Game On (15 page)

“What are you thinking?” she asked, dragging his thoughts back to the present. Crossing her forearms on the table, she leaned her breasts on top of them, giving him a great view down the front of her—his—shirt.

He smiled. “I was just thinking that it’s nice to eat with a woman who actually enjoys food. No whining about a special diet or stressing over the ingredients.”

“Ah.” She leaned back, picking up her wineglass as she did so. “You mean those anorexic/bulimic Hollywood types you date. I’ll bet it’s a drag having to use laxative as the main ingredient of every meal,” she teased as she took a sip of wine.

He laughed with her. “Yeah, well. I gave up cooking for women.”

She raised an eyebrow in question.

He saluted her with his wineglass. “I made an exception for you.” Relaxing, he leaned back in his chair, stretching out his jean-clad legs, crossing his bare feet at the ankles.

“I feel so honored.” She smiled at him. “Do your teammates know of your culinary talents?”

“Most of the guys on my old team did. I would cook for the offensive line a lot. They were big into ribs and Mexican. No one teased me about it, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
Not if they wanted to eat
. “You ever cook for the soccer player you were engaged to?”

He wasn’t sure what prompted him to ask. By virtue of his celebrity status, she knew everything about him. Shane wanted to even the score and know more about her love life. He didn’t want to examine why he even cared, but he did.

“Not that often,” she said. “I know my way around the kitchen, but I’m not that big into cooking. The kitchen was always Julianne’s domain.”

She’d deftly shifted the conversation off her fiancé, but Shane wasn’t going to let her leave the subject.

“Tell me about him.”

A long silence stretched as Carly toyed with her wineglass and Shane tried not to look like her response was important to him. Except it was.

“Max is a lot like Julianne: passionate and demonstrative and very Italian,” she finally said. Her words were spoken softly in a voice tinged with melancholy. “It’s easy to get caught up in his larger-than-life personality. It was also easy to drown in it. I thought I could handle it. And everything that went with it.”

Seeing the sadness reflected in Carly’s eyes, Shane felt like a jerk, wishing he’d let her change the subject when she’d attempted to.

Carly chewed on her bottom lip before continuing. “I think he liked the idea of marrying a woman who was as notorious as he was in the tabloids. It ensured he’d always get the media attention he thought he deserved. I was stupid and naïve enough to believe he loved me for who I was as a person, not as a personality.”

Shane forced himself to keep his body relaxed when inside he wanted to hit something. “The guy didn’t deserve you.” The words didn’t adequately express the feelings swirling around in his head, but he didn’t know how to deal with those, so he kept it simple.

Carly smiled sadly. “I’m just happy he followed his heart before we both made a big mistake.”

Shane stared at her.
Surely she isn’t that forgiving?
“Yeah, he lives happily ever after and you’re made the scapegoat by the paparazzi. Somehow I don’t think that’s fair.”

“I learned a long time ago that life isn’t fair, Shane.”

He shook his head. Was it possible this woman had thicker skin than he did?

“So now you’re spending your life waiting for an accountant or a podiatrist? Or was it an actuary and a proctologist?” Shane teased, trying to steer the conversation back to a lighter topic.

Carly’s eyes grew wide and her mouth formed a perfect
O
. “You
were
eavesdropping outside my office that day!”

He shrugged, giving her his best Devlin grin.

Carly shook her head in exasperation with him. “I’ve learned to be careful who I date. Most guys either want to save the little girl they saw in the movie about my mother. Or, they’re after my aristocratic title and the trust fund that comes with it.”

“Not me,” he drawled. “I just want you for your body.”

She buried her face in her hands. He couldn’t tell if she was laughing or embarrassed. When she lifted her head, her eyes were shimmering. She took a deep breath.

“About that, Shane. We really need to talk.”

“Ugh. That has to be the most dreaded phrase in the female vocabulary,” he said, sitting up in his chair and leaning across the table. “Let’s not analyze this, Carly.” He took her hand, resting his palm against hers, intertwining their fingers. “Let’s just live this. I’m not going to kiss and tell and neither are you. We both know this isn’t forever. It’s just two people enjoying each other. When it’s over, it’s over. Let’s just take it one night at a time. Okay?”

Pulling her hand to his mouth, he placed an openmouthed kiss on her palm, enjoying the feel of her shiver beneath his lips. Neither one of them was immune to the other’s touch. She nodded, nibbling on her bottom lip as she did so.

