Chapter 180: Lost minds - Monet

Fear races through me as I leave everything, probably looking crazy as I follow Luke wearing only a robe and slippers with my hair half done. Right now, I don't care who might see me, my only thought is that I have to get to Cole.

"What happened?" I ask Luke when we get in the elevator, mercifully with nobody inside it.

"He's phone's screen broke this morning at breakfast." Luke looks as worried as me. "I don't even know how the fuck it happened. A waiter accidently bumped into him and the phone fell on the floor and the screen cracked. He was very quiet after that, and now when we were busy getting dressed, I suddenly heard the mirror break in the bathroom. Fuck, I haven't seen him in this mood in a long time."

I screw my eyes shut. He couldn't see me, that's why. Seeing me calms him, and here I am worried that he might be interested in other girls. I'm the only girl Cole wants to see.

"Fuck, why today of all days?" I run my hand through my unfinished curls. "I don't know if he'll snap out of it. In the past, it used to take days. First, he would have a crashout, and then he would just be quiet and depressed."

"We need him, Monet." Now Luke sounds desperate. "The one game we lost was the game he didn't play."

"I know!" I exclaim.

A team does not consist of only one player. That is something that Cole told me one night when I asked him why he's studying so hard when he already knows all the plays like the back of his hand, it's not like he's the only player.

But when one player lacks heart, a whole team can fall. That's what he answered me.

He's the heart of this team right now, the one they rely on to make the right decisions when they are behind on the scoreboard and they don't have much time left. I've seen how his decisions on that field has turned things around for them.

If Cole isn't in the right headspace today, we lose. As simple, and as complicated as that.

"We don't have much time before we have to leave." Luke looks around the empty hallway when he unlocks the door to their room. If anyone sees me there, they might get into a heap of trouble, and I also don't want the team to know that something might be wrong with Cole.

"He's still in the bathroom." Luke tells me, and my heart beats even faster in my chest as I approach the door.

"Cole?" I knock on the door. "Cole, It's me."

The door gets pulled open seconds after he hears me, and I first look at him in shock before I slip into the bathroom and immediately hug his bare waist.

His arms clamp around me, and his nose immediately finds my hair, sniffing deep like I'm a drug he can't get enough of.

He pulls back, and takes my face in his trembling hand like he can't believe I'm here.

"You're bleeding." I say softly. "Let me clean you up, please."

There's a tiny cut above his eyebrow, probably from a piece of glass from the shattered mirror. He has some explaining to do to his team manager when this gets out, but I can't worry about it right now.

"No." His voice is gruff, barely controlled. "Take off your clothes and get in the shower."

Why is that demand making me feel hot?

Especially now when he has to get ready.

"Cole, we don't have time for that." I try to keep my voice calm, but my stomach is clenching. As much as I know this is wrong, when Cole gets in this mood, I get extremely turned on.

His blue eyes are burning instead, and he bends his dark head down and brushes his lips slowly over mine, his energy wild and most likely trying very hard to contain himself.

"You have a championship, remember?" I say against his lips, but I know he's not leaving this bathroom, not before he fucks me senseless.

His free hand goes to the knot of my bathrobe, and he unties it, brushing it over my shoulders so that it pools at my feet.

"Fuck." His hand goes over the red lace of the lingerie I put on, the lingerie I was supposed to surprise him with tonight when he took off my dress. "I take back my words, don't take it off."

"Cole, you're going to be late." I tremble when his fingers brush over my hardened nipple.

"I nearly lost my mind." His lips travels over my cheek, his breath hot in my face until he reaches my ear. "I couldn't see you. My phone's screen is ruined, and I have to see you before the game, and I couldn't."

"Cole..."

"But this is so much better than a video." His hand goes down over my middle, around me and grips my buttock. "Now I get to be inside you, and that's so much better."