by Sabrina York
Witnesses stated one of the boyfriend’s gang buddies pulled out a gun and shot Nate in the leg. Rick, Nate’s former teammate on a half-assed Scottish team and one of the youngest guys on the Black Jacks, had shown up and body tackled the guy with the gun. By the time they were pulled apart, Rick had a bullet lodged in his heart. He’d died on the scene.
Sophie shuddered and cranked the heat up in the car. The thought of dealing with death, or near death, in a hospital, caused her gut to churn. Her face burned, but she had a small flutter of anticipation, knowing that he, Robert, would be at the hospital too. At that moment, she allowed a tiny lick of hope to hit her chest—before stuffing it down deep under plenty of reality checks and touching her stomach and the scar that lay there, a constant reminder of her previous misjudgment about men.
Chaos reigned as one might expect at a Detroit hospital on an early Saturday morning. Sophie bitched her way past security, making several vain attempts to get someone to help her locate her group. Coming in through emergency probably wasn’t the best plan, but she felt muddled, already spinning the dead soccer player story out in a thousand different ways and coming up with nothing good at the end of it.
After being shuttled around between floors, she finally found Rafe and Metin, huddled around someone who must be a surgeon. She faltered, braced herself against the wall as tidal waves of memory washed over her. Swallowing the urge to bolt, she noted how distressed both the coach and manager appeared by whatever the scrub-suited doctor in front of them had to say. She needed to rally, to be in charge. She set her shoulders and walked toward them. Both men seemed visibly relieved to see her there, which bolstered her. But she kept glancing around, seeking Brody. By the time she reached them, Metin had dropped into a seat.
Rafe pulled her aside. “He hates hospitals. His…you know his story, right?”
She stared at him, at a total loss. Metin Sevim’s personal horror story had been national news for months, not only in the sports world. She touched Metin’s shoulder.
Then, she spotted him—Brody, dressed in the trousers and shirt he’d worn the night before. She took a breath and allowed for the fact that the sight of him made her knees a little unreliable. He stood, talking with some hospital flunky, then spent a few minutes on the phone before acknowledging her. The relief in his eyes at that split second gave her another boost of confidence. She tried not to appear so obviously happy to see him, considering the shit circumstances.
“Hey.” His calm voice jarred her, as if they had not spent an hour or so not long ago, naked, with her mouth-fucking and hand-jobbing him to climax, then kicking him out of her Dominatrix lair for no good reason.
She smiled, trying to keep it on a business level, but her heart did a painful tap dance in her chest and words caught in her throat.
“So, we have to contact their next of kin. I assume you have that info?” He dropped into a seat next to his coach, who still sat, shell-shocked and green around the edges.
She pointed to the slim briefcase slung over her shoulder. “Got everything here. Where can we go?”
Brody glanced up at the ceiling then leveled his gaze at her, giving her another jolt of surreal emotion. “I’ve arranged for a private room so we can all be on the call. Rick’s folks are in Florida. He told me once. I’m not sure about Nate’s. Still in Scotland, I think.”
“Okay.” She didn’t see any point to delay. “Let’s get this done. They need to be here to figure out what do with…with…” She blinked back tears and put a hand to her lips, embarrassed. Brody rose slowly, put an arm around her and as if it was the most natural thing in the world, pulled her into a tight embrace.
“How’s Nate?” she finally asked, into his chest, hoping he’d never let her go.
Metin got to his feet. “He’s gonna make it. One leg is broken all to hell. I don’t know. Jesus. Fuck.” He stared at Brody. “What the hell are we gonna do?”
Sophie looked from Metin’s anguished face to Brody’s set in a stubborn way she’d never seen. Realization dawned. The Black Jacks had a long run of away games, a West Coast tour playing some of their league teams but ending with a crucial exhibition game against the Mexican national team. Something Metin had scheduled as a bit of a why the hell not? Before, of course, his star goalie had a concussion, and the back-up keeper just got shot by a gangbanger in a bar while being a hero.