Together, they finished what was left of their meal and cleaned the kitchen. The intimacy of the domestic scene should have unnerved him, but it didn’t. Carly stood beside him at the sink, barefoot and naked underneath his shirt, her hip brushing his thigh. They washed and dried the dishes while talking about their similar, dysfunctional childhoods. They laughed over stories of boarding school. They talked about their favorite foods: she craved Thai; he loved Mexican. Their favorite music: he liked grunge rock—Pearl Jam and the Red Hot Chili Peppers; she was a Top 40 girl who loved the international artists. Both loved Springsteen. He’d seen him five times; she’d seen him three. Before he knew it, the kitchen was spotless and darkness had fallen in spite of the summer solstice. She leaned against the kitchen counter looking sexy as hell with her hair covering one eye.

“I really should get going. You have to be up early for mini-camp tomorrow.” She didn’t say it with much enthusiasm. Shane knew it wouldn’t take much persuading for her to stay. Sliding his hands under her shirt, he wrapped them around her waist. At the same time, he nudged her with his hips so her back was against the stainless steel refrigerator. With two fingers, he pushed her hair to one side, giving him access to her neck.

“Sure you don’t want to stay for dessert?” His tongue trailed along the soft skin below her ear.

“I really shouldn’t,” she whispered. Her body was saying something else as it came to life beneath his roving hands. Reaching behind her into the fridge, he pulled out a can of whipped cream. A squeak barely escaped her lips as he shook the can.

“You sure? I got fat-free.”

Her skin betrayed her again as a blush crept from her chest to her forehead.

“Only if we can work it off first.” She licked her lips.

“Your wish is my command, Dorothy.”

Thirteen

Carly woke early the next morning. Shane’s house
sat secluded at the back of a cul-de-sac and they had forgotten to draw the shades before going to sleep. The long June days began early and sunlight spread out over the bed. A muscled leg hung outside of the sheet. His breathing was steady and deep with sleep, giving her a moment to take in her surroundings.

The house was a large contemporary. He’d filled it with comfortable, rented furniture, but it had the feel of a monastery. With the exception of the kitchen, there wasn’t one picture or personal effect evident anywhere in the house. The walls were bare. The tables lacked any knickknacks. She wanted to believe the sterile environment was because he’d only lived in the house for a month, but she knew better. Shane Devlin was the ultimate loner. His house was a reflection of his personality. She doubted he’d ever lived any differently. Sadness crept into her heart as she thought of the anger he still held on to.

Slowly, she rolled over onto her side so she could leisurely take in his face, relaxed and boyish in sleep. His body was beautiful. She thought of how that body had merged with hers last night and heat rose from her toes to the pit of her belly. Shane was a powerful lover. Playful at times, focused and intent at others. Tuned into her needs, he never left her wanting. But he took as much as he gave. The man sleeping beside her was dangerous to her senses. Dangerous to her heart.

The intimacy of their dinner last night shook her more than their lovemaking. Perhaps it was their similar life stories that bonded them together. It was more than just sexual chemistry, she knew. That’s what scared her. He would have no trouble keeping things on a physical level. Could she?

Reaching over, she traced a finger along his chest, trailing it down along the line of hair at his belly and lower. Mumbling to himself, he blinked his eyes open. With a slow, dazzling smile he rolled over on top of her. She wrapped her hand around him and he covered her mouth with his. The shrill ringing of the telephone startled them both.

“This is starting to get old,” he growled. “For crying out loud, it’s six fifteen in the morning.”

“Don’t answer it.” She tried to pull his hips back in contact with hers.

He swore as he looked at the caller ID. “It’s the guardhouse.” He snatched up the phone. “Yeah?”

Carly winced as his warm body rolled off hers. He sat up on the side of the bed. She trailed a finger down his spine.

“What?” he bellowed. He stood, searching for his clothes. Tucking the phone between his neck and his ear, he pulled on a pair of jeans over his naked butt. “Are you kidding me? Sure. Fine. Send him here.” He slammed down the landline phone before grabbing his cell off the nightstand, swearing under his breath.

“Shane? What is it? What’s going on?” Carly sat up, clutching the sheet to her bare chest.

“It’s the kid.” He pounded the buttons of his cell phone.

“What kid?”

“Bruce’s kid!” he all but shouted.

“You mean Troy?” she asked incredulously, taken aback by his reaction. “Your brother?”

Finally bothering to look at her, he pierced her with a menacing glare. “Yeah,
that
kid.” Shane stormed out of the bedroom, yelling into his cell as he went. “I know what time it is, Tif, just put him on the phone,” he demanded as he stomped down the stairs.

And just like that, the sympathetic lover of the past two nights was gone and the Devil of the NFL was back. Carly flopped back down onto the bed listening to Shane argue with someone on the phone. He’d gone into the kitchen so she couldn’t make out exactly what he was saying, which only heightened her curiosity about who he’d called. Staring at the ceiling, she took a few deep, cleansing breaths. Obviously, there would be no returning to the bliss of five minutes earlier. One thing she knew for sure: she needed to get some clothes on before his younger brother arrived. Things were difficult enough to explain without a preteen boy finding her naked in his brother’s bed.

