Then absolute annoyance had her stabbing a piece of chicken a little too hard. She’d been trying to get to know Scott before Chad showed up smelling like a barn and looking like a battered, sexy bull rider. But the truth was, Scott just wasn’t ringing her bell. Sure, he was handsome in a nerdy kind of way, and boy, was he built, but he wasn’t much of a conversationalist. Luckily, Ryan had been there so she could focus on him when Scott grew quiet. She preferred guys who didn’t rely on her to carry the whole conversation during a date.
She glanced at Chad, his fork stabbing the air for emphasis as he talked about formations and long passes that had led to his last division win. Scott gazed at Chad like it was love at first sight.
Maybe taking Chad to the ER would be a good way to get out of the uneasy silence that was sure to fall over them when Chad and Ryan left in a few minutes. And she really wasn’t looking forward to the awkward “good night” after the date. No way was she kissing Scott.
He’d probably rather kiss Chad anyway.
When he was done eating, Scott leaned close and said, “I’ll take Chad to the hospital. Why don’t you take Ryan home?”
Seriously? There was such a bromance going on between them, she was tempted to tell them to get a room.
Chad said, “Not necessary. Jo’ll fix me up.” He turned and smiled at her. “Ready to go home and get rough with me, babe?”
Scott frowned and looked back and forth between them, as if trying as hard as she was to figure out what Chad was up to.
She locked gazes with Chad, staring into his coffee-colored eyes filled with equal parts lust and amusement, torn between wanting to kiss him for saving her from her bad date or poking his injured shoulder again and watching him writhe in pain for being such a jerk for joining them. And for being so damned arrogant. And charming, and . . . hot.
What’s wrong with me?
Scott stood and cleared his throat, breaking the spell that staring into Chad’s eyes had cast over her. “You two clearly have unfinished business you should take care of. It was nice to meet you all. Good night.” He turned and hurried toward the door.
“Way to ruin my date.” She wasn’t really mad at Chad, but she needed him to know he’d better never do that again.
Chad shook his head and finished the last of his dinner. “He wasn’t right for you anyway. Anyone could see that. Right, Ryan?”
“He was nice.” Ryan finished off his milkshake and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “He let me order normal food.”
“Yeah.” Jo nodded. “He was nice. And clean. I can’t say the same for you.”
Chad finished off his beer. “You said I needed to get here ASAP. I was just following orders.” He sent her a smart-assed salute that made her irritated with him all over again.
“Well, for the record, you need to ask me next time, if you need a sitter. Don’t just assume I’m free.” She poked Chad’s good shoulder again to drive her point home. “Now let’s go get your dislocated shoulder fixed. It must be killing you.”
“That’s two pokes tonight. Which makes me negative one in strikes. I’ll let the pokes go if you’ll fix my shoulder.”
“No. You should have a doctor check you out. And you can pay the dinner bill too, for running off my date.” She stood and slipped her coat on, and then helped Ryan into his.
Chad slowly stood, and then threw a stack of bills onto the table. His limp was as bad as she’d ever seen it as he walked beside her. “Did you hurt your knee too?”
“Yeah. I twisted it when I was trying to get out of the hoof’s way.”
“I need to take a look at that later.” She slipped her arm around his waist to help take some of the weight off. “You’re just making things worse by not using the cane in public.”
He slung his arm around her shoulder and leaned heavily on her. “I wasn’t planning to be in public,” he growled. “I was planning to go home and take a damned shower before I fell face-first into bed. Now I’m going to have to wait for hours in the ER for them to fix what you could in five minutes!”
She couldn’t blame him for snapping at her. Dislocated shoulders were incredibly painful. “I still think you should see a doctor. Hand over your keys, please. I’ll drive.”
When he slapped them into her outstretched palm, it confirmed he was in bad shape. He never used to let her drive. It went against his man code.
She beeped the locks, helped Ryan into the backseat of the truck first, and then she stepped aside to let Chad get in. If she offered to help him too, he’d surely bite her head off.
