Pick Six Read online

  It was hard to tell, and I hated that I started thinking about Six’s body.

  God, I loved her body. Subtle curves that fit so perfectly into my hands. I loved every inch of her curvy, petite, fucking mind-blowing little frame.

  Fuck, get it together, I coached myself. Stop thinking about her and focus on the blond chick who keeps rubbing her hand up and down your thigh.

  It was all pretty fucking sad, really.

  The fact that I was thinking about Six while another woman was all but shoving her hand into my pants and getting my dick out.

  I couldn’t keep living like this, though. I needed to move on.

  Eyes focused…well, focused enough, I looked directly at the blonde sitting beside me. “What’s your name, sweetheart?” I asked, and her scarlet red lips crested into a smile.

  Her lips were all wrong, but I fought past the turn-off.

  “Kimberly.”

  “Kimberly, I’m Sean,” I introduced myself, and she just giggled.

  “I know who you are.”

  “Is that right?” I questioned, grinning, and wrapped my arm around her shoulders. “You a big Mavericks fan?”

  “I’m a big Sean Phillips fan,” she whispered and punctuated that statement by sliding her hand up my thigh until it sat just centimeters below my dick.

  She was pretty in an overdone kind of way, but at this point, I didn’t really care.

  All I wanted to do was fuck Six out of my system.

  And Kimberly seemed like the perfect option. Hell, she was already trying her damnedest to seduce me.

  No patience for talking and no desire to actually get to know her, I decided then and there to put my plan into action.

  “You want to get out of here?” I asked her, and she nodded.

  “I’d love to.”

  I threw a handful of cash onto the bar and waved goodbye toward the bartender.

  With my arm wrapped around Kimberly’s shoulders, I led us toward the front of the bar and out the doors.

  The cold New Jersey air hit me straight in the face, so fucking frigid it nearly sobered me up completely.

  But I kept my focus and tried to stick with the plan.

  I led us toward an outside awning, and the blond chick on my arm nibbled at my earlobe and kissed along my neck while we waited for a cab.

  It took all of thirty seconds for me to grow tired of the fake little fucking moans she kept forcing past her lips.

  I tried to ignore it. I tried not to be annoyed with her. I tried to focus on the task at hand—fucking Six Malone out of my goddamn system.

  But when Quinn strode out of the bar and met my eyes, his own shining cold, defiant, and judgmental, I felt like he’d managed to dump a bucket of cold water over my head, even though he was standing like fifty feet away.

  Fuck. What am I doing?

  I looked down at the overzealous woman, and instead of being aroused, all I felt was fucking nauseated. And disappointed. Not in her, but in myself.

  I wanted to go back to the way I’d been before Six had walked into my life, but I couldn’t. As much as I didn’t want to admit it to myself, she’d changed me. She’d opened my eyes. And most importantly, she’d shown me that I wanted more than just a random fuck.

  I wanted more than that.

  I wanted her.

  “You need a ride?” Quinn asked loudly, and I nodded.

  “We going with him?” the blonde asked me, eyes excited.

  I shook my head and started to guide her back toward the bar entrance. “Listen, honey, I’m going to have to take a rain check.”

  “What?” she questioned and stopped just before I could get her back inside. “But I thought—”

  I cut her off. “I’m sorry, but I just can’t,” I answered honestly. “I wanted to, but I can’t.”

  “You can’t?”

  “No. I can’t.” I shook my head. “Why don’t you go back inside, have a few more drinks, and tell the bartender to put your drinks on my tab?”

  Her smoky eyes stared up at me in confusion. “You’re not staying?”

  “No,” I stated firmly. “I’m going home.”

  Eventually, she shrugged, and without a second thought, walked back inside the bar.

  And I did the walk of shame toward Quinn’s truck.

  He didn’t say a word, though, and we both climbed inside, only silence, the click of the engine, and the soft hum of the radio filling up the space between us.

