by Debra Elise
When Maverick had last seen his father the day after Connor’s death, the only outward sign that Randall Sr. was affected by his youngest son’s death was his five o’clock shadow. He spoke in his typical even-toned fashion. Never one to waste energy on emotion, Maverick’s father let him know exactly how upset he and his mother were without so much as raising his voice, and he reminded Mav that if he hadn’t chosen the fast-paced life of a baseball player, Connor would still be alive.
Connor would never have gone to the party with Maverick if he hadn’t been struck with hero worship or envy of Mav’s lifestyle. No, his favorite son would never have been so irresponsible as to allow anything like an accident to occur. Like anyone could control fate.
Even though Maverick had done the right thing by not driving impaired himself, he still managed to screw up. It didn’t matter that the big rig truck driver chose to drive through his mandatory rest break and fell asleep, crossing the dividing line where he slammed into the driver’s side door of the luxury sports car.
If only Maverick had been sober, he’d have been the one killed instantly and his brother would have lived to carry on the family name, the family dynasty created by an emotionally unavailable father. God damn it, he needed to . . . he didn’t know what.
He started his truck and pulled out of the parking lot, and began driving with no destination in mind other than away. All he knew for sure was that he couldn’t face his teammates, his manager, and especially Kelsey.
The only thought that kept going through his mind was that once again he’d failed his brother. He hadn’t come through with the promise he made as Connor lay dying in his arms— justice.
His phone started to blow up with texts and phone calls about thirty minutes later. Dr. Caris Sloane kept calling and sending him text messages. She was more persistent than Syndi had been during her crazed pursuit.
Maverick knew he needed to see the Doc, to get a grip on his crumbling life, but he couldn’t bring himself to face anyone. Not today. Kelsey, Blake, and even T.S. had called, and kept calling, but all he wanted to do was escape.
He got on the interstate and headed for the airport. There was no way in hell he could pitch today. He bought a ticket on the next flight out of Arizona. He didn’t even care where it was headed. He just needed to be on a plane away from the fans, his teammates, and the paparazzi who were sure to be at the game.
Tomorrow, he decided. Tomorrow would be soon enough to deal with everyone and their disappointment.
Chapter 29
For the first time in his life Maverick purposely missed a game. He knew there would be hell to pay, but he hadn’t been thinking of the team or the fans. He’d thought only about the growing blackness in his soul and the fear that he could have done more. More for Connor, more for his family, for himself.
He knew he needed Dr. Sloane. He owed her for dropping everything for his sorry ass. So he pushed through his grief and called her as soon as he landed back in Idaho.
It stirred up a lot of shit he should have dealt with a long time ago. His missteps with Kelsey for starters.
Caris was quiet while he told her everything he’d kept inside for too long.
“Maverick, what if you allowed yourself to believe you had no control, no responsibility in Connor’s death?”
“Doc, those are just words. Telling myself is one thing, believing it, feeling it, is another. And right now all I feel is guilt.”
Her face gave him no clue to what she thought of his statement. But she didn’t call bullshit, which was a weight off his shoulders. Somehow, her allowing him to voice his fear was the validation he desperately needed.
Instead Caris talked about the trigger that had propelled him to run from baseball, from Arizona, from everyone. They talked about how his being in the courtroom wouldn’t have had any sway on the verdict. Deep down he understood logically she was right. It was his heart that was having trouble being convinced.
He and Caris also spent a lot of time talking about his relationship with Kelsey. Hell, he didn’t know how to handle a woman like her. She didn’t seem to need him for more than mind-blowing sex. She’d told him plenty of times she wasn’t looking for anything other than a good time, something he should have been happy about. Instead, he was confused and often found himself picturing her in his life—permanently.
He left Caris’s office with the promise to call her tomorrow. But he wasn’t sure she could help him further. Right now, he wanted to be left alone.
He knew Blake and T.S. wouldn’t give him another chance after his stunt today. They’d trade him. But he’d quit first. He was done with baseball.
He swung by the liquor store on his way back to his condo.
He threw his keys on the counter and sat down on his couch and stared at the picture of Kelsey and him at dinner last month. The photographer had caught them whispering to each other. It was the only photo taken by the paparazzi he actually liked. He opened the whiskey he picked up on the way home and poured himself a double.
An hour later, he was no longer able to focus on the picture he still held onto. The now empty bottle in his other hand fell to the floor. He let his head fall back onto the couch and closed his eyes.
Fuck. He didn’t know what to do next and missing today’s game wasn’t going to help him in his efforts to hold onto the starting pitcher position. The fresh-faced rookie, Yagasaki, was chomping at the bit to knock Mav down off the pitching mound and take over the coveted role. Maybe he should let him? Walk away from his career and let the dedicated players, the ones not screwed up in the head, handle it from here.
Mav’s cell phone went off, breaking the silence of his pity party for one. He wasn’t ready to end his self-imposed exile from the world. He grabbed the phone from his jacket pocket and chucked it toward the black leather couch and watched as it bounced off the gazillion pillows Kelsey had placed there last week. Her attempt to warm up the space, she said.
