Foul Ball

For the first time in my adult life, I forgot to set an alarm on my phone, and when I finally woke up cuddled in Jayce's arms, I'd already missed my first class of the day.

"Holy shit." I sat up abruptly, pulling the sheet with me to cover my naked breasts. Jayce stirred as well, his eyes fluttering open to look at me, the crazy girl in his bed with the wild eyes.

"What's wrong?" he mumbled, tugging me back down until I was lying on the pillow again, quietly trying not to freak out.

"I missed class," I said, and Jayce laughed. He actually laughed.

"Not class," he said. "Whatever will you do, Mace?"

"I don't know about you, sir, but I don't tend to miss my classes. I like to do well. My future depends on it."

Still grinning, Jayce rolled over and propped himself up on his elbow to face me. "You do very well," he assured me. "Even if once a year you miss a college class. There's a reason assignments and lectures are posted online." "Yes, I know that." Scowling, I hunkered back down into the blankets. It was too late to try and go now, and despite Jayce's teasing, there was nothing I wanted to do more than lay in bed with him and just...be.

"Besides." Jayce reached out and ran his fingers up and down my arm, teasing me, and the wetness between my legs intensified. "You can't say that last night wasn't worth it."

"I suppose," I said with a mock eye-roll, but damn if he wasn't right. Last night had been one of the best nights of my life-maybe even the best. After wining and dining me at a local Italian restaurant, he'd taken me then to a charming, rustic old theatre. We'd gotten an exclusive tour from the owner, who played a short film for just the two of us. Afterwards, we went home, only mildly tempted to find another abandoned path to use for extracurricular activities. "For real, I hope you enjoyed it," Jayce said, leaning in to kiss me. He rested his thumb on my temple and gently rubbed it in soft circles.

"Last night was one of the best nights of my life," I told him honestly. "I wish I could relive it every day."

"Don't worry, baby." Jayce kissed me again, parting my lips with his tongue, thumb still caressing me. "We'll have plenty of time to do all that and more."

We cuddled in bed for the next hour until Jayce got up to make breakfast, insisting I stay in bed so he could bring it to me. I even ended up catching a few more minutes of shuteye as he puttered around in the kitchen, coming into the bedroom soon after with a make-shift tray of an empty pizza box loaded with a plate of chocolate chips pancakes. He held a steaming mug of coffee in the other, and he set it on the nightstand next to me as he put the pizza box on my lap, grinning.

"It's not as great as we had last night, but it's passable."

"This is wonderful, thank you." And it was. In all my years on earth, besides my mother, nobody had ever made me breakfast in bed.

"So," Jayce said, sitting down on the mattress next to me. He was wearing only boxers, and every movement he made accentuated the muscles in his back and arms, the hard abs from years and years of working out and playing ball. I wanted to touch him constantly, to run my hands all over his naked body until I could no longer hold them up. "Since you already missed your first class, how about we just stay in bed the rest of the day? We could, you know, cuddle."

I laughed, chasing my bite of pancake with a swish of coffee. The coffee was good, but I couldn't determine how old the chocolate chips had probably been.

"Even if I didn't go to my next class, I still have a shift on the ambulance this afternoon," I told him. "If I call out, then they'll need to call someone else in, and I hate doing that to Addy."

Jayce groaned, putting his hand over his heart like he'd been stabbed. "I don't want to adult today," he mumbled.

"Besides, don't you have practice?" I reminded him, which only brought out another moan.

"I don't want to go. I don't think I can spend a second away from you."

Setting the pizza box of half-eaten pancakes aside, I flipped my leg over him until I was straddling him on the bed, his back rested against the headboard. "I want to stay, too," I said, kissing his lips. I trailed my finger down his chest, feeling the muscles in his abdomen tighten under my hand. "But we can't. We have to be responsible."

I rolled off him, drawing in frustrated growl from Jayce, and gathered up my clothes from the floor. I hadn't even bothered going home for a fresh pair of clothes after our date last night. We'd been all over each other for the entire night, all the way up to the moment we'd stumbled through Jayce's apartment door sometime early this morning without a single care in the world.

"You're beautiful," Jayce said, his eyes on me as I dressed. Even now, after everything, I could still feel the heat rush to my cheeks as I hurried to button my pants and pull my shoes on.

"You've already bedded me, you don't have to try so hard anymore," I said with a grin, crossing the room to give Jayce one final, needful kiss. When we parted, we stayed like that for a long moment, Jayce's hand on the back of my head, keeping me there.

"I like you," he said. "I really, really like you."

I kissed him again, then turned to leave, reaching for the handle on the front door. Then I stopped and turned back around to smile at him.

"I really, really like you, too."

Still buzzing from everything that had happened so recently, I was still on Cloud 9 when I walked down to the lobby to grab a second coffee, hoping this one would keep me awake long enough to get through my only other class of the day. I had just paid for my drink and was turning to leave when someone bumped into me, spilling a bit of coffee all down my front.

"Oh my God," someone gasped, grabbing my arm before I fell. "I am so sorry, Macey."

"It's okay." I straightened up to find Dalton's girlfriend Candace standing in front of me, looking horrified and humiliated all at once. "It was my fault."

"No, it was mine," she said. "I saw you and came over to say hi, but I should have let you know I was right behind you."

"It's okay, lady," I promised, taking a couple of napkins from the barista. "It's just coffee. It was already stained from yesterday."

If you're loving the book, nel5s.com is where the adventure continues. Join us for the complete experience-all for free. The next chapter is eagerly waiting for you! Candace paused, still staring at me, and I swear I could see her working something out in her head.

"Yesterday," she said, and her eyes flickered just briefly from my face and up the stairs towards where Jayce's apartment was, notoriously, located. "Did you spend the night here?"

I had two choices. I could deny any wrongdoing and convince her, myself, Jayce, and probably the rest of the baseball team that this meant absolutely nothing and Jayce and I weren't into each other, or I could come clean. "Yeah," I said, adding a slight shrug in there for the effect. "With Jayce."

"Holy shit," said Candace, and three different students stopped what they were doing to turn to look at us. "I wasn't sure if you guys were serious or not."

"Okay." Taking Candace's arm gently in my hand, I corralled her out of the extra small coffee shop and back into open space where students were too busy hurrying past us to their next classes to stop and eavesdrop. "Don't make a big deal out of this," I insisted, still unconsciously dabbing at the dried stain on my shirt. "Jayce asked me to be his girlfriend, like, super soon after we had met. I'm just stepping into this. We're still getting to know each other." Candace's eyes lit up like a Fourth of July night, and I could basically see the glee filling her soul, oozing out of every orifice.

"I knew as soon as I met you that we'd be good friends," she gushed. "I just hoped it would be because of Jayce." "Thanks...I think."

"Welcome to our group," she continued, taking my hands in hers. "I'll see you soon?"

"Probably."

"Awesome." Still grinning like a high school girl on prom, Candace turned on her heel and scurried away, only looking back once to smile at me before she vanished around a corner. I stood there for a moment, kind of flustered, then looked down at the coffee stain on my shirt. There wasn't time to go home and change, but it didn't matter. This was me. All of me.

Jayce could take it or leave it.