Chad gritted his teeth and slowly worked his way into the truck, finally landing with a groan in the front seat. She shut his door and then rounded to the driver’s side and got in. Chad’s head rested against the seat, and his eyes were closed. “I’d rather you just take care of this for me.”
“You could have broken something, Chad. I might make things worse by trying to fix it.”
With his eyes still closed, he quietly said, “It’s happened before during games. I’d know if something was broken. It really hurts, Jo. Please?”
His plea for help sent a dagger to her heart. “Fine. But only if you promise you’ll go to the doctor tomorrow and get it checked out properly.”
“I have an appointment Monday morning. I’ll have the doc look at it then. Deal?”
“We’ll see how you are in the morning.” She put the truck in gear and drove toward Chad’s condo. “And the score is still negative one. I don’t want to be accused of not playing fair again.”
“So I have two free strikes?” Chad rolled his head her direction. Even in pain, a slow, sexy smile lit his face. “I’ll have to use them wisely.”
The innuendo in his words made her belly tighten as memories of their last kiss filled her.
She really needed to find herself a man to put out the fire Chad kept at a low simmer inside her.
7
NOT ALL PAIN CAN BE FIXED WITH A PILL.
After Jo helped him out of his shirt and the prescription
pain reliever had kicked in, Chad tossed the ice pack Jo had laid on his dislocated shoulder onto the bed beside him. “Let’s just do this.” He wasn’t sure he could stand the agony much longer.
Jo grimaced. “Okay. But it’s gonna hurt.” She turned to Ryan, who seemed fascinated by the whole thing. “Why don’t you go get your PJ’s on? Then you can check on Chad before you go to bed.”
“‘Kay.” Ryan scampered away. He listened to Jo so much better than he did to him. It was annoying. But he was glad Ryan wouldn’t have to witness what they were about to do.
He closed his eyes and drew a deep breath. “Hurry. Before Ryan comes back.”
“Here goes.” Jo slipped out of her shoes, propped her bare foot against his side, and pulled on his arm.
The pain was so intense, little black dots appeared in his eyes. He feared he’d pass out. He wanted to scream out a streak of curse words but didn’t want to scare Ryan. Finally, a pop sounded, and his shoulder clicked back in place. The pain immediately lessened, and he could finally breathe again. “Thank you.”
“Just a little more tweaking.” Jo took his hand and elbow and maneuvered his shoulder until she was satisfied it was aligned. “There. How does that feel?” She sat on the bed beside him.
“Great.” She was still in her pretty dress, her shapely legs tempting him to use one of his strikes and reach out and touch her smooth skin. “But now I need some help washing my back in the shower.”
“Nice try. Not happening.” Jo smiled as she laid the ice pack on his shoulder again. “You’ve probably got a whole line of ladies waiting to wash your back in San Diego, though, right?”
That she asked with a grin gave him a spark of hope that they could actually be friends again. “I was living with someone until last month, but after I hurt my knee, she said she wasn’t cut out to be a babysitter and a nurse too. Like everyone else, she probably figured my career was over and the money train was l
eaving the station.” One more woman Ryan had started to care for who’d disappeared from his life.
“Or maybe she just wasn’t cut out to be an instant mom? It can be hard to raise a kid who isn’t your own. I’m thankful my parents took me in.”
“You like to look for the good in people. I’ve been screwed over too many times to be so optimistic.” He took her hand and gave it a squeeze. “I appreciate how you’re always so nice to Ryan.”
Jo didn’t yank her hand away like he expected she would. “He’s a great kid. And you really need a shower, so go do that.” She stood so he could swing his legs to the floor.
“Okay.” The pain meds made it easier to walk.
He started hobbling toward the bathroom but then remembered something. “My mom asked me to invite you to lunch tomorrow. You could see the new foal. Ryan’s going to go nuts over her.”
A frown rumpled her forehead before she slowly sank to the side of the bed. “I don’t know, Chad.”
He turned on the water in his circular stone shower and stripped out of the rest of his clothes before he called out, “It’d mean a lot to her if you came.” He stepped under the hot water and sighed at how good the heat felt on his tired muscles. When Jo didn’t answer right away, he popped his head out and added, “She still loves and misses you.” He did too, but Jo wouldn’t want to hear that.