“Oh, no you will not,” she declared, loudly. “I…I mean. He can’t play.” She pointed to Brody.
He frowned at her. “Let’s not talk about that now.”
Metin tucked his hands in pockets. Rafe cleared his throat. She rolled her eyes.
“C’mon.” Brody guided her away from the group. “Let’s get set up in the conference room and make these calls.”
Rafe and Metin followed them, but they were all interrupted by a commotion from the opposite end of the hall. Parker, the team’s captain, dashed down the hall, dragging Nicolas Garza with him. Brody frowned at the sight of them. Then he motioned for the men to join them in the stuffy, windowless room where they’d call one set of parents to tell them their twenty-four-year-old, soccer-playing son had been killed. And another, to tell them theirs lived, but barely.
“What are we gonna do about a keeper?” Nicco blurted out, bringing a nice level of awkward to the already tense room, while staring straight at Brody.
“Gee, Garza, not sure. Since you and your bullshit put Vaughn on ice.” Rafe’s tone made it clear how he felt about Nicco’s sudden concern.
“We’ll have to figure that out later. It’s not a priority right now,” Brody said with the sort of authority that shut everyone else up.
And with that, she understood that Robert J. Vaughn would be returning to his spot in goal within the week. The team needed him, medical advice be damned.
He leaned into her, his eyes intense. “It will be fine,” he said, low-voiced, for her ears only.
She shivered. Had she spoken out loud? He touched her leg under the table, just a brush of skin, but in it he transferred the oddest sensation directly to her nervous system. A sudden calm settled over her brain, allowing her to focus. She had a job to do. Concentrating on the task at hand, she got to work.
Chapter Thirteen
When the team took the field for the last game on the grueling west coast tour, Brody had about convinced himself the whole concussion thing must be a bunch of alarmist nonsense from doctors worried about lawsuits. He’d never played better. Granted, he got headaches with predictable regularity but he learned to coast through with painkillers and long stretches of sleep. The trainers evaluated him before and after every match, using the head injury protocol for acute concussion, and he always passed with flying colors.
Sustaining a loss with the death of one player and injury of another seemed to calm some of the roiling conflict between the pro and anti-homosexual team member camps, too. Thank god for small favors.
Brody took practice shots while warming up for the final exhibition game. He had little hope they would do much more than hold their own against a strong Mexican national team that had defeated the U.S. men’s team twice already that year. But the Black Jacks were on a bit of a roll having won every single match in their expansion league, so hopefully they would carry some momentum into this day.
Above all the tragedy, hard work, grueling road trips, and newly annoying headaches, something soothing had settled over his psyche. The sort of peace he hadn’t experienced since Nashville but one that had a decidedly different and healthier vibe to it, due in no small part to the fact he had struck up a nightly conversation with Sophie via the Internet. His skin flushed thinking about her, how her tightly wound personality appealed to him, how hard she worked to transmit strength while yearning for someone to be strong for her at the same time.
He truly enjoyed talking with her. Light flirty chatter, never actually touching on their one steamy encounter, but digging into their backgrounds a little, just enough, mixed with news of the team. He
anticipated it every day. It grounded him pure and simple. He wasn’t even sure what he wanted from her anymore other than just that—someone to actually talk to, to share things with—although his wild, erotic dreams of her lithe, naked body certainly kept his hand busy every night afterward.
“Ow!” he yelped when a ball hit him in the chest. “Shit.” He kicked the thing back out and focused on his day job for a while.
So, nice save. Too bad our forwards didn’t convert.
Sophie’s first Skype message of the night brought a smile to his face. Wincing, he swallowed some painkillers and downed water before dropping into the hotel chair, sick of hotels and this whole trip. The damn game had been so close…right up until the last two or three minutes. He’d made an incredible save and set the midfield up for a great set-piece play, but a forward had stumbled, tripped by an opposing player who went unnoticed by the officials, effectively blowing the scoring opportunity.
