Bases loaded, the crowd went wild. Fuck.
Wade ignored Pace’s next motion that he was fine and walked to the mound. Pace kept his hat low over his face, because out of anyone, Wade could read him like the back of his hand.
At first, Wade said nothing. Nope, as if they had all the time in the world, as if thousands and thousands of people weren’t watching and waiting, both in the stands and also on television, he calmly stood there, taut and steadfast. He adjusted his cap, then his mitt. Looked at the sky.
“You got something to say?” Pace finally asked.
“Yeah. It’s fucking hot out here.”
Pace let out a low laugh, which hurt like hell.
“So . . . Pizza after the game?”
Wade loved pizza, it was his comfort food. Pace’s, too, but at the moment the thought of food made him want to hurl.
Wade eyed the crowd, then the batter waiting on them. “He likes the ball inside. Don’t give it to him. Unless you’d like to give up another hit with bases loaded.”
Pace said nothing.
Wade adjusted his cap again. “You going to tell me the real problem or not?”
Pace turned the ball in his fingers.
“Not.” Wade sighed. “You want to get us through the inning?”
“Hell, yeah, I want to.” Pace pushed up his hat and revealed his face.
Wade met his gaze, his own going very somber. “But you can’t.”
At his imperceptible nod, Wade closed his eyes a minute, then gestured for Gage.
The Skipper jogged out, took one look at Pace’s face, and got a tick in his jaw. “You’re green. Tell me you have the flu.”
“No.”
“The shoulder?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, fuck me.”
“I’d rather not.”
Gage wasn’t amused. They lost eight to one.
In the medical room afterward, Pace had some X-rays taken but he was too swollen to see anything. It didn’t matter, in his gut he knew the truth. He’d likely torn his rotator cuff. That, or his arm was falling off, because that’s what it felt like.
On the bus back to the hotel, he sat packed in ice, his free hand in his pocket, his fingers wrapped around Holly’s thong.
Gage dropped into the seat next to him. “You okay?”
“No.”
“You want to talk?”
“No.”
“Okay.” Gage nodded. “Good. I’ll talk. What the hell happened in that shower room?”
“What do you mean?”
“You do more than kiss her?”
“Are you really asking me that?”
“It was supposed to be just a damn kiss. Whatever you did, you screwed with the flow.”
“Come on.”
“I’m serious. Now look at you, hurt.”
Pace let out a careful breath. “We did not lose because of whatever I did or didn’t do with Holly in that shower room and I sure as hell didn’t get hurt because of it.”
Gage leaned in and lowered his voice. “Maybe that’s true. Maybe you and I know it, but the rest of the team? They don’t know it. So you’re going to do this. Or not do this, in this case. No more hooking up with her.” Gage took in Pace’s expression and nodded. “Yeah, it’s stupid and juvenile, but it’s as good as fact that if they believe you’ve screwed with the routine and it’s over, then it’s as good as over.” With that, he got up and left him alone.
And he stayed alone for about two seconds before Wade slid into the spot. “Hey. Are you—”
“Don’t ask me how I am.”
Wade looked at him for a beat, his eyes sliding to Pace’s shoulder, and then he nodded. “Fair enough. We got some interesting rumors going on.”
Pace leaned back wearily. “I don’t care.”
“There’re two camps,” Wade said anyway. “One says you’ve already done the deed with the hot reporter and the lack of sexual tension between the two of you is the reason we lost.”
Pace closed his eyes and shook his head.
“The other says that you haven’t slept with her yet but that you took it too far in the shower room today, and that’s why we lost.”
Pace sighed.
“Personally, I have a different theory.”
“That we lost because I pitched like shit?”
“That we lost because we sucked today. All of us.” Wade smiled wryly when Pace opened his eyes. “Look, man, I’m going to make a suggestion.”
“Do you have to?”
“Screw the team and our stupid superstitions. Sleep with her already.”
