Backfield in Motion (29 page)

“However long it takes.” Mac walked to the
door, holding it open for him.

“Then I guess we have nothing more to say to
each other.”

“I guess not.” He heard a note of regret in
her voice, as if someone had let the air out of her anger.

Bruiser walked to the door and paused. “Be
careful.”

“I will. Good luck at your game.” She
refused to meet his gaze.

“Thanks.”

Bruiser walked to his car. This time he
wouldn’t be coming back in a few minutes to apologize. He was
done.

They’d sung their last song together and
there wouldn’t be an encore.

Chapter 20

Bruiser glanced at the game clock: 6:32 left
in the game. 21-14, Jacks ahead and in possession of the ball. He
lined up in the backfield and sprinted past Harris toward the
sideline. Harris faked a handoff, then tossed the ball on a slant
route for a ten-yard gain. Seven plays later, Bruiser took the
handoff from Harris, kept his legs churning, and powered five yards
into the end zone, taking a couple defenders with him. The rowdy
crowd in the stadium went wild. Bruiser grinned, over the
hundred-yard mark for the game. Damn good way to start the new
season. Helluva lot better than last year. But then last year the
team hadn’t been running on all cylinders.

Bruiser jogged off the field, pausing long
enough to salute the skybox where Elliot sat with Rachel, Kelsie,
and Lavender. He sank down on the bench, chest heaving, lungs
screaming for oxygen. It was a fucking hot day, and he downed a
couple cups of Gatorade, not giving a shit that the sticky liquid
ran down his face.

Brett slid next to him on the bench and
elbowed him in the side. “Good job.”

“Yeah, thanks.” Bruiser couldn’t stop
grinning. Damn, he loved this game.

“Is Mac up there?”

“Uh, no, Elliot is.” What a way to deflate
his good mood. Mac’s absence weighed heavily on him. He’d hoped
she’d have a change of heart and show up to surprise him, but she
hadn’t. He’d put her cute face and sexy little body out of his mind
on the field, but elsewhere, he just wasn’t that strong. As soon as
he jogged off the field, thoughts of her flooded his brain, which
pissed him off—a little. Women did not affect him like this. But
Mac did.

Brett studied him for a moment, nodded, and
joined Harris and the coach huddled over a clipboard while poring
over the next set of offensive plays. Bruiser rubbed his face with
a towel and guzzled another cup of Gatorade.

On the next play, Murphy nailed San Diego’s
running back for a loss. The veteran linebacker fell on the fumbled
ball. Bruiser leapt to his feet, yelling along with the sold-out
crowd. Game over. The Jacks won it, 28-14.

Absolutely damn good way to start a
season.

Except for this business with Mac.

Bruiser jogged down the tunnel to the locker
room, accepting his teammates’ praise with a nod or a high five. A
bevy of reporters converged on him as soon as entered the locker
room. They loved his interviews. Bruiser fielded their questions
with his usual charm, even as he engaged in a fantasy of shoving
their microphones down their throats. That in itself gave him
pause. In the past, he’d basked in the attention, yet today it
irritated him, just like the modeling gigs had lost their luster,
too.

They asked the same damn questions over and
over, stupid questions, not the questions he’d ask if he’d been in
their shoes, and not the questions that he would assume the average
viewer would want answered.

Bruiser glanced over their heads to Harris,
surrounded by a similar group. The guy soaked up the attention like
a sponge, grinning and giving the reporters the amusing, blunt
responses they’d come to expect from him. Bruiser used to rival
Harris in the quick comebacks department. Not today. His answers
sounded stilted and disinterested, especially to his own ears, and
even a little impatient.

“Bruiser!” One of the most annoying local
reporters shouted at him and brought him back to the present.

“Uh, sorry. What was the question?”

“How did you feel about the fourth and one
play where you were dropped for a loss?”

That tight rubber band of control inside
Bruiser snapped. “How the fuck did you think I felt? Happy?
Pleased? You fucking idiot. The team trusted me to get a first
down, and I missed the hole. And you’re asking me how I felt? I
felt fucking pissed.” Bruiser snapped a towel in the direction of
the reporters, and they quickly backed up.