Jo leaned against the arched opening that led to the bathroom so they wouldn’t have to shout. She was careful to keep her eyes diverted. “I don’t want her to get the wrong idea about us and get her hopes up. She told me it broke her heart when we went our separate ways.”
His hand stopped soaping his chest. “You talked to my mom after we broke up?”
“She called me a few times those first weeks, asked if I was okay.”
He stuck just his head out again so he could see her face. “Did you tell her? About . . . Bryce?” Familiar guilt filled his gut. He hadn’t told his parents about the baby at first because his agent had him convinced Jo was a gold digger and the baby might not even be his. After he figured out his mistake, he wanted to tell his parents in person, but by the time he’d made it home, it’d been too late. He never saw the point in upsetting them.
Jo studied her bare feet and slowly shook her head. “My parents and Shelby are the only ones who knew. But my loose sweaters wouldn’t have been able to hide my pregnancy much longer.”
Painful memories of that time rushed back. How he’d kept tabs on Jo through her mom and how Jo, just over six months pregnant, had gone into early labor while he’d been in the middle of a game. Her mom said Bryce was really small but doing well, so he’d gone home with the team and then kept a business meeting the next day so he could free up some time off to see his son. But by the time he finally made it to the hospital, something had gone terribly wrong, and Bryce had only lived for two days. Had he’d known Bryce’s true condition, he would’ve been on the first flight to be with him and Jo.
He’d always regret not coming home immediately rather than staying with his teammates celebrating their victory that night. If Jo knew he’d made that choice on purpose, she’d probably never forgive him. “I came to the hospital. But they wouldn’t let me see you.”
“I know.” She wiped away a single tear that had tracked down her cheek. “My mom told me after I got home.”
Jo looked so unbearably sad, he wanted to wrap her up and hold her. But she was through with him, and it’d do nothing but garner him more strikes. “Sometimes I wonder if he would have been anything like Ryan.”
Jo blinked away her tears and finally looked at him. She forced a smile. “I’d like to think so.”
He thought about Bryce every month when he paid the bill for the flowers to be placed on his grave. It was the one bill his business manager didn’t pay, because it served as a guilty reminder of what he’d lost because of his selfishness. He’d always wonder if the stress of their breakup had caused Bryce to be born too early. “Do you ever go? To the cemetery?”
She shook her head. “I can’t.”
Why the hell had he even brought it up? Maybe because he’d wanted to talk to her about it for nine long years. And because Bryce’s birthday was in a week. “If you change your mind, I’ll go with you. Like maybe next Saturday? We could go as friends, Jo. Nothing more.”
Jo’s eyes locked with his. The obvious pain in them showed she knew exactly what next Saturday meant. “I won’t change my mind.” Jo crossed her arms and quickly looked away, her guard firmly back in place again. “Ryan is being way too quiet. I’ll go check on him.”
“Thanks.” He ducked back under the water and was still cursing himself for upsetting her when his cell rang. “Can you answer that please? The code is 1-2-3-4. I’m expecting a call from my coach.”
Jo called out, “I read that’s the most popular password for cell phones. What if a crazed fan found your phone?”
“It’s why I don’t use any last names. Just first names and initials.”
“It’d be easier to just change your lame password. The screen says Linda B.”
Really? The last he’d heard from her was when she’d dropped Ryan on his doorstep. He quickly rinsed the shampoo from his hair and snapped off the water. “Tell her I’ll be right there.”
He’d just wrapped a towel around his waist when Ryan called out, “Is that my mom?”
Dammit!
Jo glanced at Chad, who was hurrying out of the bathroom. He met her gaze and shook his head in silent warning. The look on his face told that it probably was Ryan’s mom.
Jo looked into Ryan’s trusting eyes as he waited for her answer. Her heart melted. “I don’t know. I just answered the phone for Chad.” That wasn’t a lie.
When Ryan reached up for the cell, she desperately waggled the phone Chad’s direction.
