It Had to Be You Part 29

Molly's expression grew mulish. "Peg said I could. Now I suppose you're going to tell me I can't."

"No. I think it will be a good experience for you. I just wish you'd talked to me about it."

Dan observed the exchange between the two of them, but didn't comment.

Half an hour later, Phoebe thanked him as she walked with him to the door. As she had suspected, he was returning to the Stars Complex for a late-night session to finalize the week's game plan against their crosstown rivals, the Bears.

He reached for the k.n.o.b, but hesitated before he turned it. "Phoebe, I'm not saying you were right about what we discussed today, and I definitely don't like the way you went about handling the problem, but I'm going to keep an open mind about what you said."

"Fair enough."

"In return, I want you to promise me that you'll tell me right out if you've got a problem with my coaching."

"Should I bring along a bodyguard, or do you think a loaded gun will be enough."

He sighed and dropped his hand from the k.n.o.b. "You're really startin' to exasperate me. I don't know where you get this notion that I'm difficult. I'm about the most reasonable man in the world."

"I'm glad to hear that because there is something else I wanted to discuss with you. I'd like you to put Jim Biederot on the bench next week so his backup can get some playing time."

He exploded. "What! Of all the Of all the stupid, asinine stupid, asinine ..." The expression on Phoebe's face stopped him. ..." The expression on Phoebe's face stopped him.

She lifted an eyebrow and grinned. "Just testing."

He paid her back by looking her over from head to toe and then speaking in a silky whisper that sent her shivering all the way to her toes. "Little girls who walk too close to the danger zone can find themselves in some real bad trouble."

He brushed her lips with a quick kiss, opened the door, and disappeared down the sidewalk.

As he climbed into his car and settled behind the wheel, he was already regretting both the kiss and his suggestive words. No more, No more, he promised. He'd finally made up his mind how he was going to handle this relationship, and flirting wasn't part of it. he promised. He'd finally made up his mind how he was going to handle this relationship, and flirting wasn't part of it.

He'd spent the final leg of the plane trip home last night trying to figure out how he could have Phoebe in his bed while he was courting Sharon Anderson. He wanted Phoebe so much that he'd tried all kinds of arguments to convince himself it would be possible for them to have a brief affair, but even before they'd landed, he'd known he couldn't do it. His future with Sharon was too important for him to jeopardize just because he couldn't get his l.u.s.t for Phoebe under control.

During a hasty dinner with Sharon last week, he'd become even more convinced that she was the woman he wanted to marry. She'd been a little skittish around him, but that was to be expected, and she'd relaxed some by the time he'd taken her home. He'd given her a quick good-night kiss at the door, but that was all. Somewhere along the line, he'd gotten this old-fashioned notion that he and Sharon wouldn't make love until their wedding night.

As for Phoebe- He wanted her so much he ached, but he'd dealt with l.u.s.t before, and he figured time would take care of that. He knew the safest thing for him to do would be to keep their relationship strictly professional, but the idea depressed the h.e.l.l out of him. He'd grown to like her, dammit! If she'd been a man, she might very well have ended up in his inner circle of friends. Why should he cut her out of his personal life now, he asked himself, when she'd be going back to Manhattan at the end of the year and he'd probably never see her again?

It wasn't as if he planned to keep leading her on. All he had to do was treat her like a friend. There'd be no more slipups like that little kiss he'd given her tonight, no more s.e.xual challenges issued in airplane johns. Right now, she might be interested in continuing the physical part of their relationship, but in his experience, women like Phoebe were philosophical about things like that. Once he showed her he was changing the rules between them, she'd follow along. She knew that sometimes things worked out and sometimes they didn't. n.o.body'd have to spell it out for her.

He smiled to himself as he turned the key in the ignition. Phoebe was a crackerjack, all right. Without quite knowing how it had happened, she had managed to earn his respect. He'd never expected her to work so hard at her responsibilities as the Stars' owner, and her dedication was even more impressive because she was so far out of her element. She also had a way of standing up to him that he admired. Somehow she managed to hold her ground around him without being a b.i.t.c.h about it, in contrast to Valerie, who tore into him just for the pleasure of the kill.

His relationship with Phoebe had become important to him, and as long as he didn't give in to the powerful, but inconvenient, physical attraction between them, he didn't see what the harm was in enjoying each other as friends. Not that keeping his hands off her would be easy. It was a good thing he'd been sitting down most of the time he was with her tonight because watching her sashay around in those fancy tights with that sweater that barely made it over her rear had kept him in a constant state of arousal.

