by S. J. Bishop
Lars and I looked at each other and burst out laughing. It felt good to let go like that for a minute. We hung onto each other, helping each other up. It wasn't until we were both seated properly that the nurse finally left us alone, turning her attention to someone pounding on the candy machine trying to get their quarter back.
We sat holding each other's hands. I let his warmth envelop me, soothing my aching muscles. "I got a part in a Broadway show," I told him. "The lead, actually."
He turned his eyes to me. "Of course you did. It was only a matter of time."
I laughed. "You sound as if you never doubted it."
"I didn't. I've heard you sing. No one can even compare to you."
"Thanks," I murmured, my cheeks burning. My mind was racing with thoughts, ideas, memories... Some were about Lars, others were about my father. "What did you mean before?" I asked suddenly. He looked at me, confused. "About not always being on the right side of the law?"
I'd gotten the impression from some of the things he and my father had said that Lars came from a troubled past, but I couldn't imagine him actually breaking the law. His eyes glazed over, and his lips turned down.
"Let's just say I got mixed up with the wrong people."
I nodded, burning with curiosity. "So like...a gang?" I'd noted the tattoos he had all over his body. Barbed wire, a rose, an eagle...and those were just his arms. I wondered how many others he had hidden under his clothes. I hadn't gotten a chance to see the whole of him the night we were together.
"Something like that," he said.
"So, how'd you get out? You're not still in it, are you?" Something in his eyes shifted. It was as if a cloud rolled over them, covering something he didn't want to think about.
"I...promised a friend of mine I'd get out, so I did." His lips were too tight. I knew there was more to his story but didn't think now was the right time to ask. Then again, what was it the right time for?
How about telling him you're pregnant?
I shushed the idiot voice inside my head. I had flip-flopped back and forth on the whole issue so many times I wasn't sure where I stood on it anymore. Tell him? Not tell him? Keep it? Get rid of it? I didn't want to be pregnant, but the fact remained that I was. My father hadn't raised me to run from my problems.
"Lars, there's something I think I need to tell you."
He looked at me expectantly, and my mouth suddenly ran dry. "I... I..." I took a deep breath, trying to force the words out. "I'm glad you're here." Fuck! I just couldn't do it. Lars smiled and took my hand. A pang of guilt shot through me.
Just then, a group of nurses and doctors ran by. I could only make out bits and pieces of their conversation. They were talking very rushed and running as they moved past us.
"... Walker...”
"...crashing..."
"We have to stabilize him."
My heart jolted out of my chest. Lars and I looked at each other, his face as ashen as mine. We stood up and ran after the doctors. They were so wrapped up in what they were doing that they didn't see us pass through the emergency room doors.
We followed them into my father's room. His face was so bruised and puffy I barely recognized him. I gasped, and one of the nurses turned around, glaring at us.
"You shouldn't be here," she said, pushing us back and attempting to shove us out as I struggled to keep the door open.
"Nurse, we need you, we're losing him!"
"Out!" she yelled, pushing me hard enough that I fell backward into Lars and we toppled out of the room together. She shut the door on us just as I heard the sharp, steady beep of my father's heart flatlining.
24
Lars
I was beginning to think that the waiting room of a hospital was one of the worst places on Earth. Everything here seemed cold and sterile. The air didn't smell right. The lights were either too bright or too dim. There were too many sounds and cries echoing through the halls.
I paced up and down the floor, keeping my eye on Clarissa as she sat curled in a chair. I wanted to sit next to her and hold her, make her feel safe again, but I couldn't keep my feet still.
I couldn't stop thinking about Coach's face, all bloodied and bruised as he lay in the hospital bed. Worse than that, I had betrayed him. In every way possible. What the hell was I thinking when I'd agreed to get back into bed with Angelo? I'd been out of that life for over a year. Coach had put his faith and trust into me, and I'd promised to lose the very game he'd been counting on me to help win.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket, wondering if I should call Angelo now. I glanced in Clarissa's direction. Her eyes were open, but I wasn't sure if she was aware of what was happening around her.
