Hunter (Campus Kings): A Football Secret Baby Novel Read online

  By Celia Loren

  A Hearts Collective Novel

  Copyright © 2016 Hearts Collective

  All rights reserved. This document may not be reproduced in any way without the expressed written consent of the author. The ideas, characters, and situations presented in this story are strictly fictional, and any unintentional likeness to real people or real situations is completely coincidental.

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  HUNTER

  A Campus Kings Novel

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  By Celia Loren

  CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter 1

  Britt

  I sneak a glance over at my roommate. Her breathing changed a bit when my alarm went off a minute ago, but I don't think she's awake. I slowly sit up and ease myself to standing, then walk over to my university-issued chest of drawers. As silently as possible, I pull off my nightgown and step into my underwear. My dad tried to get me to live at home while going to college, but I was dead-set on living in the dorms. Now I wonder if I should have listened to him.

  It's not just that I feel uncomfortable getting changed in such a small room while someone else is here—hell, I feel uncomfortable with my body when I'm alone in a room—it's just strange to have someone else always around. My roommate Danielle really likes to chat, about everything, especially mindless prattle about the “hot guys” in her classes.

  "Wow, how often do you work out, Britt?" Danielle asks from behind me. I jump, but still manage to secure my bra straps on top of my shoulders. I pull a t-shirt from the drawer to cover myself as I answer.

  "Um, I don't really," I reply, turning to respond. She pushes her bright red hair out of her eyes and blinks at me.

  "Lucky!" she sighs. That's the other thing I have to get used to about Danielle: she's ready to talk the second she wakes up. I'm more the type who likes to putter around for a while, get a cup of coffee, then strike up a conversation. Or just skip the conversation entirely and go straight to the library. "You have like, an ideal body. Like a petite Victoria's Secret model."

  "Really?" I ask. "I mean, I actually grew a couple inches this past summer."

  "To what? Five foot two?"

  "Well, yes," I admit. "My doctor said it's really rare to have a growth spurt that late. Plus, you know, I filled out a little."

  "I'll say! What are those? C's?" she asks staring at my breasts. I blush and quickly pull on my shirt.

  "No, no. B's, I think."

  "You sure? I think you need to get resized. That bra looks like it's about to bust open." Noticing my stunned expression, she backtracks a little. "Don't mind me, I'm just a jealous surfboard over here. So where are you headed so early? It's Saturday, the day of rest."

  "I think that's Sunday," I reply, and face the mirror to try to wrangle my unruly, dark brown hair into a pony tail. I glance down at the way my light blue t-shirt stretches over my breasts and frown, but at least the color matches my eyes. "I'm just going to visit my dad."

  "Where does he live again?"

  "No, I mean at work."

  "Oh, where does he work?"

  I sigh inwardly. I knew it would have to come out sooner or later. "My dad works for the football team here, actually." I watch as the lightbulb goes off in Danielle's head and her eyes widen. The day I moved in and saw all the university football posters on her wall, I knew we were going to have a problem.

  "Wait....wait...your dad is Lou McKay? Couch Lou McKay?" she squeals. "I mean, I knew your last name was McKay, but I never put it together. I guess because Coach McKay is such a hard ass, I never pictured him having a daughter. Oh, sorry," she adds, hearing herself out loud.

  "It's okay, I'm well aware of his reputation." Coach Lou McKay, head of the football program at Vanover University for the last ten years. Known for his winning record, and the fact that no one has ever seen him smile.

  "That is so awesome," Danielle breathes. I snort under my breath. She might feel differently if she saw things from the other side. Vanover is the only private school in the NCAA's Southeastern Conference, but that doesn't mean the fans are any less rabid. When the team is winning, my father is a god, but where they're losing, adult men think nothing of leaving death threats on our home answering machine. "You have to introduce me to the players!" she adds.

  "Oh, no. No, no, no," I reply emphatically.

  "Why not?" she whines.

  "I don't even know them, for starters. Second, my dad would murder them if he caught them anywhere near me. Plus, they're gross anyway."

  "Gross?" Danielle repeats, her eyes bugging out of her head. She quickly kneels on her mattress and pulls a Vanover monthly calendar from her wall. "You think Hunter Phillips is gross?" she asks, stuffing the month of September's image under my face.

  I glance down at the Vanover Tigers' star quarterback. The photographer caught him just as he pulled his football helmet off
after a win. A triumphant smile crosses his face as he wipes his dirty blonde hair out of his face with his gloved hand. I can't argue that he's handsome, with his cleft chin and straight, proud nose, but... "Nope, sorry. Football players are Neanderthals, trust me. Even Hunter Phillips."

