Текст книги "Triple Play"

Автор книги: Sloan Johnson

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With the only call I could make taken care of, I bent over to rest my head over my forearms on the table. I doubted I’d be able to sleep, but I needed to block out what was going on outside this room.

I’d actually managed to drift off when the cavalry came storming into the conference room. Apparently, no one had heeded Jason’s advice to stay behind so the hospital wasn’t overrun with baseball players. Half the team and their significant others filed into the room, leaving poor Devon playing doorman. He seemed unfazed by the chaos which ensued, and actually offered to run to the store on his lunch break to get us some food to soak up the alcohol seeping out of the pores of most of the guys.

“Thanks, Devon.” I pulled three twenties out of my pocket and handed them over to him. “Seriously, when this is all over, I owe you big time.”

“Don’t mention it, Mr. Sapp. As I said earlier, I know what it’s like when a teammate is down.”  As the big guy walked away, I noticed the way he favored his right leg.  I wondered if he was the injured player he kept referring to, and knew how his own teammates had responded.

I followed Devon into the hall and called after him. He stopped and waited for me to catch up. “Have you heard anything?”

“Not yet, sir,” he responded, looking around to make sure no one else could hear us. “I’m sure you know I’m not supposed to give you any information since you aren’t family, but it seems to me someone should know the score.”

“Thanks Devon, but I don’t want you jeopardizing your job for me,” I responded. It seemed a more suitable response than throwing my arms around his neck and kissing his cheek, which had also crossed my mind.

“Don’t you worry about me, sir.” Devon motioned for me to follow him out a side door, which appeared to lead to an employee smoking lounge. It seemed odd to me that a hospital allowed their employees to smoke on the property, but then again they all had high stress jobs and it made sense that they needed to decompress from time to time. “As I said in there, I don’t have much information just yet, but they’ve taken him to X-ray and they’ll likely run a slew of other tests before the night is out, trying to rule out a head injury or any internal bleeding.”

That didn’t sound good, but after having been there with Drew, it wasn’t a surprise. I let out a sigh of relief because it sounded as if Drew might not be in as bad of shape as I’d assumed.

“Look, I gotta get back in there. If I hear anything else, I’ll be sure to let you know right away.” Devon stepped toward the door. “I know it’s not much, but if he’s gotta be here, tonight’s a good night. We were staffed heavy in case the Mavericks won, and people got stupid...”

How ironic. Drew was going to get expedient, attentive care, all because the team he played for lost the game. Because of a play that he’d been involved in. Talk about bittersweet comfort.

“Thanks again, Devon. I’d better get in there before the guys hunt me down.”

A conference room full of pissed off, mostly drunk baseball players awaited me inside. When I opened the door, the room exploded into a barrage of questions so loud I couldn’t hear any of them. Finally, Mason whistled loud enough to wake the dead and everyone stopped talking at once. “Thanks, Mason.”

“I didn’t do it for you,” Mason barked out. “You got these guys all worked up, and I want to know what the fuck happened that we’re sitting here instead of down at 42.”

Sean pulled Mason back as he advanced toward me. I swallowed hard and nodded my thanks to my friend. Murmurs started throughout the room again and I cleared my throat. “First, let me tell you I don’t have a lot of information just yet. I cut through the alley on my way to 42 and interrupted someone beating the shit out of Drew. I didn’t know it was him at first, but I scared the guy off and called 911.”

“Why the fuck didn’t you go after the guy?” Kevin Green asked, which earned him a slap to the back of the head from his girlfriend. Amber wasn’t the type to take shit off anyone, including Kevin. That quality may very well come in handy before this was over. I needed someone with a level head in my corner as the rage in my friends and former teammates grew.

“Because if I’d gone after him, that would have meant leaving Drew lying in the alley in a pool of his own blood,” I snapped back, slapping my hands on the table, leaning in closer to Kevin. “It was a snap decision, but if I had it to do all over again I’d have done the fucking same. Hopefully when Drew wakes up, he’ll be able to tell the cops something and they’ll catch the mother fucker who did this to him. If I hadn’t let the asshole go tonight, we might be having a very different argument right now.”

My entire body shook uncontrollably. I hoped I wasn’t about to break down crying, but I couldn’t be certain. The gravity of what had happened crashed down on me and it became hard to breathe. I felt a hand on my shoulder and glanced to see Jason standing behind me. I placed my hand over his, not giving a flying fuck who might have an issue with it.

