In the Zone (Portland Storm 5)

by Catherine Gayle

  When I turned to leave the office, he curled that hand on my waist in, drawing me close for a kiss—only a peck on the lips, but more than enough to throw all the thoughts in my head into confusion.

  He winked as he released me. “I’ll be right here.”

  When I got to the dressing room, I pressed my forehead against the cool metal of my locker for a moment, hoping it would put a damper on the heat that had started racing through me the moment Keith stepped up behind me. I needed to make up my mind, and fast, about what I was going to do. Go along as things had been and pretend it didn’t matter that he wasn’t able to share his past with me? Or make the move to protect my heart, telling him I couldn’t be more than a friend until he was ready to let me in?

  I stayed as long as I thought I could get away with, but I still didn’t have an answer by the time I took out my coat and headed back to the office.

  “Ready?” he said, his smile sinful enough to make me weak in the knees. He reached for me.

  Not even close to ready. I finished pulling on my coat and took his hand, mentally berating myself for my indecision.

  “YOU NEVER ANSWERED me about tonight,” I said as we turned the corner around the building, heading toward a nearby park.

  Her hand tensed in mine, only a tiny change in pressure but one that reverberated through me. So my assumptions had been right, then. When she’d only responded to last night’s text with a hasty message about being late instead of telling me if she would go out with me tonight, I’d gotten the distinct impression that something was wrong between us. Not that I had a clue what that might be. I’d come home from our road trip wanting nothing more than to see Brie and spend as much time with her as possible. I’d hoped that she would have answered last night, that I could have seen her then instead of having to wait until today. But that hadn’t happened, and now she was pulling away.

  Talk later, she’d said. Not See you later. Those two simple words seemed to carry the weight of a thousand implications.

  “No,” she said at length. “I haven’t.”

  “Does that mean you don’t want to see me?”

  “Not exactly.” Her voice sounded strained. She obviously didn’t want to say whatever it was she intended to say.

  I guided us onto the sidewalk that lined the park. With the cold front that had blown through while the team had been gone, there weren’t a lot of people hanging around outside today. A man walking two dogs was heading toward us, and a few walkers and runners were scattered throughout the area, but that was about it. No one could overhear whatever she might need to say. This was as private as we were likely to get, short of going to her apartment or my house.

  “Then what, exactly?” I asked when she didn’t elaborate.

  She took a few more steps and then gestured to a bench nearby, crossing her arms as though to ward off the chill. I nodded and followed her, taking the seat next to her once she was situated. I wanted to move closer to her, to press right up against her side like I had when we’d had dinner at Kells, but I knew better than to push her. If she wanted space, I’d give it to her even if it killed me.

  “I think,” she started, but then she stared at a huge maple tree across from us and took a moment before continuing, her lips turning down in concentration. “I think we’ve rushed into things.”

  My chest constricted, taut as a drumhead on the verge of breaking. “I thought things were moving along well.”

  “In a way, yes. In others… We went about this all backward,” she said. “We started out in bed and tried to move from there, but instead of getting to know each other, we end up back in bed over and over again.”

  “Because we’re good there.” That was only one of the many reasons we kept ending up in bed together, though. My lungs felt tight. Breathing didn’t seem possible. This had to be about Garrett—about my shooting her down every time she tried to get me to talk about the things I couldn’t talk about.

  If only she hadn’t known him. Then she wouldn’t realize I was keeping all that to myself. But she had known him, and she knew he’d killed himself, and there was no way to take away that knowledge. No way for me to hide the past, even if I couldn’t confront it.

  “We are,” she said after a brief but tense silence. She crossed her ankles and swung them back, her hands gripping the edge of the bench on either side of her. “I need us to be good elsewhere, too, though. I need to feel like I know you, the man on the inside, not only how you like to be touched.”

  “Aren’t we getting there?” I asked even though I knew we weren’t, at least in that one way. And that was all on me, just like Garrett’s death.

