Draw Play: The Originals (Seattle Steelheads Book 4)
big gulp of his beer.“How the hell do you know? You’ve never asked her.”
“I might.”
Bruiser stared at his friend and shook his head. “You’re a piece of work, Brett, you know that?”
“Takes one to know one.”
“Sure does,” Bruiser chuckled.
Brett stared at his beer as if it held the answers to world peace. “I wish I could take her.”
“I wish you could too. Cancel your plans.”
“I can’t. I’m in Portland judging a pet parade fundraiser to benefit to an animal shelter. Remember? I asked you, and you said no. Said you had commitments.”
“Uh, yeah, that. My plans got canceled.” Bruiser had been outed. “I’m not good with animals.” Pets reminded him too much of his own crappy upbringing with his barfly mother and crazy-wild sister and their unattended menagerie of dogs and cats. “Hey, I gave you a big check to help with expenses.”
“You think money replaces people, Bruce?”
He didn’t have an answer for that. His ex-wife, CeCe, would say money solved everything. She took half of his rookie-year signing bonus and hooked up with a New York quarterback so she could bask in the limelight of the Big Apple. Bruiser had really loved that woman. Adored her, actually. They’d been together since high school, dated all through college, and married as soon as the Steelheads drafted him in the first round. Less than a year later, she left him with a broken heart and an empty bank account. She’d been one in a handful of people in his life who’d deserted him, and after that Bruiser tore a page from his family’s playbook and kept his relationships superficial. A guy didn’t get fucked over that way.
He had one simple rule when it came to women: his one-week rule. Most didn’t last one entire night, but none of them lasted a week. Not since CeCe. At least he hadn’t confided his secret guilt to her. If she’d known the depths of his private pain, she’d have used it and turned it back around on him.
She’d been his biggest fucking mistake. Being betrayed by someone you loved and trusted sucked worse than losing the Super Bowl in the last second of the game.
He kept his relationships so superficial, he didn’t even know much about Brett, his best friend, and he didn’t ask, even though he suspected his buddy had similar scars from his own past. Brett had interrupted his college education to become a paratrooper. Sometimes Bruiser caught the tragic sadness in Brett’s eyes and worried like hell about his friend, but he kept his concerns to himself, holding the world at arm’s length and concentrating on football and his foundation.
Except lately, he’d been concentrating on Mac, which was fucking weird. Hell, he didn’t even know if she cleaned up well—or cleaned up at all. A new image crashed into his brain: Mac wrestling with him in a pit of warm, thick, gooey mud. Her body covered with wet, soft dirt and her nipples standing out against the material of a thin T-shirt and nothing else.
Oh, hell. He smacked the flat of his palm against his forehead.
“What is wrong with you?” Brett narrowed his eyes and studied Bruiser with a gaze that pierced way too deep.
“Nothing. Just got a headache. I’ll flip you for the next round of drinks.”
“Nah, I’m done for the night. Gotta get back to the kids.” Brett’s kids consisted of a shitload of animal rejects, which was why Bruiser never went to Brett’s place.
“Catch ya later then.”
Brett sketched a salute and headed for the door, stiffing Bruiser for the bill. With a sigh, he took out his wallet and paid up. Across the room, an athletic blonde woman chatted with her friends. She caught his eye and waved. She reminded him a lot of Mac. Bruiser got up from the table and made his way to her. Maybe he just needed a change in type.
Or maybe he needed something more, something he wouldn’t get from a one-night stand with a stranger he picked up in a bar.
Smiling at the ladies, he walked past their table and out the door.
Chapter 3—The Play Fake
Mac plopped down in a plastic lawn chair on the concrete patio of her little house and kept her back to the house next door. Two years ago, she’d planted arborvitae next to the fence dividing the two properties in hopes they’d block any view of the neighbors, but the shrubs weren’t growing fast enough for her taste.
The old craftsman-style cottage had been her home for about four years. Previously, her grandmother had lived there. This property had been in her family for four generations.
After Mac made the decision to move into the long-vacant house, she’d worked side by side with her brother Will to make it livable. Since he’d lived next door, it’d been easy for him to drop by and work on stuff, even though it pissed off his selfish wife, Sonja. No one in the family ever understood why Will married the woman. Well, other than the obvious. She had big boobs and wasn’t afraid to show them off. But a wedding ring hadn’t guaranteed Will exclusive rights to that show.
Mac rubbed her eyes with her fists and let out a shuddering sigh. She glanced around her carefully landscaped yard with its flower gardens erupting in a riot of summer colors. Birds splashed in the birdbath and flitted to and from various birdfeeders. She loved her little house and was immensely proud of all the improvements she’d made over the years.
Shifting in her lawn chair, Mac’s gaze swung toward her house. Beyond the open French doors on the opposite wall, an ornate, antique mantel surrounded the old brick fireplace. Will had found it on Craigslist and sanded, stained, and installed it as a surprise for her birthday.
God, she missed her brother with his dancing, mischievous eyes and zest for life. His absence left a huge hole in her heart that time didn’t seem to heal.
Bart rubbed his black head against her leg, and