that had plagued him all summer.
“What’s wrong with my shoulder?”
Joey drew up short one step into the living room. “What? Nothing!” His expression turned sheepish. “You just haven’t been answering your phone.”
Very true. He had wanted to wring every moment out of his time with Tori, so he’d taken to leaving his phone at his house. He hadn’t looked at it in two days.
“Um, so who’s been calling?”
“Your boss.”
Oh shit.
“Coach or…”
Joey shook his head. That meant it was Mr. James Dolan, the owner. His gaze went to Tori’s and she smiled sweetly at him. Everything she did was sweet, but in this case it was especially clueless. She didn’t know what a call from the team’s owner meant.
“So I guess I should, uh, go check my messages.”
“No need. The message is to call him right back.”
Right. “So why’d he call you?”
Joey glanced at Tori, then he sighed. “I had to tell him your shoulder was okay. Not quite good as new, but good enough to play.”
“Well of course you had to tell him that.” He hadn’t actually been hiding his shoulder recovery. He just hadn’t been anxious to get back to the East Coast.
Joey held out his phone. “Call him on mine. That way he knows I got you the message.”
Right. And it made sure that Mike called back right then and there. “You think I could wait until tomorrow?”
“Absolutely not.”
Well, that’s what came of being paid millions of dollars a year. The man who signed the checks expected you to jump when he called. He looked at the phone. Joey had even keyed in the phone number for him. Great. He pressed dial and lifted the phone to his ear.
Mr. Dolan answered on the third ring.
“Hello, sir. It’s Mike. I’m sorry. I’ve had, um, problems with my phone. What can I help you—”
Mr. Dolan didn’t even let him finish his sentence. It was all about the new season, the publicity planned, and the fact that one of his teammates sprained an ankle. Which meant that the usual media frenzy was going to focus on him. It was everything he feared would happen. A big story about his surprise injury in his waning years.
Waning years. Jesus. It sounded like he was about to turn eighty.
“Sir, I’ll be there in two weeks, just like we—”
Again, more words. Lots more words, but they all boiled down to “tomorrow.” A flight at eight a.m. tomorrow from O’Hare. Which meant…
He looked to Tori. She flashed him another smile and for a moment he thought she didn’t understand. But then she picked up the Nerf basketball they’d been playing with. She tossed it to him.
“Guess my rebound’s over, huh?”
He nodded grimly. His boss was still talking. He listened with half an ear. All the rest of his body was completely and totally focused on Tori. And when the phone call was done, he passed the cell back to Joey before heading straight for Tori. “You’ll come to my first game, right? I’ll buy you season tickets. You can—”
“Of course I’ll come. But you don’t have—”
“For you and your dad.”
She snorted and from the other room, her father called out, “I’m a Bulls fan.”
Mike flashed him a wan smile. “Maybe I can convert you.”
The man gave him a look that spelled no way. Meanwhile, Tori took hold of his hand. “What time do you have to leave?”
“Tomorrow. Early.”
“Well then,” said one of the women behind him. He didn’t even care who. “I think we’re going to call it a night. Right everybody?”
God bless his friends. He glanced over his shoulder, pleased when they all started gathering their things. But then he looked back to Tori and her name came out as a tortured groan.
She looked at him, her eyes steady and her shoulders excruciatingly stiff. A month ago he would have thought it a wide-eyed innocent look, but he’d been making a thorough study of his woman. She was gripping her hands together to keep them steady. And her jaw was clenched against her saying the wrong thing.
“So, um,” he said softly. “I was hoping you could help me pack.”
“Oh,” she said, her voice small. “Is that what you really want?”
“It is. If you want to.”
“Then…” She took a deep breath. “Then of course I’ll help.”
She did.
She helped him pack and promised to keep an eye on things until the Ketchums came back. And then they made love.
She cried when she came, turning her face away from him so he wouldn’t see her tears.
But in the