“I’m done answering questions. Get these
fucking things out of my face.” The words spewed from his mouth
like an evangelist preaching hellfire and brimstone. Instead of
carefully measuring his responses and always being the perfect
interviewee, he’d shocked them all by saying what he thought for
once.

The reporters scurried away. The news
stories wouldn’t be singing his praises for his hundred-yard day
but instead chastising him for losing his temper. They’d blow it
all out of proportion and rumors would fly. He’d either be on
drugs, ready to quit the game, or having a fight with his
girlfriend.

Bruiser froze. Well, shit, maybe he was
having a fight with his girlfriend.

He escaped to the privacy of the showers. So
far the assholes didn’t follow the team into the showers, though he
expected that day would come. He stood under the warm water,
waiting for it to wash away his frustration and anger. But it
didn’t. When he finally returned to the locker room only a few of
the guys lingered, one of whom was Harris, and his laser-blue eyes
were trained on Bruiser like a stinger missile honing in on its
target. Bruiser buried his head in his locker.

“A little testy for a guy who’s predicted to
have a record-breaking season.” Harris said in his ear.

“Yeah,” Bruiser stood and toweled off his
wet hair.

“It’s not like you to lose it with those
assholes. Something pissing you off?”

“Just them.”

Harris studied him with eyes that made
rookies pee their pants and veterans take a step back. “Bullshit.
You’ve been on edge all day. Not your businesslike self.”

“I got the job done, didn’t I?” Bruiser
snapped.

Harris blinked a few times, almost smiled.
“Yeah. Can’t complain.”

“Damn straight.”

Harris’s eyes grew bigger and a sly smiled
crawled across his face. “It’s Mac.”

“How would you know?”

“Because the only person who can tie me in
the knots like that is Lavender. It’s always a woman. But not just
any woman.
The
woman.”

“I’ve got a lot of stuff on my mind.”

“Take my advice. Make it easy on yourself
and her. Admit defeat, quit making excuses, and go after her.”

“Spoken like a man who’s been there.”

“Definitely a man who’s been there.” Harris
grinned, pulled his shirt on and buttoned it, and slapped Bruiser
on the back. “Good game.”

The quarterback sauntered from the locker
room, looking every inch like a man in control of his destiny. Yet
he’d admitted defeat and given in to a woman. Only Bruiser’s
problem wasn’t like that.

This wasn’t a battle of wills with Mac. This
was a matter of her misplaced priorities and strong guilt
overriding her life. And Bruiser knew all about those two things,
which made them kindred spirits and an impossible match.

* * * * *

The Jacks won their first game, and Mac
missed it. And for what? Another wild goose chase that came to
nothing. Ben’s former employee admitted he’d just been trying to
cause trouble for Ben. Mac wasted a weekend on another dead-end
lead. Now she was back at work and glad to be away from her
father’s scheming and obsessing for at least a day.

She put away the gardening tools in the
storage shed. She glanced up as Jed approached. His guarded,
businesslike expression scared the crap out of her.

“Mac, I need to see you in my office when
you’re finished here.” Jed refused to look her in the eye.

“If this is about the scholarship, I already
know.”

“It’s not.” Jed walked away.

“Okay, I’ll be right there.” Mac’s internal
emergency broadcast system slammed into full disaster mode. Running
to the bathroom, she washed her hands, splashed water on her face,
and walked to the gallows of her boss’s office filled with more
dread than a free agent with a poor training camp performance. Call
it a sixth sense; she knew the news wasn’t good, not even close.
Mac ran through the scenarios in her mind. Finally, she bit the
bullet and knocked on Jed’s door in the maintenance area.

“Come in,” he called.

Mac entered the room and sat in the folding
chair next to Jed’s messy desk. One pile of paper leaned
precariously, just waiting for the air conditioner to kick on and
send it fluttering across the room like birds scattering when a
hungry tomcat shows up.

“So what’s up?” Mac clutched her hands in
her lap and faked a casual smile.

Jed didn’t smile. In fact, he squirmed like
a man about to deliver some very distasteful news, and Mac was the
recipient.

“Jed?” Her smile stuck on her face, almost
painfully.

“Mac, this is hard for me.” God, he still
wouldn’t look her in the eye.