  Once he pulled out of the parking lot and drove for a good five minutes on the main road, he couldn’t hold it back any longer.

  He smirked at me and shot me a look out of the corner of his eye. “So, I was right, huh?”

  “Right about what?”

  “The reason you’ve been in a shit mood the past few weeks,” he said, and I looked over at him just as he said the one name that hit me right in the fucking chest every time I heard it. “Six.”

  He had a small idea that something had happened between Six and me, but I’d never opened up and told him the real details.

  I sighed, but instead of lying or brushing it off, I decided to tell him the truth. Hell, maybe telling him what had really gone down between Six and me would make me fucking feel better.

  “Yeah,” I finally responded. “You were right.”

  “I fucking knew it!” he exclaimed with a soft chuckle.

  “Well,” I said through a sigh. “There really isn’t much to know besides the fact that I was starting to fall for her and she pretty much wrote us off as fuck buddies.”

  Quinn grimaced. “Fuck.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m sorry, dude.”

  “Me too, man,” I responded. “Me fucking too.”

  The open road stretched long and far in front of us, and I settled into my seat and let my misery consume me.

  There was no use avoiding it.

  No use trying to fight it or trying to find ways to get past it.

  Obviously, Six Malone had done a real fucking number on my heart.

  Georgia: Call me. I have an exciting proposition for you.

  I stared down at the text message and sighed. Unless she’d started a new job, her exciting proposition had something to do with the Mavericks. And the Mavericks meant the one man I was valiantly trying to scrub from my brain would be involved.

  It’d been a few weeks now, but still, Sean Phillips was all up in my goddamn thoughts like a sticky vat of jam.

  Mothersmucker.

  With a heavy heart and anxiety clawing at my throat, I tapped her number and called her.

  She answered by the second ring.

  “Six! How are you?” Georgia greeted, voice cheerier than Santa Claus on Christmas Eve.

  Even though it felt like my entire world was crashing down and I was on day one of my period and I was certain my uterus was plotting an exit route from my body and my traitorous brain couldn’t stop thinking about Sean, per societal norms, there was only one appropriate response to her question.

  “I’m good.” It was a bullshit response on my end, but I didn’t make the rules for proper social interactions. “How are you?”

  “Well, considering the Mavericks are getting ready for the championship game, I’m fantastic.”

  I already knew the news. I’d watched the game. I’d seen Sean score two glorious touchdowns. Hell, I’d even watched the live aftershow where they celebrated and interviewed nearly half of the team.

  Well, they’d interviewed nearly everyone but Sean.

  Which, pathetically, had only made me feel sad.

  Even if he’d moved on, even if he’d long forgotten about me, I still wanted to see him. Hear his voice. Take in the handsome lines of his face and the way his eyes lit up when he was happy and excited about something.

  Obviously, I was a masochist.

  “That’s a huge deal,” I responded. Because it was. The Mavs could very well end their postseason with a big-ass championship trophy in their hands and bragging rights
for the rest of their lives.

  “A huge deal that we want you to be a part of,” she added, and I could hear the giddy smile in her voice. “We want you there for the big game. We want to add an additional episode to the series.”

  Shit. Sadly, it was all of my worst fears realized.

  It was one thing to see Sean’s handsome face on my television, but it was a whole other ball game to have to witness it in person.

  My sad little heart could only handle so much.

  I knew my reaction to her news was crazy stupid. I should have been ecstatic. I should’ve been jumping up and down like a lunatic. But all I felt was anxiety. Throat-clawing, chest-tightening, vomit all over myself unease.

  “Six? Are you still there?”

  “Yeah. Sorry about that.” I cleared my throat and swallowed down what felt like an entire bread loaf’s worth of apprehension. I knew I shouldn’t have eaten an entire baguette. “I guess I’m just a little bit shocked.”

  “I hope it’s a good shocked…”

  “Of course.” I pushed the two words past my lips. “Of course, it’s a good shocked. This is an incredible opportunity.”

