More than the Game by Jenni Bara

25

@HotShotDemoda:Find the girl that gets you to dance in the rain, trust me, it’s worth it.

Beth propped her arms on Marc’s chest and looked down into his face. Fear etched his features. Her fingers ran along his cheek.

That was hands down the best sex of her life, and it had been more than her body involved. The second he’d put his hand on her shoulder and told Mandy to eat her peas, she had lost her entire heart to the man. Beth wondered if she’d told him telepathically, because he looked terrified.

“Marc?”

“That’s never happened before,” he said, turning his eyes her way. “Ever.”

She forced a chuckle because her stomach was in her throat. “You mean you’ve never had mind-blowing sex in a barn?”

He finally cracked a smile.

“I haven’t.” His face became serious again. “But more importantly, I’ve never had unprotected sex before, and I’m really hoping you’re about to tell me you’re on some form of birth control.”

“Oh.” Her face fell; she hadn’t thought of a condom. “I have an IUD.”

“Good.” He relaxed under her. Now it was her turn to panic.

“But…” Beth swallowed.

“But what?” Marc looked nervous again.

She spun her ring a few times, regrouping. “That won’t do anything to prevent STDs,” she said. “I haven’t slept with anyone in four years, so you don’t have to worry. But…?”

He let out his breath.

“Part of the agreement we signed with your father involved a blood test for me. I’m clean,” Marc assured her and wrapped his arms around her. “And like I said, I’ve always used condoms. I’m not sure how that even happened. I have one in my wallet.” He pointed to the shorts on the floor and shook his head. “I can only blame the whole ‘mind-blowing’ part.” He smiled again and reached up to brush her hair behind her ear.

She leaned down, resting her head against his shoulder. She loved the intimacy of these moments they had when Marc had his walls down.

“Do you ever think about having more kids?” Marc asked.

“I’d like to have more. I love my big family, and I want that for the kids. Will you?”

“No,” Marc said quickly.

“Really?” Beth asked, surprised.

“I’m not father material.”

“Marc, that’s not true. You’re great with Mandy and Steve.”

“That’s different. I’d resent the sacrifices a parent has to make for their kids. Unlike you—you do it for people who aren’t even your kids.”

She wasn’t sure what he meant.

“How did you do it?” Marc asked, finally tucking his free arm behind his head, looking up at the ceiling.

“Do what?” Beth asked, still not understanding.

“After winning the gold medal, after standing there on the podium with the entire world listening to the National Anthem, how did you walk away?”

Beth didn’t answer right away. The question wasn’t a straightforward one; really, he was asking how to do it himself.

“I had something I wanted more. It’s short-lived, that feeling. Fame and fans are fickle, and boy, did they prove that a few months later, after everything with Corey. But my brothers—they love me. Good or bad; it doesn’t matter. I don’t need to earn their love. It’s unconditional. And that feeling is better.”

Marc’s hand rubbed along her back, but he said nothing else.

“It was easy for me, but I think it would be a lot harder if something or someone had decided for me.” She wished he would say something else, but he just shifted her off his bad shoulder.

“Does it hurt?”

“Not usually.” He shook his head. “But it gets stiff sometimes if I overuse it, and I did.” She heard the sadness of his laugh.

“What happened that night?” she asked. Marc had never talked about it with her. He stiffened instantly.

“The crash crushed my shoulder. The surgeons rebuilt it, but it’s not strong enough to pitch again.” He shrugged, but she knew better than to believe his apathy. This was important, and she wanted to learn more.

“Were they your friends, the people in the car with you?” Beth tried again. Marc looked down at her for a minute and then shut his eyes. She didn’t expect him to answer.

“Not friends,” Marc said finally. He took a deep breath and then added, “One girl was someone I occasionally slept with, and the other two were her friends.”

Her heart pinched. It was silly; he’d been with a lot of women. Despite that, the way he talked about this one told her something was different. The accident had killed the two women on the car’s passenger side.

“Do you miss her?” Beth asked, and he flinched.

“No,” Marc said and opened his weary eyes to look at her. “Beth, I never missed her. It took me three days to even think to ask about them. I—” He cut himself off.

“So why don’t you ever talk about the accident?”

Marc shut his eyes again.

“Will you ever get over what happened with Corey and be comfortable in a relationship with someone in the public eye?” he asked instead.

Now it was her turn to flinch. She wanted to say yes because she did that now, with him. But she hated being in the glare of the media. It wasn’t comfortable. If anything were to bring up the drama from ten years ago, it would be awful. And now, looking at Marc, the thought that her past could hurt him or what he wanted for his future career was unbearable.

Beth tried to form an answer, but then he opened his eyes.

“You know I hate it that you wear another man’s ring,” Marc said and glared at her hands.

“Huh?” she asked. She looked down at her fingers fiddling with her ring.

“This,” Marc said, spinning the ring on her thumb as she did. “It’s Bob’s.”

“How…?” Beth asked, looking down at it. She rarely even thought of it that way anymore.

“I asked Clayton about it. And I don’t like how you spin it so much thinking about him, especially when you’re lying here with me.” His frown turned into a scowl.

“I wasn’t thinking about Bob,” Beth said honestly. It had been his voice that echoed in her head when she spun the ring at first, reminding her not to worry so much. But it had stopped being his voice a long time ago.

“Then why do it?” Marc asked.

She shrugged. “It helps me relax.”

“What if I asked you to take it off?”

Beth pulled away and sat up.

“I won’t,” he said finally and leaned up to pull her back.

She settled against him, and his silver chain caught against her cheek. “Is this something special?” she asked, letting her fingers run over the chain and the cross that hung in the middle of his chest.