His text tone, “Take me out to the ball game,” blared again as the phone skidded across the floor. It was a knife in his heart every time it played. He needed to change it. Maybe a funeral dirge would be more appropriate?
Someone began pounding on his door and when it didn’t stop, he made the trek to the door. He looked through the security lens and swore. Should he let her in? He didn’t want Kelsey to see him in this condition, but maybe it’d be better for her to see for herself what a mess he’d become.
Maverick let her in, braced for fireworks.
She marched to the middle of the living room and whirled around. “So you’re going to throw it all away? Everything we’ve worked so hard to rebuild, everything you’ve now screwed up so spectacularly?” She held nothing back.
“How can you give in, Maverick? How can the man who pushed himself to pitch in the division playoffs days after he buried his brother, be reduced to this?” Kelsey spread her hands and indicated the empty whiskey bottle. “Is this really going to solve anything? Because it sure as hell isn’t going to bring your brother back.”
“Kelsey, I don’t need you to state the obvious. Dammit, I know missing the game was wrong. Don’t you think I realize what it’s going to do to my career? Give me some credit.”
“Credit. You want credit for being stupid?”
When he didn’t answer she kept going, tears on the verge of spilling over. “Why did you pull a no-show, Maverick? Why didn’t you call me and tell me what was going on? After all we’ve been through, I thought . . . I thought I meant more to you than this.”
Maverick slammed the door, hangover forgotten, and strode over to stand toe-to-toe with the woman who held his heart.
“It’s a little hard to pitch a ball when you feel like a son of a bitch for not attending the sentencing of a man who caused your brother’s death. Sorry, my heart wasn’t in it.”
“You could have called me or Blake, he would have understood,” she whispered.
Kelsey stepped closer to Maverick and reached out a hand, but let it drop. “M
averick, I’m here for you, please . . .”
“This is something I need to work out on my own. Besides, you’ve made it pretty clear you only wanted a professional relationship with some hot sex on the side. I didn’t need you to come over and pat my hand and tell me it would all be okay, because it’s not. I don’t think it ever will be.”
“Tell me why, Mav? Why can’t it be okay? How does it really matter if they found the driver not guilty? It’s not going to change the outcome. Your brother is gone. But you’re still here. You have a chance for a successful career. Don’t you think that’s what your brother would want out of all this?”
“It’s not just about my brother,” he growled. Mav pushed his hand through his hair. Frustration riding him hard, he shouldn’t have opened the door.
“Hell, I don’t want you here right now, Kelsey. I don’t want you to see me this way.”
“What way? Drunk or vulnerable? Maybe you don’t want to admit you’re not the superstar everyone made you out to be before your brother died, hmm? The bad boy who could handle whatever curve was thrown at you.” She stepped closer to him, and poked a finger into his back.
“Maybe I need to start putting your life into baseball metaphors? What do you think, Maverick? Maybe I should give up on thinking you’re anything else other than a selfish, spoiled, egotistical baseball player who can’t handle it when he doesn’t get the hero worship or attention he feels is his right because he can throw a hundred-mile-an hour fastball, cut ball, or whatever it is you’re famous for. Maybe . . .”
“Kelsey, that’s enough.” He whirled around, took hold of her shoulders and walked her back two steps where he pinned her to the wall. All thoughts of their argument vanished as he pressed his long, hard body into hers, wound his hand in her hair, and tipped her face up to his.
“You really don’t know me at all if you believe any of those things.”
“What am I supposed to think, Maverick? You shut yourself off from the people you claim are important to you. You once accused me of not asking for help. I guess I can add “hypocrite” to the list of reasons to be pissed off at you. And to top it off, you almost drink yourself out of a job and refuse my sympathy.”
“I don’t want your sympathy, goddammit.”
“What do you want?”
“This,” he growled.
Maverick slammed his mouth on hers and took exactly what he claimed he wanted. He pushed his knee between her legs and grabbed her left leg, bringing it up around his waist as he ground his cock into her core.
She should be furious, but all she felt was need. She’d missed him more than she wanted to admit, but she also missed this. The red-hot explosion of desire he created whenever they touched.
He continued to grind against her center and caressed her breast while tiny spasms tugged in her womb. Mav trailed hot, wet kisses down her neck and along her collarbone, hovering at the top of her blouse. His heated breath and wicked tongue made her ache for skin-on-skin contact.
She managed one coherent thought as he unbuttoned her top, “This doesn’t resolve anything . . .” She wasn’t able to finish her sentence as he kissed her again, capturing her lips in hard, searing nips while he pushed a hand inside her slacks. He thrust two fingers into her and began stroking her to madness.
She was beyond caring at the moment and let him take everything he needed from her. The time for words had passed. She heard a low moan and wasn’t sure if that had come from her or Maverick. She began moving her hips along to the rhythm he set as he pumped his fingers in and out of her.
“So wet, baby. Just for me. Is this what you want? Is this why you came over here today?”
Kelsey shook her head. No, this wasn’t why she was there. She pushed both hands against his chest—hard. He didn’t move and kept his wicked fingers inside her.
On the edge of an orgasm, he mastered her body within mere minutes, but she couldn’t let him think that all she wanted from him was a physical release. No matter how much her traitorous body wanted it more than her next breath.
