“Your boobs are a lot bigger than they were last week. Are you wearing a padded bra?”
She folded her arms over her chest like he was a pervert. “It’s a water bra.”
“You can’t wear that outside the apartment.” He couldn’t let her outside with her breasts pushed up and out like that.
“I wore it to school all last week.”
Holy shit, he’d bet just about anything that the guys at her school had stared at her chest too. All week. While he’d been on the road. Christ, his life was a mess. A whole churning cauldron of crapola. “I bet the guys at your school had a real good time staring at your hooters. And you can bet they weren’t thinking very nice things about you.”
“Hooters,” she gasped. “That’s disgusting. You’re so mean to me. You always say mean things.”
Hooters wasn’t a bad word. Was it? “I’m telling you how guys think. If you show up in a big padded bra, with your breasts falling out, they’ll think you’re smutty.”
She looked at him as if he were a child molester instead of her brother who wanted to protect her from the little perverts at her school. “You’re sick.”
Sick? “No, I’m not. I’m just trying to tell you the truth.”
“You’re not my mom or my dad. You can’t tell me what to do.”
“You’re right. I’m not Dad and I’m not your mother. I may not be the best brother either, but I am all you’ve got.”
Tears leaked from her eyes and messed up her makeover. “I hate you, Luc.”
“No, you don’t. You’re just throwing a fit because I won’t let you walk around in a padded bra.”
“I bet you like women who walk around in padded bras.”
Actually, he’d grown an affection for, and an obsession with, small breasts.
“You’re a hypocrite, Luc. I’ll bet your girlfriends wear padded bras.”
Out of all the women he’d known, the one woman who had fascinated him the most didn’t wear a bra. He wondered what that said about him. He tried not to care, but he did. His cauldron of crapola churned a bit more.
“Marie, you’re sixteen,” he reasoned. “You can’t walk around in a bra that turns boys on. You’ll have to wear something else. Maybe a bra that has locking hooks.” That last he’d thrown in to be funny. As always, she failed to share his humor. His sister burst into tears.
“I want to go to boarding school,” she wailed and ran to her bedroom.
Her mention of boarding school set him back on his heels. He hadn’t thought of boarding school for a while. If he sent her to boarding school, he wouldn’t have to worry about her wearing padded bras when he was out of town. His life would be simpler. But suddenly the thought of her going away held not the slightest appeal. She was a pain and moody, but she was his sister. He was getting used to having her around, and the thought of boarding school no longer seemed like any kind of solution.
He followed her to her room and leaned a shoulder into the doorframe. She lay on her bed staring up at the ceiling, her arms spread out like she was a martyr on the cross.
“Do you really want to go to boarding school?” he asked.
“I know you don’t want me here.”
“I’ve never said that.” They’d had this conversation before. “And it’s not true.”
“You want to get rid of me,” she sobbed. “So I’ll go away to school.”
He knew what she needed to hear and what he needed to say. For her as much as for him. He’d been indecisive long enough. “Too late.” He folded his arms across his chest. “You’re not going anywhere. You live here with me. If you don’t like it, that’s too damn bad.”
She looked over at him then. “Even if I want to go?”
“Yeah,” he said and was surprised at how much he meant it. “Even if you want to go, you’re stuck here. You’re my sister and I want you to live with me.” He shrugged. “You’re a pain in the keister, but I like having you around bugging me.”
She was quiet a minute, then whispered, “Okay. I’ll stay.”
“Okay, then.” He pushed away from the doorframe and moved into the living room. He looked out the tall windows toward the bay. His relationship with his sister wasn’t the best. Their living arrangement was less than ideal; he was gone almost as much as he was in town. But he wanted to know her before she left for college and grew into an adult.
Over the past sixteen years, he should have seen her more. He certainly could have. He had no excuses. No good ones, anyway. He’d been so wrapped up in his own life, he hadn’t thought about her all that much. And that made him ashamed for all the times he’d been in LA and had never made a real effort to see her. To know her. He’d always known that made him a selfish bastard. He just hadn’t ever really thought there was anything wrong with being selfish-until now.
He heard her soft footsteps and he turned around. With her cheeks still wet and mascara running down her face, she wrapped her arms around him and laid her head on his chest. “I like living here bugging you.”
“Good.” He hugged her. “I know I can never take the place of your mother or dad, but I’ll try to make you happy.”
“I was very happy today.”
“You still can’t wear that bra.”
She was quiet a moment, then gave a long-suffering sigh. “Fine.”
They looked out the windows together for a long time. She talked about her mother, and she told him the reason she kept the dried flowers on her dresser. He guessed he understood, although he did think it was creepy. She told him she’d talked about it with Jane too, and that Jane had told her she would put them away someday when she was ready.
Jane. What was he going to do about Jane? All he’d wanted was a peaceful life. That’s it, but he hadn’t had a peaceful moment since he’d met Jane. No, that wasn’t true. When she’d been with him for those few short weeks, his life had been better than he could ever remember. Being with her was like being home for the first time since he’d moved to Seattle. But that had been an illusion.
