The Game of Love (22 page)

Pro-ho.

Reaching in his back pocket, he pulled out a folded envelope. The stark white contrasted with the man’s tan fingers as he held it out, fluttering slightly in the near-winter wind. “Proof, at least, that we dated. I know it’s hard to hear. She’s a good liar. I know better now, and hopefully you will too.”

He climbed into the large vehicle, gave a mocking salute for a goodbye wave. “Take care. And just keep your eyes open.” With that, he backed out of the driveway and booked it down the road.

Brett waited until the Hummer turned completely out of sight before he slumped against the brick, then slid down until he was sitting, the rough surface scratching him through his shirt, shredding the material. He didn’t care.

Fuck. Goddammit.

It wasn’t true. It was some other Christina. Chris hated jocks, thought they were cavemen. She hadn’t wanted to date him because of it.

He stared at the so-called proof in his hand.

Throw it away. Don’t do this. Just trust her. You love her, so trust her.

But he couldn’t. His hand was shaking as he opened the envelope, so he made himself put it down, take a few deep breaths. When his heart had slowed down to something under heart-attack-inducing level, he opened the flap.

Picture upon picture poured out, scattering on the driveway in front of him. He picked up one that landed on his shoe.

Dax, a little younger, a little less bulky, was smiling at the camera, wearing his Centaurs jersey with jeans, no pads on. His arm was wrapped tight around the waist of a girl who came up to about his armpits. Her hair was streaked blond, with bangs that swept over her face, and she was looking off to the side.

It was Chris. Younger, different style hair, different facial expression. But Chris nonetheless.

He picked up another, this one where the woman was squished between Dax and another Centaur player. Her hair was shorter, more blond. But it was still Chris.

More pictures, each one showing Chris with Dax or other teammates. She always looked like she’d rather be somewhere else.

But she was there. Every picture damning the image Brett had built up in his head of the woman she was.

He came to a picture of Dax dipping her back in a Hollywood-inspired kiss. He was grinning as his mouth touched hers, face slightly turned to the camera. Her eyes were wide open, and her hands were fisted around his shirt.

Brett shuffled all the pictures back up into a stack, walked to the garbage can on the side of the house and dumped them in unceremoniously. Then he walked in through the front door, headed straight to the fridge, pulled out a beer. With nowhere left to go, he turned to his father’s recliner, kicked the footrest up and let himself melt into the cushions.

He wasn’t stupid. He knew she had dated people in the past. But she’d sat there, listening to him talk about his ex-wife, talking about women who flitted from one pro athlete to the next, and didn’t say a damn word. Not a “I have to tell you something,” or “Funny you should mention that, ’cause see I have this ex…” Nothing.

He wouldn’t have cared. He would have understood. Coincidence, right? So she’d dated another pro athlete before him. It wouldn’t have mattered.

Except that she hid it from him. Why? Because there was more to hide. He thought back to the pictures in the trash, the ones of her with his other teammates. Dax’s words.

Caught her trying to start something up with other guys in the league a few times. Even a few of my own teammates.

He took a swig of beer, sputtering when his furious hand motion caused the bottle to tip faster than he was ready for.

Ready for…He was ready. Hell, he’d been planning on shopping for a ring. A fucking ring. She’d even fooled his family, his own mother. Lilith couldn’t pull that off. She was good. An expert.

He glanced at his watch, knew that she’d have her planning-and-lunch period soon. He was headed over to the school anyway, might as well make it worth his while.

His half-finished beer clinked down on the coffee table and he gauged his ability to handle the drive. Deeming himself road-worthy, he changed his shirt, grabbed a new jacket and headed over to the school.

They were going to settle it, and now.

“Thank you, Mr. Mitchell.”

Chris took the final test from the last student, who’d taken ten minutes over class time to finish his exam. Her next period was her lunch break, so it wasn’t a huge deal. But it still sucked away some of her much-needed alone time.

She was filing the test alphabetically when she heard the teen say, “Hey, Coach Wallace,” on his way out the door. Glancing up, she smiled at Brett, who stood in the doorway, arms folded.