He grinned as he pulled away from the curb. If the Russians had been smart, they'd have taken Phoebe's radioactive body into account before they'd signed off on that nuclear proliferation agreement with the United States.

Which was all the more reason he needed to marry Sharon. He knew from painful experience that long-term relationships weren't built on l.u.s.t. They were built on mutual values, and that was what he and Sharon had in common.

So by the time the plane had landed, he had made up his mind. When Phoebe left town at the end of the year, he would pop the question to Sharon, but for the present, he was going to enjoy being with both women. As long as he kept his pants zipped, he wouldn't have a bit of trouble living with himself, and the fact that never again making love with Phoebe depressed the h.e.l.l out of him was all the more reason to keep their relationship platonic. No matter what, he wasn't going to repeat the mistakes of his first marriage.

His thoughts were interrupted by a glimpse of a gray van parked on a narrow side street not three blocks from Phoebe's condo. Cursing, he shifted the Ferrari into reverse. The tires squealed as the car fishtailed. He shifted again. The powerful motor responded instantly and the car shot down the side street, reaching the van just as the driver began to pull forward. Dan spun the wheel so the van was trapped between the Ferrari and the parked car behind it.

He flung himself out of his car. In four long strides he had whipped open the driver's door and dragged the man out by the front of his jacket. "Why are you following me, you sorry son of a b.i.t.c.h?"

The man was heavy and he stumbled, barely righting himself before he fell. He drew back his arm to take a swing, but Dan slammed him against the side of the van. "Tell me!"

"Let me go, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d!"

"Not until-" He broke off as he realized there was something familiar about this man. Overweight, florid complexion, big nose, grizzled hair. At that moment he recognized him.

"Hardesty?"

"Yeah," he sneered. "So what's it to you, c.o.c.ksucker?"

Dan wanted to slam his fist into the older man's gut, but he remembered Ray Senior's grief at the funeral and restrained himself. Instead, he eased the pressure he was keeping on his chest, although he didn't let him go.

"You've been following me for weeks. What's this all about?"

"It's a free country. I can drive wherever I want."

"The law has a different view. What you're doing is called stalking."

"So what? You got a guilty conscience about me tailing you?"

"Why should I have a guilty conscience?"

"Because you killed my son, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d! Ray Junior died because of you. If you hadn't cut him from the Stars, he'd be alive now."

Dan felt as if he'd been punched. He'd never quite buried his guilt, and he immediately released the man. "I didn't have a choice, Mr. Hardesty. We kept him on the squad as long as we could."

But he could see by the crazed expression in Hardesty's eyes that he was past reason. "You need him, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d! It was only luck that you won the Giants game without him. The Stars can't win for long without my boy. Without Ray Junior, you're a bunch of losers!"

Dan felt a wave of pity. Ray had been an only child, and his death must have pushed his father over the edge. "Ray was a great player," he said, trying to calm him.

"You're G.o.dd.a.m.n right he was. Because of him, I used to be able to walk anyplace in this town with my head high. Everybody knew who I was. Everybody wanted to talk to me. But now n.o.body knows my name, and it's all because of you. If you hadn't cut my son, people would still treat me with respect."

Bubbles of saliva had gathered at the corners of Hardesty's mouth, and Dan's pity faded. Hardesty didn't miss his son; he missed living in Ray's reflected limelight. His own father had been dead for fifteen years, but as he looked into Hardesty's small, mean eyes, he felt as if he were once again standing in front of Harry Calebow.

Harry had also used his son to pump up his own consequence. In high school Dan had squirmed under Harry's constant public bragging, all the more ironic since he never received anything but criticism in private. He remembered his soph.o.m.ore year of high school when Harry had hit him with a bottle because he'd fumbled in the final thirty seconds of a game against Talladega.

He stepped back before he punished this man for something that had been another's fault. "Stay away from me, Hardesty. If I see that van of yours tailing me again, you're going to regret it."

"Big man," Hardesty sneered as Dan walked away. "Big f.u.c.king man! Let's see how big you are when your team loses again this week. Let's see how big you are when you finish in the bucket for this season. The Stars are nothing without my boy! They're nothin'!"

Dan slammed the car door against Hardesty's malice. As he drove away, it occurred to him that this might be why he wanted so much to be a father. Maybe he needed to prove to himself that he could do the job right.

19.

