Melting the Ice(124)

            He just wished he knew how they were going to do that, what the magic secret was to taking a team that kicked ass at home and sucked on the road, and turning them into absolute winners.

            He closed his eyes and willed it to happen.

            Because at this point, skill didn’t seem to matter. And will, hope, and prayer were the only things he had left.





TWENTY-SIX


            CAROLINA COULDN’T BELIEVE FASHION WEEK WAS just around the corner.

            She felt ill-prepared, but it was here. The final touches had been put on everything, so ready or not, it was here, and there was nothing she could do about it now.

            The one major item left was getting her print advertising moving along, and for that she needed Drew.

            He’d texted her from the road, and called her a few times. She’d been working nonstop, twelve hour days, so their phone calls had been short, but she had to admit she’d enjoyed hearing from him. He’d seemed down since they had a couple losses on the road, and she was so in her own head she wasn’t sure she was much good at cheering him up, but she did try to send him some messages about his games, which, surprisingly, she’d found time to watch.

            She was hooked, and couldn’t seem to not watch his games, no matter how busy she told herself she was. Even Stella came over one night for takeout and they watched together, since Stella and Trick were still bed buddies, though Stella insisted that’s all that was going on between them.

            “No emotional attachment?” Carolina had asked.

            Stella laughed. “I’m too busy to be emotionally attached, and I’m pretty sure Trick is one of those girl-in-every-port kind of guys. Which suits me just fine, because my first love is dance, not men. And clingers aren’t my type.”

            “Trick doesn’t strike me as a clinger.”

            “He’s not,” Stella had said, opening up her fortune cookie. “Which is why I’m still sleeping with him.”

            Carolina wished she could be so laissez-faire about her . . . thing with Drew. But it seemed so much deeper, so complicated between them. And maybe that was all in her head, and because Drew was tied into her fashion line. Maybe she was deliberately keeping him closer to her because of that.

            She paused as she perused lighting and music for the show. Was that what she was doing? Was she keeping Drew interested because she needed him so desperately for her fashion show? Surely she wasn’t that superficial. Besides, Drew had agreed to do it before the two of them had ever slept together. And he had been the one to pursue her—rather diligently, as she recalled. She could have said no, firmly, and he still would have agreed to participate.

            Wouldn’t he have?

            She worried her bottom lip with her teeth and pondered.

            No, that wasn’t it at all. She thought about him all the time. There was more to it than that. Though her thoughts about him were often jumbled up between hot sex, how he made her feel, an ache in the pit of her stomach, and how hot he was going to look in her clothes.

            She laid her head in her hands. What a mess. She’d hate to think she was using him. Then again, hadn’t he done the same thing to her all those years ago?

            Oh, please. She was so past over that now. He’d apologized, she’d forgiven. That was done and she wasn’t going to think about it anymore.

            Her phone rang and she picked it up with a smile on her face.

            “Hey, Stella.”

            “I’m starving. Are you finished working for the night?”

            “No, but I’m tired. And hungry, so I need to shut it down.”