  "You're nuts," she says, lying back on her bed and holding the calendar above her head. "He's gorgeous. And word is he's going to be drafted first round into the NFL next year."

  "I have to get going. And I'm going to the library after, so the room's yours for the day!" I add as I head for the door.

  "I know what I'll be doing," she says, wiggling her eyebrows at the picture of Hunter Phillips.

  "Oh my god," I murmur, my face turning scarlet. I quickly shut the door behind me and hurry down the hall.

  The air is crisp and warm as I head out of our dorm and across the quad. We live on the freshman campus, which is set apart from the main campus but actually a bit closer to the training facilities, so it's only about a five-minute walk to my father's office.

  Vanover is located just outside Nashville, and though I was hoping to escape my hometown for college, I have to admit the campus is beautiful. I begged my father to let me apply to the colleges in the Ivy League, but he said there was no way he was letting me go that far away from home, especially when faculty members here get free tuition for their children. So instead of imposing, Gothic structures, I'm surrounded by the comforting red brick and white domes of the Neoclassical style.

  Except for the athletics facilities, which are modern and state of the art, of course. There's even a special cafeteria here where the athletes have special, more nutritional, and better-tasting, meals. I've been to my dad's office before, so I head inside and take the elevator down to the basement, which opens on the other side to the practice field. My dad has a flashier office on the top floor for when he has to meet with university donors, but I know he never works there unless he has to. He says he prefers to be near his staff and players so he can keep an eye on them.

  I press my key fob to the sensor next to the heavy swinging door outside of the elevators meant to keep fans and reporters out, and push it open after it beeps. I asked my dad if it was alright for him to give me a pass, and he said that no one was going to question a coach with two NCAA championships under his belt.

  About halfway down the hallway, I feel my hair pop out of its hairband. I sigh. If I fasten it too tight, my hair breaks, but too loose, and the band falls out. I spot it on the floor and bend over to pick it up. I feel a slight breeze just as my fingers brush against it, and glance up.

  Oh my god. I'm looking right into the football players' locker room. Someone is holding the door open on their way out as they shout something back toward a teammate, unaware that I'm hunched over right next to the doorway.

  And standing not twenty feet away from me, clad only in a towel, is star QB Hunter Phillips.

  I gape at the way his damp ab muscles clench as he throws his head back with a laugh. I've seen pictures of him, but holy shit. They do not do him justice. I didn't think that men could look like this in real life.

  I glance back up at his face. Fuck! I straighten up with a gasp. He's staring right at me! Move, Britt, move. But my feet are anchored to the ground.

  I watch as a dangerous grin spreads across his face. In slow-motion, he reaches his hands up to his waist and begins to untuck one end of his towel. He opens it, showing a swath of muscular thigh and then…

  The door shuts and I jump back. A huge linebacker looks down at me. Always protecting their quarterback, I guess.

  "You lost?" he asks, eyes twinkling. "I'd be happy to show you around."

  "No thanks!" I squeak, my feet finally unstuck. I rush down the hallway toward my dad's office, wishing that the door had closed just one second later.

  Chapter 2

  Hunter

  I pick up my towel from the floor, smiling at the expression on the girl's face. She was fucking mesmerized. Not that I haven't seen that expression before, hell, I see it every night in my bedroom, sometimes more than once. But there was something about those big, innocent blue eyes, the way her lips parted and her hair fell around her face... damn. I'm around hot women so much that I've honestly gotten a little numb to it, but this girl has me standing up to attention, literally.

  I pull a pair of boxers out of my locker and quickly tug them on. I don't really want to explain why I have a rapidly hardening dick in a locker full of sweaty men.

  "The fuck you smiling about, Phillips?" Adam, my best friend and go-to wide receiver, yells from across the room, and throws a dirty, balled-up towel at me. I sidestep it and nail him in the head with the one I just picked up from the floor.

  "Just thinking about how your mom looked in my bed last night," I retort. Our teammates guffaw around us as we all get changed after practice.

  "Dude, my mom would probably love to sleep with you though, for real," Adam replies, shaking his head. "She's like, always, asking about you. I think my stepdad can't get it up."

  "You guys see that new cheerleader?" Devon asks, emerging from the showers. At 6'7'', he's a couple inches taller than even me.

  "The blonde?" Adam asks.