Phoebe studied her reflection in the long, narrow mirror that occupied the end wall of the only ladies' rest room in the Stars Complex. The loose-fitting, gray cowl-necked sweater she had chosen to wear to work today covered her from neck to thigh. Below the sweater, a matching wool skirt fell in soft folds to mid-calf, where gray opaque hose and conservative pumps covered up the rest of her. She'd brushed her hair into a neat page boy held back from her face with a gray velvet headband, and only her enormous free-form silver earrings and wide cuff bracelets kept her from looking like the president of a suburban bridge club.

It was a good thing Viktor couldn't see her because he'd die laughing. She didn't care. For the first time in her life, she was enjoying dressing in different ways. Now when she donned her flashier clothes, it was because she enjoyed wearing them, not because she was trying to reshape who she was. Spandex and gold lame would always be part of her wardrobe, but she was no longer afraid to dress in less conspicuous outfits.

She turned slightly and frowned as she ran her hands over her hips. They weren't boyishly slim by any stretch of the imagination. Maybe Dan thought she was fat and that was why he hadn't indicated any desire to make love to her since that night in the airplane rest room nearly two months ago. As she left the rest room, she wondered if he would ever cash in on that "now" he'd promised her.

Pooh trotted up to her, the red and green plaid bows Phoebe had just refastened at her ears dangling, untied. The staff had left an hour ago, and after the chaos of the day, the building seemed unnaturally quiet. She pa.s.sed offices decorated with swags of gold tinsel and pots of red poinsettias in antic.i.p.ation of Christmas, which was less than a week away. Pooh padded out to the lobby to claim one of her favorite spots near the door.

Dan chose the dinner hour to work out because he could have the weight room to himself, and Phoebe'd fallen into the habit of stopping by to talk with him before she left for home. She heard his rhythmic grunts even before she entered. He was lying on a padded bench with his knees bent, feet on the floor, and hoisting an alarmingly large set of weights over his chest. His muscles knotted and the veins in his forearms stood out like thick, dark cords as he extended the bar and slowly lowered it. She watched his pectorals bulge beneath the sweat-soaked cotton of his T-shirt and felt her mouth grow dry.

He hadn't seen her yet, so she didn't have to hide her longing as she gazed at him. The muscles in his thighs bunched, and her eyes moved upward to the leg openings of his baggy gray shorts. She treasured their growing friendship, even as it left her frustrated. She wanted to be his lover, not just his friend, but she was beginning to believe she might as well wish for the moon. A decade's worth of hang-ups about men was proving hard to overcome, and she was increasingly afraid that she couldn't give him whatever it was he wanted in a woman.

With a noisy grunt, he dropped the bar into the standards and sat up. His damp hair was rumpled, and sweat glistened on his neck as he smiled at her. "When are you going to get into some sweats and start working out yourself?"

"I'll get back to my aerobics cla.s.ses one of these days," she said without much enthusiasm. "Besides, Pooh and I walk every night."

"I'll just bet that's a workout and a half."

"Don't be smug. Not all of us want world-cla.s.s muscles."

He grinned. "So you think my muscles are world-cla.s.s?"

"For a man of your age. Definitely."

He gave a hoot of laughter, rose, and made his way over to another bench, this one with a padded roller. While he turned his back to adjust the weights, she kicked off her pumps and stepped up on the elephant-sized Toledo scale at the end of the room. If she allowed nine pounds for her clothing, she was exactly where she wanted to be.

The dial was nearly the size of a stop sign, so she stepped off before he had a chance to read it. She walked over to the bench he'd vacated, and as she sat down on it, her soft wool skirt fell in decorous folds around her calves. At last Sunday's game, she'd worn an updated flapper dress that had been a big hit with the fans, but coming up with a new outfit every week was straining her living allowance.

"The front office was crazy today," she said. "Since the Bears are out of contention, the whole town's caught Stars fever."

He had hooked his ankles under the padded roller and was straightening his legs to lift an impressive stack of weights. "Chicago likes its sports."

Two more Stars' victories had followed their upset over the Giants, and then they'd lost to the Saints and the Buffalo Bills in the final weeks of November. They'd won three games against formidable opponents since then, however, and their record made them long shots for the AFC Central Division t.i.tle.

The most surprising development had been in the AFC Western Division. Dan had told her what a devastating effect injuries could have on a team, and she'd seen it happen with the Portland Sabers. What had begun as a brilliant season for them had turned sour when they lost their talented quarterback and three other key players. After going undefeated for five straight games, they had lost every game but one. Their quarterback was healthy again, however, and the experts were expecting them to come back strong in the playoffs.