“Then just do it.” Mac ground her teeth
together and waited for the worst.

“We have to cut a full-time person.”

She dug her fingernails into her hands.
“No,” she whispered.

“You’re our newest hire.”

“But I need this job. I really like working
here. It’s my dream job.”

“Mac, don’t make this any harder than it
is.” He shuffled some papers on the desk, looked at them as if he
were reading them. Mac suspected he didn’t see them at all.

“You think it’s hard on you? I have bills to
pay.”

“Mac, calm down. You’ll get unemployment, of
course.” Finally, the coward glanced up, regret and sadness etched
into every line on his craggy face. This wasn’t much easier for
him.

“But you guys need me. I take care of the
gardens in front of the building. I make sure the inside plants are
healthy. Remember the philodendron? It almost died until I came
along and nursed it back to health.”

Jed pursed his lips and said nothing.

“Jed, tell me the truth.”

“Well, we’re hiring some temp staff, interns
from the college.” He tried to smile. “I’m so sorry, Mac.”

Mac forced another smile when all she wanted
to do was cry—which had become way too much of a habit lately.
“It’s okay, Jed. I’ll be fine.”

He stood, dismissing her. “Are you
sure?”

“I’m certain.” Mac bolted out the door
before he saw how fine she wasn’t. Avoiding a group of players
jaw-jacking at the end of the hall, she took a detour, and ran like
hell for her car.

Once inside the metal sanctuary, she gripped
the steering wheel and stared straight ahead, gulping in deep
breaths of air and fighting back the panic. She couldn’t pay her
bills on unemployment. She’d lose her house. Her father would
expect her to do detective work twenty-four seven. She’d probably
be able to get a job on a landscaping crew, but most of those jobs
ended in the fall, and fall would be here in another month.

Mac drove home, fighting back the lump in
her throat every step of the way.

She was so screwed. And worst of all, she
didn’t even have Bruiser’s broad shoulder to cry on.

* * * * *

Bruiser was just about to leave Jacks’ HQ
when Brett waved him down. He rolled down his window. “Miss me
already? We just spent the last several hours together.”

“Fuck you.” Brett glanced behind him then
leaned in the window. “I just heard that Mac got laid off.”

“What? Why would they do that? She works her
ass off for this place.” Anger and guilt spread through Bruiser
like a wildfire in a dry grass field. This had to do with him. He
knew it did.

“Uh, can we say Veronica?”

“Well, shit.” When Bruiser got his hands on
that woman, he’d have more than a few words with her.

Brett straightened. “Exactly. Well, I
thought you’d want to know.”

“Yeah, thanks.” Shaking his head, Bruiser
rubbed his chest with one hand, the other rested on the steering
wheel. The tightness in his chest gripped him harder.

As Brett nodded and backed away, Bruiser
peeled out, leaving his friend eating his dust. This was partially
his fault, and he knew it, making Mac one more person in his life
he’d let down. Determination squeezed out the guilt because guilt
did no one any good at this point. One way or another, he was going
to fix this and keep his promise to Elliot. He would not disappoint
the two most important people in his life.

Most important? Elliot, yes, he could
honestly say that. But Mac? He sucked in a quick breath and shook
his head, but denial wasn’t working so well for him right now.

Bruiser took the exit to Mac’s house. He
might not be welcome, but hell, he’d do it anyway. Her father
certainly didn’t pay attention to his daughter, and she’d need a
friend right about now. He ignored the small fact that they were
through, he told her he’d never come back, and that he was a major
wuss where she was concerned.

Craig’s truck sat in her driveway, but he
didn’t see Mac’s F-150. Bruiser jogged up to the front door and
knocked. Her father came to the door, binoculars in one hand and
looking worse than ever.

“Is Mac here?”

“I haven’t seen her. I’ve been here all
day.”

“Have you talked to her?” Bruiser couldn’t
keep the annoyance out of his voice. This guy needed to be her
father for once.

“No, not since last night.”

“She lost her job today. I’m trying to find
her.”

“Damn, what happened?” To his credit, Craig
put down the binoculars and actually pulled off a concerned-father
expression. Whether it was genuine or not, Bruiser didn’t have a
fucking clue.