The game had ended a 0-0 draw, which many Black Jack fans considered a victory if the blog and Twitter chatter were to be believed. He, however, refused to accept tie games, believing them unfinished business unless settled by a shoot-out. But as a friendly exhibition, they’d agreed not to take it there and all had shaken hands and moved off the field, exhausted but mostly satisfied.
A nervous, jittery energy coursed through him at the thought of seeing her again. He had no way of understanding it, having spent nearly three years in service to a Mistress who had trained him as her perfect submissive: pliable, eager to please, needy while with Her but master of his destiny otherwise. However, he had been turning over those experiences in his head lately and no longer believed it as clear-cut as that. He may have enjoyed getting off by learning to control orgasm and how to please a woman but…something about the whole thing no longer rang so true. As a matter of fact, it felt a little sordid, tainted with the distance of time.
Sustaining a low-lying level of nausea he attributed to low blood sugar, he typed out a reply. Yeah. And how. Lazy fuckers.
I know you don’t like games to end in a draw, but everyone seemed a little gassed. Probably could use the break.
What’s the latest with Nate? he asked, still trying to shake the strange carsick feeling torturing his equilibrium.
He’s out of intensive care. His mom is with him. They’ll release him in a few days, I think, with a long round of PT and a fistful of Vicodin. Speaking of which, how’s the noggin?
Hurts kinda. Thinking I might have to do something drastic to distract myself. He sat back, took deep breaths, as the dizzy sensation slowly faded.
Oh? Like what? Take a nap?
Maybe…after…. He didn’t know why he’d decided to take their usual friendly, informational exchange banter to a different level, but his ears buzzed with a familiar urge and the rest of him tingled in anticipation.
So…want some help with it?
He grinned, pleased she hadn’t shied away.
Her next words took some of the shine off that. I mean, in a friendly sort of rub-down-after-a-hard-game way. Madame K says no charge for you.
I don’t want Madame K.
His phone buzzed immediately at his elbow. Sophie’s number appeared on the screen, and he spent a few seconds staring at it, thinking he’d just ignore her and take that nap which sounded pretty good. But he didn’t. He’d had better training than that.
“Yes?” He reached under the towel. Might as well finish what he started.
“Robert,” she purred. “Robert, you have been bad.” She kept talking, and he kept listening. “I never came that night, you know? I do not like that, not a bit.”
He drowned in her words, groaning and crying out at the last minute as the climax gripped his spine. He lay back, relaxed, but pissed off at the same time. He still held the phone to his ear with his other hand.
“Madame, thank you.”
“My pleasure, Robert.” She hung up before letting him return the favor, which he had fully intended to do. He glanced at the computer screen. Her Skype icon read offline.
“Goddamn you, Sophie.” He sighed as sleep coated his nerves. Getting to his feet, he dropped face down on the bed, heading straight into a dreamless, restless sleep. He woke at two a.m., sweaty and breathless in the pitch black room.
He’d dreamed of his Mistress again, but instead of the beautiful savior he always took her for, she’d opened her robe to reveal a skeletal, burned carcass that lunged at him, forcing him to do things to her even as he swore he could not take another minute. Sitting up fast, the dizziness hit him hard. He stumbled for the bathroom and after emptying his stomach, he crouched on the cool tile floor, legs clasped tight to his body.
He’d been such a fool. Would he ever have a normal relationship? Did he even know what that felt like? He’d been ignoring Kelli for so long he hoped she got the message, but even that seemed wrong. Why not Kelli, now that he had a better grasp on what had been done to him in college? Why not indeed?
Groaning, he leaned into the toilet to puke once more, hoping the demon he harbored would exit the same way, and leave him in peace.
I like it when you call me Robert. He sent her a text the next morning on the team bus to the airport almost by rote, as if communicating with a girlfriend or wife.
