Lucia Jordan's Four Series Collection: Chosen, Whipped, Lick, Risk (33 page)

She had to admit. Her experience with men was somewhat limited, and all the experiences she had with them were everything but good. In fact, it was because of those experiences that she’d fled her home town and sought refuge in Miami. Nothing like starting over in a new city with a new job and a new name.

“You have seriously got to get your crap together,” she said as she pushed away from the wall. She had three more sessions booked and then she would head over to her other job. Maybe she would even have one of the girls she worked with take care of the stress knots that seemed to be forming in the base of her neck.

Trevor watched as Lacey disappeared into the locker room. His cock twitched in his shorts, reminding him of how attracted to her he was. His manager had told him that if he could finish up his therapy, he could be pitching again by the tenth game of the season. What he didn’t expect was that his therapist would be smoking hot.

Lacey had the bluest eyes he’d ever seen in his life, and with as many ad campaigns and stuff that he’d had to do, there were a lot. He’d also noticed the soft curve of her body beneath the scrubs she wore. More than once he’d chanced a peak at her cleavage when she leaned over to help him. His mouth practically watered. She was confident in her work, but he could see just below the surface of her gaze that she was unsure.

He wasn’t sure what it was, but there was something there that screamed innocence. That was the most appealing thing for him. She wasn’t throwing herself at him. In fact, she hadn’t even known who he was, which was refreshing. It meant that any attraction that was between them was pure and untainted by who he was. It was hard to find women that were interested in him for who he was. They often saw dollar signs.

Lacey was successful and he could tell by the way she interacted with him and the others he’d seen that she truly loved her job. Not only that, but she boasted of a Midwestern accent, which reminded him of home. If he had to say anything, it was that she went out of her way to blend in or be invisible. He noticed that when he spoke to her, she often lowered her gaze or would look away. She did joke with him, but it was all light. It almost seemed as if she was scared. He hadn’t meant to kiss her, but if he’d said he regretted it, he would be lying.

He nearly lost it when she pressed her body against his. Those tight tits and that firm ass. He groaned as he swiped the sweat away from his head with the towel. Right now the only thing he wanted to do was finish what had just been started with his physical therapist. While every bone in his body was screaming for him to hurry and move things along, there was something in his mind that told him he needed to tread lightly with this one.

Lacey Carson wasn’t just another groupie or fan. She was a paradox and he found himself very much wanting to figure her out.

***

By the time Thursday rolled around, Lacey’s nerves were fried. She’d had very little sleep because every time she closed her eyes, the only thing she could see was Trevor as he kissed her. The times that she did manage to sleep, her dreams were filled with erotic pleasures that had her waking with her panties soaked and a throbbing between her thighs. She’d tried to manually ease the ache and while it did satiate the desire for a short while, it did little to slake her thirst for Trevor.

She kept telling herself how absurd she was being. There was no way she wanted him, because she’d only just met him. In fact, she’d only met him twice. Sure, one of those times he’d kissed her brainless and caused all the bones in her body to turn to rubber, but that didn’t mean anything. Did it?

In the hours in which she found herself awake, she contemplated just about every angle there could have possibly been involving Trevor. It simply could not happen. He was rich, famous and didn’t want anyone as simple as her. That really wasn’t the main thing that was holding her back. The main thing was that if she got serious with Trevor, it meant she had to do one thing she wasn’t sure she could do. Trust him.

***

Lacey sat at her desk, updating patient files and progress reports. When she looked at the clock she realized that is was
1:20
. Trevor’s therapy began at
1:30
. Early on she’d made up her mind to put the kiss behind her. It hadn’t meant anything. Trevor could have any woman he wanted. He sure as hell wasn’t going to settle for her.

“Time to pull the big girl panties up,” she muttered as she prepared to leave her office. The flashing email icon on her screen reminded her that she’d received one nearly a week ago and had forgotten all about it. She rarely checked her mail, but for some reason she felt she needed to this time.

Using the mouse, she clicked on the envelope and waited for her mailbox to open. When it did, she saw a message from an unfamiliar address. She hovered her pointer over it for a few seconds before opening it. She had no idea what she was getting herself into, but she wished more than anything she’d never opened that email.

Lace,

I miss you. No matter how far you run from me, we will be together again, soon. I love you and want to make things right.

Always my love,

Robert.

Lacey’s breathing became shallow and her eyes watered. It couldn’t be. How had he gotten her email address?

Pulling a spare phone out of her top desk drawer, she hid her number and quickly dialed a familiar number. It rang twice before a woman’s voice answered on the other line.

“Hey Momma,” she said.

“Hi baby girl,” her mom said cheerfully. “It’s so good to hear from you. How are you doing? Is the weather nice where you are?”

Lacey flinched. When she’d left Kansas she hadn’t told her parents where she was going, only that she would be fine and check in. That’s how it had remained for the past three years. Sure, at first they’d pressed her for her location, but she’d refused to give it to them. If they really wanted to find her, they could. It wasn’t that hard. But with her dad’s salary at the mill and her mom’s teaching job, they didn’t have the funds to track her down. Finally, after realizing they weren’t going to get any information out of her, they’d stopped pressing for her location.

“I’m fine, Momma. Hey, did you give Robert my email address?” She drummed her fingers nervously on the top of her desk.

There was a long silence on the other end.

“Momma?” she pressed.

Her mom huffed out a breath of air. “He misses you, baby. He’s really sorry about what he did and he wants to make it up to you. Just give him a chance,” she said in one long breath.