"Clarissa?" I asked. There was a flicker of movement in her pupils that told me she'd heard me. "Do you think you'll be okay if I go outside for a minute? I just want to make a phone call."
There was a slight nod of her head. I hated the idea of leaving her alone but couldn't stomach this thing with the Super Bowl hanging over my head. I had to take care of it. Now. I'd taken two steps toward the front doors when I saw movement from the corner of my eye. I looked back toward Clarissa. Her eyes had gone wide, and she was sitting up.
"Clarissa? Are you okay?"
Suddenly she jumped out of her chair, placed her hand against her mouth, and ran to the bathroom. She disappeared inside and emerged a few minutes later looking greener than cabbage.
"Hey," I said, walking quickly to her and wrapping an arm around her waist. "What happened? Are you alright?"
I tried not to show her how anxious she was making me. For some reason I didn't quite understand, I panicked whenever I thought there might be something wrong with her.
"I'm fine," she said. I knew she was lying.
"Yeah, right. That's why you just ran to the bathroom like your stomach was full of piranhas."
She glanced at me, cocking one of her eyebrows into a seductive arch. "Piranhas? As in those fish? That's a terrible analogy." The corners of her lips curved up, and my heart lightened. Angelo could wait. I would call him in the morning. He would probably take the news better if he had a full night's sleep first anyway.
"What's wrong with my analogy? Those fish are crazy. Have you seen those razor sharp teeth they have? They could dig right through your stomach if you swallowed them whole."
She giggled a little as I helped her into her chair.
"Are you sure you're really alright? When's the last time you ate anything?"
She looked blankly at me.
"Have you eaten anything today?"
"I had a bagel."
"When?"
"Um... six or seven?"
"This evening?"
Her bottom lip stuck out, making me want to bite it. "This morning."
"That's it. I'm getting you food."
"I'm so not hungry."
"It'll help," I said, two steps toward the cafeteria. "At least a candy bar."
"No, Lars. I'm fine, really."
I was preparing to argue with her when one of the doctors came out. He did that thing a doctor does where he takes a deep breath and lowers his head, scratching his chin, as if whatever he's about to say is so grave it causes him pain to say it. Then again, what the hell did I know about doctors? Maybe it wasn't an act. Maybe it was just hard to watch this sort of thing day in and day out.
"Ms. Walker?" he asked, coming toward us.
"Yes?" I could hear the apprehension in her voice. She stood up, and I went immediately to her side.
"I'm Doctor Herald. I was one of the doctors who performed your father's surgery earlier when he first came in. He's stable, for the moment."
"That's what you said before," she interjected, her eyes widening.
The doctor cleared his throat. "Yes, well, he developed internal bleeding. No one could have foreseen it. We've managed to stop the majority of it, but there's still..." He took a deep breath and looked at us both with a look I recognized well from back in Vinegar Hill. It was a l
ook of hopelessness. "There's still bleeding happening. We can't find its source."
"You can't find..." Clarissa's voice trailed off. "So he's still in surgery?"
I put my arm around her, holding her up.
"Yes. I'm heading back in to join them. I just wanted to update you. We have our best people working on him. I..." He paused, looking at me, and I suddenly understood that he was a fan. He probably wanted Coach to live so that he could ensure our victory in the Super Bowl. It pissed me off, but at the same time, it made me realize just how many people other than Coach Walker were counting on me.
"I'll keep you apprised of any changes," Doctor Herald said and left us alone.
Clarissa stood still a moment, her bottom lip trembling but her back stiff. Then, without warning, she spun around and hit me.
25
Clarissa
My hand slapped against Lars' chest. I saw the shock on his face, and it only pissed me off more. "I hate you!" I screamed, pounding my fist against him again. "I hate this place! This is all your fault!"
"Are we back to that again?" he asked, his eyes darkening.
