Caught Looking (Hot-Lanta Series) (37 page)

Jane’s eyes were watery and then she did something he never thought she would do. She put one hand on his chest and the other behind his head and pulled herself on his lap. She slowly lowered her hand on his che
st as she stroked his muscles up and down.

Michael did not dare
breathe, any slight movement might scare her away. She began to cry which Michael thought was strange but she had been crying a lot recently. She lowered her mouth toward his and he licked his lips right before her plump lips met his. She slowly kissed him on his mouth, nothing evasive just sweet kisses. There was no passion behind them; just the touch of human on human like their relationship had always been like.

Michael could not help but think that the passion she had for him will never be at the same level as the passion he ha
d for her. He separated himself from her and set her on her side of the couch. Breathing heavily Michael ran his hand over his face.

“Wh
at is wrong Michael? Did you not enjoy that?”

“Jesus, of course I did. I’
m so hard for you right now it is ridiculous.” Michael watched Jane blush. “But the fact is Jane, you were not enjoying it. I know what it feels like to be kissed by someone who is madly attracted to you and someone who is kissing you out of pity. I’m not mad at you, but you were not kissing me with passion. I don’t need your pity Jane. I have always been fine with being friends with you. I don’t want to be your toy to play with to get back at Brady. I don’t deserve to be treated like that”

Michael knew he was being harsh but he needed to be honest. His heart w
as not hers to play around with. Maybe Brady’s but not his. Jane looked furious, she did not move for a second and then out of nowhere her hand slapped the side of his face. What the hell!

“How dare you accuse me of using you?”

Michael was astonished at first but once he got his wits about him he realized what was happening. Jane wanted to turn this around on him. Oh no, he was the one being fucked around with. He shot off the couch and paced the living room.

Finally he shouted, “If you are not using me, then what the hell are you doing Jane? You can’t sit there and tell me you are not in love w
ith Brady still. I know you are. It is all over your face. What I don’t get is why you won’t see him and end everyone’s misery.”

Jane grabbed her crutches and started to get up. “Well I apologize for making your lives so miserable. I did not ask
for you guys to babysit me twenty-four-fucking-seven. I can do things on my own so you can take the pity party you have been throwing me and take it somewhere else.”

Michael was furious with her. She was being so un-grateful. She started to the door to clearly let him out but he stopped her in the hallway.

“Really Jane? Playing the woe is me card a little early, aren’t you?”

“Fuck you Michael! Get the hell out of here.”

Michael did not move a muscle he wouldn’t leave her like this no matter how mad he was. He turned, grabbed her, knocked her crutches down and threw her over his shoulder. He carried her to her bedroom while she kicked and screamed the whole time, he threw her on her bed and went back to the kitchen to grab her some food and the ginger ale she never touched. He came back and she was curled on the bed crying. Michael sighed and sat on the bed next to her. He touched her shoulder and she pulled away.

“Jane, listen I’
m sorry I accused you of using me…”

Jane interrupted Michael, “Michael stop. You were right. I was using you and that wa
s so beyond fucked up of me. I’m so sorry.”

Jane
cried in her hands as she rocked back and forth. Shit, he was right. She was using him. He could not help but be furious. He tried to calm himself before he spoke because he didn’t want to say anything he would regret later.

“Jane I’
m going to leave, I don’t want to deal with this right now. I’m done being in the middle of your relationship with Brady. If you are still in love with Brady then grow up and deal with your problems. If you don’t want anything to do with him then put the guy out of his misery and tell him. Either away stop being a child and face your problems head on. It is about time you stop hiding behind everything and using excuses for your problems. I’ll let Molly know I left early from your apartment. I will talk to you later.”

Michael grabbed his keys and left Jane to think about what he said. He decided to just drive to the stadium and hopefully Brady was there because
it was about time Michael paid him a little visit.

                                                                      ***

Jane just laid there on her bed for a while and thought about how her life had gone from perfectly in love to crying in her bed with a broken leg and her friend yelling at her. She knew she was wrong in using Michael. She felt like a complete shit because she kissed him and when she kissed him she knew she felt nothing, nothing at all.

J
ane thought about what Michael said. She was not entirely sure what she wanted in her life. She knew her career was right where she wanted it. Her love life on the other hand was a pile of trash. She still hurt from seeing Brady with Laney and hearing about how she had been contacting him for a while. Why did he not tell her? Duh Jane, because he didn’t want her to know he was cheating on her. She felt so much worse than when she found George humping Rebecca’s brains out.

She actually trusted Brady and believed him when he told her he would never hurt her. He told her he wanted to be with her forever and make her his wife. Was he fucking Laney when he was telling her that? Or was that just a recent development? Either way she could not stop loving him. She wanted to so badly but it was not like a switch she could just turn on and off.

She realized she had to go to the bathroom but her crutches were all the way in the hallway near the front door. Annoyed, she crawled off the bed and headed for the bathroom. She was too tired to make it to the bathroom so instead she just laid down on the floor for a while and cried as she felt the coldness of the tiles touch her face. Man she had hit rock bottom if her bathroom floor was the one soothing thing in her life.

                                                                      ***

Brady got to the stadium and went directly to the clubhouse. He dreaded this meeting with his manager but he had to just get it over with. He knocked on his manager’s door and Deek answered in a gruff voice to come in. Brady entered the office and was instantly smacked in the face with the musky cologne of Deek Jones. He wore a brand that all the guys in the clubhouse called Deek’s stink. They were not sure where the man got it, but it must have been fifty years old and out of production. The guys were almost positive when the company who made the cologne shut down Deek bought out all of their remaining inventory.

