FORCE: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (80 page)

Crash

My fucking wallet. God dammit.

Here I was, driving without a license, and in the shit town of Lenape where the cops don't really have much else to worry about. I figured I left it at Gabriela's house. I was going to have to go back to her, after I rolled out of bed without saying goodbye this morning.

Fuck.

So I'm here for the moment, and I have no money and no license. Why shouldn't I go back to Gabi's? Maybe she wouldn't be too pissed about me running off like that this morning. She seemed like a reasonable girl, maybe I could make up some bullshit about needing to hurry over here for visiting hours. Chicks love sad stories about old people. I bet I could even squeeze out a tear or two, and maybe she'd comfort me by letting me fall asleep on her tits.

Yeah, those tits were definitely worth swallowing some pride for. 

I straddled my bike and pulled out of the parking lot into the bright winter sunshine. I had a huge pickup truck still parked on the street in North Philly. I wondered how long I could leave it there before the PPA towed it. Fuck, they probably already did, the money-grubbing bastards. Well fuck it, free parking. I'll deal with that later.

Besides, I felt better on my bike.

I pulled out on to the divided highway, feeling the smooth rumble of my engine. Right on cue, my mind went to its familiar, pleasant blank. Riding had a way of shutting everything off except the essentials. It kept the bad shit at bay for as long as I was on top of the machine. I could control my bike much better than I could control anything else, so I rode as much as I could, even in the winter sunshine.

Luckily my asshole brain somehow remembered how to get to Gabi's from here. I rolled through town, slowing at the crosswalks, looking to see if I saw any familiar faces. But I was just as anonymous here, in my purported hometown, as I was in the huge, unfeeling city of Philadelphia. I wasn't sure how that made me feel, so I decided to ignore it.

This was just another place. I was just another guy, heading over to the apartment of just another girl.

There was no sign of the silver hatchback on the street. I cursed under my breath. What the fuck was I going to do, wait around here all day? Who knew when she was going to come back?

I looked up and down the street. Everyone was at work, all the self-respecting citizens of Lenape, New Jersey had abandoned their people-holders and headed somewhere else for work. The whole town seemed empty.

I swung my leg over my bike, absently rubbing the stiffness from my bad leg. There were no eyes on me. I yanked the black watchcap from my head, mindful of how suspicious it made me look in broad daylight. Then I casually sauntered up the icy walkway and tried the door.

It was locked.
Well, fuck.
But at least Gabi wasn't a total idiot.

I swung around the side of the careworn house. There were bikes in the yard behind the house, a swingset. Clearly Gabi wasn't the only tenant. I needed to be careful.

There was a window that looked to be the one into her room right over a large AC unit on the ground. I hoisted myself up onto the top of it and pressed the heel of my gloved hand against the pane. Single glazed, no storm window; I could easily bust it with one quick punch.

But then I'd have to haul my lame ass up through the broken glass and I'd leave Gabi with a huge mess on her hands. If the only thing missing was my wallet, then she'd definitely know it was me who caused her the grief and for some reason this bothered me. I liked the girl, what I knew of her. She had a quick wit and didn't take shit.

I slid back down from the AC unit, landing hard on my bad leg. I gritted my teeth against the pins and needles jolting up to the base of my spine.

When I went down, the bike landed on top of me, pinning me onto the asphalt as we both rolled into the ditch. That's what they told me anyway. The surgery on my crushed femur left me with metal plates on my body and the ability to set off metal detectors wherever I went. It was a neat party trick, but annoying as fuck to deal with on a daily basis.

Walking properly, now that was something I could remember. I had the distinct muscle memory of how straight I should be able to stand, not with this one leg shorter than the other bullshit. The accident robbed me of about three inches of height and as much as it sounded like vain bullshit compared to the shit my face went through, I still resented the loss of my six foot one frame.  For one thing, chicks liked taller guys. For another, I still felt like I looked at the world through the eyes of a taller man. It was yet another instinct left over from the person that existed before me. I remembered how easy it used to be, just to put one foot in front of the other, no need for the brain to get involved. Just walk like a normal, regular person. I could remember how to do that.

But I couldn't actually do it.

Jesus, where's all this broody shit coming from?

I still don't know why the fuck I'm here in Lenape.
When I cut out of Philly, it was like my bike just pointed itself in the right direction. I drove north, a bullshit idea in the wintertime in hindsight, and just got off the exit from 287 like it was something I did every day.  Like I was just showing up after a weekend away.
Hey there everybody, Ben is back! He doesn't remember who you are, maybe you can remember for him?

Shit, I'm in a bad place.
I shoved my hands into my pockets, assuming my usual hunched shoulders posture, and started quickly back to my bike.
Get your head back. Stop the black thoughts.
There wasn't anyone around to talk me down if I started on this path. I'd have to push the blackness back down again without Doc's help or J.'s talks or Case's jokes. Fuck.

I needed a plan, that was the first thing. Couldn't go without my wallet.  I'd drive around, maybe ask a few people if they knew where Gabi worked. That might do it. See if anyone knew Gabi...Gabi...whatever the fuck her last name was.

Shit.

I was just realizing the futility of my plan when I rounded the corner of the house and stopped. The silver hatchback was sitting there on the street, rematerializing out of thin air. I wondered for a moment if I just hadn't seen it there before. My brain and I have this sort of uneasy truce, and we don't always play nice. Maybe the car had been there all along and I had contemplated breaking and entering for no reason.

But then Gabi slid out of the driver's side door, deftly balancing a tray of foofy coffee. The way she flicked her long mass of curls over her shoulder did something to my stomach. That skin I had so loved last night was even better in the sunlight, a perfect cocoa cream.

Shit, I wanted her again.