“You made the right call, Eric,” Jason assured me before stepping to the side to address the rest of the room. “And if any of you disagree with that, you can come and talk to me. It’s easy for all of us to sit here and talk about what we would have done, but the reality is none of us had to make that call. None of us had to see one of our own lying on the ground. None of us will go to bed tonight with those images running through our heads. Eric will. And even though he’s no longer a Maverick, he’s still our brother. Remember that.”

A soft knock on the door interrupted everyone from coming at me with questions for which I didn’t have answers. Devon poked his head inside and motioned for me to join him in the hall. He cocked an eyebrow when Jason followed me.

“It’s okay. If one of us is going to be here, it should actually be him,” I informed Devon. “Jason’s boyfriend is Drew’s best friend. He’s probably the one you should be talking to.”

I took a step back, but Jason stopped me. “No man, you’re as close to him as the rest of us. I’d like to hear what they have to say, but I think Drew would want you here. He and I haven’t exactly had the best relationship over the past few months.”

“You two can figure that out between yourselves.” Devon chuckled. “For now, I’ll just say what needs to be said. Drew’s back from X-ray. He has three cracked ribs and his right wrist is broken. He woke up for a while, but now he’s out again thanks to the pain meds. The CT scan showed no bleeding or swelling on the brain, which is a damn good thing. He does have a moderate concussion, but that’s to be expected in this type of scenario.”

“When can we see him?” Jason asked. Devon simply shook his head and looked past us into the conference room filled with men nearly gripping the table to keep from rushing into the hall.

“If by ‘we’ you mean the two of you, that should be possible once we take him upstairs for observation. I know it’s a long shot, but do either of you have information on how to reach his emergency contact?” Devon waited for me to answer and I looked to Jason, because I sure as fuck had no clue.

Finally, Jason spoke up. “Was his cell phone in his pocket when they brought him in? If it was, I’d like to see if I can call his parents. That way they don’t flip out by getting a call from the hospital in the middle of the night.”

“I believe it was with his personal belongings, yes.” Devon’s phone rang and he pulled it out to look at the display. “I have to take this. I’ll come back when I have more information.”

“Thanks, Devon.” I was surprised he’d given us so much information when he didn’t have to. After he walked away, I slumped against the wall feeling completely wrung out. Without the adrenaline coursing through my body, I was left running on fumes.

Jason wrapped his arm around the back of my neck and pulled me in for a hug. My body went rigid at his touch. He was one of my closest friends, but I’d never known him to be openly affectionate. “Come on, let’s go tell the guys, and see if we can get some of them to clear out.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, unable to form a complete thought. This wasn’t the way our night was supposed to go, but I was grateful to Jason for understanding what I needed. I couldn’t explain why, but something inside me refused to set foot outside the hospital before I had a chance to talk to Drew and know he was okay.

Chapter 3

All I wanted to do was sleep. You’d think that’d be easy to do in a hospital. Not so much. Between the nurses coming in to make sure I woke up normally, the doctors checking to confirm they hadn’t overlooked something, and my over-vigilant family, it felt as though it’d been a week since I’d last slept.

This time, it was the scent of coffee filling the room that pulled me out of my haze. I turned my head and scowled as Jason took the seat next to my bed and sipped his morning brew. On top of being exhausted and every inch of my body hurting, I had yet to convince anyone in this place to give me anything beyond water and ice. No one can be expected to be satisfied by that, especially someone who’d played the game of his life the night before and lost.

“You’re up awfully early.” My voice was hoarse and my head throbbed as I tried to sit up. Jason reached for the remote and handed it to me so I could raise the head of the bed rather than continue trying to make the pillows support me.

“Can’t be up early if you haven’t gone to bed,” Jason admitted. That made me feel like an ass. He shouldn’t have to be up here waiting around to see if I was going to live or die. And from what they’d told me, I was definitely going to live. With the amount of pain I was in, I wasn’t sure yet if that was a good or bad thing.

“Sorry if I freaked you out last night,” I apologized. Jason waved me off before I could say anything else. As comforting as it was to have him by my side, he wasn’t the one I wanted to see sitting in that chair. Perhaps Cam’s absence also had something to do with Jason not sleeping. “Have you heard from him?”