  “In some ways.” She tilted her head up so she could look me straight in the eye. A wry smile was on her lips, almost grim. “You’re getting to know me, at least. But every time I try to find out about your life before now—your family, your childhood—you clam up or change the subject. Why can’t you talk to me about that? About your brother?”

  The longer she kept talking, the edgier I grew. Every bone in my body felt ready to shatter, my muscles ready to run. “There’s not much to tell.” Not much I could tell, at least.

  “I don’t buy that for a second. Not with what I know.”

  “Exactly. You already know, so what’s the use in dragging it all back up?” I could hear the hardness in my voice. Could feel my blood pressure rising. But there wasn’t a damned thing I could do to stop it.

  “I know the parts that are public knowledge.”

  Brie reached for my hand. I let her take it but left mine hanging limp within her grasp so that I wouldn’t let all the rage that was roiling beneath the surface come through and hurt her. It wasn’t about her; it was about me. I needed to keep it that way, too, keep all that hurt and anger and guilt and blame under wraps where it couldn’t hurt anyone else, no one but me. I’d already done enough damage.

  Her touch was so gentle it nearly undid me.

  “What I don’t know,” she said quietly, “is what led to it. How it affected you. What it’s done to your family.”

  It had ripped my family apart at the seams, that’s what it had done to us. And it had left me a shell of a man. The only times I’d felt whole since the day I’d found Garrett hanging in my parents’ garage were when I’d been with Brie, when I’d been inside her, holding her, touching her.

  “Will you talk to me about it?” she asked after a long moment.

  “I can’t.” My voice cracked on the two simple words.

  “You can’t?” She squeezed my hand, placing her other over the top of my knee. “Or you won’t?”

  It was all the same in the end. I gave a noncommittal shrug.

  “Then I need—” She turned her head away suddenly, reaching a hand up to her face as she let out a sniffle. “I need to take a few steps back.”

  I felt as though the sand of an hourglass was drifting through my fingers. I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to catch all the tiny pieces and put them back where they belonged.

  I’D BARELY WALKED through the front door, herding all three of my dogs back inside with all their yapping and barking and dancing about, when my phone started ringing. I slammed the door shut, tossed my keys on the counter next to the unopened package from Hips & Curves, and whipped my cell out of my pocket, answering it without even looking to see the name or number popping up on the screen.

  “Brie?”

  “Not unless Mom and Dad have some serious explaining to do, although maybe that would make a few things easier to understand.” Shane, my youngest brother—no, my only brother now—let out a mirthless laugh that cut me to the quick after the day I’d had. “Who’s Brie?” he asked, half casual even though I knew he was just trying to pry.

  The woman who broke my heart. Not that I had any intention of telling Shane that. He had enough weapons to use against me already. I wanted to keep her separate in my mind, whether she and I were going to have the sort of relationship I wanted or not.

  “Just
a friend,” I finally said, echoing the words she’d said to me only a few hours before. She didn’t think she could be any more than a friend to me right now. Not until I was ready to face my demons. “What do you want?” I wasn’t in the mood for bullshit, and that was all I could expect from Shane these days.

  “Oh, I don’t know. How about a ride to your place from the airport and a room to stay in through the holidays?”

  I almost dropped the phone. “You’re coming to Portland? When?” It’d been seven years since anyone from my family had come to Portland during the season. Since Garrett had died.

  “Now. I’m at PDX.”

  “Now?” I definitely wasn’t keeping up. I still felt as though I’d been kicked repeatedly in the gut from my conversation a few hours ago with Brie, so I thought surely I had misheard my brother.

  “I’m at baggage claim waiting for my suitcase to come down the chute. Get off your ass and come get me.”

  “Wha—” I dropped the dogs’ leashes, and Pepper immediately took off chasing after Dexter, barking loudly enough the neighbors would probably start issuing noise complaints any minute. “Are Mom and Dad with you?” I asked, trying to wrap my mind around the idea of my brother being here.