It only took a few minutes for her to brush her teeth and pull back her hair. They’d showered together last night after their adventure with the whipped cream. She’d grabbed her gym bag out of her car afterward, which, thankfully, had clean clothes in it. A pair of yoga pants and a modest V-neck T-shirt would have to do. Her sneakers were next. She was shoving yesterday’s clothes into the bag when the doorbell rang. She didn’t want to intrude, so she kept herself busy by tidying up the bedroom. Turning on the TV was out—she might miss something important going on downstairs.

Standing in the doorway she strained to hear the voices. Shane and the voice of a boy were easily distinguishable, but she heard other voices as well.

Several other voices.

Curiosity got the better of her and she made her way to the top of the stairs. After all, Shane hadn’t actually told her to wait upstairs. Maybe she could slip out to the garage without anyone noticing. But then she’d miss the action. What if Shane wanted her there? Somehow she doubted that. She wasn’t exactly sure
what
she should do. Her feet were already moving before she could make up her mind.

The voices were louder now, interspersed with the sound of Beckett’s paws clicking on the tile floor. He was obviously more excited than his owner at this morning’s company. Carly couldn’t see the boy clearly from this vantage point, but he obviously hadn’t come alone. Three other men were with him. They were large, one of them as big as some of the players on the Blaze. One wore a college T-shirt. If she had to guess, she’d say they were players from Bruce Devlin’s team.

No way this was going to go well.

Silently, she climbed down the last few steps and rounded the corner toward the kitchen. Hanging back in the shadows, she tried to get a better look. Troy Devlin stood near the French doors in the breakfast area. His brilliant green eyes shone with unshed tears behind a pair of wire-framed glasses. His dirty blond hair had a bad case of bed head. She guessed he was about Molly’s age. He still hadn’t grown into his gawky body, but the boy was going to be a lady-killer one day.

Troy was beyond tired, his eyes red rimmed with dark bruises beneath them. But even exhausted, he held his chin in the same defiant way his brother often did. From his stance, he looked as if he’d come to do battle with Shane.

Beckett seemed to sense the tension in the kitchen. The dog parked himself on Troy’s toes, panting frantically at everyone else in the room. Carly empathized with the wounded look in the boy’s eyes. That feeling of being alone in the world was a familiar one. What’s more, Shane was well acquainted with that feeling, too. Surely he’d have some compassion for his brother?

Beckett outed her as soon as she slipped into the kitchen. Jumping from Troy’s feet, he galloped over to bury his nose in her crotch.

“It figures,” Troy’s voice squeaked. “You didn’t want me here so I wouldn’t mess up your sex life. Is this the latest bimbo of the week?”

Well, alrighty then. Clearly, the boy had been reading from the same manual on obnoxious behavior as her nephew.

“Hey!” Shane yelled at the boy, causing him to flinch.

The big football player cuffed Troy in the back of the head. “Mind your manners,” he said in a voice higher than Troy’s.

Inhaling a deep, cleansing breath, she stepped farther into the room. Something wasn’t right here. Whether or not it was her business, the boy standing across the room was hurting and she wasn’t leaving until he was taken care of. It was impossible to interpret the look Shane flung at her: anger, frustration, perhaps even a bit of confusion. Too late now. She was in this mess whether he liked it or not.

“You must be Troy,” she said, trying to infuse a little cheer in her voice.

The boy just stared at her, his chin betraying his bravado with a slight tremor. “Yeah, that’s me.”

“And you are?”

She turned to look at the source of the question. Besides the big Neanderthal standing with Troy, there were two other players. One was a handsome all-American blue-eyed blond who had poster boy written all over him, and the other a sculpted African American with diamond stud earrings that probably cost more than her car. His expression was surly, like the tone of his question.

Shane answered before she could. “Your worst nightmare.” His tone was soft but lethal. “She’s assistant to the Blaze GM. So if you buffoons are thinking about playing in the pros someday, I’d watch your mouth and your step. I’m sure you broke any number of laws on your little escapade last night.”

Carly forced herself not to roll her eyes at Shane’s statement. She wasn’t sure what constituted a “little escapade” or whether any laws had actually been broken, but she’d get to the bottom of that later. Fairly confident that these three hadn’t seen the inside of a law book, she played along with Shane. It was his house, after all.

“Kidnapping comes to mind,” she said. Mr. All-American went pale, while the big guy nervously shuffled his feet. The walking DeBeers advertisement only sneered at her. He probably had a defense attorney on retainer. “Ain’t nobody been kidnapped,” he said.