"Yes!" I shouted. "I hate you!" I beat my hands against his chest until they hurt. I felt like a child throwing a tantrum, but I didn't care. Lars stood there taking it—I gave him everything I had and more. He never once lifted a hand to stop me. He never once yelled or told me to get away from him. I let all of my rage and pain and sadness out on him, and he took it all like a man.
The longer my tantrum lasted, the more erratic my thoughts became. I felt my mind flip-flopping like a fish out of water. One minute I hated Lars, the next I needed him. I couldn't decide if he was all bad or the greatest thing to happen to me. As my fists beat against him, I began to feel something inside me change. His chest was so hard...so solid. His eyes were dark with emotion. Slowly, my fists opened. Instead of beating against his chest, I began to rub my hands over him. His back stiffened, and his hands caught mine.
"Clarissa," he said, his voice husky. There was a thrum of energy that carried from his voice all the way down to my toes. I felt my body begin to tingle, and my head suddenly felt light. It seemed impossible that his hands were so soft. Throwing the ball like he did should have left them hard and calloused, not like a warm feather tickling my skin. Sudden desire overwhelmed me. I pressed my mouth to his, inhaling his masculine scent. My tongue twirled inside his mouth, dueling with his tongue as we pressed ourselves harder to each other.
"Lars," I breathed, tasting him, forgetting completely that we were in the middle of a hospital. All that mattered was Lars’ warmth and heat and the wetness of his tongue as it slid over my neck. Then I remembered one of the reasons I was so mad at him.
I pushed him away, breathing hard as I fought to regain control of myself. My eyes darted around the waiting room to see if anyone had been watching us, but the patrons had thinned considerably in the last hour.
"What's wrong?" he asked, panting. He took a step toward me, and I took a step back.
"Nothing...everything," I said, my head aching with confusion. I went from picturing Lars with Madeline to seeing my father's bruised face as he crashed in his hospital room. My own trembling desire for Lars mixed into it all, forcing me into a sort of befuddled daze.
"I can't do this with you." I shook my hands in frantic circles through the air trying to shake out these conflicting feelings that were dragging me down and making everything I was going through ten times worse.
"Clarissa, tell me what's wrong." Lars was looking at me with such tenderness that it was hard to believe this was the same man who had hit Madeline the other night. But then, I'd seen him hit my father with my own eyes. Lars had a violent temper, and it wasn't something that I could handle. Not now. Not ever.
"I think you should go," I told him. My throat felt like sand, but part of me still longed to press myself against him.
"I'm not going anywhere," he said, setting his face into a hard line.
"Lars..." I wanted to say more, but I didn't know where to start. "Just... get out!"
"No."
We stood facing off against each other. Lars folded his arms across his chest. How could someone so violent be so damned charming?
"I don't want you here!"
"I'm not here just for you. I'm here for him. You said your father was asking for me. I'm not going anywhere until I see that he's safe."
God, he was infuriating! "Fine! But you stay away from me. I know what you did to Madeline. First, you attack my best friend, then you hit my father. You're nothing but a lowlife, and I want nothing to do with you."
Lars stood looking at me with an odd expression. I'd expected him to yell back... retaliate in some way. Instead, he looked confused. "What did you say?" he asked.
"You heard me!" I snapped, puzzled by his eerie, all-too-calm demeanor. Somehow, that was more unsettling than if he'd been screaming his head off at me.
"Did you say that I attacked Madeline?" His face scrunched up. That little part above his nose and between his brows developed a very large dimple that made my thighs moist.
"She told me everything."
That's when Lars’ eyes darkened, not with lust like I'd seen before, but with anger. “Clarissa, I've never attacked a woman in my life. I don't know what Madeline told you, but whatever it was, she was lying."
26
Lars
My mind raced with a hundred different thoughts. Primary among those was the fact that Madeline was making up lies about me, and that it was almost certainly because of those lies that Clarissa had been so hot and cold with me.