  “Well, it’s well deserved,” she said. “The response to the series has been overwhelming, and ever since that first episode posted several weeks ago, my players have received several endorsements. Because of you, the Mavericks are becoming a household name to nearly everyone in America.”

  “Wow. That’s fantastic.” The incredible nature of it all was amazing to me.

  “So, you’ll do it?” she asked. “You’ll let us fly you out to Minnesota for the championship game next week?”

  I wished I could say no. I wished I already had some sort of obligation that would make me unable to commit.

  But I had nothing. Not even the self-sabotaging stupidity it would take to turn down an offer like this. Obviously, my parents were to blame here, helping me pursue an education and all.

  “Count me in.”

  “Fantastic!” she exclaimed. “We’ll get our lawyers to draw up a contract and send it your way. In relation to the terms, almost everything will stay the same as the first eight episodes in the series. The only difference is that we would like this to be an hour-long episode instead of thirty minutes. And because of that, the compensation is higher.”

  If one thing could be said about Georgia Brooks, it was that she was fair. She could negotiate the hell out of a deal, but she never faltered at being honest. It was a rarity inside her profession.

  I was sure it also helped that the Mavericks’ marketing budget wasn’t a pocket full of peanuts.

  “Sounds good to me,” I said. “I can’t wait to get started.”

  Liar. You’re totally dreading this.

  “Fantastic. I’ll have a contract for you by the end of the day,” she said. “See you soon, Six!”

  I ended the call with a feigned excited goodbye.

  The irony of the situation wasn’t lost on me.

  Basically, everything I had ever hoped for and dreamed about in terms of my career was coming true. And all I felt was melancholy.

  Which then made me angry.

  I should’ve been celebrating. I should’ve been calling everyone I knew and letting them know I’d be at the fucking championship game.

  But what was I doing? Grabbing my keys, hopping in my car, and stopping at the goddamn grocery store to pick up a cheap-ass bottle of wine and more tampons.

  And what did I do after purchasing the wine? I went the fuck home, threw on some yoga pants and a tank top, and started to drink it.

  One glass. Two glasses. Three glasses.

  Down the hatch, it all went.

  By the time the bottle didn’t have a single drop left, I sat in the living room of my apartment buzzed—more like drunk—rewatching Game of Thrones.

  I’d already finished all seven seasons, but I was addicted, and I wanted to see my two favorite characters together again.

  Khal Drogo looked at his Khaleesi like she held all the power, like she was the most beautiful, perfect creature he’d ever seen, and I started to feel the emotion build up behind my eyes.

  And then, he said it. One of my favorite quotes from the series where Drogo professes his undying love for his Khalessi and calls her the moon of his life.

  My emotional dam burst, and tears starting flowing like water down my cheeks.

  God, I wanted that. I wanted a man to look at me like I was his whole fucking world.

  And I wanted to feel the same about him.

  You have felt the same.

  That thought only made me more emotional.

  I didn’t want to think about him.

  I didn’t want to think about Sean’s smile or his laugh or his gorgeous eyes. And I sure as fuck didn’t want to think about how he was probably out fucking other women while I was at home on my period, drinking my sadness away.

  I hated how much it all hurt.

  I hated that I wasn’t really over him.

  I hated that I’d let myself fall for him and still hadn’t found the ability to move the fuck on.

  I decided to blame it all on my period. No doubt, hormones held the power to make you a lunatic. And day one was always like being on an emotional roller coaster ride straight to hell. I could cry about anything and everything. Car commercials. Pictures of mini pigs in rain boots Sean’s sister Cassie sent me. Running out of cookies. Thoughts about Sean.

  The far too sensitive struggle was real.

  Although, the whole bottle of wine I just drank probably isn’t helping either…

  A truer thought had never occurred.

  With the sleeve of my shirt, I scrubbed the tears and snot away and took a long, deep inhale.

  I needed to get it together.