"Now let's see if I've got this right." She dangled one gray pump from her toes and let it swing back and forth. Her silver ankle bracelet, with its tiny crystal beads, glimmered in the light. "We can take the AFC Central t.i.tle if we win this week and if Houston loses its game against the Redskins. Is that right?"

"Only if the Bengals beat the Steelers." He grunted from exertion. "And I have to remind you that we're playing the Chargers this weekend. The last time we went up against them, their defense held us to seven."

"Bobby Tom told me he's not afraid of the Chargers' defense."

"Bobby Tom'll tell you he's not afraid of nuclear war, so I wouldn't put too much stock in his opinion."

The ranking system was so complicated that it had taken Phoebe forever to get it straight. Although she still didn't completely grasp all the variables, she knew that if the Stars won the Central Division championship, they were in the running for the two AFC playoff games, which would culminate in the AFC Championship the third week of January. If they won that, she would be the undisputed owner of the Stars, and her father would roll in his grave.

She could no longer put her finger on the exact moment when the idea of keeping the Stars had begun to be far more appealing than returning to New York and opening a gallery. It was more than her attraction to Dan, more than achieving some sort of posthumous revenge against her father that lured her. Every workday presented new challenges. She loved turning on her computer and manipulating the numbers on the spreadsheets. She loved the meetings, the phone calls, the sheer, impossible task of trying to perform a job for which she was so woefully unqualified. Sometime in the past few months, she had begun to dread the idea of turning the team over to Reed.

"Frankly, I wish you'd act a little more confident. Where's all that jock talk I hear you giving the players."

"It's just the two of us now ..." He gasped for breath. "... and you've got even more riding on this than they do. I don't want to give you false hopes. We've got a great football team, and we're getting better every game." He kept glancing over at her, and for some unfathomable reason, he seemed to be growing irritated. "n.o.body gave us enough credit at the beginning of the season, but for all the heart our players have, they're still young and we still make too many mistakes. The Chargers have one h.e.l.l of a football team, and with Murdrey coming off the injured list for the Sabers- Would you mind not doing that?" Would you mind not doing that?" The weights fell with a clatter. The weights fell with a clatter.

"Doing what?"

"What you're doing!"

He was glaring at the gray leather pump she was swinging back and forth from her toes. She stopped the movement. "What are you so grouchy about?"

He got up from the machine. "I'm trying to concentrate is all, and you're sitting there showing off your legs!"

Her skirt had ridden up until it was a scandalous three inches below her knee. "You're kidding. This is bothering you?"

"That's what I said, isn't it?"

He stood in front of her with his hands on his hips and that mulish expression on his face that told her he didn't intend to back down even though he must know he was well on the way to making a fool out of himself.

She forced herself not to smile, but a small bubble of happiness was expanding inside her. "I'm really sorry." Looking contrite, she stood. "I had no idea you were so sensitive."

"I'm not sensitive exactly."

She stepped a little nearer to him. "Of course you're not."

He looked wary. "Maybe you'd better not come any closer. I'm pretty sweaty."

"Gosh, I hardly notice anymore. I guess that's what comes from spending so much time around a football team."

"Yeah, well ..."

With the courage of the desperate, she placed the palm of her hand on his damp T-shirt, directly over his heart. "You've been working hard."

He didn't move. She could feel the solid, fast thump of his heart and hoped it wasn't just a reaction to the workout. Their eyes locked, and she experienced a yearning so intense that she knew it must show in her face.

"This isn't a good idea." His words had a tight, choked sound, but he made no attempt to back away.

She found her courage. "You didn't mind my touching you the night we were flying home from the Meadowlands."

"I wasn't thinking straight that night."

"Then don't think straight again." Closing her eyes, she wrapped her fingers around his upper arms and kissed him. When he didn't kiss her back, she brushed her lips over his, praying he would respond before she lost her courage.

With a groan, his lips parted and he thrust his tongue into her mouth. He splayed one of his hands over her bottom and caught the back of her head with the other, pulling her hard against him. Their mouths ground together, tongues probing. Her hands were all over him, she wanted him so badly. She felt him hard, throbbing. Maybe now.

He grasped her shoulders and gently set her away from him. She could see him struggling for control. "We shouldn't do this, Phoebe."

"Why not?" Numbly, she tried to absorb his rejection.

"There you are."