Time Out

11

A PART OF Mark had been braced for Rainey to grab her purse and walk out of his motel room.

And out of his life.

He’d fully expected it. Hell, he deserved it. But she let him pull her in, even pressed her face to his throat and inhaled deeply, and relief flooded him. Knee-knocking, gut-squeezing relief. “Rainey-”

“I don’t want to talk about it. You’re not sticking around, we’ve never made each other any promises. There was no plan, so there’s no reason for me to try to back you into one now.” Her cell phone vibrated. “It’s Lena,” she muttered. “Probably apologizing for being a bad wingman.” She opened her phone. “It’s too late to help me now, I-” She broke off and came to immediate attention, straightening up. “Sharee?”

Mark watched the furrow across Rainey’s brow. Her hair was wild, probably thanks to his fingers. Her make-up had smeared beneath her eyes a little and she had a whisker burn down her throat. Lifting his hand, he ran a thumb over the mark.

“Sharee?” Rainey said. “Honey, what’s wrong?”

Mark shifted in closer and put a hand on her shoulder. She looked up at him, her eyes dark with concern, and surprised him even further when she leaned into him as she listened. “I’m coming right now,” she said. “Stay in a lit area-Hello? Sharee?” She stared at her phone. “Dammit, her battery died. I’ve got to go.”

Mark was already grabbing a shirt and keys. “I’ll drive.”

RAINEY’S NERVES WERE in her throat as she picked up her purse. She’d never heard Sharee upset before. Pissed-off, yes. Pure bravado, often. Upset and scared, no. “She’s at the high school,” Rainey told Mark. “She got dropped there after shopping with friends. Her mom was supposed to get her but isn’t there yet and Sharee said those boys are there, the ones I kicked out of the rec center last week. They’re harassing her because she’s the one who told me who they were.”

Mark opened the door for her, then followed her out. “Oh, you don’t have to-”

“I’m driving,” he repeated in that quiet but firm voice she’d heard him use in interviews, on the teens, and on his players. It was a voice that brooked no argument while at the same time instilled confidence and a belief that everything was going to be okay.

She wanted to believe it. They moved through the lobby. The guys were still there and waved at them.

“The walk of shame,” Rainey murmured.

Mark’s hand slid warmly to the back of her neck. “They won’t say anything.”

“Are you kidding? Look at me.”

He pulled her around to look at her, and his eyes softened. “You look like you just-”

“Rolled around in bed? Had an orgasm?”

An affectionate smile crossed his face. “Or three.”

She smacked him lightly in the abs-which didn’t give-and he grabbed her hand, holding her at his side as they continued to walk.

True to Mark’s word, Casey and James didn’t say a thing, but that was because Mark was giving them a long look over her head, which she managed to just catch. She waited until they were outside heading to his truck. “What did you threaten them with?”

He slid her a glance. “You were standing right there. I didn’t say anything.”

“Uh-huh.”

He smiled. “Push-ups. Laps. Sitting their ass on the bench. Pick one.”

“They’re grown-ups. You’d do that?”

“I don’t care how old they are, their asses are mine.”

She shook her head and laughed. “You sound like a dictator.”

“I am.”

“And you like it? All that power?”

He just shot her a look.

Yeah. He liked it.

They stepped out into the cool night. Rainey reached into her purse for her keys while Mark caught sight of her car and went utterly still.

Someone had spray-painted Bitch across the trunk.

“Huh,” she said. “That’s new.” And unwelcome. And more than a little unnerving.

“The boys?” Mark asked, hands on hips, grim. Pissed off.

“I don’t know.”

Mark pulled out his phone.

“What are you doing?”

“Calling the police. We need to make a report.”

“Later. We need to get Sharee first.”

Not looking happy, he took her hand again and led her to his truck. As they drove, the moon slanted into the windshield at an angle, giving her only peeks at the man beside her. He took two calls and made one, though she missed out on eavesdropping because she was busy demon-dialing Sharee, who wasn’t answering.