  “They flew to Dublin to spend the holidays with Gran. I had initially intended to go with them. Changed my mind at the last minute.” He let out a couple of grunts, probably getting his suitcase off the conveyer. “You did ask me to come for the holidays, you know.”

  “Two years ago,” I said, dumbfounded.

  “Yeah. And? I’m here now. Are you going to come and get me or what?”

  “I—” A whoosh of air left my lungs, and I ran a hand through my hair. Shane was here. If I was ever going to have the chance to make things right between us, this was it. I grabbed my car keys from the kitchen counter, raced upstairs to deposit the package in my bedroom until I could figure out what I intended to do with it, and headed for the garage. “Give me twenty minutes,” I said.

  Broken heart or no, this wasn’t an opportunity I could let pass me by.

  HE LOOKED EXACTLY as I remembered, if only a few years older—almost as tall as me, fit, his dark hair cut short and neat, clean shaven. He had my eyes. Garrett’s eyes. There had been no way to miss the fact that the three of us had been brothers when we were growing up. We’d been practically identical, at least if you ignored the age differences.

  Shane had his coat draped over his left arm when I found him at baggage claim, and he had on a fitted, short-sleeved red shirt, a few buttons open to reveal the black T-shirt underneath. The long, white scar on his right forearm was as visible as ever. It was an old hockey injury from back in major junior. He’d been fighting for a puck in the corners when a couple more guys joined in, bumping into him awkwardly and knocking him down to the ice. One of the guys trying to dig the puck out had stepped on his arm, and the blade has sliced straight through my brother’s jersey and into his arm. Shane had left a trail of bright-red blood from there all the way to the bench as he’d skated off for repairs. A full period and eighty-three stitches later, he’d gone back out for more.

  Maybe he hadn’t been the best hockey player out there, but he’d had the most heart, the most grit. No one had doubted his courage. His masculinity. He’d fought harder on the ice than anyone he’d played with or against. No one had ever picked on Shane the way we’d teased Garrett. We would never have dreamed of it. Garrett had been the so-called sissy boy who’d chosen dance over hockey, the “queer” who would rather wear sparkles and rhinestones under disco lights than smelly hockey pads in a cold rink. He’d been the easy target.

  Garrett might have been easier to pick on, but it was Shane who was gay.

  Only I hadn’t known.

  He’d seen how my friends and I had tortured Garrett, and he’d been too afraid to let anyone know. It was only after Garrett had killed himself that Shane even came out to our parents, but he’d made them swear they wouldn’t breathe a word about it to me. And that was when everything between me and my family had gone to hell. They all blamed me for Garrett’s death, much as I blamed myself. But they also had Shane’s secret to protect.

  I only found out a few summers ago when Gran had let it slip. That was when I’d asked Shane to come and stay with me for the holidays. So I could try to do anything I could to make sure he knew I loved him, no matter what. That I’d never meant any of the things I’d called Garrett. That I’d only caved in to peer pressure. That I knew I was a worthless piece of shit, but that I was going to do everything possible to make a better man of myself.

  He hadn’t come then, but he was here now.

  “Hey,” he said. He looked at me with a one-shouldered shrug, holding out a hand to shake.

  “Hey.” I took his hand and pulled him in for a hug.

  It was an awkward hug, one of those back-slapping guy hugs during which neither party is comfortable with what’s happening but doesn’t want to be the first to end it. I was the one, in the end, to pull back.

  “Good to see you,” I said, feeling as awkward and gangly as I had as a fourteen-year-old with pimples trying to ask Tasha O’Neil out on a date.

  He nodded and bent down to his carry-on bag. He opened an outer zipper pocket and pulled out an envelope addressed to me, then shoved it toward me. “From Mom,” he said. “She asked me to bring it to you.”

  “Thanks.” I slipped it into my coat pocket. Whatever was inside, I didn’t really care to open it here. “You waiting on anything else?”