Even though I still didn’t love the idea of Jason and Cam being stupidly in love with one another, I had to admit Jason was better for my best friend than I ever could have been. He’d forced Cam outside of his comfort zone and into the opportunity of a lifetime. Cam would be here now, likely losing his fucking mind, if Jason hadn’t pushed him to go to an audition for A Cut Above yesterday.

“Yeah, he called last night.” By the wide smile on Jason’s face, I knew it had to be good news. “By now, he’s probably asleep in a hotel in New York, waiting to begin filming.”

A pit formed in my stomach. I was elated for Cam, but I wished he could be here. Maybe it made me a dick, but Cam was the only person I could really talk to about everything that was going on. I needed my other half with me, if for no other reason than to serve as a buffer between me and everyone who tried coddling me as I healed.

“You didn’t tell him about this, did you?” I figured he hadn’t since I knew Cam well enough to know that he would have thrown away whatever they were offering him if he knew I’d been beat up. Still, I needed Jason to confirm my assumptions.

“No, he called shortly before Eric called me,” Jason assured me. Wait, what did Eric have to do with this? Jason must’ve read the confusion across my knitted brow. “He’s the one who stopped that asshole from killing you.”

Bile rose in my throat and I seriously thought for a moment that I was going to hurl all over myself and Jason. I remember bits of the beginning of the attack, but somewhere along the way, I must’ve passed out. The next thing I knew, I was in the emergency room. Hearing Jason speak so bluntly freaked me the hell out. I knew him well enough to know that he wasn’t the overly dramatic type. If he said there was a chance I could’ve been killed, he meant it.

Jason reached for my hand, squeezing gently as I started to hyperventilate. “Hey, I shouldn’t have been so crass. Yeah, it was that bad, but you don’t need to be thinking about that shit right now. You’ve gotta calm down, man. Otherwise, the nurses are going to come running back in here and before you know it, they’ll be running all sorts of tests again. You don’t want that, do you?”

I shook my head. The only thing I wanted was to get the hell out of here. Well, and I wanted to talk to Eric. He might be able to fill in the huge blanks in my mind. “Sorry, you probably think I’m a colossal wuss right about now.”

Jason snorted in disbelief. “Are you fucking kidding me? I’m shocked as hell you’re doing this well with everything. You might not remember it, but from what I hear, it wasn’t pretty when Eric found you. It takes a hell of a man to bounce back from that.”

I looked all around the room, as if trying to show Jason just how much I hadn’t ”bounced back.” I was lying in a hospital bed, nearly desperate enough to offer him a blowjob if only he’d bring me something to fucking eat and give me a sip of his coffee.

“Thanks.” Jason sat back in his chair once my breathing returned to normal. “Were you the one who called my dad in the middle of the night?”

Jason had the decency to look a bit nervous at the curt tone in my voice. “Yeah, and I’d do it again if I had to,” he admitted. “Your dad wasn’t too happy about being woken up at one in the morning, but I figured he’d be even more pissed off if I hadn’t called him at all.”

I laughed because Jason was so right about that. Then, I nearly doubled over at the searing pain through my torso. “Man, and to think you’ve never met the guy. Yeah, he’d have stormed in here ready to kick some serious ass if he hadn’t found out pretty much right away.”

“Cam talks about your parents a lot,” Jason informed me. That wasn’t surprising, since they were the closest thing he’d ever had to decent parents. It surprised me that he turned out as well as he did, given the shitty hand he’d been dealt as a kid. Still, it warmed my heart to know Cam talked about my family to the guy he was in love with. “I think that helped last night, too, because I was able to tell them who I was to Cam and that way I wasn’t just some asshole calling in the middle of the night with bad news.”

I knew my parents had been here, but they were nowhere to be found. That was odd, because I’d have figured there was nothing that’d keep my mom from hovering over me until she was satisfied that I’d be okay. “Where are they now?”

“Eric took them back to your place to get a shower and some breakfast,” Jason told me. Man, I owed Eric big time. First, he basically saved my life and then he got my parents out of the hospital before they could drive everyone insane. I chuckled as much as my battered body would allow as I wondered if he was currently sitting on the couch regretting his decision. “He said they can sleep up in Cam’s room while they’re there. If the doctors hadn’t told your mom you’ll probably be getting out of here later today, I don’t know that she’d have left.”

