by Violet Paige
“No, sir.”
“Well, I have to say, Dr. Ashworth is an amazing surgeon. I’ve never seen a recovery like this.”
I grinned. “She is pretty amazing.”
He looked at me over the rim of his glasses. “Yes, the hospital rumor mill said something about you two being an item.”
“I think your rumor mill is accurate.”
The man nodded. “Thought so. I wondered why she handed you over to me so quickly.” He laughed. “Doesn’t matter. She did the right thing. She has strong ethics and standards. And she is an excellent surgeon.”
I wasn’t used to feeling pride for someone else. But I did. My heart almost burst with it. My little sex vixen was a fucking genius, and everyone around here knew it. I needed to do something for her.
“You’ll sign off for me, won’t you?” I towered over the doctor, but I didn’t think intimidation was necessary this time. I had proven my hand functioned fine. I could play in the Sunday game.
“Not a problem. The AFA and the Wranglers will be happy you’re back.” He handed the freshly inked document to me.
“Thanks. Do you know if Dr. Ashworth is out of surgery?”
He shook his head. “No, she’s probably got another two hours ahead of her, but I’ll tell her you stopped by.”
“That’s okay. I’ll talk to her tonight.”
We had a lot to celebrate. I had my medical clearance. And I owed most of it to the sexiest woman in this hospital.
Lennon walked through the door looking exhausted. I threw a kitchen towel over my shoulder and shoved a glass of wine in her hand.
“Here.” I kissed her on the neck.
“Thanks.” She kicked off her shoes and sat on the couch in her scrubs. “I’m going to drink this and then take a shower.”
I turned my attention to the pot of boiling water on the stove. I could make one dish, and Lennon was getting ready to try it.
“So, I heard you caused quite the commotion at the hospital today.”
“Really?” I poured in a box of pasta and set the timer.
“Were you there for your follow-up physical with Dr. Evans?”
“No, I got my clearance for the AFA.”
She jumped from the couch. “What in the hell are you talking about? It’s not even close to six weeks.”
I rotated my right hand in front of her. “Look, I’m fine. You’re an amazing surgeon. I’m ready to play.”
“Play?” She choked. “You think you’re going to play with that hand? You’re fucking crazy.”
I liked it when she said fuck. Such a dirty word on a pretty, luscious mouth.
“Calm down. My doctor cleared me.”
Her hands were on her hips. I knew that livid look in her eye. “I didn’t clear you.”
“But you’re not my doctor, are you? You handed me off to Dr. Evans and he and my therapist have signed all the paperwork.”
Before I knew what she was doing, she grabbed my right hand. I didn’t flinch. “Let me look at that.”
She twisted it in front of her, drawing imaginary lines with her fingers between the bones. She made a cross over my knuckles and applied pressure at my fingertips.
“And this doesn’t hurt you?”
I shook my head. “Not at all.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What did you do? This is impossible.”
“Do?” I pulled my hand back.
I had made the decision that I wasn’t dragging her into this. As far as she was concerned, she needed to think I was a medical miracle. The kind of man who could heal with the speed of The Flash.
“Yes, what did you do? Best case scenario you had a six to eight week recovery period and then you would start rehab. We talked about it, Wes. This isn’t possible.”
“Well, I’m fine. The hand works great. See?” I waved with all fingers and my thumb. “I’m lucky I had such a kick ass surgeon who could stitch me back together.”
Her lips puckered together. “I don’t buy it. What are you not telling me?”
“Let it go, Lennon.” I stirred the pasta in the pot. I miscalculated this conversation.
She walked around the kitchen island. “I can’t. I know you took something. You did something. Who helped you? Where did you get it?”
I shook my head. “Stop. Stop.”
“How could you do this? How could you jeopardize your career like this? Your health? Do you even know what you took? The side effects?”
“It’s none of your damn business. You’re not my doctor, you made sure of that.”
“Yeah, because you wanted to date me.” She stormed out of the kitchen.
“Where are you going?”
“To take a shower.” She slammed my bedroom door in my face, but I walked in after her.
“Take a breath, and calm the fuck down.” It was the wrong thing to say. I knew it when she pivoted toward me, blue eyes blazing.
“I’m trying to get some space. I’m trying to calm down, but you’re following me. I don’t even know what to say to you right now.”
“How about that you’re happy my hand works?”
She scowled. “If the AFA finds out that your medical miracle is really medical intervention, are you still going to have that smug look on your face?”
“It is a medical miracle. I had an excellent surgeon.”
“You’re sticking to that ludicrous story? Really?” She walked into the bathroom, throwing her top on the floor and wiggling out of her pants. She turned on the water.
“It’s what happened. I’m playing Sunday and I want you to be there.”
She opened the glass shower door, closing it so there was a barrier between us.
“I might have to pick up a shift on Sunday.”
I studied her in the shower. Her beautiful skin glistening under the running water. Her breasts dripping. My favorite slice of heaven between her thighs guiding the water down her legs. I licked my lips.
I reached for the handle, but she stopped me. “No. You’re not coming in here.”