  But more importantly, I needed to chat. I needed to vent. I needed to ramble. I needed to get all of these thoughts off of my chest.

  Without hesitation, I grabbed my phone, pulled up the YouCam app, and logged in to my private account. My long-distance besties, Everly and Sammy, would be the perfect audience for my emotional tirade.

  “Guys,” I said, skipping the greeting and diving right into the meat and potatoes of my pseudo-breakdown. “Buckle up and prepare for a ramble.”

  I stared into the camera and sighed.

  “I’m on my period and my mental health status is in question. Fuck periods!” I bellowed. “Being a girl is so hard. So, so, so hard, right?” I questioned, but I didn’t need a response. The constant sensation of a knife repeatedly stabbing my uterus was answer enough. “My uterus is plotting murder against me. Like, don’t be surprised if you have to attend my funeral next week. If you do, it was my uterus. She finally killed me. She’s a real bitch and a plotter, you know? Month after month, she makes her move, but this time, this time,” I shouted, “she’s really done it.”

  I picked up the camera and walked into my kitchen to grab a bag of Doritos.

  Once the bag was open and I’d shoved a few chips into my mouth, I talked to the camera over a mouthful of nacho cheese.

  “Wouldn’t it be easier if we were men? I mean, if I had a penis, then I wouldn’t have to deal with a period.”

  The word penis filled my head, and then visuals of Sean’s penis followed.

  “I has no penis,” I said…well, slurred…into the camera. Obviously, I was drunk, but Everly and Sammy would understand.

  Tears started to form behind my eyes again, and I let them fall unchecked down my cheeks.

  “I have no penis at all,” I announced. “But I had the best penis once. Seriously. The. Best. Penis. I’ve. Ever. Seen.”

  My lip trembled from the sad penis-less thoughts, and I tried to busy myself by licking the nacho cheese dust off my fingers.

  And eventually, I found the strength to forge forward into another ramble.

  “I was best friends with that penis. But it’s been so long since I’ve seen him. It’s been so long, practically as long as he is, and I’m so sad. I wish I
could talk to him. I wish I could kiss him. I wish I could tell him I didn’t mean any of the things I said on the last day of filming and that he’s got the perfect rounded head. I wish I could tell him that I do want to be with him. That I want to be together. That I want to try to make it work. But I-I got scared. I got so scared, guys.” Tears blurred my vision, so I took my hand out of the chip bag and scrubbed at my eyes. “I fell for the penis that never falls for anyone. The rod that never sets its reel. The shaft that never ever closes down its elevator for the night. That thing goes up, guys. It’s like poetry. But you only need poems when you’re in a relationship!”

  I sighed and sighed again and then blew some of the curls out of my face with a long, upward puff of air from my lips.

  “But now it’s too late. He’s moved on. He’s found other girls.”

  Other girls. Sean and his penis were probably out fucking other girls right now.

  A soft sob escaped my lips. “I wish I had more wine right now. Even though I think I’m really drunk. Like, right now, it looks like there are two cameras. But I’m pretty sure I only started with one camera.”

  I wiggled one finger in front of my face, but there appeared to be so many it was bordering on disorienting. So, I refocused on the bag of Doritos on the kitchen counter.

  “And there’s also two bags of Doritos, but I think that’s a good thing because I love Doritos. You know what else I love?” I asked, and instantly, fresh tears formed behind my eyes and started to fall in big fat waves down my cheeks.

  I scrubbed away the liquid emotion with my hand, and then quickly realized I still had Doritos on my hand, so I wiped it all away again with my shirt.

  “What was I just saying?” I looked up at the camera and then at the ceiling, and then I remembered. “I love Sean Phillips, guys. I love Sean and his penis, which used to be my penis. It was all veiny and thick and really and truly perfect. It was warm without a turtleneck, and the circumcision really looked good on him. I don’t think I want to love him—Sean, him, not penis him—because he isn’t the kind of guy who settles down, but I can’t help it. I love him.”