Her bright smile was way out of place. She should have been pissed to see me again, maybe make some crack about crawling back for more. I had cut out without saying goodbye this morning, and though we'd given each other a pretty good workout last night, I still didn't know her last name.

"Hi there!" she smiled, showing perfect white teeth. "I thought you might come back."

I hedged. "Yeah," I said, non-commitally. Why the hell did she think that?"

"I just ran out for coffee, you want some?"

"Uh, sure." Unsure of what exactly was going on, I decided to follow her into her apartment.  Besides, I was enjoying the view from back here. Gabby was wearing these tight little yoga pants, and the way her ass punched against the thin fabric did something even nicer to my stomach. He hair was swung back over her shoulder, and in the sunlight I could see the little marks on her skin where I had kissed her neck. I liked that. I liked that I had marked her as mine, even if it was only for a night.

"It's my day off!" she said, and I could hear the smile in her voice even if I was still staring at her butt. "And I'm so proud of myself, because I'd actually got up this morning, and didn't just spend the whole day lazing around in bed."

"Why would that be a bad thing?" I smirked.

She put her key in the lock and turned back to look at me. "Well it really depends on who I'm lying in bed with…."

My heart did a weird little flop. "Hey, let me carry that," I reached for the steaming tray of coffees. They smelled fucking delicious, not at all like the swill we used to down at the clubhouse. I don't care if it makes me less of a man, I fucking  love fancy coffee drinks.

She smiled and handed the tray over, then gave the sticky door a shove. She stepped over the threshold and then turned back and looked at me. "So I have something of yours… Ben."

She said my name like it was supposed to mean something to me. The way she paused, the way she bounced from side to side on her toes, it all told me I should be picking up a clue that I was missing. All this subtle, non-verbal communication shit that chicks do really confused the hell out of me.

I pulled my usual routine, vague smile, a casual run of my fingers over my bald scalp. Usually that was enough to derail whatever it was they were trying to tell me.

But Gabi was still staring at me, head cocked to the side, exposing the curve of her long neck. Jesus, she really was beautiful. I could tell in the dark, but here in the daytime, the morning sun streaming through the window I had decided not to break, gave her skin a golden hue. Her eyes were so wide set she almost looked alien, but in the most beautiful way, huge chocolate pools that looked good enough to drown in. I both congratulated myself on scoring her last night and yelled at myself for not having enjoyed her even more.

"Yeah," I finally said, seeing that she was expecting me to say something. "I appreciate you grabbing it, I kind of need it."

Gabi paused, working her lips like she wanted to say something. Then she gave a slight shake of her head and turned around. This girl showed every emotion she ever had. Watching her was like getting a direct show of her brain. She'd make a really shitty poker player.

"I'm glad you're back," she said softly. "Maybe we could catch up."

"Catch up?"

She did that a full body shudder thing again, like my words had somehow caused her physical pain. I felt the gnawing guilt deep in my stomach, the kind that came when someone expected me to remember something I had no way of getting a hold of.

Did I know this girl?

Had I fucked her before?

Had I broken her heart and somehow not remembered it?

The familiar feeling of resentment was starting to bubble up in my chest. I was getting angry, at this girl, at myself. What was I thinking in coming back to this town? Of course there would be ghosts here.

Gabi twisted her mouth a little, a cute little quirk that would have made me want to kiss her again if I wasn't so on edge. She set two cups of coffee out on the battered kitchen table, strewn with opened envelopes and a whole mess of earrings, and then sat heavily down in one of the mismatched chairs.

"Relax, Ben," she finally exhaled. "It's okay that you don't remember me. It was a long time ago, and I was only a kid."

I sat down heavily, stretching my bad leg out straight in front of me, feeling better being able to stretch it. I stared at my coffee cup, tracing my finger around the rim. It was still too hot to drink, somehow. But I ached to do something with it to soothe the nervousness in my hands. "Did I…?"

She grinned, those wide kissable lips spread into a smile that would have knocked my socks off if I wasn't feeling so shitty. "No," she said, "we never actually talked before last night." She extended her hand, "I'm Gabriela Ortiz," she said formally. "Class of 2010."

I blinked at her. Doing some quick math, I recognized that I was the class of 2008. She wouldn't have brought up graduation unless we had gone to the same school. "So, you knew me before my accident," I said slowly, still trying to feel everything out.

She smiled at me like I had just done something that I should be really proud of, and I tried not to bristle and feel like I was being patronized. "That's right, my sister was a grade ahead of you."

"Oh," was all I said. She wanted more than that. I could tell she wanted more than that. She wanted my eyes to go wide with recognition, a sudden flood of memories to take over, nostalgia that would carry us both backwards through time, laughing at inside jokes and all that other bullshit. She wanted me to remember her specifically, to say something about how I had noticed her in the hallways, to tell her something intimate that she could hold onto. She wanted all of these things but I couldn't give her a single glimmer.

"Oh. Cool," I elaborated. I looked at the door, wondering just how much she'd hate me forever if I just got up and walked away now. Better have her hate me than pity me, though.

But when Gabi's beautiful face crashed down into a frown, I changed my mind about walking out. Instead, my guilt redoubled. I leaned forward, pressing my elbows into the table. I didn't usually feel like I needed to explain, but for some reason with Gabi, I wanted to try anyway.

"Look, I don't know how much you know about what happened," I started, fiddling with the paper sleeve on the cup. "But that accident, well, it kind of changed everything for me."

"So you really can't remember anything?" Gabi exhaled, leaning back in her chair.

The way she stared at me hurt me physically. I had never had someone listen to my words so carefully before. Not Doctor D., not anyone. It was a strange feeling to be taken so seriously and it made me struggle all the harder to give her the real story.