“Hey, what’s going on?”

He stayed silent, eyes searching her face as if she had food from lunch stuck to her cheek. Trying to be nonchalant, she brushed a hand along her cheek and jaw line to see if she’d somehow left some of her breakfast on her face. “So, are you here to watch game tape?”

He pushed off the door jamb and stalked into the room, placing his palms solidly on her desk. Leaning in, he asked, “Who the hell did you think you were fooling?”

She started to laugh, wondering what game he was playing, but the look in his eye stopped her short. His mouth was tight, throwing his cheekbones into relief. His brows furrowed. And his eyes, the expression in those eyes said he wouldn’t spit on her if she were on fire. What the hell had happened in the last eight hours?

“Brett, if you have something to say, I’d rather you saved it for later.”

“There is no later.”

Four words, one shot through the heart. The end, which loomed over them from day one, had come. Too soon. It felt too soon. She didn’t want to give it up. But the way Brett was standing over her like a pissed-off Viking made her suddenly wonder exactly why it was over when, just that morning, he’d tried to coax her into sex in the shower.

She schooled her voice, forcing the panic out. “That’s your choice, of course. I’m not sure why you’re angry, but you have the right to walk away. Those were part of the rules. So, now that I know, if you wouldn’t mind…” She tugged on some papers trapped under his large hand, but they didn’t budge. Tears clogged her throat and she was terrified she would burst into hysterical sobs in front of him.

Do not let him see you cry. Hold it together. Keep your dignity.

“That’s all you have to say to me?” He snorted. “Figures. Why stay with a sinking ship, right? Gotta find the next meal ticket, can’t afford to deal with something that isn’t working.”

Sinking ship? Meal ticket…oh God. The news report. He must have seen the replay of the newscast and put Christina Parsons together with Chris St. James.
Play dumb.

“I don’t know what you mean. If you think back a few weeks, you’ll recall that we both agreed to the terms of our affair. If someone wanted out, we made it as simple as possible. You want out, and I won’t cause a scene because of it.”

She couldn’t fight the burning any longer, so she grabbed the nearest file and walked to the drawers in the back of her classroom. Thick footsteps, muted on the industrial carpet, warned her he was following close behind. Blinking furiously to rid herself of the tears, she opened the drawer and fiddled around until she filed the papers—incorrectly—and shut the drawer with a snap.

His hand grabbed her arm, twirled her around. Oh, why hadn’t she put her heels on before she made this walk? She, the woman who was always so tall, felt tiny all of a sudden.

“You’re right. We did have rules, most of them were yours. I never intended to follow them. Know why?” He didn’t give her the chance to answer before he barreled on. “Because I never thought I needed them. I knew I wanted a relationship with you, that we were going somewhere. I was just waiting for you to catch up.”

Huh? What? He was waiting for her to…She couldn’t follow where he was leading. Sidestepping around him, she headed back to her desk. Back to the shelter of having something large and metal between them. Her butt had barely hit the cushion when he picked up where he’d left off.

“And to find out the whole time, I was the idiot. I thought I was waiting for you to catch up, but you were light years ahead of me. Scouting out your next pro guy, right?” Steam should have been coming out of his ears. He paced up one row, down the other, never still. His muscled arms were almost flailing as he gestured. “Oh, I must have been a big step down for you, already retired. I was good enough for a filler though, right? Bide some time before you figure out the next guy?”

Overacting, party of one, your table is now available.

“Not good enough to stick with forever, but enough to add a notch to your fairy princess bed post. ’Cause you certainly didn’t get anything out of me that was worth a damn.”

I got an “I love you.”
Apparently it didn’t matter, though, since he was so quick to judge. Sure, she could have told him her history at some point, but that was her business. He didn’t need to know.

And now my pride cost me the man I love.

But since pride was all she had to hold on to anymore, she kept her chin up and said, “I think you should leave. This isn’t a proper conversation for school, and I’m not really liking your tone.”