Chad quickly snagged the phone from her hand. “It’s a private call, Ryan. And you should be in bed!” He left in a hurry, leaving Ryan blinking back tears.
She leaned down to Ryan’s level. “Chad didn’t mean to snap at you. He’s still in a lot of pain. It can make people grumpy. Let’s go get you tucked in. It’s late.”
Ryan frowned but stuck his hand out for Jo to grab.
As she held his warm, chubby little hand in hers, she led Ryan back to his room while trying to shake off the conversation she and Chad had in the bathroom about Bryce. It probably needed to happen at some point, so maybe it was good they’d gotten it over with. Or maybe started it was the better term. They had more to talk about at some point. She could only take so much at a time, though.
She was still reeling inside that Chad remembered Bryce’s birthday. She would’ve thought he’d have long forgotten by now. He hadn’t carried Bryce for six months and then held his tiny body in his arms after he was born like she had. She’d loved Bryce before he was born, but seeing him, holding him, had filled her with a whole new kind of love she’d never felt before. Maybe she’d have that same love again one day.
Ryan pulled her hand to stop as they approached his bed. “I don’t want to go to bed. I want to talk to my mommy!”
“You don’t want to get me in trouble if he hangs up and sees you’re not in bed yet, do you?”
As Ryan debated, she pulled back the covers on his bed and then lifted him up, holding him at eye level to command his attention while scrambling for a diversion tactic. “Besides, I thought you said you wanted to be like Chester and eat your veggies and get lots of sleep from now on so you can be a big monkey too one day.” Ryan had loved the book so much, he made her read it three times to him before she’d had to get ready for her disastrous date.
His frown didn’t dim, but finally he said, “I do.”
“Well then, it’s way past time for you to hit the hay. I’ll see you tomorrow. Okay?”
“Promise?”
She nodded sharply. “Promise.”
“Okay.” Ryan wrapped his arms around her neck and gave her a hug. It didn’t look like he planned to le
t her go anytime soon.
Tears formed in her eyes, whether from the conversation she’d just had with Chad or at the desperate way Ryan clung to her or both, she wasn’t sure.
She searched for the ratty little brown bear she’d seen him carry sometimes, spotting its scruffy paw sticking out from under the bed. She scooped it up and then laid them both down. After she drew the covers over them, she said, “How about I bring you another Chester book tomorrow. Would you like that?”
Ryan tucked the well-loved, one-eyed bear under his chin and nodded.
“Then it’s a deal. I’ll even ask Shelby to autograph it for you.” She stood and turned out the lights. “Door open or closed?”
“Open. Night, Jo.”
“Sweet dreams, Ryan.”
Jo headed for the living room to gather her things and go. Chad sat on the couch with his head in his hands and an unopened beer bottle on the coffee table in front of him.
She scooped up the beer and twisted the top off. After a long pull, because God knew she could use a drink too, she sat beside him. “Was that Ryan’s mom?”
“Yes.” He lifted his head. “And please, just help yourself to my beer.”
Her gut told her it was more than just the pain upsetting him. “You can’t have this. Mixing meds with alcohol is a bad idea.”
“Oh . . . right. Linda’s call threw me off. I honestly forgot I’d taken anything.” He shook his head. “She said she wants to see Ryan tomorrow. She’ll only be in town for the day. I told her no, that we had plans at the ranch. She said she’d like to see my mom anyway and she’ll meet us there. Then she hung up. I should call her back and tell her to go to hell.”
And yet he hadn’t. “Are you afraid it’ll upset Ryan to see her, especially if he can’t go home with her?”
“Yeah. But she’s his mother. I don’t know what to do. She can’t just pop in and out of his life like this.”
“Have you guys talked about visitation rights?”
He shook his head. “All she said when she dropped him off was that it was my turn to be the parent for a while. That she needed a break. She handed me a bundle of his important papers, and then she left. My lawyer has tried to contact her multiple times, but she just ignores him.”
Perfectly Ms. Matched (Rocky Mountain Matchmaker Series Book 2) Page 7