“Come on, Doc. Stop being so pissed. I just asked you to sit in my box on Sunday. Aren’t you going to give me an answer?”
“Right now, I am going to wash my day off of me, and that includes your insane idea to pretend that I don’t know the real story behind your recovery. I don’t know if I’m more angry that you did it, or more angry that you’re lying to my face.”
It hit me in the gut. I knew I was a liar. I knew I would cross lines. I crossed them all the time. But to have this woman, who I craved like nothing else, throw it in my face, gave me a jolt of reality. My lies never affected other people, and all of a sudden, I realized they did.
I pressed my palm against the glass. “Enjoy the shower. Dinner will be ready in a few.”
I walked out of the bathroom, fighting every instinct I had. The one to take her the way I wanted. The one to break down and tell her the truth. The one that was in the back of my throat: telling her I didn’t want to disappoint her.
16
Lennon
I’d never scrubbed my skin so hard. What in the hell was he thinking? And why hadn’t I noticed the past week or longer that his hand was healing faster than any natural process? He wore his sling and acted like it bothered him. He tried to throw me off. That might have pissed me off the most.
I cut the hot water and reached for a towel. In a short amount of time, I had basically moved into Wes’s apartment. He had taken one look at my rented extended stay and decided I needed a place with a view, and preferably one with a view of him.
I arrived with an entirely new wardrobe and my own closet. Dating a highly paid quarterback had its advantages. He was a millionaire on top of having a rock hard body and eyes that stirred every impulse under my skin.
And the sex. God, the sex. There was nothing like it. There never had been, and I knew that the day Wes walked out of my life, I’d never have anything like it again. That was the problem. I knew this was temporary. There would be a day when
we’d both wake up and realize there was no way we were compatible.
He’d never had a girlfriend before. Why did I think he’d suddenly change now? It was insane to think he wanted commitment and all the things that came with it. I laughed. This was probably the first time he’d had an actual argument with a woman and didn’t kick her out. Ben and I fought. That’s what regular couples did.
We fought about what movie to watch or whose parents were more annoying. We fought about what shifts we should work, and who should buy groceries. But had we ever fought about an ethical and moral issue? Had Ben and I ever fought about something that mattered like this?
I toweled off my hair, slipped on Wes’s jersey and a pair of yoga pants, and trotted off to face him.
I sat on the barstool. He plated a pasta dish and placed it in front of me. “Dinner.”
“Smells good.” I picked up my wine glass. “We have to finish this discussion. You know that, right?”
“I know that I’ve said everything I want to say. And I don’t expect you to keep questioning me.”
I fought back the anger and tried to remind myself he was new at this. “Whatever it is we’re doing here, Wes. This thing between us… it’s not going to include lies. I’m not compromising on that.”
He gripped his fork. “You knew what you were getting into with me. I drink. I gamble. I sleep around. Uh, used to sleep around. I cross lines that have to be crossed so we can win. I do the things that other people don’t want to do.”
“What is it with you and winning? Damn it, Wes. Winning isn’t everything.”
He slammed the fork on the counter. “Yes it is. You don’t get it. You don’t understand my life, or what it’s taken for me to get here. You live in a happy black and white land where you get to save people and put them back together. It’s my job to tear them down. To trample and stomp. To tackle and defeat. That’s my life. I’ve fought for everything I have. Every victory. Every dollar. Every single damn thing. Everything.”
“Hey, hey. I’m not judging you.” I saw the flames in his eyes. The vein on the side of his neck was throbbing. “Tell me. Just tell me. Explain it. All of it.”
He hunched back in his seat, letting an expansive breath escape his chest. “It’s not a great story. Let’s just let it go. I don’t want to fight with you.”
I pulled his right hand into my lap. Something desperate had made him do what he did. And I knew enough about my connection to him that I wanted to understand it. I wanted to know what would drive a man who had everything to risk it all. Put his health at stake. I still had no idea what he had taken, and that scared me.
I traced the side of his jaw. “No. I’m not letting it go. I care about you. And if we’re doing this, then I’m here for all of it. Not just the sex and the beautiful clothes.” I smiled. “Although, those are nice perks.”
“The truth comes out.”
“It always does.” My thumb rubbed his bottom lip. “You can trust me. Talk to me. I want to know why you have to win.”
“Huh. I think that’s the first time someone has asked me that. Doesn’t everyone want to win? Isn’t an instinct?”
I shook my head. “Not at the risk of everything. There’s something driving you. I see it. I feel it. It’s even with me. You wanted to win me over.”
“And I did.” He winked.
“Yeah, you did. And here we are. So, I’m asking you, where does it come from?”
He closed his eyes. “This is fucking hard.”
My heart pounded. I wanted to pull him to my chest and cradle him and tell him he could trust me with everything. Even if he had done something I thought was completely unethical. But that wasn’t really the problem. Whatever he had done to regenerate his hand wasn’t the core issue. It came from something far deeper. There was something Wes wasn’t telling me.
“Where does all this come from?” I pressed him for an answer. Some kind of explanation.