“So you’re not going to deny it.”

She couldn’t. She’d dated another pro athlete before him and had hidden it. What was there to deny?

Looking him dead in the eye, she shrugged one shoulder, as if it didn’t matter. Didn’t matter. Right. Like it didn’t feel as if she had to move a fifty-pound weight for that one careless shrug. “You’ve made up your mind about me. And you clearly know I dated Dax. There’s nothing more to discuss from here.”

As she said Dax’s name, fire snapped in his eyes. “I can’t believe how wrong I was about you.” He stared at her a few seconds more, like she was something he’d stepped in, and she fought the urge to squirm. Then his fist banged the desk once and he left her room.

She expected him to slam the door, but the soft click of the latch was almost worse. She walked to the door, turned the lock, went back to her desk. Moving things around, she crossed her arms over the top of the cool surface, laid her head down and let the silent tears come.

He couldn’t focus. No matter what he was doing, his thoughts were with her.

Her, the traitorous liar. The schemer. The beautiful con artist. The adorable player. The sexy…

Oh, hell. He couldn’t even focus on being properly pissed. But damn, did she have to burrow under his skin like that? Even now that he had a reason to hate her, he couldn’t. Maybe it was because every time he conjured up a picture in his mind, he didn’t see her wearing a T-shirt that said Gold Digger.

Instead she was on the side of the court, screaming encouragement to her players. Or hunched over the kitchen table outlining the best teaching method for the remedial students. Or wearing his baggy sweatpants like they were the latest fashion craze. Or wearing nothing but a sheet in bed, hair spread out on the pillow, smiling like she had a secret—

“Coach!”

Fuck. He was getting a hard-on in the middle of the game. A playoff game. His head snapped up and he glanced at Steve, who looked annoyed. “What?”

“You gonna call a time-out here, soon?” He’d asked the question mildly enough, but his face said,
What the hell is wrong with you?

“Yeah, yeah a time-out. Signal the QB.”

With only four minutes left in the fourth quarter and the score tied at fourteen a piece, they needed every bit of time to put them within field goal range, or preferably a touchdown. And he’d almost missed an important opportunity because his head was stuck up his own ass. The team didn’t deserve less than a hundred percent from him.

Using every trick in the book, he worked hard to keep thoughts of Chris out of his mind, and was rewarded when a field goal brought the team to a three-point lead in the final seconds of the game.

The team was moving on.

So why couldn’t he?

Almost two hours later, he was too pissed to go home alone, but not sure where to go. He drove mindlessly and without aim, and twenty minutes later was idling in Jared and Katie’s driveway.

It was late, and Katie was most likely asleep already. Pregnant women slept a lot, right? His sisters-in-law always slept like twenty hours a day when they were knocked up. He should go.

The SUV didn’t make the move to back up. Apparently his Escalade couldn’t read minds.

He was reaching for the shift when a knock on his window startled him. Jared was standing outside his door, looking confused and slightly harassed.

Brett rolled down the window. “Sorry, I know it’s late. I just…” There was no way to finish that, and his forehead dropped to the steering wheel. “Sorry, man. Did I wake Katie up?”

“She told me to tell you if you’re going to come over, then come over. Don’t sit in the driveway like a creepy stalker all night. So turn off the car and get your ass inside.” And with that, his best friend turned on his heel and walked back in through the front door, leaving it propped open for him.

He had the greatest friends in the world. He turned off the ignition and followed, taking his shoes off in the entryway. Gestation had made Katie a germaphobe and he wasn’t willing to endure her lecture on the dangers of dirt particles in newborn baby lungs. Again. Following the dim light, he trailed into the kitchen to find Jared sitting at the table, two beers waiting. He slumped down into the chair and took a long swig.

“You look like shit.” Jared’s assessment was quick and said with the confidence of decades of friendship.

“See, that’s what best friends are for.” He tipped the bottle in mock salute and took another pull. “Nobody knows how to lift your spirits like a true buddy.”