Mark slipped his phone away and continued driving with single-minded purpose, fast, but steady. In his zone. He pulled into the high school parking lot, where they found Sharee huddled on the front steps. Rainey ran out and hugged her. “You okay?”

Sharee allowed the contact for a brief moment before pulling back. “Yeah.” She looked around uneasily. “I think they left.”

Mark was alert, his eyes missing nothing as he scanned the lot, his posture both at ease and utterly ready for anything. “Let’s get out of here.”

Twenty minutes later, they pulled up to the trailer that Sharee shared with her mom.

It was dark.

Rainey turned to face the girl in the backseat. “Sharee-”

“I’ll be fine,” she said, getting out of the truck. “Thanks for the ride.”

Mark got out with her and looked at Rainey. “Stay here.”

Before she could say a word, he’d engaged the locks and walked Sharee to the door. He waited there, keeping both Rainey and Sharee in sight until lights were on in the trailer. Then he came back to his truck and drove Rainey to the motel, where they met a police officer and filed a report about her car.

Then Mark followed her home and saw her to the door just as he had Sharee.

But the smoking hot kiss he laid on her was hers alone.

THE NEXT DAY Mark poked his head into Rainey’s office and surprised her. “Hungry?” he asked.

It was late afternoon and she’d worked through lunch. She was starving. “Maybe,” she said. “Why?”

“Thought we’d go get dinner.”

A date? She wasn’t sure what that meant, not that it mattered. “I can’t. I have plans.”

Nothing about his body language changed. He was too good for that. But she sensed that her statement hadn’t made him happy. “Plans?” he asked.

“I’m going to my parents’ house.”

“Are you taking a date with you?”

No. She’d decided she couldn’t be dating while she was doing…whatever this was that she was doing with him. It wouldn’t be fair to anyone else. She barely had the mental capacity to handle Mark, much less another man as well.

And…

And the truth was, she didn’t have the emotional capacity either. Mark was currently using up all she had. “Would that bother you?”

“Hell yes.”

Odd how that made her all soft and warm inside. “I’m not taking a date to my parents,” she said quietly. “My plans to date are temporarily on hold.”

He closed her office door behind him, then came around her desk and hauled her up to her toes, kissing her until she couldn’t remember her own name. “Good,” he said, and was gone.

RAINEY’S PARENTS LIVED in a small, modest home in an area that had been spared the fires but not the economic downturn. Here, the houses were tired, the yards were tired, everything was tired. In addition, thanks to the drought, they were under strict water restrictions. The grass hadn’t survived but there were potted wild flowers on the porch, which made Rainey smile.

So did the fact that her mother stood in the front door, waiting with a warm hug. “Honey, it’s so good to see you!”

“Mom, you just saw me a week ago.”

“I know.” Elizabeth Saunders was blonde with gray streaks, medium build like Rainey, with the softness that having two kids and then thirty years of happiness gave a woman. “You look different, honey.” Her mom studied Rainey’s face. “What is it?”

“Nothing.” Lots of sex… “New face lotion.”

“Well it’s done something fantastic to your skin. You need to use it more often.”

Rainey nodded. Keep having orgasms. Got it.

Her mom cupped Rainey’s face, staring into it. “It really suits you.”

Oh, for the love of-“What’s for dinner?”

“Lasagna. And a surprise.”

Rainey hoped it involved chocolate. She moved into the kitchen to check things out. Her younger sister Danica was there, stirring something on the stove. Danica was married to her high school sweetheart. Zach was a marine, out on his second tour of duty at the moment. Rainey’s seven-year-old niece sat on the counter sucking a Popsicle. Hope’s mouth was purple, as were her lips and hands. Actually, just about everything was purple except for her dancing blue eyes. “Rainey!” she squealed in delight.

Rainey leaned in for a kiss and got a sloppy, wet smack right on the lips. “Yum. Grape.”

Hope grinned.

Danica looked behind Rainey towards the doorway. “Where’s your date?”

“I don’t have one.”

“Mom said you did.”

“Nope.”

“She said you were dating Mark Diego.”

“Mom’s crazy.”

“Yeah. So?”

Rainey shook her head. “So I’m not dating Mark.” I’m just doing him.

