“Do you have to?”
“Screw the team and our stupid superstitions. Sleep with her already.”
“How do you know I haven’t?”
“Because if you had, you’d be a helluva lot more relaxed. At least if you’re doing it right.” He lifted a brow. “Is that the problem? You forget how? You need some pointers?”
“Wade?”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. Shut the f**k up.” Again he looked at Pace’s shoulder, still packed in ice, and his eyes sobered. “I meant what I said before. You need to go for it with her. You need to get yourself something outside this game.”
“Why her?”
“Because she’s the first woman to drive you insane instead of the other way around. Because you’re different with her. You’re happy around her.”
“What if I told you that she’s decided to go after a drug story regarding the Heat?”
Wade was quiet a moment, then he blew out a low breath. “Shit.”
“Yeah.”
“What did you tell her?”
“That I had nothing to tell her.” He closed his eyes again and rested his aching head against the headrest. “And I just hope to God it stays that way.”
When they arrived at the hotel, Pace had to jump through hoops for the team doc before getting to go to his room. They would evaluate him in detail back at home, but the grim consensus was that he’d most likely torn his rotator cuff. Alone in his room, Pace stripped down to his shorts, stood in front of the blasting AC and breathed in the blissful silence until someone knocked on his door.
Hoping it was someone with a hammer to bash in his head and put him out of his misery, he pulled open the door and found Red. “I don’t want to watch any tapes.” He stood blocking the doorway. “I don’t want to even think about baseball.”
“What crazy talk is that? Baseball is all you think about.”
“Yeah, well things change.” His every movement was agony. Plus, he was feeling the need to beat something up.
Or sleep with someone.
Holly.
“You’re hurting,” Red said, gazing worriedly over Pace like a mother hen. “Let me call a masseuse in for you or get you something for the pain.”
“They already offered me something for pain.” He knew nothing would help, not the knee-weakening fire in his shoulder or the wrenching ache in his gut because he was afraid, so f**king afraid. “I don’t need anything.” Except maybe a lobotomy. Yeah, that would help. He could stop hurting and stop thinking. Thinking and wondering how it’d happened that he had no life, and that he’d never even noticed until now.
“You need something to sleep,” Red said. “So you can heal better, faster. Whatever you want, just name it. Vico din? Something strong? Have you been taking the vitamins Tucker gave you? I have some herbal shit from Tucker that’s amazing. You should see what it did for Ty—”
“I’m good, Red.”
“But—”
“I said I’m good. Jesus.”
Red stared at him. “Fine. Stare at the ceiling all night, in pain when you don’t have to be.” Turning stiffly, he stalked off, hurt, and Pace sighed. “Don’t do that. Dammit, Red.”
But Red kept walking. The man was as stubborn as a damn ox. “Fine. I’ll take the damn pills,” Pace called after him, even stepping into the hallway, but Red didn’t stop.
Shaking his head, Pace turned back to his door, nearly plowing over Holly. God, not her, not now. He didn’t want her to see him like this, and he sure as hell couldn’t take the way she looked at him, as if even in spite of not believing in happily-ever-afters, she secretly hoped he was hers.
He had no happily-ever-after in his future.
Her gaze tracked up his nearly naked body to meet his. “I’d ask you if you were okay,” she said. “But I know the drill by now. You’d just say—”
“I’m fine.”
“Yeah,” she said softly. “That. Pace . . . are you okay?”
“Don’t.” He couldn’t go there, not right now. “Please, just . . . don’t.”
“Okay.” She held out her hand. “I believe you have something of mine.”
Yes. Yes, he did, and images flashed in his brain; her pressed back against the tile wall, her halter dress untied and revealing her br**sts, a perfect nipple hardening in his mouth . . . how wet she’d been. “Finders keepers.”
“Aren’t you funny. What ‘damn pills’ are you taking from Red?”
The question managed to do what nothing else had. It cleared the sexual haze. “What?”
“He’s not a doctor. You know he can’t prescribe. Is it painkillers or other stuff, like performance enhancers?”
Insulted and pissed, never a good combo, he let out a short, mirthless laugh. “Didn’t realize we were on the record.”
“Sorry.” She shook her head at herself. “I’m researching that article, and—”
“And you’re curious. You’re also sure there’s a dirty little secret to ferret out. Well, you caught me. I’m having a drug party tonight. Sorry, no reporters invited.” Sick, hurting like hell, he turned and stalked into his room, half wishing he’d let Red give him something after all, anything to get rid of his pain, both physical and otherwise.
Holly caught Pace’s hotel door just before it closed in her face. She let herself in and looked around. Nicer than hers, bigger, fancier, but she’d never needed big and fancy.