Night Games (The Storm Inside #6) Read online

  “No, Mom. I’m married to my work.”

  She tsk-ed me. “That’s not how it should be, Carrie Anne. You should find someone to help you carry the load.”

  Take care of you, I recited in my head.

  “Take care of you. You should be starting a family, not taking care of strangers.”

  And just like that, we were back to the same old argument. “Actually Mom, that’s exactly what I should be doing. Taking care of strangers is kind of a big deal.”

  “A woman’s place is in the home.”

  I somehow—I’m really not sure how—resisted the urge to launch my phone across the room. This backwards bullshit was exactly why I left home. Mom never liked that I played softball. She hated that I took up other sports with the boys. Getting hurt was her proof I was wrong and she was right.

  “A woman’s place is wherever she wants it to be, Mom. My place is in an operating room. I’m good, Mom. Really, really good. And what I do changes people’s lives.”

  “There are more than enough surgeons in this world, Carrie Anne, but there are not enough loving mothers. Think of what a great teacher you would have been if you’d only listened to me.”

  And found a nice husband and settled down. Popped out a few grandkids, just like she wanted me to.

  I wanted none of it.

  “Do you hear anything I say, Mother? That I’m good? Better than most? That’s not an easy thing to accomplish. And just for the record,” my voice was getting really high now, “there may be enough surgeons, I really don’t know if that’s a thing, but there will never be enough good ones.”

  I wanted to end the call, slam my phone into the counter until it splintered into a million pieces, but I didn’t. Instead I listened to her disappointment and let it sink inside me even though I knew better.

  “You make life so much harder than it needs to be.”

  “Why is it such a horrible thing that I wanted more out of life?” I shouted. “I think we’re done here, Mother. I have a knee to repair and that person is counting on me.”

  “Good night, Carrie Anne.” She said quietly, then ended the call.

  The man is the head of the family and as his wife you will be his helper. You’ll honor and obey him. This is how a marriage works.

  I remembered that conversation so clearly. I wanted to run away right then and there. The idea made me physically ill. I knew even then that she had it wrong. She had to have it wrong.

  Getting hurt, learning about medicine, going off to college, it was like having a light turned on and seeing clearly for the first time. Taking control. Being confident. I was in charge of my destiny and no man would ever tell me what to do.

  I was happy with my life. I just wish my mother could see it.

  “AND WE’RE DONE.” I stepped back from the knee I’d just brilliantly repaired for a retired golfer named Timothy Renfrew. Yes, the Timothy Renfrew. Five PGA Championships and countless other awards during his ten years on the circuit.

  “Excellent work,” Timothy’s doctor, a bastard of an old man, said with a smile. I’d allowed good old Doc Henry into my O.R. because Timothy asked and I was in the business of making my highest profile clients as happy as could be—including indulging jackass personal doctors who didn’t trust me because of my age.

  Or my gender.

  I was never sure which. Or both. Probably both.

  One might say I was biased after my earlier conversation with my mother. Those people could bite me. I’d been through this again and again, and even if I was on fire already it wouldn’t have mattered. I’d still be pissed that I had to deal with a dinosaur like Henry.

  “Thank you. I hope Timothy’s rehabilitation goes well.” Stay professional. Ignore the sideways comments that are about to come out of his mouth.

  “Oh it will. I’ll be supervising everything.”

  “I’m sure you will. He’s in good hands thanks to your guidance.” I should get an award for managing to get shit like that out of my mouth without laughing.

  “I’m just so impressed with how quickly you were able to repair his knee. I never would have expected someone so beautiful to be so skilled.”

  Full stop. “Excuse me?”

  “I said you were skilled.” He blinked at me as he stripped off his gloves and pulled off his gown, completely ignorant to the ways he’d insulted me and pretty much all women everywhere.

  “No, you implied beautiful women weren’t skilled.” My head started to pound as my blood pressure spiked. “Are you saying beautiful women aren’t smart? Or skilled? Or shouldn’t waste their talent on things other than being beautiful? Or are you saying that ugly women are more appropriate surgeons?”