She said she loved him. He knew better than to believe it, but deep down in a place he couldn’t ignore, he wanted that lie to be true. He was a sucker and a chump. He would see her tomorrow night for the first time in a week, but he hoped that, like all pain, after the initial sting he’d become numb and wouldn’t feel it anymore.
That’s what he hoped, but that wasn’t what happened when she walked into the locker room the next night. Luc felt her presence even before he glanced up and saw her. The impact of seeing her slammed in his chest and left him winded. When she spoke, her voice poured through him, and against his iron will, he soaked her up like a dry sponge. He was in love with her. There was no denying it to himself any longer. He’d fallen in love with Jane, and he didn’t have a clue what to do about it. As he sat there with his feet jammed into his untied skates and the laces in his hands, he watched her walk toward him, and with each step his heart felt like it was pounding a hole in his chest.
Dressed in black, with her smooth white skin, she looked the same as always. Her dark hair curled about her face, and he forced himself to lace his skates, when what he really wanted to do was shake her, then hold her tight until he absorbed all of her.
The hardest thing Jane had ever done was walk across the locker room and face Luc. When she approached, he looked down at his laces. For several long seconds she watched him lace his skates, and when he wouldn’t look up at her, she spoke to the top of his head. “Big dumb dodo.” She balled her hands into fists to keep from reaching out and touching his hair. “I want you to know,” she said, “that I have no intention of writing anything about you ever again.”
Finally he looked up. His brows were drawn over the turmoil in his blue eyes. “Do you expect me to believe you?”
She shook her head. Her heart cried for him. For her. For what they might have had together. “No. I don’t, but I thought I’d tell you anyway.” She looked at him one last time, then walked away. She joined Darby and Caroline
in the press box and took out her laptop to take notes.
“How’s your father?” Darby asked, heaping more guilt on her head.
“He’s feeling much better. He’s at home now.”
“His recovery has been amazing,” Caroline added with a knowing smile.
After the first period, the Chinooks scored a goal against the Ottawa Senators, but the Senators rallied in the second frame and put up a goal of their own. When the final buzzer sounded, the Chinooks won by two points.
As Jane moved to the locker room once again, she wondered how much longer she could take this. Seeing Luc constantly was more than her heart could take. She didn’t know how much longer she could continue covering the Chinooks, even though it meant giving up the best job she’d ever had and a chance for a better career.
She took a deep breath and entered the locker room. Luc sat in front of his stall as usual. He was bare from the waist up. His arms were folded across his chest, and he watched her as if he were trying to figure out a puzzle. She asked as few questions of the players as possible and beat a hasty exit before she broke into tears in front of the team. They’d assume she was crying because of her sick father and would probably send her more flowers.
She practically ran from the room, but when she was halfway to the exit, she stopped. If ever there was something she needed to stick around and fight for, Luc was that something. Even if he told her he hated her, at least she would know.
She turned and leaned a shoulder into the cinder block wall, in the same place Luc had once waited for her. He was the first to enter the tunnel, and his gaze locked with hers as he walked toward her, looking obscenely handsome in his suit and red tie. With her heart in her throat, she straightened and stepped in front of him. “Do you have a minute?”
“Why?”
“I wanted to talk to you. I have something I need to say, and think it’s important.”
He looked behind him at the empty tunnel, opened the janitor’s closet they’d been in before, and shoved her inside. He flipped on the light as the door shut behind them, sealing them together in the same place where he’d once kissed her passionately. As she gazed into his face, he neither smiled nor frowned, and his eyes looked tired but gave nothing away. Nothing of the emotion she’d seen earlier in the locker room.
“I thought you needed to say something.”
She nodded and leaned back against the closed door. The scent of his skin filled her with a visceral memory and deep longing. Now that the time had come, she didn’t know where to begin. So she just talked. “I want to tell you again how sorry I am for the Honey Pie column. I know you probably don’t believe me, and I don’t blame you.” She shook her head. “At the time I wrote it, I was falling in love with you, and I just sat down and poured out my fantasy about you. I wasn’t even sure if I was going to send it in. I just wrote, and when I was through, I knew it was the best thing I’d ever written.” She pushed away from the door and walked past him in the small closet. She couldn’t look at him and tell him everything that needed to be said. “When I finished it, I knew I shouldn’t send it in, because I knew you wouldn’t like it. I knew how you felt about untrue things written about you. You’d made that really clear.” With her back to him, she wrapped her hand around a part of the metal shelving. “I sent it anyway.”
“Why?”
Why? This was the hard part. “Because I loved you and you didn’t love me. I’m not the kind of woman you date. I’m short and flat-chested and I can hardly dress myself. I didn’t think you’d ever care for me the way I care for you.”
“So you did it to get back at me?”
She looked over her shoulder and forced herself to turn and face him. To face the contempt she might once again see in his eyes. “No. If I’d wanted just to get back at you for not loving me, I would have kept myself anonymous.” She folded her arms across her chest as if to keep her pain from spilling out on the floor. “I did it to end the relationship before it began. So I could blame the article. So that I wouldn’t get in too deep.”
He shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“No. I’m sure it doesn’t to you, but it does to me.”
“That’s the most ass-backward excuse I’ve ever heard.”
Her heart sank. He didn’t believe her. “I’ve been thinking a lot this past week, and I’ve realized that in every relationship with a man that I’ve had, I’ve always entered an escape hatch just in case I might get hurt. The Honey Pie column was my escape hatch. Problem was, I didn’t get out fast enough.” She took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “I love you, Luc. I fell in love with you, and I was so afraid that you would never love me. Instead of thinking a relationship with you was doomed to end, I should have fought to keep it together. I should have… I don’t exactly know what. But I do know it ended badly. I take the blame for that, and I’m sorry.” When he didn’t say anything, her heart plummeted further. There was nothing left to say except, “I was hoping we could still be friends.”
He raised a dubious brow. “You want to be friends?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
She’d never thought one little word could hurt so much.
“I don’t want to be your friend, Jane.”
“I understand.” She put her head down and moved past him to the door. She hadn’t thought she had any more tears to shed. She thought she’d cried them all, but she was wrong. She didn’t care if the rest of the Chinooks were in the tunnel; she had to get out of there before she fell apart. She twisted the door handle and pulled, but nothing happened. She pulled harder, but the door didn’t budge. She turned the lock, but it still didn’t open. She looked up and saw Luc’s hands above her head holding the door shut.
“What are you doing?” she asked as she turned to face him. He stood so close her nose was inches from his chest and she could smell the clean cotton scent of his dress shirt mixed with his deodorant.
“Don’t play games, Jane.”
“I’m not.”
“Then why do you tell me you love me in one breath, and then in the next tell me you just want to be friends?” He placed his fingers beneath her chin and lifted her gaze to his. “I have friends. I want more from you than that. I’m a selfish guy, Jane. If I can’t be your lover, if I can’t have all of you, then I don’t want anything.” He lowered his face to hers and kissed her, a soft press of his lips to hers, and the tears she’d been trying to hold back filled her eyes. Her hands grasped the front of his shirt and she held on tight. She would be his lover, and this time she wouldn’t invent reasons to get out. She wanted this too much.
He slid his mouth across her cheek and he whispered in her ear, “I love you, Jane. And I’ve missed you. My life has been total shit without you.”
She pulled back and looked into his face. “Say it again.”
He raised his hands to her face and brushed his thumbs across her cheeks. “I love you, and I want to be with you because you make my life better.” He pushed her hair behind her ear. “You asked me once what I see when I look into my future.” He slid his palm down her shoulder and took her hand. “I see you,” he said and kissed her knuckles.
“You’re not mad at me?” she asked.
He shook his head and his lips brushed the backs of her fingers. “I thought I was. I thought I’d be mad at you forever, but I’m not. I don’t really understand your reasons for sending that column in, but I just don’t care anymore. I think I was more pissed off about feeling like a fool than about the actual column.” He placed her palm on his chest. “When I saw you waiting for me, my anger evaporated and I knew I’d be a bigger fool if I let you go. I want to spend the rest of my life getting to know your secrets.”
“I don’t have any more secrets.”
“Are you sure there isn’t at least one?” He wrapped an arm around her back and kissed her neck.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re a nymphomaniac?”
“Are you s
erious?”
“Well… yes.”
Jane shook her head and managed a weak, “No,” before she burst out laughing.
“Shh.” Luc pulled back and looked into her face. “Someone will hear you and bust in on us.”
She couldn’t stop laughing and so he silenced her with his mouth. His lips were warm and welcoming and she slid into the kiss with the abandon of a true nympho. Because sometimes in life, Ken didn’t always choose Barbie. For that, he had to be rewarded.
Epilogue
She Shoots! She Scores!
Luc stepped off the elevator to the observation deck of the Space Needle and looked to his left. A woman in a red dress looked out at the glittering skyline of downtown Seattle. Her hair fell to her shoulders in soft dark curls, and a warm August breeze tossed a few strands about her face. They’d just finished having dinner in the restaurant below, and as he waited for the bill, she slipped away to the upper deck.
As she watched him walk toward her, the corners of her red mouth turned up in a seductive smile.
“Nice night for watching stars,” he said.
She bit her bottom lip, then spoke just above a whisper, “Do you like to watch?”
“I’m more of a doer.” He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her back against his chest. “And right now, I want to do my wife.”
“That’s not in the script,” Jane said as she rested against him.
They’d been married for five weeks now. Five weeks of waking with her every morning. Of looking at her across their dinner table, and then loading the dishwasher together. Of watching her brush her teeth and pull on her socks. Never in a million years would he have ever thought those mundane, ordinary things could be so sexy.
Most of all, he liked to watch her work. To create all those erotic stories in her head. To look beyond that natural girl face, and see the real woman.
Since their engagement, she no longer wrote about being single in Seattle. And Chris Evans was back from his medical leave, working his sports beat. The Times had let Jane go completely, and now she was the newest sports reporter for their rival, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
See Jane Score Page 25