“How do you know I haven’t?”
“Because if you had, you’d be a helluva lot more relaxed. At least if you’re doing it right.” He lifted a brow. “Is that the problem? You forget how? You need some pointers?”
“Wade?”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. Shut the fuck up.” Again he looked at Pace’s shoulder, still packed in ice, and his eyes sobered. “I meant what I said before. You need to go for it with her. You need to get yourself something outside this game.”
“Why her?”
“Because she’s the first woman to drive you insane instead of the other way around. Because you’re different with her. You’re happy around her.”
“What if I told you that she’s decided to go after a drug story regarding the Heat?”
Wade was quiet a moment, then he blew out a low breath. “Shit.”
“Yeah.”
“What did you tell her?”
“That I had nothing to tell her.” He closed his eyes again and rested his aching head against the headrest. “And I just hope to God it stays that way.”
When they arrived at the hotel, Pace had to jump through hoops for the team doc before getting to go to his room. They would evaluate him in detail back at home, but the grim consensus was that he’d most likely torn his rotator cuff. Alone in his room, Pace stripped down to his shorts, stood in front of the blasting AC and breathed in the blissful silence until someone knocked on his door.
Hoping it was someone with a hammer to bash in his head and put him out of his misery, he pulled open the door and found Red. “I don’t want to watch any tapes.” He stood blocking the doorway. “I don’t want to even think about baseball.”
“What crazy talk is that? Baseball is all you think about.”
“Yeah, well things change.” His every movement was agony. Plus, he was feeling the need to beat something up.
Or sleep with someone.
Holly.
“You’re hurting,” Red said, gazing worriedly over Pace like a mother hen. “Let me call a masseuse in for you or get you something for the pain.”
“They already offered me something for pain.” He knew nothing would help, not the knee-weakening fire in his shoulder or the wrenching ache in his gut because he was afraid, so fucking afraid. “I don’t need anything.” Except maybe a lobotomy. Yeah, that would help. He could stop hurting and stop thinking. Thinking and wondering how it’d happened that he had no life, and that he’d never even noticed until now.
“You need something to sleep,” Red said. “So you can heal better, faster. Whatever you want, just name it. Vico din? Something strong? Have you been taking the vitamins Tucker gave you? I have some herbal shit from Tucker that’s amazing. You should see what it did for Ty—”
“I’m good, Red.”
“But—”
“I said I’m good. Jesus.”
Red stared at him. “Fine. Stare at the ceiling all night, in pain when you don’t have to be.” Turning stiffly, he stalked off, hurt, and Pace sighed. “Don’t do that. Dammit, Red.”
But Red kept walking. The man was as stubborn as a damn ox. “Fine. I’ll take the damn pills,” Pace called after him, even stepping into the hallway, but Red didn’t stop.
Shaking his head, Pace turned back to his door, nearly plowing over Holly. God, not her, not now. He didn’t want her to see him like this, and he sure as hell cou
ldn’t take the way she looked at him, as if even in spite of not believing in happily-ever-afters, she secretly hoped he was hers.
He had no happily-ever-after in his future.
Her gaze tracked up his nearly naked body to meet his. “I’d ask you if you were okay,” she said. “But I know the drill by now. You’d just say—”
“I’m fine.”
“Yeah,” she said softly. “That. Pace . . . are you okay?”
“Don’t.” He couldn’t go there, not right now. “Please, just . . . don’t.”
“Okay.” She held out her hand. “I believe you have something of mine.”
Yes. Yes, he did, and images flashed in his brain; her pressed back against the tile wall, her halter dress untied and revealing her breasts, a perfect nipple hardening in his mouth . . . how wet she’d been. “Finders keepers.”
“Aren’t you funny. What ‘damn pills’ are you taking from Red?”
The question managed to do what nothing else had. It cleared the sexual haze. “What?”
“He’s not a doctor. You know he can’t prescribe. Is it painkillers or other stuff, like performance enhancers?”