I had seen two sides of him. There was the competitor. The cocky bastard who wanted people to fall at his feet. The man who dominated me in the bedroom. The womanizer. The reckless millionaire who threw money around.
And then there was this man in front of me. The one who had cooked dinner for me after I had a hard day at the hospital. The one who made sure I had everything I needed. The one who sent flowers and kissed me like every kiss was making him whole again. That man was the reason I was here. That man was the reason I slept under his sheets and wore his jersey.
I waited, trying to be patient. Trying to understand why it was so hard for him to open up. He wasn’t used to this.
“You’re not from Texas, Doc.”
I shook my head. “No, this has all been a culture shock.”
“What you have to understand is that football is life here. My dad shoved a helmet on my head and a set of pads on me when the ball was still bigger than my head. He had me run drills on Saturday mornings at 6am when most kids were still sleeping. I threw the ball until it was time for dinner. He hired a private coach when I was eight. I was scouted by the time I was twelve.” Wes’s eyes hardened. “It didn’t matter to him if I liked football or not, I was going to be a champion.”
“But did you like it? Did you want to play?” I tried to imagine a younger version of the strong man sitting in front of me, spending his every waking minute on a football field instead of playing Chutes and Ladders or watching cartoons.
“I didn’t know what I wanted. He didn’t ask. I never had a choice. By the time I was in high school, I was already getting scholarship offers for top schools. It was a no brainer. Football was in my blood by then. It was my life and I kept riding the train.”
“But you love it now?” I questioned.
“It’s who I am. I can’t separate it. I don’t even think about it. I live and breathe football. I always have.”
I touched his hand, the one I had so carefully put back together. I didn’t know what lengths he had gone through to heal it in record time, but I was starting to understand pieces of his story.
“But your dad isn’t making you do those things now, is he? You’re your own person, Wes.”
His eyes hardened. “He made me into a winner. A champion. And that’s who I am. I’m who I am because he pushed me. He made me.”
I swallowed. It sounded like brainwashing. It sounded like a child being robbed of precious years of imagination and happiness. It sounded like a tyrant parent living out his own dream vicariously through his talented son. The entire story pissed me off.
“I know it’s not the same as playing for a national team or having the world watch my every move.” Although lately, it seemed like the press was following me around. “But when I’m in surgery, I know that feeling. I want to win. I want to succeed.”
“No, that’s not the same.”
“Just hear me out.” I ran my fingers along his arm, swirling over the ink that ran the length of his bicep. “When I’m in there, I know I can’t win every time. People count on me. The patient. Their family. The surgical team under my direction. But we can’t win every time. And I have to live with that. That has to be okay. Because if it’s not, I can’t be a good surgeon. If every time something went wrong and I believed we were failures, how would I ever walk back into the next OR? How could I ever give someone else hope?” His eyes were on me, and I prayed he understood what I was saying. “Being a good surgeon means accepting loss. And I think it’s the same thing for you, too. Everything can’t be a win. There is a line drawn that isn’t worth crossing. Not for winning. Not if it means being unethical. Not if it means it will let more people down. Not if it costs you your health, or possibly your life.”
He gently brushed the hair off my shoulder. I sighed, believing I had struck a nerve with him.
“I don’t think we’re wired the same way.” His words smacked me in the face.
“You didn’t agree with any of that?”
“You were right about one thing. Being a surgeon isn’t the same as being
a quarterback. You don’t know the weight on my shoulders.” He stood and took our plates to the sink. “You don’t know what I’ll do to win.”
I looked at the empty counter, feeling the disappointment sink in. Our first fight had transformed into an emotional story, and now I couldn’t believe I’d never felt more disconnected from him than I did at this minute.
Maybe I didn’t have the warrior’s spirit to win like he did, but I wasn’t going to give up. Not yet.
17
Wes
I washed the dishes and tried to ignore Lennon’s eyes needling my neck. She didn’t know what the hell she was talking about. We were from different worlds. Surgery and football had nothing in common.
“I’ve got to go over some plays.” I turned off the kitchen light and sank into my recliner. “Coach has changed up some things.” I started flipping through the binder the messenger had sent over.
She sat on the couch, holding her wine glass, and started switching through the channels. She landed on a show about a president and his mistress.
“Could you turn that down, please? I’m studying.”
“Sorry.” She practically muted the TV.
I didn’t like this. The fight. The tension. The fact that I had done something to piss her off, when it was none of her business. I did what was necessary to win. And the Wranglers weren’t going to win with Cosech on the field. He’d made that clear last game. We had run the ball almost every play and barely won by a field goal. My return was the only way to punch our ticket to the Super Bowl.
“I think I’ll study in the bedroom.” I kicked the recliner in place and headed to my suite. This was awkward as fuck.
“Why don’t I just leave for tonight? You can study. I’ll give you some space.”
I turned in front of the double doors leading to my room. “Hell no.”
“I don’t want to pressure you, Wes. Me sitting here while you’re pissed feels like pressure. I don’t want to make this worse. We can talk tomorrow.”
I dropped the binder on the table. “That doesn’t work for me.”