"What are you saying?" Clarissa asked, looking distrustfully at me. "You're saying that you never attacked her?" She laughed, refusing to believe me.
"That's exactly what I'm saying. Why don't you tell me what she said? Give me a chance to defend myself."
I could see her thinking. Her eyes darted around, confused and desperate and probably afraid. There were too many things happening all at once. It was like being hit from all angles.
"She said that you came onto her, and when she refused, you wouldn't take no for an answer."
I could feel my eyes bulge out of their sockets. "She said what? Are you serious? Did she say that I raped her?"
The thought of hurting a woman, even as one as reprehensible as Madeline, was appalling to me. In my lifetime I'd knocked around plenty of guys, but I'd never laid one hand on a woman or kid. Ever.
"No, she didn't say that. She just said that you kissed her, but who knows how much further it would have gone if I hadn't walked into the locker room when I did?"
My head was dizzy. I was trying hard to ease my anger, but all I could picture was Madeline's face and my fist bashing into it. I could hear Ash's voice in the back of my head, telling me to cool down.
"She came on to me, Clarissa."
Clarissa scoffed, "Right. That's why you had your tongue down her throat."
I shook my head, desperate now to explain myself. Why the hell had I ever kissed Madeline that night anyway? I was a fucking moron. "Look, I fucked up, okay? I kissed her, yeah, but she came looking for me. She made the first move, not me. If she hadn't shown up that day, I would never have gone looking for her."
I could see Clarissa's mind whirling. "But..."
I took her hesitation as an opportunity to keep going. "I was waiting for you, Clarissa. I thought it was you coming to meet with me that day after practice, not Madeline."
"Ha! Then explain the bruise!" Clarissa cried.
"What bruise?"
"The bruise on Madeline's face where you hit her.”
I shut my eyes and counted to ten, hoping some of this anger would dissipate before I lost control. I couldn't do it. I fucking lost it. I practically leaped across the room, balled my hand into a fist, and hit it into the wall. It left a fist-sized hole where I'd punched it. I was lucky I didn’t break my knuckles.
A couple of nurses looked in my direction and quickly bent their heads toget
her in rapid discussion. They were probably calling security. A third nurse, the same skinny redhead who'd recognized me earlier, came running up to them. She stopped the older nurse with her hand on the phone. Sometimes being a sports celebrity had its perks, even if I was just a rookie.
"I never laid a hand on her," I finally said, seething through my teeth. "She hit her face on the ground when she tripped and fell. I had nothing to do with it." A new thought occurred to me just then. "I can prove it."
The conviction of my words seemed to spark something in Clarissa. "What do you mean? How can you prove it?"
I pulled my cellphone from my pocket. I still had the texts Madeline had sent me that day before coming down to the stadium. And a few texts she'd sent me even after that. I hadn't recognized the phone number when it had come in, but Clarissa would. I pulled the messages up and handed my phone to Clarissa. Her eyes went wide as she scrolled through them.
"Oh Jesus," she said. "Oh my God. This is Maddie's number. I can't believe it."
She dropped the phone, and it bounced once on the floor before I picked it up. Luckily, the new gorilla glass screen protector I'd bought had saved it from cracking.
Now, Clarissa was looking at me with confused tears in her eyes. "I don't understand. Why would she do this? We're friends."
"She's probably jealous. You've got a pro-football player for a boyfriend and a spot in a new Broadway show. How could she not be jealous?"
The corner of Clarissa's mouth turned up in a grin. "Did you just say boyfriend?'"
I felt my cheeks flush, something they never did. "I'm...I just meant..."
It was just then that Dr. Herald came back.
"Ms. Walker," he said. Clarissa turned toward him, ashen. "I have good news. We've located the source of his internal bleeding and stopped it."
"Oh, thank God," Clarissa said, letting out a loud sigh. She reached for me, gripping me tightly. Her hand shot electricity into my arm when she touched me, like a needle poking deeply into my skin.