Insulted and pissed, never a good combo, he let out a short, mirthless laugh. “Didn’t realize we were on the record.”
“Sorry.” She shook her head at herself. “I’m researching that article, and—”
“And you’re curious. You’re also sure there’s a dirty little secret to ferret out. Well, you caught me. I’m having a drug party tonight. Sorry, no reporters invited.” Sick, hurting like hell, he turned and stalked into his room, half wishing he’d let Red give him something after all, anything to get rid of his pain, both physical and otherwise.
Holly caught Pace’s hotel door just before it closed in her face. She let herself in and looked around. Nicer than hers, bigger, fancier, but she’d never needed big and fancy.
She needed the truth. And she really hoped she hadn’t just accidentally found it. “Pace—”
“Look, I’ve had a fairly fucked-up evening, so I really don’t want to go around and around with you on what you think you might have heard just now.”
She’d come to see how he was. To talk about what had happened in the shower room.
And to retrieve her underwear.
And maybe . . . maybe to figure out what the hell they were doing with each other, if it was real or imagined on her part. “Fine enough, except I don’t remember asking you to go around with me at all.”
“Ah Christ. We’re going to.” He shoved his fingers through his hair and turned in a slow circle, coming back to face her, arms still up, eyes resigned and exhausted, body tense.
He wore only knit boxer shorts low on his hips and getting lower with his every movement, a fact that was hugely distracting, emphasis on the huge. “Your shoulder,” she said softly, clearly her throat and trying to clear her mind as well. “You’ve got some mobility at least.”
“I can lift it up until the cows come home,” he said wearily. “It’s lowering it again that kills me.”
She looked at the taut strength in his arms and shoulders, at his hard chest, the ripped abs. At the way his shorts gaped away from those abs with every breath.
Concentrate.
Noting the pain he was clearly in made it easy. “Pace,” she murmured softly.
He turned away, carefully lowering his right arm. She couldn’t see his face, but she heard his low breath of pain, which shot straight to her heart.
“How bad?”
Not answering, he strode to the duffel bag open on his bed and pulled out a foil pack. Ripping it open with his teeth, he poured what looked like at least five different pills into his hand and then tossed them into his mouth, dry swallowing them whole. “Better call the DEA,” he said when he noted her watching him.
“Those were just vitamins, right?”
Without answering, he turned and headed straight for the minibar, grabbing a small bottle of vodka.
“What are you doing?”
“Getting some good old-fashioned pain relief.” He tipped his head back and drank it down.
“You shouldn’t mix pain meds and alcohol.”
“Jesus.” He set the now-empty glass bottle on the nightstand, grabbed another, downed it, too, then strode to the door, which he whipped open.
A not-too-subtle invitation to leave.
Well, it wasn’t the first time she’d irritated a man beyond repair, that was for certain. And if she was being honest, she could admit that maybe, just maybe, she’d pushed his buttons to see how easily he’d cut their tenuous relationship.
Pretty darn easily, apparently.
She moved toward the door, then stopped only a breath away from his tall, built, hurting body. Lifting her head, she looked into his eyes, searching for the truth, or a flicker of regret, some knowledge that he was sorry it had come to this.
Nothing.
“You can be pissed at me all you want for asking about drugs,” she said. “But why would Red so easily offer you some if you never use them?”
He stared down into her eyes and then at her mouth. And then the next thing she knew, he’d slipped his good arm around her back and tugged her up until her toes were dangling off the floor. His eyes were sleepy and at half-mast as he licked his lower lip, then kissed her—a deep, wet, hot kiss that came out of nowhere and stole her breath, her reasoning, and more than half of her brain cells.
She heard her purse hit the floor. One of her shoes joined it. He groaned into her mouth as her arms entwined around his neck, ripping a shockingly needy little sigh of pleasure from her as she gave him everything she had.