“You want me to shove some sunshine up your butt? Not gonna do it, and you know that.” Jared rolled the beer between his hands, staring at it like it was a puzzle to figure. “Could you just apologize?”

Jared knew about the fight because, thanks to a moment of insanity, he’d got piss-drunk and blabbed the entire, embarrassing thing at his house two days afterward.

Of course, when he relived the story, he left out the fact that he’d needed someone else to point out the mistake he’d made. He just let Jared assume he’d figured out Chris’s evil motives on his own.

The bottle made a thick clunking sound as he set it down, stared at Jared like he was crazy. “Apologize for what? For not finding out the truth faster? For being an idiot and not seeing the signs sooner?”

“For jumping to conclusions?”

He turned to see Katie, wrapped in a fuzzy robe, her nightgown-clad belly sticking through the opening. Her eyes were heavy with sleep, she was shuffling instead of walking, and she yawned as she made her way to the counter and grabbed a loaf of French bread. While she spoke, she cut off a piece with a bread knife.

“Do you know anything about Christina’s past? Anything at all?”

Her sharp tone, along with glint of light bouncing off the steel blade, made for an intimidating opponent. “Not really, but that’s her fault. She never said a word about her family, other than she didn’t speak to her parents often. That’s it. I know you two met in college. The end.”

Katie reached in, grabbed some butter and started spreading. “Perhaps not everyone had a happy childhood like you did, Brett. I know your father died when you were young, but beyond that, you were always loved. Right?”

“Yeah.” Where was she going with this?

“Never felt like your parents wouldn’t love you if you didn’t win the big game? If you cost your team the victory?”

“I think you know the answer to that, Katie.”

“Yeah, I do. Which is why I know it’s hard for you to understand because you have tunnel vision. We all do, it happens.” She ripped off a hunk of buttered bread and popped it in her mouth. Talking around the wad of food—something only a very pregnant woman could pull off and still remain formidable—she said, “There’s one important fact that would really make you think twice about automatically labeling her a pro-ho.”

“Yeah, what’s that?” He took a swallow of beer.

“She was a pro. Hold the ho.”

The beer he’d just swallowed took a detour up his nose as he choked on the liquid. Sputtering, he grabbed for the paper towel Katie handed him and mopped up the dribbles down his chin. “Repeat that, please?”

“Chris played on the pro tennis circuit for a few years right out of high school.” She took another large bite of bread, chewed and swallowed. “She was never higher than twenty-five in the ranking, so anyone who wasn’t big in tennis wouldn’t have heard of her.”

Brett felt like he’d been punched in the head. “Why, I mean, how…” How did someone as hot as Chris slip under the radar?

“She used her mother’s maiden name. Parsons. And of course it stands to reason that the people she would be surrounded by most were other athletes, both male and female. Hence, that made up her dating pool. She didn’t have to go searching an athlete out. She was swimming in them. What she would have had to try hard to find was an average Joe. Of course she dated an athlete.” Another hunk of bread disappeared as Katie continued her late-night snack.

“Honey, do you think you should be eating this late at night?”

Daggers flew from her eyes, and Jared immediately huddled farther into his chair.

“Bad move, bro,” Brett muttered under his breath.

“I am currently donating my body to the baby. Baby. Incubator. Being a baby incubator makes me hungry. And when I’m hungry, I’m cranky. When I’m cranky, we all suffer. Do you seriously want to tell me not to eat right now?”

“I love you?” he said weakly, taking a sip of beer.

“Uh huh.” She turned back to Brett, and he fought the urge to shrink into his own chair. “Despite what any normal, reasonable person would deem a successful pro career—because really, how many people can say they were ranked among the top thirty women in the world in anything?—Chris was ashamed. Her parents raised her to believe that anything less than number one was worthless. So, she kept her time in the pros quiet.” Polishing off the last of the bread, she dusted her hands off then put her palms behind her on the counter. Her weight shifted, and she looked like she was about to jump up to sit on the counter, then thought better of it. A sheepish look crossed her face. “Forgot.”