“Then can I date him?” Danica wanted to know.

“You’re married.”

Danica grinned. “Yes, but I’m not dead.”

Rainey sighed. “He’s not all that.”

“Liar.”

“Okay, he’s all that with frosting on top.” Bastard. Rainey plopped down in a kitchen chair, accepting the grape Popsicle that Hope pulled out of the freezer and handed her.

Danica waited until her daughter had gone looking for grandma. “So you’re not doing Mark?” she whispered.

“Okay, that’s not what you asked me.”

“Honey,” their mom called from the living room, “your surprise arrived.” She appeared in the kitchen doorway. “I ran into him today at the gas station,” she whispered.

“I thought my surprise was chocolate,” Rainey said, a very bad feeling coming over her.

“Nope. Better than chocolate.” Her mother smiled, then turned and revealed…

Mark Diego.

MARK NEVER GAVE much thought to his next meal. During the season, he ate at the Mammoths facilities, the same as his team. When he was on the road, there was room service and restaurants. Even off season, he usually went that route.

But one thing he rarely had-a home-cooked meal.

Rainey’s mom had made lasagna and cheese bread, which was delicious, but his favorite part was afterwards, when Danica brought out the photo albums and showed him the old family pictures, including one of a two-year-old diaper-clad Rainey waddling away from the camera, diaper slipping low, thighs thick and chunky.

“Seriously?” Rainey asked.

“Oh, you don’t like that one?” Danica flipped the pages to reveal a pre-teen Rainey in braces, looking…well, as annoyed as she was right now. Heart softening, Mark reached for her hand but she stood up.

And gave his feet a little nudge. Actually, it was more like a kick. “Mark has to go now,” she said. “He’s got a thing.”

“A what?” Danica asked.

“A thing. Somewhere to be.”

“I don’t have a thing,” Mark said, remaining seated, ignoring Rainey’s dirty look.

“Okay,” she said. “Then I have a thing.”

Mark snagged her wrist. He was extremely aware that she thought that he was in this just for the sex, but she was wrong. He was in for more. He just wasn’t sure what that more was. All he knew was that sitting in the slightly shabby living room surrounded by Rainey and her family made him feel more relaxed and calm than he could remember being in far too long.

Danica smiled at him and continued to flip through the photo album. “Uh-oh,” she said. “Don’t look now but here’s Rainey’s first boyfriend. You were what, like eighteen? Slow bloomer. Probably because you still had a crush on this one.” She gestured to Mark, then grinned at him. “We all had a crush on you,” she told him. “But I think Rainey’s lasted a little longer than most.”

Rainey tugged free of Mark’s hold and headed to the door.

“Ah, don’t get all butt-hurt and embarrassed,” Danica called after her. “I’m sure Mark already knew-everyone knew.”

The front door slammed.

Mark made his thank-yous and goodbyes, and got outside in time to see Rainey drive off. Given that she drove a POS and he didn’t, he had no trouble keeping up with her. Especially since she stopped at a convenience store. He watched her go in and then come out five minutes later with a brown bag. He followed her to her town house and parked next to her.

“So,” he said conversationally, following her up the path to her door, gesturing to the brown bag. “Alcohol or sugar?”

“Sugar. I don’t need an escort.”

“There’s some guy out there writing BITCH on your car, I’m walking you up.”

She unlocked her door, stepped in, and tried to close it on him.

“I’m also coming in,” he said.

“Fine, but we are not talking.”

“Not talking is right up my alley.” He moved through her place, checking out the rooms. Satisfied, he found her standing in the dark living room, staring out the window into the night. “Rainey.”

She dropped her head to the window. “Don’t.”

He wasn’t exactly sure what she was saying don’t to, but had a feeling it was don’t come close, don’t talk, don’t touch, don’t so much as breathe. He was bound to disappoint her since he was going to insist on all of the above, and coming up behind her, he risked his neck by stroking a hand down her hair. “You okay?”

She made a soft sound, like a sigh. “She’s right, you know. I’ve screwed up my love life, over and over again, because of how I felt for you. I think I compared every guy to you.” She shook her head and let out a low laugh. “It was real nice of you to pretend you didn’t know how I felt back then.”