Lacey could hardly believe what she was hearing. The sting of betrayal from her own mother hurt deeper than anything.

“Give him a chance? Are you kidding me right now?” she screeched into the phone.

“Baby, he’s real sorry.”

“Momma! It’s not like he cheated on me.”

“I know and he’s been getting help.”

“HELP?! He’s been getting help? Momma, he’s a sick man. There is no help for him.”

“Lacey I raised you better than that. I’ve dealt with your flightiness over the years, but it is time you grew up and came home.”

Frustration blossomed in Lacey’s chest but she clamped down on her tongue. “Does Daddy know you gave him my email?”

“No,” came her mother’s clipped tone. “And you’d best not tell him either.”

Lacey made a snorting sound. “Momma. I don’t want Robert in my life. Tell him to leave me alone. I am home and I’m not coming back to Kansas.”

“Don’t talk to me like that young lady.”

She wasn’t about to be cowed by her mother. “Do. Not. Give. Him. Anything. Else,” she said in a clipped tone. “If I hear from him again, this will be the last time you hear from me, but not before I tell Daddy what you’ve been up too.”

“But . . .” her mom sputtered.

“I mean it Momma. Stay out of it or I’ll fall so far off the grid you’ll never know what happened to me.”

That was the last thing she said as she disconnected the call and threw the phone back in the drawer. She let out a frustrated cry and squeezed her eyes tightly together. Tears rolled down her cheeks and dripped onto the papers she’d been working on. The ghosts of her past were sneaking back in, and just when things in her life were finally on the right track.

“Damn it.” She sighed. She scrubbed the heels of her hands against her eyes. It was a good thing she hadn’t put make-up on this morning.

She looked up at the clock. It was already
1:35.
“Fudge,” she said as she gathered her things and rushed from her office.

When she got to the gym, she found Trevor tying his shoes. He looked up and greeted her with a bright smile, but the smile immediately faded. “What’s wrong?” he asked as he climbed to his feet and pushed the hair out of his eyes.

“Nothing,” she said with a slight sniff. She adverted her gaze and began to gather the weights she’d planned on using. “Okay, since you are doing so well I thought we could start . . .”

He was standing in front of her and his arms reached out and clutched her firmly by the shoulders.

“Lacey? What’s the matter?”

There was no way in hell she was going to tell him what was bothering her. It simply wasn’t going to happen. She’d much rather focus on something else.

Finally she looked up, her blue gaze meeting his green one head on. “There was a slight family issue. It’s been taken care of. That’s all you need to know. Now, I want you to start with the weighted ball and slowly go into the throwing motion. Don’t over exert or use too much force, but I want to check your range of motion and see how your muscles are holding up.”

She didn’t give him a chance to respond. There was no need for him to. It was none of his business what had happened or what was happening in her life, because he was a patient, and that was all.

Their session was quiet. Lacey was lost in thought as Trevor went through with his therapy. She went easy on him simply because she couldn’t get her mind off of Robert’s email. Was he really going to come after her? Would he be able to find her? She shuddered. She sure as hell hoped not.

“You did well today,” she said as he Trevor his shoulder out.

“Thanks.”

“You said you found a massage therapist to help you?”

He nodded, his blond hair falling over his sweat dampened forehead. “I did. I have an appointment for tonight. My manager talked to the owner and they agreed to let me come in after hours since the media seems to be all over the place.”

Lacey sat on the bench and leaned forward, resting her forearms on her knees. She studied her hands without really seeing them. “That must suck after a while,” she said thoughtfully.

“Yeah. It does. I came from a small town in Nebraska. I’m not used to a lot of attention.”

“I don’t like attention either,” she muttered.

“Is that why you’re having a tough day? Because of attention?”

“Where at in Nebraska are you from,” she said, blatantly dodging his question.

He snickered. “A little town called Wymore.”

Lacey’s eyes grew wide and she whipped her head around. “You are not!”

“Yeah. Pretty sure I am. Why?”

“Because I’m from Marysville Kansas.”

Trevor smiled. “Well isn’t it a small world.”

She shrugged. “I guess.”

Well, things made a little more sense. That would explain why he looked like an all-American boy next door, because he practically was. You can’t grow up in a small town like Wymore and not be a country boy. What was even more ironic was the fact that, apparently, they’d only lived about thirty minutes apart, just across the state line.

“How long have you played ball?” she asked.

“I played all throughout high school, but I’ve only been in the majors for about two and a half years now.”

That would explain why she hadn’t heard anything. She’d already left her hometown at that point, so she didn’t know any of the news. Even though they’d lived close together, they were still thousands of miles apart. There was enough of an age difference between them that they wouldn’t have crossed paths. She’d been in Elementary school when he was a senior.

“Well, I need to get going,” she said. The silence between them was making her uncomfortable, even if it was only a thirty second lapse.

“Lacey?”

She turned and found him standing and staring at her. Her heart fluttered and, when he smiled, her core began to throb.

“Yeah?”

“It’s not worth it.”

She frowned, confused by what he was saying. “What do you mean?”

“Whatever it is that made you cry. It’s not worth it.”

His words touched her, but the only thing she could do was offer him a sad smile.

***

The rest of the day flew by. Lacey reached the massage clinic just a little past five. She was having a late day since her physical therapy was running late.

“Hey, Ali,” she said with more cheer than she felt.

“Hey girl. You only have one appointment tonight,” Ali said, looking up from her computer.

“What? I had at least five booked two days ago.”