“The cross was my grandfather’s. My grandmother gave it to me when I turned eighteen. She said it would be like my guardian angel. She told me to always wear it, and I would get where I needed to be. My mother believes it’s why I lived through the accident. Silly, I know.” Marc pulled her on top of him. “But I never take it off. I suppose that’s why I’ll leave this alone,” Marc said as he spun her ring again.

Beth sighed.

“So.” Marc’s smile became lazy and sexy. “How long do you think we can get away with staying out here?”

“Awhile. I mean, it’s not like they don’t know why we’re out here.” Beth chuckled. The barn had been Luke’s idea. He’d said it looked like both of them could use a good roll in the hay.

“I don’t understand them at all, but I like your brothers.” Marc smiled at her and kissed her deeply. “You’re going to have to give my shoulder a break this time, though.”

“I think I can handle that,” Beth murmured against his mouth, realizing they were both using sex to avoid talking about something.

Marc woke to the smell of breakfast. There were two things that could have made his morning better: First, he’d rather be waking up in Beth’s bed with her instead of alone in the bottom bunk. Marc hated that after spending hours with her, he’d had to kiss her goodnight at the door to her bedroom. He liked how she fit into the crook of his arm, and how her leg felt when she draped it over his. He loved the feel of her soft, warm skin against him, and the scent of peaches in the air when he shut his eyes.

Second, he didn’t like Bob’s ring. He didn’t have the right to ask her to take it off, he knew, and he’d been an ass about it. The ring hadn’t bothered him before his conversation with Will. But now, it kept reminding him she’d been someone else’s. And Marc didn’t like the idea of Beth being with anyone else.

But his mind circled back to how happy Beth looked in that picture with Bob. She deserved that kind of happiness. Marc made her happy, didn’t he?

Last night had made things more complicated. Sex with Beth had always been great, but yesterday had taken it to another level. It was more than the lack of a latex barrier—although having felt what it was like to be inside her, to feel her warm flesh surrounding him, he knew it was going to be damn hard to go back.

No, it wasn’t the condom issue. Suddenly sex had become more than physical for him. He had tried to show her how much he cared, and it had become emotional—something sex had never been for him before. When he’d slid into her, he’d felt it in his gut. Every fiber of his body was screaming. Finally.

That had forced him to look at the future, at how she would handle him moving back into the spotlight with a job like the one he might get at NESN. Snapping a question at her like that had been the wrong approach. But he didn’t want to talk about that fucking accident. His brain had been yelling at him to ask her opinion about NESN, and it came out wrong. Then he’d opened his eyes and seen her playing with Bob’s ring. And he snapped.

He shook his head. Things were getting incredibly involved, and he wasn’t up for ‘involved.’

However, he was up for breakfast and then some fun, and thanks to the best agent in the world, he had everything planned perfectly for Beth’s birthday. He grabbed his jeans off the floor and headed down toward the voices he heard coming from the kitchen.

“Luke, you can’t,” Beth said as she flipped the bacon. Luke wanted to be in Alaska, but it wasn’t an option. And this was the third time they were having this discussion. He was trying to annoy her. It was the downside of him working for the national branch of Helping Hands. She was his boss, and he loved to give her crap.

“But it’s Alaska,” Luke moaned.

“Can you please not burn the pancakes?”

Luke grabbed the spatula and flipped them onto the plate.

“Can’t one of the others do the Jersey thing?” he asked as he poured more batter onto the griddle.

It was a fair request, and if any of the other guys had the training, she would have let them. But they didn’t.

“I’m sorry, but I will not keep hashing this out with you. Think of it this way: You get to spend some quality time with Will.”

“Does that mean I’m not allowed to live with you?” Luke joked.

Luke was almost as crappy as Danny was with women. Unlike Will, who preferred a steady girlfriend, Luke had bed buddies. And Beth didn’t do bed buddies at her house.

“Ha-ha,” Beth said, putting the bacon on the plate with the sausage as Luke flipped the last pancake off the griddle. “Let me put it this way, Luke: I’m asking, not telling. Please?”

He smiled softly. “You know I will.”

“Thanks.”

Beth turned to carry the plate to the table, but Marc stood in the doorway, frowning.

“Morning,” she said, walking toward him, and he kissed her lightly.

“You’re making Luke move home?” Marc asked, looking from her to Luke. He didn’t seem to like the idea, and she wondered if Marc realized Luke was only joking about moving in with her.

“She’s not making me; I’m just giving her garbage.” Luke shrugged. “I’ll call everyone for breakfast.”

Marc’s gaze followed Luke out of the room. She didn’t think Marc had any problem with Luke, but something had upset him.

“You okay?”

“Yeah.” He shook his head like he was trying to rid himself of some thought. “Did a package come for me?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. It’s on the back porch,” she said.

“Perfect,” he said and headed out of the room before she could ask him what he’d had shipped here.

Marc bent down over the box, looking inside. But he didn’t see the picnic lunch or the cupcakes; instead, it was Beth’s face as she spoke to her brother. She’d turned those emerald-green eyes on Luke and asked him to come home. Marc hadn’t heard the entire conversation, but he’d heard enough to know that Beth needed Luke. In the end, Beth didn’t tell him what to do, but she had asked him to do something for her. Give up something he wanted for her.

And Luke had agreed.

It didn’t bother him that Luke was coming home. It wasn’t even the fact that Beth wanted him near that bothered him. The thought that chilled him right to the bone was Beth turning to him and asking him to give up something. To stay in Jersey with her. If he got the job with NESN and she asked him not to take it, he wasn’t sure what he’d do—and that fact terrified him.

His father’s words echoed through his brain. And maybe his dad was right. Good sex had fogged his mind, and now he was thinking about giving up his whole life. He needed to remember to keep Beth separate from his career, and his life.