Catching her arm, he pulled her around to face him, unhappy to see the look in her eyes, the one that said she felt a little defeated, a little down, and definitely wary. “I wasn’t pretending. I was really that slow, especially that night when you came to my apartment.”

“Well of course you were slow that night. You were deep in the throes of getting…pleasured.”

He let out a breath. “That’s actually not the part of that whole nightmare of a night that I was referring to.”

She crossed her arms. “Well, there’s no other part of that night that I want to discuss. Ever.” She looked away. “Certainly not why you felt the need to come after me if you didn’t want me.”

He stared at her bowed head and felt an unaccustomed squeeze in the region of his heart. “You were sixteen.”

“I want to go back to the no-talking thing.”

“I cared about you, Rainey. But you were off limits to me, with or without the girl in my bedroom that night. I didn’t allow myself to look at you that way, and with good reason.”

“I wasn’t a child.”

“You were a felony.”

She seemed to stop breathing, which he took as a good sign. She was listening. “As for what happened after, I’m not sorry about that. He was drunk and being aggressive with you, and I don’t care what you think of me now, surely you know I’d never walk away from that.”

She said nothing.

“Never, Rainey. As far as I knew, you were innocent-”

She made a soft moan of protest, and he paused, taking in her profile, which wasn’t giving much away. “And I’m not sorry I kicked his ass either.”

At that, she looked up. “You did?”

He hesitated, knowing she wasn’t going to thank him for this part. “After I made sure you got home, I went after him. I threatened to kill him if he ever went near you again.”

Her eyes narrowed, and he raised a brow, daring her to protest. Finally, she blew out a breath, and even gave him a little smile. “Thanks.” Pushing away from him, she headed for the kitchen.

Catching her by the waist, he turned her around and had to duck to look into her eyes. “And I didn’t desert our friendship, I went to Ontario for a job. When I left, you weren’t speaking to me.”

“I’m not speaking to you now either.”

He pulled her up against him. “I liked you,” he said quietly. “A lot. You were fearless and a little wild, and a whole lot determined.”

She snorted.

“I liked you,” he repeated quietly, firmly. “But let’s be honest. I liked all women back then. I wasn’t much for commitment or a relationship beyond what I could get in the hours between dinner and breakfast. It was day-to-day for me.”

“By all accounts, that hasn’t changed much.”

“Fair enough,” he said. “I still tend towards the day-to-day. It suits my lifestyle.” He hadn’t given a lot of thought to having a deep, serious relationship in a while. He’d been there, done that, and it was more trouble than it was worth. He didn’t play with women, he didn’t lead them on. He enjoyed them. Made sure they enjoyed him. And then when things got sticky or uncomfortable, or too much to handle, he moved on.

Day to day…

“With my job, having a deep, meaningful, heavy relationship just hasn’t been on my radar.”

She nodded.

“None of that doesn’t mean that I don’t like the woman you’ve become,” he said. “Because I do. Very much.”

“Even though I’m different?”

“Especially because you’re different.”

Her eyes lifted to his, revealing a vulnerability that cut him to the core. “Doesn’t hurt that you’re smart and smoking hot,” he said.

“I’m a sure thing, Mark,” she said on a low, embarrassed laugh. “You don’t need to-”

“And fiercely protective about those you care about,” he murmured. “And strong. So damn strong. I think that’s what I like the best. Watching you run your world and make a difference while you’re at it.”

She shook her head. “If it’s my turn to say I like you now, you’re going to be disappointed. I got over liking you.”

He grinned. “Aw, Rainey. You like me. You like me a whole hell of a lot.”

“We really need to work on your self-confidence.” But she blew out a breath and relaxed into him a little. “You’ve read your press, right? You know they call you a hard-ass.” She lifted her hand and touched his face. “But they’re wrong.” She pressed her face to his throat and inhaled him in, like maybe he was her air and she needed more. And when her hands slid around his waist, beneath his shirt, and up his back, he knew he was a goner.