“Probably not.” I loved Mom, but she was most protective over me. I was the baby of the family, their ”oops” child, and she hadn’t quite learned to let go of me once I reached adulthood.

“Don’t worry, they’ll probably be back within the hour,” Jason said, laughing when I groaned. Between the physical pain and the thought of a panicked mother when she got back up here, I suddenly wanted something much stronger than coffee. Like, maybe a bottle of scotch.

“Is Eric coming with them?” I wanted a few minutes alone with him to thank him for everything. It was completely inadequate but it’d have to do for now. I also worried about how he was doing in the aftermath of last night.

“Yeah, he’ll be here.” Jason looked uncomfortable, as if there was something else on his mind. Something he wanted to say, but wasn’t sure he should.

“Whatever it is, just spit it out.” I was never one for dancing around uncomfortable conversations, and I sure as hell wasn’t in the mood to start now.

“Is something going on between the two of you?” he asked after a long silence. “I mean, it’s totally cool if it is, but you have to know he’s not someone who’s good at fooling around. He might say he is, but he’s not.”

That was reassuring, not that it mattered. Eric and I had spent a bit of time together in the week since he’d been home, but never anything more than two guys hanging out. And even that was limited because he was trying to relax after a horrendous season for the Seattle Storm, and I was trying to stay focused in hopes of helping the Mavericks get to the World Series. Which hadn’t happened. Because of me. Fuck, as if I needed anything else trampling through my head, now I was back to thinking about that fucking game. Fucking Mark Butler. Jason was right about one thing. Mark was a cocky sonuvabitch who wanted to be the hero of the game. And I stopped him and screwed our team in the process.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Two reasons,” Jason stated, sitting a bit straighter in his seat. “First, Eric freaked the hell out last night, and I don’t think it was just because of what he interrupted. He was seriously worried about you. Second, a text message came in for you this morning.”

He tossed me my phone and then picked it up when I couldn’t hold and unlock it one handed. I read the message from Bryce three times and it still didn’t make sense. It said he was in town and wanted to get together today. I wondered why he hadn’t told me he was coming back to Wisconsin. I tried to figure out how to blow him off because there was no way I wanted him to see me this way.

“I could give you the same speech about that one,” Jason said as he nodded toward my phone. “But for some reason, I don’t think I need to worry as much about him.”

“Jason, you can think I’m some sort of manwhore if it’ll make you feel better, but I haven’t done anything with either of them.” I clenched my jaw and took a few breaths to try and calm down. “Bryce and I have seen each other exactly once, the night you and Cam made up. Since then, we’ve been talking but there’s nothing going on there. And Eric, well he’s my roommate. I can’t exactly ignore him.”

“As long as you remember that both of those guys are like brothers to me. You hurt either of them and the payback will be swift and unpleasant.” I’d be pissed if I hadn’t given him the same warning, almost verbatim, when he and Cam started fooling around.

“Got it. Now, if you’re done would you please go and see when they’ll let me eat something?” I didn’t give two shits if I sounded whiny. If I didn’t get something in my stomach soon, the petulance would turn to anger and then no one would want to deal with me.

Jason laughed as he hoisted himself out of the chair which was too small for his large frame. “Yeah, I’ll see if I can scrounge up something. I think the doctors just wanted to make sure you weren’t going to puke when the water hit your stomach.”

“Thank you.” I was grateful to see him leave, not only because I was ravenous, but also because I just wanted to be alone. Just a few minutes without anyone asking what hurt, how I felt, if they could do anything for me, and on and on.

Chapter 4

When I took the job with Pot of Gold, I thought it’d be a great way to actually do some good in life. I’d been jaded by my time in the Army, but I think that’s why I was so hell-bent on making a difference. I’d seen horrible acts fueled by hate and bigotry, but knew my CO wouldn’t believe me if I confessed my assumptions to him. So, I kept my mouth shut and my inaction led to the death of one of my best friends. That was something I’d live with until the day I died, but it also led me to vow to help keep someone else from being too much of a coward to say anything.