  I really shouldn’t have blown my top on the old jerk, but I was so over everyone always being so shocked I could do my job. I was so young. Yep. That’s what happens when you graduate high school a year and a half early then fly through your undergrad before you turn twenty. I wasn’t a genius or anything truly gifted like that, but I was smart. Wicked smart, and I happened to fall into my dream career—something that suited my talents well—by accident.

  And I had no life outside of school.

  So yeah, here I was, young and beautiful and fucking brilliant, at the age of thirty.

  So fucking what?

  And why did it have to shock all the men?

  Women? Not so much. A few raised their eyebrows at my age, most kept their distance thanks to my clear bitchy vibe, but they were rarely shocked at my abilities.

  So fuck Doc Henry and his outdated bullshit.

  “I—I don’t know what to say right now Doctor Walker. This is highly inappropriate.”

  “You’re highly inappropriate.” I stuck my finger in his bony little chest and pushed. “Since you seemed to miss this in medical school when they went over DNA, physical attributes don’t correlate to one’s mental abilities. Maybe you’ve never realized how sexist you sound because you’re so ugly no one ever questioned your ability to be a doctor. Goodbye Doctor Henry. You are no longer welcome in my O.R.”

  I stalked off, leaving a trail of nurses and aftercare professionals staring at my exit, not that I cared. Hopefully they heard every word. Maybe they’d share it on social media or tell all their friends. This was the kind of news I was more than happy to lend my name.

  “Carrie!” Gloria, my keeper of all the things called. “Carrie, wait! You still have to speak to the family!”

  I stopped and kicked the wall. “Fuck. I’ll be right there.” But after that? I was changing into my tiny dress and meeting Wes in Jacksonville. He had three games this weekend and I was off. If I was really, really lucky, he wouldn’t be exhausted after his game and we could trade mind-bending orgasms.

  Lord knew I deserved a treat after a day like today.

  I steeled myself and turned around, heading back toward the little room I used to discuss the surgery with family while my patient was in recovery.

  “You’re in rare form today,” Gloria said as I fell into step beside her. “Something going on?”

  “Oh the usual. I’m in a bad mood, people are dumb. Whatever.”

  She shook her head. “Just for the record, I think he’s a prick, but guys get the same shit.”

  “What shit?” Dammit. Was I going to fight Gloria too? I didn’t think I could handle that. She was sassy and blunt, but she was usually right. I was not in the mood to be wrong.

  “Too pretty to be smart. Guys hear it too. Maybe not as much as women, but they hear it. Take my Anthony. He’s a beautiful man, am I right?”

  I nodded. Her husband was a god of a man.

  “Well he’s been passed over for two promotions because his new boss assumed someone else had to be doing his work.”

  I stopped in the middle of the hallway. “You’re shitting me.” Anthony was a brilliant veterinarian at the zoo.

  “Nope. When he confronted his boss they had it out. The jerk made Anthony take a test to prove he knew what he was doing.” />
  “Tell me his boss got fired.”

  She laughed and pushed open the door. “No. But Anthony got his job six months later when he ‘left’.” She air quoted.

  Poor Anthony. At least he got his revenge.

  I didn’t think about it again as I went through the motions of talking to Renfrew’s family and changing. It wasn’t until I was on the tiny commuter plane that was giving me a quick lift across the state that her words floated back into my subconscious, mixed with Wes’s words from the night we met.

  I’m a dumb jock who only thinks with his dick, right?

  10

  Wes, present day

  Snickers ran circles around my legs. It was noon and I was meeting with my business manager, Rick, over lunch in my condo, much to Snicker’s amusement.

  “The t-shirt sales have dropped off but are still making money. We need to discuss moving ahead with the marketing campaign for the Dirt Dog rollout.”