Until he pulled back.
Her eyes slowly opened as he let her slide down his body so that her feet were back on the floor.
“Sometimes,” he said, his voice hoarse, “Sometimes, Holly, people do crazy odd things in the name of caring and love. Things they normally wouldn’t do. Things that might look wrong in a black-and-white world. But see, in this world, my world, not everything is black-and-white.”
She was so turned on, so revved up, it was nearly impossible to put words together. “You’re talking about what you might put into your body in the name of your love for baseball.”
He stared at her, then let out a low breath. “No. I’m talking about what Red would do for me. Which is anything, by the way. The very definition of love.” Seeming weary to his very core, he shook his head. “You know what, forget it. You wouldn’t understand.”
She felt like she couldn’t breathe. “Because I told you I don’t believe in love? Or because I turned my last boyfriend in for his unscrupulous actions?”
When he didn’t say anything, she took a step back, pressing a hand to her chest because her heart hurt. “You know what I think?”
“That I’m right?”
She’d been about to say that his fear of her was showing, but the same was true in reverse as well, which felt too revealing, so she swallowed hard. “I’m thinking that you, Pace Martin, are a very stupid male.” She bent for her shoe and purse. “And I want my panties back.”
“No.”
“Oh, for God’s sake.” She had to brush against his body to get out, that warm, hard, amazing body she’d been hoping to have pinning her down on the bed right about now. Ha! Turned out he was no better than any of the other men she’d known.
Actually, he was worse.
Because he, unlike the others, had sneaked in past her defenses when she wasn’t looking. He’d made himself at home in her heart and was right this very minute power blasting his way back out again, destroying the organ in the process. “Excuse me,” she said stiffly.
Stepping back, he let her go.
She walked down the hotel hallway, her face hot, body hot, everything damn hot, and stopped at the ice machine. Grabbing a spare bucket, she filled it, then lifted the thing and pressed it to her cheek. When that wasn’t enough to cool her jets, she took a piece of ice and ran it over her forehead and
then down her neck.
Temper and arousal did not mix well, not with her, and with a sigh, she turned and then went still. Pace stood in the opened doorway of his room, arms crossed, that big body leaning causally against the doorjamb, his eyes calm and steady for someone who’d just had two shots of vodka straight up.
And cynically amused.
“I have a better way of cooling down,” he said.
Yeah. But she didn’t think she could take it. She certainly couldn’t survive it. So she lifted her chin and continued down the hallway, stopping only to reach back for the bucket of ice, which was definitely going with her.
His soft, mocking laugh followed her all the way to the elevator.
Chapter 16
Three words that describe baseball: You never know.
—Joaquin Andujar
Holly went back to her room and, pressing the ice to her hot face, called Allie. “Heading to LA seems more and more appealing every day.”
“Yay for me. To whom do I send a thank-you?”
“No one in particular.”
“Baseball stud,” she guessed. “Ah, honey, is he an ass then?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” She blew out a breath. “Truthfully, I think I might be the ass.”
“Well, admitting it is half the battle.”
Holly sank to her hotel bed and laughed. “My damn head isn’t on straight and I can’t find my usual happy place, and you have me laughing.”
“You can’t find your cool, calm happy place because your heart’s involved. It’s about damn time, chica. If I was there, I’d hug him myself for that alone.”
“You’d hug him? He’s driving me crazy and you’d hug him?”
“Yes. Call me when you can admit I’m right.”
Holly closed her phone thinking that would be a cold day in hell. But knowing she needed to, she put on gloss, combed her hair, and went to the one place she’d discovered over the years that she could get an answer to any question she had.
The bar.
Wade was nursing a drink and staring off into space. Except that when she got closer, she could see he wasn’t staring into space at all but onto the dance floor, where Sam was doing some country swing thing with Henry, the both of them handling themselves with surprisingly good moves. “Hey.” Holly smiled at Wade. “You okay?”
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