I sure as hell hadn’t counted on sitting down with my morning coffee to analyze every line of the proposed budget, trying to figure out where we could cut dollars in order to save the entire Milwaukee chapter from closing down. If something didn’t change, I doubted we’d be able to keep the doors open for another year, and that wasn’t an option in my mind. That’s why I hadn’t given it a second thought when the founder asked me if I’d be willing to pack up and temporarily move to Wisconsin.

It seemed as if everything was finally beginning to look up for me. When I was in Milwaukee a few weeks ago, I’d met Drew, one of my friend Jason’s teammates, who also happened to be the long-time best friend of Jason’s boyfriend, Cam. The two of us hit it off and he didn’t once look at me as though I’d grown a third eye when I rambled on about the need for places like Pot of Gold through most of dinner. In fact, he seemed almost as eager to help as I’d been in the early days, even if that was impractical most of the year since he was a big shot baseball player.

The two of us had parted ways that night with what seemed to be empty promises to meet up the next time I was in town. Empty only because I hadn’t thought I’d be back so soon and it was unlikely someone like Drew would be sitting around waiting on someone like me to show up at his door. We’d shared text messages back and forth over the past few weeks, but those had dwindled to almost nothing as the Mavericks made their way into the playoffs for the first time in however long. I wasn’t upset about it since I knew from Jason how much time and focus it took to stay at the top of his game during the season.

With the Mavericks’ battle for the pennant officially over for the year, I picked up my phone, hoping that Drew would want to get together at some point. It might not be today or tomorrow since I’m sure he still had plenty of work to do before the team sent everyone home for the winter, but sometime. As much as I’d been dying to talk to him, I decided that it’d be less intrusive if I sent a text. That way, if he wasn’t as anxious to see me as I was him, I wouldn’t be waking him on the first morning he could sleep in. He was probably out last night with his teammates and nursing one hell of a hangover. After tapping out a message to let him know I was back in town and interested in seeing him, I tried to focus on the spreadsheets strewn across the table in front of me. Less than a minute later, my phone rang. The voice on the other end of the line wasn’t one I expected to hear since it was Drew’s number on my caller ID.

“Bryce, it’s Jason,” my friend responded after I said hello.

“Hey, why do you have Drew’s phone?” I’d never felt the need for niceties with Jason. He was a no-bullshit kind of guy, which was good because my mother often scolded me telling me I was born without any social graces. When Jason didn’t immediately respond, I began to think it was a huge mistake to try and reconnect with Drew. “Did I lose you?”

The silence on the other end of the line dragged on long enough I almost hung up. When Jason answered me, I began to notice just how tired he sounded. “Yeah, sorry. I had to ask one of the nurses a question.”

That put all of my senses on high alert. My stomach churned at the thought of something being wrong. I flipped the channel to the sports network to see if there was any mention of Drew getting hurt during last night’s game. The highlights of the game droned on, but no mention of anyone being injured. “What’s going on, Jason?”

“Look, I’m only telling you this because you’re my friend,” Jason said warily. “No one’s caught wind of it yet, and we’d like to keep it that way for as long as possible.”

So much for not trying to sugar coat shit. “Spit it out, already,” I grumbled.

“Drew was attacked last night on his way to the bar.” I swallowed hard against the light breakfast threatening to make a return trip up my throat. I replayed Jason’s words over and over, but nothing made sense.

“How in the hell did that happen?” I asked. I always thought that was a ridiculous question, but it was the only thing that came to mind.

“Not sure yet. The cops spent some time questioning him early this morning, but he couldn’t give them much to go on,” Jason told me. Nervous energy filled my body and I needed to do something. I stood and walked over to the sliding door which led out to a small balcony. When I opened the door, I was hit with a blast of cold air but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except finding out what was going on with Drew. “From the little bit I heard and the extent of his injuries, I think it’s pretty safe to assume that whoever did it knows Drew’s gay.”

Suddenly, I was doubting whether or not my presence in Milwaukee was going to be welcomed. I’d known too many guys in Drew’s position who turned their backs on anyone and everyone they were close to before the attack. Then again, that could be a good thing in our case since we hadn’t really gotten a chance to spend much quality time together during the one night we’d had dinner before.