  “Nah.”

  “Let’s get out of here, eh?” My lips quirked up as soon as the eh came out of my mouth, taking me back in time. For years, that had been about half of our vocabulary. I grabbed the handle of his suitcase and headed out to the parking garage.

  He helped me to put both his bags in the trunk and we got in without a word. It was only after I’d merged on the highway that he said, “So you never did answer me. Who’s this just-a-friend Brie? You sounded like you were desperate for me to be her.”

  That was because I was.

  I WAS CRAVING bacon again.

  That always happened whenever I felt down in the dumps. The way I coped was to stuff my face with that smoky, fatty, crispy awesomeness. Having a couple of strips of bacon wouldn’t be a problem, of course. I wasn’t keeping myself on such a strict diet that I couldn’t indulge a little bit. No, the problem was that when I had a craving like this, a little bit would never be enough.

  I didn’t want a couple of strips of bacon; I wanted a pound of it.

  Never mind the fact that I didn’t keep bacon in the apartment just for this reason. I had to get rid of the craving, and the only way I’d found to combat bacon cravings was with pickles. I headed to the fridge and pulled out my jar of Claussen spears. It was close to empty. I said a little prayer that five spears that were left would be enough this time and took the jar with me into the living room, curling up on the couch as I started to eat.

  It was a methodical process. I ate one bite at a time, spear after spear, until the vinegary acidity of the pickles had cut through the need for bacon. BC and Richie both jumped up to join me as I worked on the first piece.

  I really shouldn’t be this upset. The reason Keith and I were stepping back to the friend zone was because I’d insisted on it, after all. But spending the night holed up in my apartment with my two cats instead of doing whatever it was he had planned for the two of us—followed by a night in his bed—definitely wasn’t up to par.

  BC head-butted the pickle jar where I had it precariously perched on my lap, nearly sloshing a bunch of juice all over me. I scowled at him and scratched behind his ears with my free hand. “I know you love me, buddy,” I said soothingly amid the sounds of his purring.

  But then again, it could be the dill and vinegar smells that he loved. You never could tell.

  I kept eating my pickles until the cravings finally eased after four spears. I replaced the lid and got up, much to my cats’ displeasure, to
put the sole remaining spear back in the refrigerator.

  My cell phone beeped while I was still in the kitchen. I pulled it out of my pocket, hoping it would be Keith, at the same time dreading that it might be him. No need for either of those emotions, though. It was Tanya.

  You okay? Can I bring you ice cream?

  She’d forced it all out of me when I’d come back from walking with Keith this afternoon. She had even offered to see if she could get someone else to come in to cover for my last couple of classes of the day. That wouldn’t do me any good, though, so I refused. Sulking wouldn’t help anything. Burying my head and doing my work would. Besides, Devin and I’d had another session scheduled this afternoon, and I couldn’t miss that even if I wasn’t in the greatest of moods.

  I typed a response.

  Me: I’ll be fine. No ice cream required.

  Tanya: Chick flick then? I’ve got every Reese Witherspoon or Sandra Bullock movie ever made on DVD. I can be there in ten minutes.

  Me: Legally Blonde? Miss Congeniality?

  Tanya: You got it. I’ll bring both. See you in a few.

  I wasn’t entirely sure that a chick flick or two was the cure for what ailed me, but it couldn’t hurt. Neither would having company. I got up and tidied a few things that I’d left lying around. Richie took that as his sign that it was time to hide. Cleaning things up wasn’t always a sign of company, but it could also mean the vacuum cleaner might appear. There were few things in this world that terrified him more.

  I’d barely finished straightening my living room when Tanya knocked on my door. “I brought cupcakes,” she said the instant she came inside, thrusting a bakery box in my direction. She had a bag slung over her arm. “Sunshine Cupcakes. They’re the best in Portland, so you might as well familiarize yourself with them now.”