Double Play Read online

  “I told you, nothing.”

  “You’re a shitty liar, Holly. Spill it.”

  “I snooped and read your chart.”

  He just gave her a long look.

  “I wanted to make sure you were really okay. You were sleeping so heavily and I was worried.”

  “Concern or a reporter’s cutthroat curiosity?”

  “It was concern,” she said tightly. “And your curmud geonly cynicism is really getting old. Pace—”

  “Just tell me. I’m dying, right?”

  “No. You’re—”

  His doctor entered. “Look at you, awake and alert. Perfect.” He looked at Holly. “I need a moment with the patient, please.”

  Holly gave Pace an indecipherable look and left the room.

  And for a guy who prized his alone time, who craved it like some craved water, he experienced the oddest sense of loneliness he’d ever felt.

  And fear. Let’s not forget the fear, because there was plenty of that, too. “So. What’s up, Doc?”

  Chapter 20

  Strikeouts are boring—besides that, they’re fascist.

  Throw some ground balls. More democratic.

  —Crash Davis in Bull Durham

  Pace’s surgeon didn’t answer right away, waiting until the hospital room door shut behind Holly, until he’d opened Pace’s chart. “How are you feeling?”

  “A little uptight, actually, which is ruining my happy drug buzz. What’s going on?”

  “Good news and bad news. Are you in pain?”

  Pace turned his head and looked at the door that Holly had just left through, thinking that when it came to her he felt plenty of pain. She made him ache like hell. “I’m fine. Tell me the bad.”

  “No. Good first. You didn’t have a tear to the rotator cuff. You had an inflamed bursa.”

  “A what?”

  “Yeah, it’s almost impossible to see on an MRI in the position you were in. You have 160 bursae in your body, located adjacent to the tendons near large joints, such as your shoulder. You had one become inflamed from an injury, in this case probably your strained rotator cuff, and it got infected. I removed the fluid, cleaned it all up a bit. You should be good now. Relatively simple fix, at least compared to a torn rotator cuff.”

  Relief made his head swim. “Jesus, really?”

  “Really. I know those suckers are a bitch on pain but the recovery is going to be a hell of a lot easier than a repaired tear would have been, and you can cut the down time in half—maybe three weeks instead of two months.”

  Pace felt the rush of emotion clog his throat. “Okay, now the bad.”

  “Yeah. That’s not going to be as easy.” The doctor sat back on his little round stool and eyed Pace.

  It was the same expression Holly had been wearing, and he braced himself. “I wish people would stop looking at me like that.”

  “Yesterday you had the standard operating procedure presurgery lab work done. Per the request of your commissioner, and with your permission, you had your drug testing done at the same time.”

  “Yes.”

  “You tested positive for stimulants.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “I’m afraid it’s fact. And I’ve got to report it.”

  “There’s been a mistake. Test me again. I don’t use.”

  “Look, you’ll need three weeks off anyway for recovery, which should cover a good part of your discipline, which I believe can be a twenty-five game suspension.”

  “No.” No fucking way. “You have to retest.”

  The doctor rose. “You’ll be released in a few hours. I’ve prescribed pain meds to take you through the next seven days, after which I’ll need to see you for stitches removal.”

  His doctor didn’t believe him. Hell, who would? “I want a retest. I’m within my rights to request one.”

  “Pace—”

  “And I want my lawyer and agent, too.” And for some reason, Holly. He wanted Holly.

  Holly drove a virtually silent Pace home from the hospital. He was dressed in his warm-up sweats, sitting very still in the passenger seat next to her, his long legs stretched out, his right arm held to his chest by a complicated sling and sprint, both covered in a huge ice pack. She knew he was still fuming over the drug-test results and the backlash that was liable to hit him over that. His agent and attorney had come to the hospital and they’d talked, which had included a conference call with Gage, but she had no idea the outcome other than they’d demanded a retest.

  Pace hadn’t said one word to her when he’d gotten off the phone with Gage or when his agent and attorney had left. In fact, he’d called a cab, but she’d sent the cab off and had put him into his car, which she was enjoying the hell out of.

  He sat in the passenger seat, head back, eyes covered in his mirrored Oakleys, giving nothing away. She even revved the engine to try to get a rise out of him. Nothing. He was silent and pale, and after a few minutes, also a little green, so she slowed down. “The doctor said nausea was normal after anesthesia.”

  He didn’t respond.

  “He also said you’d feel like crap for a few days, but that you’d be fine in a month.”

  “Two weeks.”

  “Ah, I forgot. You’re Superman.”

  He didn’t respond, but it didn’t take a psychic to sense the irritation level, which was rising, possibly due to the fact that his phone kept beeping from some mysterious depth in one of his pockets. “You want me to play secretary for you?”

  “No.”

  He wasn’t just hurting, he was angry. Vibrating with it. “Are you mad at the doctor, or the lab, or—”

  “Pretty much everyone, thank you,” he said with silky ire.

  “Including your driver, I’m guessing.”

  “You snooped and read my chart.”

  “Out of concern.”

  “The test results are wrong,” he said flatly. “So I’d better not be reading about this in your next article.”

  “Ah, so we’re back to the mistrust.” She sighed. “I’m going to cut you some slack since you’re hurting.”

  “I’m not hurting. High as a kite, but not hurting.”

  Okay, then. Good to know where she stood with him.

  Or didn’t.

  His phone rang again and he swore roughly, making her realize it was in his right pants pocket. With his arm freshly cut open and sewn shut and completely protected, he had no way of getting to it. She pulled over to the side of the highway and put her hand on his thigh.

  “Fine,” he said, unhooking his seat belt and taking off his sunglasses. “Angry sex works for me. But you’re going to have to do all the work.”

  “Shut up, Pace.” She frisked him for the phone, indeed finding it in his right pants pocket.

  “A little to the left.”

  A little to the left and she’d be wrapping her fingers around something else entirely. She slid him a look.

  “Hey, I’m drugged up nice and good,” he said. “Go ahead, take advantage of me. I’ll suffer through it.” His voice was low and hoarse, not with passion but pain. The ass. She wanted to hug him.

  Or smack him. “I prefer my men willing and able.”

  “Move your hand over a little and you’ll see I’m both.”

  She pulled out the phone, and then because she couldn’t help herself, glanced to the left of his zipper. He was hard. Her eyes met his glazed but amused ones. “Seriously?”

  “Apparently you have the touch.”

  His phone rang again and she eyed the ID. “It’s Wade.”

  “Tell him I can’t talk right now, I’m in your hands.” He laughed at his own joke.

  Rolling her eyes, she opened the phone and assured Pace’s best friend that he was okay. Or as okay as he could be under the circumstances of having just tested positive for stimulants. Then she handed the phone to Pace, and listened to him proceed to tell Wade that he hadn’t had a rotator cuff tear after all, that he’d be good to go in a few