Happily Ever All-Star: A Secret Baby Romance - Sosie Frost Page 0,80

I was going to die.

Starving. Half-naked. Suffocating on either my overblown breasts or mouthfuls of a blouse I couldn’t rip off my shoulders.

With a fierce grunt, I ripped the shirt off and pitched it into the sink. The bowl of spaghetti plopped down next to it.

“Fuck it. I won’t wear a shirt anymore. Ever!”

I looked down.

Somehow, I’d stained my bra. The worst part? The red blotch wasn’t from the leftovers. I didn’t even think it was from this batch of spaghetti.

Classy.

Now I was crying.

And being watched.

Jude stared with that look of veiled abject horror most men gave pregnant women. He knew better than to ask me what was wrong or what had happened or why I was sniffling in a stained bra while my butt smelled like pickle brine.

He surveyed the damage and picked up his keys from the designated jar.

“I’ll go get you food,” he said. “What would you like?”

He was too sweet. Too kind. And he really needed to rest.

“I don’t need anything. I just want you.”

To Jude’s credit, he hugged me. He also saw through it.

“What do you really want?” he asked.

“A burrito?”

He nodded. “I’ll be right back.”

“Jude—”

“It’s okay.”

“I much rather you rest.”

He gestured to me. “Take some of your own advice, Doc.”

“I’m only pouty. You’re having a bad day.”

“No worse than usual.”

I hoped to God he wasn’t serious. “If this is usual…”

“I’m fine.”

He wasn’t. I could see it. Hear it in his voice.

The slur. So slight.

“Where are you going, Jude?” I asked.

“To get you food.”

Moment of truth. “And what is it I want?”

His steel-grey eyes darkened. He twisted the keys in his hand.

I knew it.

He couldn’t remember.

“Jude, I want you to lay down. No sounds. No visuals. Stay in the dark and quiet.”

Jude gave a smile, but it was weak. “Trying to get rid of me, Doc?”

I wasn’t falling for it. “You don’t have to pretend. I can see it.”

“See what?”

“That you’re hurting. You can’t look into the light. Are you nauseous too? Dizzy?”

“I hoped you’d stop diagnosing me after we slept together.”

Like hell. It only made me more worried. “You have a headache and you’re delusional.”

“I’m fine.” It was his usual mantra. “I get like this. It goes away.”

“Your last game was brutal. You took a lot of hard hits.”

“And I got up after each one.”

I sighed. “It’s not about getting up after a hit anymore—it’s about how many good years of your life you’ll sacrifice because of lining up again.”

He wasn’t hearing it. “You’re over-reacting.”

“You’re not taking this seriously. You, above all people, should know the consequences of a concussion. It won’t take a Cole Hawthorne to knock you out next time. It could be something little.”

“It’s just a headache.”

And I was an idiot for letting him convince me of that for so long. “Who did we play last week?”

“What?”

“What team did we play last week?”

Jude crossed his arms. “You sure you want to do this without your computer? Wanna check my balance while you interrogate me too?”

“You don’t remember, do you?” I didn’t wait for the excuse. “Do you remember how you played?”

“I played good.”

“No.” The chill traced my spine, made worse by my bare skin. “You played the best game of your career.”

“So? What’s the problem?” Jude snapped his fingers. “We played Carolina.”

“Yeah, that’s…reassuring.”

“We’re near the end of the season. The games start to blur. Ask any player. The hits, the scores, the plays. Everything. It’s bound to be hazy.”

“Should it be?” I asked. “I’ve seen the results of traumatic sports injuries. If you studied what I did, you’d be just as scared.”

“I’m not some textbook case.” He rubbed his forehead…not in frustration. “Come on, Rory. I’m playing good ball. Jack and Lachlan and me, we’re in-sync. The offense is hot. This might be the only chance for me to get what I really want.”

“What’s that?”

“A relationship.”

I stilled. “A what?”

“A relationship. The ring. The glory.”

My stomach pitted. Was it a Freudian slip or speech aphasia? “A championship?”

“Yeah. That’s what I said.”

Enough was enough. “No. It wasn’t. Jude, you need to go back to sleep. Rest up. I’m going to call the trainers and Coach Thompson.”

“Why?”

“Because there is no way you are playing this Sunday.”

He didn’t like that.

Jude didn’t get angry often, but he turned away, slamming a hand against the sink.

“What the hell do you mean I’m not playing?”

“Look at you. You can hardly stand up straight. You can’t look in the light. You have these crazy migraines. Jude, you are even mixing up words. It’s dangerous.”

“You’re panicking over a stuttered word?