  Dirt Dog was my line of bourbon blends. It had been in development for over five years now, bankrolled along with Roman and one of my cousins, from our first big paychecks as a long game to diversify our business interests. We were finally—finally—into the launch phase, with me as the face.

  “I still think we should consider a rebrand before the rollout. Dirt Dog doesn’t have the best ring to it.”

  “No.” That was out of the question. I picked the name, Roman and Adelaide approved it. We knew there would be a little bit of a hurdle to overcome in the beginning, but with all the right marketing to explain the meaning, it would work.

  And it meant a lot to me.

  “But—”

  I waved him off with my hand. “It’s not an option, Rick. Do you know what a dirt dog is?”

  He sighed. “Yeah, I looked it up. Hard working, rough around the edges scrapper who worked his way up in baseball.”

  And the nickname of my hero growing up.

  “So you see, the name is the name.”

  Rick shrugged, picking up Snickers. “I guess it does make sense when you put it that way.”

  “And that’s exactly how we’ll market it. We’ve got this. Trust me.”

  Rick scratched Snickers on the top of the head just where he liked it. “And this guy? He might be making more money off merchandise than you these days. I wanted to recommend writing a book.”

  I practically spit out my beer. “What?” I . . . did not write books. I was funny, charismatic on camera, slayed it on the field, but writing was not ever considered one of my many talents.

  “Don’t worry. There are plenty of options. It can be a picture coffee table book of Snickers with some of your already written notes about his days, or we could make a coloring book. Have a ghostwriter write anything. Just think about it. I think it would be in your best interest to capitalize on his fame before the end of the year.”

  No shit. “Snickers, my man. You’ve done well.” I took the cat and cradled him in my arm like a football. Snickers wrapped his paws around me and began purring. And then a thought occurred to me. A crazy stupid thought, but one of those crazy thoughts that might just be stupid enough to be brilliant. “What if I already had a writer in mind? Someone who wouldn’t have to ghost it, but would co-write it with me? We could do the story of how Snickers and I came to be a team.”

  That was what made us both internet famous. Everyone assumed it was my shirtless shots—and trust me, those helped—but it was Snickers coming on the scene that did the trick. Some partnerships were magic like that.

  “I like it. Run with it and we’ll make a plan next month when we meet.”

  I pet the cat in question as I thought through the logistics. It would be a blend of everything Rick just mentioned. Photos of Snickers, my stories about his days, and Zoe writing our story. I didn’t understand anything else, but the demon pixie would, and I had no doubt she’d point me in the right direction.

  “Now let’s discuss your wife.”

  I sat up straight. “Excuse me?” The news had leaked, it always does, and I knew Roman had been in contact with both Rick and Liz to strategize how, or if, it affected my endorsements and branding.

  “Whoa. Stand down!” Rick put his hands up, laughing. “You have it bad, my friend.”

  I realized how defensive I became of Carrie. How fast I jumped to protect her. Us. I still felt like, despite our agreement to give this a real shot, she was on a thread, ready to snap and leave me if anything went wrong.

  Every time I thought I understood why she was so hesitant I’d learn something new that made me question if I knew anything at all.

  “Sorry.”

  “So this is a real thing? You’re staying married?”

  Did he have to get all technical? “Yes. We’re married and we’re staying married.” Snickers must have felt my mood change because he moved up onto my shoulder and licked my ear with his sandpaper tongue. “Stop.”

  I swear the cat glared at me.

  “Then we need to talk about brand. Liz and I had a call the other day to talk strategy and she asked me to broach the idea with you today so that you had some time to think it over before your meeting with her.”

  Liz was my publicist. “Okay . . . what’s up?”

  “Well, Wes. Your brand is built on you being a playboy bachelor. You’re single, shirtless, and fun. Women flock to you because they want to date you. Now that you’re off the market your brand has to change.”

  Oh. It was probably dumb of me to not have thought of that myself, but in my defense I was using all my brainpower just to keep my wife around. And besides, this is why I paid Rick and Liz. It was their job to think of the things I didn’t have time to think about.