“Maverick, stop.” She pushed away from him again. This time he moved away. He removed his hand from her slacks, fingers covered with her essence and stepped back. An unreadable look in his eyes. Breathing as hard as she was.
“In answer to your last question, this is not what I came over for.” She gulped for air and nodded to his state of arousal and her unbuttoned clothes. “I’m here because I care, Maverick, and to help.”
“Really, because a minute ago I could have sworn you wanted me to get you off—again.” Kelsey didn’t think, she just reacted. She slapped him across the face. “Bastard.”
He rubbed his hand over the spot she’d hit and scowled. “Well, I guess we’ll add that to the list of things wrong with me. What were they again? Oh yeah, selfish, spoiled, egotistical, and now . . .”
“Oh, shut up. You are the most frustrating person I’ve met in a long time. And since you seem to have things all figured out, just forget I ever came—”
“Well, you almost came,” he interrupted.
If Kelsey hadn’t been so embarrassed and upset, she would have laughed. But it was hard to be jovial when your heart was breaking.
“Kelsey, listen. This isn’t how I wanted this conversation to go, I’m sor—”
“No, no, you can’t take it back now. And you know what? It’s not enough; not for me. Because I’m not going to give my lo—time to someone who doesn’t even respect himself enough to go after what he’s worked so damn hard for.”
Maverick didn’t as much as blink when she almost slipped and said she loved him. Damn. Maybe he wasn’t a bastard, but right now he seemed clueless to her real feelings.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Kelsey. I suggest you stop before you say anything else you might regret. Besides, I wasn’t looking for your “time” when we met, and I sure as hell don’t want it if it comes with conditions.”
He let out a sigh and rubbed his hand behind his neck. Almost losing his balance he threw out an arm to catch himself on the wall.
“I didn’t know self-respect was a condition you, asshole. Thanks for the heads-up on that. I’ll be sure to double-check that one the next time I take on a baseball player who needs my services. You don’t want my help, my sympathy? Great. Fine. I take it back. I take it all back.”
She had almost made it to the door before he finally spoke.
“Do you want to know why?” he ground out. His voice raspy and toneless.
Hand on the doorknob, she sighed and closed her eyes. “Yes.”
“Seems we both have daddy issues. When I heard the news of the acquittal all I could think was I had failed him—again. I failed to follow him into the law firm, I failed to protect Connor, and now I failed to bring justice to the man who took everything away from my family.
“I understand your anger, but I also needed to go through this on my own terms. Maybe it wasn’t what you or anyone else would have done, but it is what it is, and now I realize I have to make things right. So many things right. Beginning with myself and you.
“I’m sorry I hurt you. I’m sorry you got caught up in this mess that is my life. You have to believe me that I cherished all that we shared, in and out of bed. Hell, I’m sorry I’m not the man you wanted me to be, Kelsey. You deserve so much more.”
Her hand had fallen off the doorknob during Maverick’s speech, and she twisted both hands together not knowing what she wanted to do. What could she say that would get through to him without sounding trite? “Damn straight I deserve better.” Her voice trembled. “And if you want to do right by me, then drinking yourself into oblivion isn’t a good start. I lived through that with my mother, I can’t and I won’t with you.” When she turned around to tell him she wanted to work this out, he was gone.
She wanted to go to him and work this out, tell him she was scared to death he’d end up like her mother, but the soft click of his bedroom door stopped her. The sound echoed in her ea
rs. They both had a lot to think about and maybe now was not the time to test their already tightly wound emotions.
She left his condo and made her way home and prayed she was making the right choice by giving him some space. Perhaps distance and a good night’s sleep for both of them was needed. For once, she had no plan. How the heck could she put a PR spin on her own life?
CHAPTER 30
Maverick thought about getting up and searching for another bottle. He tried to block out the hurt and disappointment he’d seen on Kelsey’s face. He never would have treated her like that sober.
Hell, everyone thought he had a drinking problem anyway, maybe now was the time to deal with the monkey on his back and admit he was on the precipice of falling into the dark hole of alcoholism.
She deserved so much better from him. She’d done a great job at turning around his image in the public’s eye. He thought back to how she’d highlighted his work with the kids at the Children’s Club without actually compromising their privacy and his integrity.
And she even had him believing his latest apology to his fans, teammates, and the league for his hotheaded remarks about moving the team to Pineville were genuine and straight from his heart. She had a way of cutting right through the crap that he spouted and found the true him under all the ego and bravado he used as a shield.
He began calling himself all kinds of a fool for throwing away her time and energy spent arranging his interviews to the regional and national sports radio stations in order to prove to the public he’d changed his opinion. He had answered question after uncomfortable question about his past escapades and his personal life with Kelsey until they were satisfied the sports world was once again behind him.
He found a sense of community here that was missing and he found a home and most important—he’d found Kelsey.
He pushed himself up out of bed and swayed, the nausea taking hold. He was damn tired of feeling this way, he knew better, and he vowed to do better. He realized it was now crucial for him to grow the hell up if he ever expected anyone to take a chance on him again.