  "She had those big ol' titties you just wanna fuck, you know?" he mimes pressing her breasts together and thrusting his hips against them.

  "Phillips, we all talked about it, and we decided that you have to have a handicap," Adam says, turning to me.

  "The fuck are you talking about?"

  "Tonight. It's the first big party of the year, and the rest of us want a head start," Lucius chimes in.

  "I understand that coming from you, Lucius. I mean, you're a kicker," I say. The rest of the guys laugh as Lucius rolls his eyes. "But the rest of you? Come on!"

  "It's true. You always get your pick of the fresh meat, and this year we want our turn first," Devon says.

  "Seriously? There are hundreds of new girls. That's plenty of pussy to go around," I reason.

  "You're gonna take the blonde cheerleader just to fuck with me, aren't you?" Devon asks, shaking his head.

  "Now I am," I reply with a grin. "But let's make it interesting. I'll give all you dick wipes until 1:00 AM to nail down your respective women for the night, and then I'm showing up. What happens after that is out of my hands."

  "Damn, Phillips, this is the nicest thing you've ever done," Lucius says, shaking his head appreciatively.

  "Well, I had two at a time last night, so I'm feeling generous."

  "Oh, shit! I knew you had a threesome!" Adam crows. "Who was it?"

  I shrug. "Just these two groupies. They caught me coming outta here after dinner. I don't know their names. I almost never do," I add with a laugh.

  "And there's your team captain," comes a low growl from the doorway. The rest of the guys jump to attention, but I just lean forward and rest my forearms on my knees as Coach McKay comes striding into the locker room. "I was hoping for a little leadership this year, Phillips, but I can see that's not going to be the case," he snarls. "Now hurry up and get out of here. I'd tell y'all not to drink too much tonight, but I know it won't make any God damned difference." He slams the door behind him as he leaves.

  The tension leaves the room with him. Coach might be only six foot, too small to have made it in the pros, but he still scares the rest of the team shitless. Not me. I don't care how hard he rides me. The guy just has it in for me, plain and simple. He’s such a prick, too, always scheduling early morning practices on the weekends, just to punish us for partying the night before. What does he expect? It’s fucking college, and we’re football players. At Vanover, that means we’re practically royalty.

  Sure, it would be nice to have the kind of coach who seemed to actually believe in me, who would talk me up to the pro scouts that are eyeing me, but whatever. He doesn't have to like me, he just has to play me. And barring some major fuck-up on my part, that's exactly what he's going to keep on doing. I'm Hunter fucking Phillips, and nothing's going to stan
d between me and my NFL contract.

  Chapter 3

  Britt

  I stare at a pen on my dad's desk, my gaze soft. All I can think about is Hunter Phillip's hard muscles...the width of his shoulders, the way his biceps seemed to pop off his arms as he reached for his towels. I shift a little in my seat, and am horrified by what I feel. Oh my God...am I wet right now? Get it together, Britt. He's just some muscle-bound jock.

  The door bursts open behind me and I jump, less because I'm startled and more because I'm feeling guilty over my dirty thoughts.

  "Sorry I'm late," my dad says as he walks around the chair I'm sitting in and heads to his old swivel back behind his desk. My dad is not a hugger. "Offensive coordinator wanted to tweak a couple plays that weren't working."

  "No problem."

  "So how's your first week been?"

  "Good. I already finished all my homework for this Monday and Tuesday, and I'm going to the library after this to finish the rest of the week's. I told my academic advisor that I'm ready to declare my double majors, but she said to wait a little since I just got here."

  "That's my girl," he says proudly, hooking his hands behind his head. His hairline is receding and he's got more than a few wrinkles, but I can see why his opponents and players find him intimidating. When he looks at you, he seems to know everything about you, his dark blue eyes resting on you a moment longer than is comfortable. Of course to me, though, he's just my dad. My supremely overprotective dad. "How's your roommate? You said on the phone she talks a lot."

  "A little," I reply warily, knowing where this conversation is heading. "But she's nice, I think."

  "Well, your old bedroom is always available if you want to move home."

  "I know, Dad. But I think I'm going to be fine in the dorms."

  "There's something I've been meaning to talk to you about," he says seriously, leaning forward on his desk.

  "Okay..."

  "Now, I know this is something normally your mother would talk to you about, but here we are." I smile sadly. My mom passed away from ovarian cancer when I was two, so I don't really remember her, but the mention of her still brings up a painful ache in my chest. "It's important, when you, ah, decide that it is time... that you feel that you might want..."