“I’m coming up there,” I informed him. I was already on my way to the bedroom to grab something other than the old pair of shorts I’d thrown on when I woke up. I couldn’t sit around doing nothing. I could tell by the thick drawl in Jason’s words that he hadn’t slept at all last night and he needed someone to take care of him. I couldn’t blame Cam for not stepping up to the plate since he and Drew were best friends. Hell, he was probably in even worse shape than Jason. “I could bring breakfast for you and Cam.”

“I’m not hungry,” Jason protested.

“You guys need to eat,” I countered. This was something else which was familiar to me. Whether it was family members or friends of the victims, those close to the situation rarely took care of themselves.

“It’s just me,” Jason admitted. Those three words sounded so somber I wished I was next to him so I could give him a hug. And maybe make sure he wasn’t about to dive head first into a bottle again. The last time I’d heard him sound this lost and defeated was in the months after I showed up on Jason’s doorstep to give him some of his dead lover’s belongings. We’d been deployed together and he’d given me a list of things to make sure Jason got if anything should happen to him. It was as if he’d known he wasn’t going to come back home. Jason must have realized how his response sounded, because he quickly added, “Cam had an audition for a cooking show yesterday. He made it, but that meant he had to fly out to New York late last night. He has no clue what’s going on.”

Shit. Now Jason’s exhaustion made sense. Not only was he trying to be there for his teammate, but knowing how loyal he was, he was trying to do everything for Drew that Cam would have done if he was there. “Well, in that case, you really need someone to take care of you. Are you alone up there with him?”

“I’m fine, Bryce. Eric is on his way back up with Drew’s parents. He’d been refusing to leave, but I convinced all of them to get out of here for a while when Drew was sleeping.” The bile rose in my throat again. I didn’t know who Eric was or how he fit into the puzzle, but he and Drew had to be close if he was keeping vigil at his bedside. This was no time for me to allow my jealousy to get the better of me. I needed to be happy for Drew if he’d found someone decent to stand by him through whatever recovery he was going to face.

“Okay, well then both of you need to eat something.” I chuckled, remembering how Drew talked about the way Cam was always trying to feed everyone. I realized that was one thing the two of us had in common. Whenever anyone was going through any sort of traumatic event when I was a child, my mom used to swear the answer was a homemade casserole. I wasn’t about to go to those lengths, but there had to be a donut shop between here and whatever hospital they were at. “Text me the address and I’ll be there as soon as I can with the biggest, blackest cup of coffee I can find.”

Jason let out a ragged breath, likely trying to decide whether or not to argue with me. If he hadn’t been able to best me when he was trying to drink himself to death, he sure as hell wasn’t going to win today. “Look, I know you mean well, but the room’s already going to be bursting at the seams once Eric and Drew’s parents get back up here. Why don’t I text you once I know what’s going on and you can meet us at the house?”

“That’s fine,” I lied. Even though what Jason said made sense, I couldn’t help but feel as though I was being dismissed. There wasn’t room for me, and I wasn’t sure if that held true outside Drew’s hospital room.

“I’ll call you when there’s more to tell.” Jason paused as if there was something he was trying to not say. With another long sigh, he added, “Don’t tell him I told you this, but Drew’s going to need you.”

“I’ll be there for him as long as he wants me around,” I responded, mostly as a reminder to myself that nothing was guaranteed. Despite Jason’s reassurance, I knew Drew could just as easily tell me to get the hell out of his house and never come back.

“Why didn’t you tell me the two of you had been talking?” Jason asked, his voice low enough that I could barely hear him. “Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great but I was surprised to see your name on his phone this morning.”

“There’s nothing to tell, really,” I admitted. “We went out the night I stopped by your apartment, since you and Cam ditched the two of us so you could make up. Since then, it’s just been a few calls and texts back and forth. We’d talked about getting together if I was in the area, so I figured I’d try getting in touch with him today since you guys lost last night.”

“Yeah, about that...” Jason’s voice became muffled and I realized he was talking to someone else. Someone who hadn’t been told to not come to the hospital. “When you talk to Drew, try to come up with a different reason for why you texted him today. He’s still not dealing well with the outcome of the game.”

“Why? It’s not like it was his fault,” I scoffed. “The other guy was an idiot to try running when he did.”

“Well, it seems everyone in the world sees it that way with the exception of Drew and Mark,” Jason said. “If I were you, I’d also refrain from bringing up your opinion on the play. Maybe after all of this blows over, we’ll be able to convince him that no one hates him.”