Shane’s cell phone rang, shattering yet another climactic moment.

“I’ll take this in the office. Keep an eye on them, Carly.”

Shane’s attitude was beginning to really annoy her. He ignored Carly’s defiant glare as he snapped open his cell phone. “What have you got, Roscoe?” he said as he left the room.

So, he was talking to his agent. Something wasn’t right here, and now was the time to get the truth. She looked over at the boy. He was dead on his feet, one hand stroking Beckett’s big head, the other gripping the back of the chair.

“You seem to have made a new friend,” she said, gesturing to the dog. “Would you like to give him his breakfast?”

The boy’s eyes darted from her to the dog. Beckett looked up at him, swishing his tail across the floor. Troy gave him a ghost of a smile back. “Sure,” he said.

Carly showed him where the dog food was kept in the pantry, scooping up the dry food and handing it to Troy to deposit in Beckett’s dish. True to form, Beckett inhaled the food in thirty seconds flat.

“Dang, that dog eats faster than Tiny,” the all-American said with a laugh. The big guy had to be Tiny, because he responded with an indignant, “Does not.”

His belly full, Beckett bounced around the room with a tennis ball in his mouth. It was answer time.

“You can take him outside if you’d like, Troy,” she said. “He likes to play catch.”

“Sure, whatever,” Troy mumbled as Beckett danced in front of the door.

Tiny went too as dog and boy disappeared into the backyard.

“Okay, why don’t you two tell me what’s going on?” she asked. “Let’s start with your names.”

The two exchanged glances. After some sort of nonverbal communication, they turned to Carly.

“Dante Stuart, wide receiver.” Carly had to stifle a laugh. The boy sounded like he was doing his cameo intro for
Monday Night Football
. He’d probably been practicing in the mirror since he was six.

“Uh, I’m Evan Andrews,” the all-American said. “We aren’t really in any trouble, are we?”

“That depends.” She leaned a hip against the counter. “What exactly have you done? Why did you take Troy from his grandparents and bring him here?”

“He asked us to!” Evan answered, as if the reason were simple. “Tell her, Dante. Troy wants to be with his brother.”

She glanced out the window as Beckett ran circles around Troy and Tiny. “His life as he knew it has been upended,” she said softly. “I doubt he really knows what he wants right now.”

“He knows he wants to be with his brother and not those crazy folk,” Dante said.

“I doubt his grandparents are crazy,” Carly said. She tried to remember if she’d done any research on Shane’s stepmother. She’d been a beauty queen, but other than that, she couldn’t recall anything unusual about Lindsey Devlin’s family.

“Oh, but they are,” Evan said, his voice earnest. “I don’t mean any disrespect for religious people and all that, but Troy’s grandparents are a little nuts. They said Troy has to stay home and be tutored because they don’t want him associating with certain
elements
, if you get my drift.” Evan’s voice rose in pitch as he be became more indignant. “They told Consuelo, Coach’s housekeeper, to go back to Mexico. She isn’t even
from
Mexico; she’s from Guatemala! She’s legal to be here! She works for the university. His grandma wants him to sing and pray at their church every night. I’m telling you, it’s just not right for a boy like Troy to have to live that way.”

“Surely it isn’t that bad,” she said, but a nagging feeling had begun to form deep in her stomach.

“It is that bad,” Dante hissed. “He’s got nobody else. The lawyer said we can’t keep him. We asked. He’d be better off with us than those people. And better than living here. But the lawyer says we had to bring him here.”

“Lawyer? What lawyer?” The nagging feeling was blossoming into a full-grown knot.

“Coach’s lawyer. It’s what Coach and Mrs. D wanted. For Troy to live with Shane,” Evan said.

“What?” Carly was suddenly light-headed. Surely she hadn’t heard him correctly. Rubbing her temple in an effort to stem the drumming there, she looked from one boy to the other.

“Lady, you need to keep up,” Dante said. “Coach’s will said Troy had to live with his brother. It don’t matter if the grandparents want Troy or not. That’s not what his mama and daddy wanted. And Troy don’t want to live with them anyways. He wants to be here. Not sure why, though. That jerk don’t want Troy,” he finished with a mumble.

In an effort to steady herself, Carly wrapped her fingers around the edge of the granite countertop. Were they telling the truth? Bruce Devlin had named Shane as Troy’s guardian? And Shane had foisted his brother off on the boy’s grandparents. It wasn’t hard to reconcile with the Shane Devlin everyone knew. But not with the Shane Devlin she’d come to know over the past few days.

Of course,
that
Shane Devlin might only exist in her dreams.

“I’m not sure what there is to eat, but help yourselves. I’ll be right back.” It wasn’t her job to play hostess, but she didn’t care anymore.