Where did Brody come from anyway? She replied as if they’d not ended their conversation the night before with a phone sex hand job for him and silence from her.
Not even sure really. As long as I can remember, I’ve been Brody, although that makes for a bit of pain in the ass on legal docs. I do know one of my foster parents insisted on calling me Bobby Joe, which I fucking hated.
Ah, so the J is for Joseph?
Yep. Bobby Joe from the Tennessee hills, parentless, soccer-playing, straight-A student. With all my teeth.
I love your accent, she replied, surprising him.
He glanced around the bus at his teammates. Half of them slept with ear buds stuck in their ears, the other half tapped messages on phones or small computers, likely doing their marketing-department-required social networking for the day, reminding him he had not logged onto either Facebook or Twitter for over a week.
Another message from her arrived. Were you treated badly in foster care?
He took a breath, trying to decide how to relate that being shuttled around like a library book didn’t exactly constitute being treated well in the first place. And how much he should actually tell her about the dirty apartments, often drunk or high parents, sometimes abusive temporary brothers, and the general unwanted feeling he still lugged around with him, no matter how far into adulthood he got.
No. It was no fun, but nothing overtly abusive, I don’t guess. He shifted and winced when pain shot up from his shoulder into the base of his skull. That damn shoulder needed therapy. The head-cracker he’d gotten from Nicco and Cody had forced him to focus on the condition of his brain pain long enough to neglect the long-standing injury he had sustained when his Mistress had shackled him overnight, arms over his head, claiming he had failed to service her properly. An event he’d only half-remembered until that very moment.
God, she had really fucked with him. Three years, such a blur of intensity and discovery and emotional and physical abuse. Only the briefest full memories would emerge now, as if he’d been chipping away at the wall holding them back, and they’d started to drip, slowly, into his consciousness. The shoulder thing he had chalked up to falling too many times on it in goal. But it had been her, his Mistress, who had bestowed that on him as punishment. And he had let her. A shiver shot down his spine.
Well, it must have been awful, not knowing where you’d be living month to month.
He blinked at that. Then again when she sent a second message on top of it:
I’m so sorry you had to go through it. It makes me mad, thinking of you as a little boy being tossed from house to house for the foster parent’s monetary benefit.
Yeah. Well, I turned out all right, I guess. It made me flexible, e
motionally speaking.
He wasn’t even sure why he said such a thing, and wished he had the nerve to say what he wanted to right then: that it had been the worst sort of awful, terrible, and left him with a giant, empty hole in the middle of his chest most days. Mainly because he had zero frame of reference for what it meant to have a healthy relationship with another person.
I know you did. See you soon…Bobby Joe.
Don’t even think about calling me that…Sophie Lynn.
WTF? How did you…never mind. Safe trip.
He smiled and typed his final message before he lost his nerve. I miss you. Can we go out…maybe to dinner or something when I get back?
Her response was nearly instantaneous. Probably not. He frowned then another message hit the screen. Maybe.
Taking that at face value, he settled into sleep, hoping to ward off the creeping onset of another headache.
Chapter Fourteen
It started when he hit the ground from the West Coast tour, well, before that actually. She realized this as she opened her front door to discover a delivery boy clutching two-dozen red roses and a note:
I won’t give up until you let me buy you dinner, RJV
She scoffed and sent him a Skype message informing him of her rose allergy, but assuring him the ladies in the front office enjoyed the flowers. He ignored her a solid three days after that. Once she got over being impressed at his self-control, she forced away any sort of silly, girlie giddiness at the thought of a man sending her flowers.
Hope equaled a recipe for disappointment, she reminded herself, touching her scar through her clothes nearly a hundred times a day keeping that mantra going. She had loved Him, her Dom, the man of her dreams. And while he had not abused her physically, at least any more than she would allow him to, he had been a lying, stealing SOB who had, in the end, nearly killed her. No, she would not go out with Robert Joseph Vaughn. She simply could not afford to risk her soul that way.
