I have ever seen him look so serious.

  “It’s better this way,” he explains quietly. “Better you found out before than after.”

  “I just…I just thought we had something. Like really…And I…” I burst into tears again. “What is wrong with me?! Why doesn’t anyone want me?”

  I cover my face with my hands and feel his ridiculously long, warm limbs wrap around my back. His chest is pressed against my face again.

  “Jessie, come on, please,” he begs softly, his breath tickling my ear. “Get a grip for me. Okay? I need you to get a grip.”

  I look up at him and choke back another sob.

  “Chance is not worth this,” he insists. “There is nothing wrong with you! He’s got something wrong with him for doing this to you.”

  I will myself to stop crying and believe what he’s saying. I’m desperate for any words that make this better. And he’s giving them to me. I have to believe him. He’s Jordan. My best friend. He’s right about everything. He’s the best.

  “And Chance did want you,” Jordan goes on, his eyes wide and sincere. “He probably still does. Half this goddamn town does. It makes me fucking crazy.”

  I blink.

  He heaves a heavy breath and looks at the ceiling for a moment. “Do you know how the guys talk about you in the locker room? I have to hear it every freaking day. And he does it too. Chance tells me how hot you are—what he can’t wait to do to you—because he knows how it makes me feel.”

  He reaches up and cups my face. His thumbs sweep over my tear-st
ained cheeks, trying to wipe them dry.

  “You’re beautiful,” he says in a voice barely over a whisper. “You’re strong and smart and funny and so fucking beautiful…”

  My tears have halted completely and I’m having trouble breathing, but not from strangled sobs this time. Is this really happening? Is he just being nice, or are my forbidden feelings mutual?

  “There is nothing wrong with you,” he repeats, his head dipping down so close to mine our noses almost touch. “You’re perfect. Chance may not know it but I know it. I’ve known it my whole life.”

  “Jordan…”

  “I love you,” he blurts out in a soft, barely audible voice filled with aching honesty. “He doesn’t. But I do.”

  And then he lets go of my face and steps back.

  I feel an overwhelming sense of panic that he might leave. Just go out the door and never come back. That somehow now I’m losing him too. I grab his arm and almost topple off the counter. I feel dizzy. I feel panicked. I feel…I feel like I would rather die than not kiss him right now.

  Chapter 4

  Jessie

  I pull on his arm and he moves closer, but his face is cast downward at the yellow linoleum under his size thirteen feet. I keep pulling him closer until he is inches from my knees. Less than inches, millimeters.

  “What did you say?”

  “Never mind.”

  “Jordy…”

  He shakes his head and tries to take a step away from me, but I still have him by his giant wrist. I keep him firmly in place. Finally, he looks up at me. He looks so vulnerable and terrified. His cheeks are pink, his eyes wide and glassy, his full bottom lip jutting out just a little more than normal. For the first time in our lives, I’m scared he might cry.

  I reach out with my free hand and cup the back of his neck. And then I do it, without the slightest hesitation or apprehension—I kiss my best friend.

  And he kisses me back.

  There’s no faltering. No reservation when our lips touch. There’s only a feeling—like a lightning bolt—that blasts through my body. I feel…bulletproof. Sitting on my grandma’s crappy countertop, when just moments before I was consumed by betrayal and abandonment, I feel bulletproof.

  Kissing Jordan is a myriad of intoxicating contradictions. He’s gentle but dominant. His lips are firm against mine but his tongue is soft as it meets mine. This is better than any kiss I’ve ever had or imagined having.

  He grabs my head, his hands tangle in my hair, and without thinking, I part my legs and tug on his shirt, guiding his torso between my thighs. The hem of my summer dress slides up and Jordan drops his hands to my lower back and pulls me toward the edge of the counter. My center, protected by nothing but the silky black Victoria’s Secret bikini underwear I ordered online for a night with Chance, is now firmly pressed up against the front of his green cotton cargo shorts.

  I can feel it—thick, long and solid—pressing against me from under the front of his shorts. My breath catches in my throat.

  Jordan pulls his mouth back from mine a fraction of an inch and his eyes flutter open at the same time mine do. He is so beautiful. I always knew that somewhere in the recesses of my heart and mind, but finally admitting it to myself gives me a feeling like being on a roller coaster.

  “I want it to be you,” I tell him, shocking myself as much as him. It doesn’t surprise me that I mean what I say—I mean it with everything in me. What surprises me is the fact that I feel no embarrassment telling him.

  “Jessie, you don’t have…”

  “I want you,” I repeat firmly, and barely brush my lips against his. “Unless…you don’t.”

  “I do,” he argues quickly, and kisses me, his tongue grazing my bottom lip as he pulls back. “I want it with you. I’ve wanted it forever.”

  But then it hits me, like burst of cold air wrapping itself around me. “But…Hannah.”

  “I told you, it’s off-again tonight,” he whispers. “And there’s no more on-again. I only want you.”

  And then we’re kissing again, and it’s hot and needy and I start to wrap my fingers under the hem of his Silver Bay Bucks T-shirt. My fingertips graze his bare abs and he shudders. I pull the shirt up as high as I can, so it’s gathered under his armpits. He takes over, pulling it over his head, and I find myself kissing his bare chest and abdomen. I know in my heart I never would have been this brave with Chance. I don’t know if it’s my emotional state or just the fact that it’s Jordan, but whatever the reason, I’m bold.