Brady tried to ignore the stench
filling his nose and sat down. Deek stood up and paced behind his desk, he looked extremely irritated. He rummaged under some papers on his desk and threw a magazine in Brady’s direction. It had Brady and Jane’s face plastered all over the front with the title, “Naked Dispute: Brady’s Brunette Exchanged for Blonde Bombshell.” Fuck!

“Please tell me this is not the fucking reason you have not had one hit in the last three games and the piss poor excuse for your fielding skills.”
Deek yelled.

Double Fuck. Anyo
ne who knew what Brady was going through right now knew that the reason his performance on the field was so terrible was because of the situation with Jane. Brady could barely function in everyday life let alone on a field with thousands of people watching him.  Brady did not know how to answer the question, all he could focus on was the picture of Jane on the magazine cover with the look of horror and heartbreak on her face. Brady just lowered his face and shook his head.

“Jesus Christ, Matthews. Are you shitting m
e? You’re seriously letting a girl affect your performance? You are supposed to be a leader on this team and there you are pussy footing around because your heart is broken. Well get used to it, it happens to all of us. It’s the people who separate their personal lives from the ball field who are the greats. Are you going to be someone who is taken down by their personal life?”

Brady wa
s so furious by now he was about to lose it. He wanted to reach across his manager’s desk and punch him several times in the face. Deek had no clue about the hell Brady had been through in the past couple of days. Brady just shook his head in agreement and did not look at the bastard.

Deek
continued, “Seriously Matthews, no hits and five errors in three games is beyond pathetic. When did you become such a damn softy? Do I need to coddle you and rock you back and forth, stroking your forehead, while telling you everything is going to be ok? Do you need me to warm you some milk and put your fluffy slippers on your feet and talk about your feelings? Shall I call your mummy and tell her that her little Brady boy needs his mummy? Should I tell the camera’s to not focus on you in the dugout so you can suck your thumb in between innings like an infant? I should bench your ass for such poor performance, if it wasn’t for your…”

Brady could not take it any longer he jumped out of his chair and threw it across the room.

“Then fucking bench me! I don’t give a shit if you don’t like the way I’ve been performing you have no clue what I have been through in the past couple of days. My girlfriend who I thought was going to be my wife one day got beaten up by her ex, she found Laney trying to take me to bed when I wanted nothing to do with her then Jane wound up getting in a serious car accident and all I want to do is make sure she is ok but oh no, she won’t fucking see me because she thinks I cheated on her with that bitch, Laney, who set me up and had paparazzi standing outside my house ready to capture the whole disgusting encounter that is now so eloquently displayed on your fucking desk. So if you want to bench me please do so. If you want to trade me, please by all means go right on ahead. If you want to end my career please put me out of my misery because it could not be any worse than what I am going through right now.”

Brady turned to leave
Deek’s office when Deek shouted to him to pick up the chair he threw and sit down. Brady was about to ignore Deek but something in his head told him to listen. He grabbed the chair and sat down, as he stared the man in the eye.

“Are you done with your
temper tantrum?”

Brady just gritted his
teeth, the man was one hell of a manager but had zero amount of compassion. Brady just nodded not wanting to be sucked into another screaming match with the man.

“Go
od, I know you’ve been through a lot. I talked to Marc yesterday after the game and he told me everything. I’m sorry to hear about Jane.”

Holy shit was that compassion from
Deek? The stone faced shit head? Brady almost passed out in surprise.

“I’
m not married and I never gave my love life a chance. I was too busy focusing on my career, I regret it now. I don’t want to see the same thing happen to you. I’m putting you on the temporary disabled list. You have fifteen days to figure your life out.”

Brady could not believe what he was hearing. Was his manager actually givi
ng him time to fix his life? Was that something that actually could happen?

Deek
continued, “I expect you in this time off to fix your life and to continue to train. If things don’t work out the way you want them, I don’t want it showing in your performance, do you hear me? I need you this season so that is why I’m giving you this time off. Get your shit together Matthews.”

Brady was shocked. “Thank y
ou sir, are you sure this is ok? What is the media going to say?”

Deek
waved his hand in the air, “Don’t worry about those blood suckers. I have a conference with them later and I’m simply going to say you have been nursing a sore hamstring and instead of pushing it we are letting you strengthen it before we get too far into the season. You have fifteen days. Fix things Matthews!”

“Yes Sir, thank you.” Brady shook
Deek’s hand and left his office.

He could not believe his manager just gave him fifteen days off to try to get Jane back. How was he going to do that? She would not even let him in her apartment. Brady went to his locker to grab his bag he was going to take to Philly and ran into Michael. He looked terrible.

“Hey Michael, how’s Jane?”

Michael scowled at him, what happened? “Oh just fine, just using me as a toy in her plans to get back at you?”

Get back at Brady? What did she do? Brady’s blood started to boil, Michael better not have touched her. He just about ran to Michael’s locker and asked him in a stern tone, “What did you do to her?”

Michael pushed Brady away from him and said, “Fuck you man
. I did nothing to her but care for her and take care of her while you were sucking it up on the ball field.”

“You piece of shit! You know I would give anything to be with her but she won’t even let me near her. You think this has been easy on me?”