  “What does she suggest?”

  “A shift. From the man every woman wishes she could date to the man every woman wishes she was married to. We play up your role as the doting and happy husband.”

  That didn’t sound bad at all. It was exactly what I was and if my brand taught me anything, it was that I was best at being myself. “I like this plan.”

  “What we need from you are the guidelines. How involved will Carrie be with your career? Will she be at public appearances? Feature on your social media? Videos? Is there a line we can’t cross?”

  Damnit. Fuck. Shit.

  My brain short-circuited as he threw one thing after another at me. Carrie involved in my career? Maybe. On my social media? I had a feeling she’d rather stab me in the leg. “I will talk to Carrie before I say anything. There will be lines, I just don’t know what they are yet.”

  “Fair enough. I do suggest making a statement to your fans sooner than later. But run it by Liz first.”

  “Yeah. Will do.” And here I’d been carrying on, business as usual. My new Try Not To Laugh video with Roman totally getting me with a joke about a talking hamburger had posted as usual. My Instagram had been preloaded a month earlier since I was in the middle of the season and didn’t always remember to post on the fly.

  I probably looked like an out of touch tool.

  “Well that wraps up things on my end. Do you have anything else you’d like to discuss?”

  I shook my head, already lost in a plan to introduce my wife to my fans. Something that would tell her how I felt without exposing too much.

  I showed Rick out then grabbed another beer from the fridge. Snickers settled into my lap on the couch as I scrolled back through the pictures on my phone looking for the perfect one.

  Bingo.

  11

  Carrie, six weeks earlier

  Snickers made circles around my ankles as I desperately tried to find the bag of coffee in the pantry, but in my half asleep state the only thing I was actually accomplishing was keeping myself alive as the fluffy feline attempted to kill me by tripping.

  “Stop!” I scooped him up and deposited him on my shoulder, which he, for some unfathomable reason, thought was the perfect perch. It was like he was a monkey or something. Snickers dug his claws into Wes’s dress shirt a
nd curled around my neck, purring. “You have a split personality.”

  Finally safe, I flung open the pantry door and stared right at my favorite coffee. The black and gold bag sat front and center beside Wes’s much cheaper brand of grocery store coffee. I picked it up expecting to find it open and stale from the last time I’d slept over but instead it was sealed and brand new.

  “Need help?”

  I spun around. “You have my coffee.”

  He blinked slowly a few times. “Yeah?”

  “You bought me coffee.”

  He scratched his head, which when naked, was a delightful sight to behold. His shoulder muscles flexed and his abs stretched. His cock stood at half-staff from sleep. “Yes. I bought your coffee. You really like coffee. I wanted to make sure you had what you needed.” Then he kissed me on the cheek. “Pancakes?”

  I nodded, dazed and confused by his ability to be so thoughtful. I was not used to such things. My parents had been married for over thirty years and I was pretty sure Dad wouldn’t know what Mom liked to eat for breakfast if he had to take a wild guess.

  “Chocolate chips today?”

  Wes was kind of brilliant at breakfast foods. So far I’d sampled three varieties of pancakes, his blueberry muffins, an omelet that was nearly orgasmic, and enough bacon to give me a heart attack.

  “And peanut butter.”

  He grinned. “I knew I’d win you over on that!”

  Wes loved peanut butter on his pancakes—something I’d never even heard of. It took me a couple of weeks, but after one try, I was hooked. I think it had something to do with the brown sugar he put in the pancakes. It balanced out with the creamy topping.

  “And bacon. We’re having bacon, right?”

  He pulled out a cookie sheet and turned on the oven. “As you wish.”

  “Oh my dear Wesley.”

  He blushed. He always blushed when I quoted Princess Buttercup. I tried using his full name in bed but it hadn’t come out right. Shouting “Wesley!” mid orgasm had been all wrong. First of all, it wasn’t his name. Not really. Wes was Wes. And second of all, quoting a childhood movie had turned the moment from sexy to strange.