  He lets out a small sigh and leans down to kiss the side of my jaw and then my neck. Jordan’s hands land on my knees and start sliding up my thighs. His fingertips touch the fabric of my panties and I shiver with nervous anticipation, but he pulls back.

  I look up, blinking in confusion. He smiles softly and takes my hand, pulling me off the counter.

  “Not here,” he says shyly. “Upstairs.”

  Wordlessly I let him lead me to the living room and up the staircase. My bedroom is the first door at the top. It’s the tiniest room in the three-bedroom house, but I don’t have to share like Callie and Rose do. It’s painted bubblegum pink. Lily painted it that color in preparation for my arrival just as she’d painted Callie and Rose’s room an overwhelming sunshine yellow. Even back then, at eight, I disliked pink but, unlike Callie, who had repainted her room a forest green two years ago, I left mine that color. It’s the only proof I have that Grandma Lily ever attempted to care.

  Jordan knows exactly which room is mine and walks right into it. He’s been in it a million times before, but somehow this time feels different, forbidden.

  I take a step toward him and reach out to place my hand on his bare chest. I let it slide down to his abdomen and over the downy trail of blond hair below his belly button. My heart skips a beat. His hands reach around my back, and as he kisses my lips again, he also starts to lower the zipper on my sundress. My heart skips again.

  A revelation blossoms in the back of my head: I’m not shy. I’m not embarrassed. I don’t feel any of the weird awkwardness I had anticipated when I thought about doing this with Chance. Instead I feel comfortable, almost giddy, and I feel loved. The butterflies in my stomach are excitement, not nerves. Because it’s Jordan. Because it’s right.

  And then I’m standing in front of him in nothing but my Victoria’s Secret bra and matching panties that cost me almost a whole week’s pay from my part-time job. He’s staring down at me. His cornflower blue eyes are darker than I’ve ever seen them. I reach up and wrap my arms around his neck, letting him lower me onto the bed, then lower himself on top of me.

  Our kissing gains intensity, and I can’t get enough of his lips on mine or his tongue in my mouth. His hips are pushing down into me; I instinctively wrap my legs around his waist and tilt my pelvis into his thrusts. I don’t know if it’s the right thing to do, but it feels right and he doesn’t object.

  I’m eighteen years old. I’ve been dating a hockey player. I’ve dry humped before. But it’s never made me feel this…out of control.

  I reach down, undo the button and zipper on his shorts then hook my thumbs in the waistband and start hitching them down over his muscular butt. He balances on one arm, kisses the curve of my breast above my bra and uses his free hand to pull my underwear down my legs.

  And then he’s naked. Well, except for his ankles, which still have his shorts wrapped around them. And I’m naked, except for my bra. He’s lying on top of me gently and I can feel him—that one part of him I have never felt before—warm and solid, against my thigh.

  He runs a hand through my hair and brushes his lips to my cheek.

  “I don’t have anything…” he confesses softly, his voice cracking with angst.

  “It’s okay,” I whisper back. “I’m on the pill.”

  “What?” he says, obviously shocked. He shouldn’t be. He knows I plan everything.

  I had no intention of telling Chance about the birth control I started taking the month aft
er we started dating. It was supposed to be my secret backup plan in case the condom failed, like they said it could in health class. But…I’ve never lied to Jordan in my life, and I’m not starting now.

  “But…are you sure?” he wants to know. “I’ve never…not without…”

  “We don’t have to,” I respond quickly, suddenly afraid that I’ve said the wrong thing. “We can stop if you…want to wait…until we have that too. But if you don’t want to stop…that’s okay too.”

  He stares at me for a long minute and then he shakes his head. “I don’t want to stop.”

  “Then don’t,” I reply, and kiss him, parting his lips with my tongue.

  And then we’re dry humping again but without clothes, and this is definitely a first for me. His hard-on is grinding into my thigh—so high up my thigh—and so close but not close enough. As he kisses my neck, collarbone and chest, his hand drifts lower and lower. And lower. He slides a finger into me and I buck my hips instinctively.

  He’s gentle, so gentle, and I appreciate it, but I want more. I want him—all of him. I reach down and wrap my left hand around him, pulling gently.

  “Fuck,” he hisses into my neck, and slides another finger into me. I groan and writhe and stroke him more firmly this time. And then his fingers are gone and he shifts his hips, making me lose my grasp on him. With his hands on either side of my head, he rests his hips against mine and looks down between us.

  I follow his gaze and there we are—our bodies grazing each other in a way they never have before. I reach down and touch his tip, carefully placing it where it needs to be. He moves his hips forward—slowly.

  I feel my body stretch and willingly shape itself around him. There’s a quick sharp sensation of discomfort, which is gone before I can do anything more than furrow my brow. He’s looking intently, cautiously, at my face now, and I meet his eyes. They’re like the ocean at night.

  “Is it okay?” he asks hesitantly.

  I nod and smile.

  He smiles back and continues to slowly, gently move farther inside me until he’s completely engulfed. He pauses for a heartbeat and kisses my lips softly before he pulls out a little bit and pushes back in.