It was a little embarrassing to admit it, but I couldn’t help taking in the tens of thousands of screaming fans and thinking how many of them probably would’ve killed to be in my position. It made me think about how much I’d been fighting my feelings for him, and why? Because I was scared.
I was scared he’d take what I gave him and discard it when it didn’t suit him anymore.
Chelsea bumped my shoulder during a time out when the crowd noise wasn’t quite as deafening. “So?” she asked. “Damon tells me you and Chris might not be pretending anymore.”
I shot Damon a look, who had taken a sudden interest in a piece of lint on his suit. Bastard.
“It’s complicated.”
Chelsea smiled, almost in a nostalgic way. “Complicated isn’t always a bad thing, you know.”
“Simple would be better, though.”
“Would it? When was the last time something simple was right? Isn’t it always the complicated, convoluted things that end up working out for the best?”
“I don’t know, but I wish I knew what the right decision was.”
“I think all the guys I was with before Damon seemed like easy decisions. We had similar interests, or we shared friends. So of course, it made sense to try a relationship. And all of those failed. And then I finally ran into the most complicated, infuriating man I’d ever met.”
Damon was now almost in a meditative state as he tried to remove a piece of fiber that had become lodged in his suit sleeve.
The game resumed, and it was apparently an important play because the crowd immediately started roaring and stomping their feet until all I could do was smile and nod at Chelsea.
Complicating and infuriating equals love? Was that the message she was trying to sell?
I stared out at the field while Chris crouched with his hands halfway shoved up a large, sweaty man’s ass. He shouted something, turning his head to either side, then stomped his foot for the ball.
I grinned. If Chelsea was right, then I could consider myself madly in love with Chris Rose.
With the ball in his hands, he backpedaled, scanned the field, and then the next thing I saw were two extremely fast men tackle him at the same time from opposite directions. Chris crumpled to the ground clutching his shoulder.
30
Chris
Medical machines beeped, doctor’s talked in hushed tones, and I was lying on a cozy hospital bed. I was also loaded up with enough sedatives and painkillers that I felt a little bit like I was floating a few feet above it all.
I glanced down at the thin blanket covering me, which was tented up from the impressive, inexplicable erection I had. “Why am I so erect?” I mused aloud.
I rolled my head to the side, spotting Belle. “Oh. That’s why.”
Belle was shielding her eyes in embarrassment. I couldn’t figure out why until I noticed the nurse beside her. And the intern who looked fresh out of college. And the doctor. And the tall, fancy looking guy at her side I didn’t recognize.
She approached my bed and tried to position a pillow to cover me. In the end, it took a few seconds and two pillows to fully shield my aggressively erect cock. If I hadn’t been pumped full of enough drugs to get an elephant high, even I might’ve been slightly embarrassed by the ordeal. As it was, all I could do was watch with light-headed amusement.
She leaned down to whisper something in my ear, but I thought she was coming for a kiss so I tried to plant one on her. She flinched back, then seemed to think better of it and gave me a light peck on the lips. “Chris,” she said softly. “My brother, Asher, is here. Please try not to mortify me any more than you already have.”
I shot upright. “You have a brother?”
The fancy guy I’d noticed approached. He was tall, well-groomed, and had a little edge of “I’ll shoot your knees out if you cross me” about him. I decided I liked him, so I stuck my hand out. “I’m erect,” I declared. I blinked. That wasn’t right. “I’m Chris,” I said, trying again.
Belle’s brother’s hand had been extended toward mine, but he hesitated. With a grimace, he shook my hand. “I’m sure it would be a pleasure to meet you under different circumstances.”
“Circumcised? Uh, yeah, I am. Why?”
Belle did a full facepalm behind him. It looked like she briefly considered leaving the room but forced herself to stay put.
Some distant part of my brain could sense that I was making a mess of things, but my thoughts were coming to me sluggishly. I also felt way too amused by everything, including the little fort of pillows shielding my erection while a nearly full room of people watched me.
I tried to lift my right arm and noticed for the first time that it was oddly stiff. I looked down and saw all the bandages. “Oh,” I said. “What’s going on here?”
Then it came back to me in little flashes of memory. I got obliterated on a blitz. I’d been carted off the field, then promptly drugged up.
One of the doctor’s stepped forward. She took a moment to look disapprovingly at the little boner fortress Belle had built for me. “You’re going to be out for at least two weeks while your shoulder heals. You… blah, blah, blah.”
I blinked, trying to figure out if I was really hearing the woman say “blah blah blah” or if the drugs were playing tricks on me. Nope. She was definitely talking, and I was tuning her out. Then, completely out of nowhere, I felt myself dozing off.
The last thing I saw was Belle watching me with mingled embarrassment and amusement.
I gave her a crooked smile. That was my wifey. Or was she my pretend wifey? Or… shit. I really couldn’t remember.
31
Belle
I had dinner with my brother after visiting Chris in the hospital. According to the doctors, the injury wasn’t really that serious. They claimed they hadn’t even given him that high a dose of the sedatives and painkillers, but Chris had seemed drugged out of his mind as far as I could tell. Then again, I had to admit the difference between sober Chris and drugged Chris might not be the sharpest line in the sand to draw.
Asher took a bite of his sandwich, then dusted his hands off on his napkin. The restaurant was quiet, with only a handful of occupied tables and what looked like one waitress taking care of all of them. It was too late for normal people to have dinner and too early for the night owls, I guessed.
“I didn’t like him,” Asher said.
“It was hardly a fair time to get a first impression.”
“You said this was supposed to be a fake engagement, right? Why did it seem like he thinks you two are a real item?”
I worked my mouth to the side, trying to decide how to answer. I’d breached my little contract by telling Asher the truth about my deal with Damon and Chris. But he was my brother, and I figured it was probably a given that I’d tell him. “Because maybe things have become less cut and dry than calling it all pretend.”
Asher leaned back, furrowing his eyebrows. “Did you sleep with him?”
“Yes.”
He nodded, like he’d suspected as much. “What kind of man pitches a raging erection like that in a full room, anyway?”