“Little late for that,” he mused as he helped plant her upright after her wild ride. “You want to yell whoa while you’re astride the horse.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” Dylan turned to take in the scene, and Charlie was gratified to see her jaw drop. She drew in a surprised gasp, and her face lit up with delight.

  “Oh, my God, the view! Would you look at that?” She ran up to the wood fence and gripped the worn slats. “I think I can see my house—yeah, that’s my front porch. If I had a telescope, I could look in my front window.”

  “Creepy,” said Charlie. “Those are for stars, not peeping in windows.”

  The two of them shared an easy laugh, and Charlie felt his heart leap. Making her laugh like that felt like a win. Like a touchdown, almost. Like he wanted to jump up and do a victory dance. But then she’d stop laughing and harp about his knee.

  “I didn’t get to ask you before, about you and football.” Dylan leaned out over the fence. “Did you always want to do that, or—”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I did,” Charlie cut in as he came up behind her, careful on his crutches. “Since I was a kid, that was it for me. That was my dream, playing the game. Dad wanted me to get serious, but he didn’t get it—I was. Just, about football, not running a ranch. Still, I’ll admit I miss this place, and the folks in town.”

  “I get that,” said Dylan. “Missing this place, I mean. Obviously, I’m new here, but I can see it’s special. I saw that the first time I drove through.”

  “Oh?” Charlie frowned. Dylan’s tone had turned wistful, her gaze sad and distant. He wanted to put his arm around her, but he had his crutches to worry about.

  “I got a flat,” Dylan went on. “It was coming on midnight and I’d had a long day. My jack broke, and I was about ready to scream. I’m talking a full-on toddler tantrum. But then these two guys came out of that bar right there—” She pointed. “They got a jack from their truck and had me back on the road just like that. I wanted to pay them, but they wouldn’t hear of it.”

  “It’s good folks here,” said Charlie. “Is that why you moved here?”

  “Sort of,” said Dylan. “I needed to get away from the city. Away from the bullshit, from people like Smitty. People so focused on their bottom line, they’d trample you flat to grab a stray dollar. But I picked Lockhart Bend because…It’s hard to explain, but it felt like a place where I could grow. To better myself.”

  Charlie nodded slowly. “It is that, yeah. Sabrina says it’s magic—folks come on her glamping trips and go home feeling clearer. Something in the air, maybe.” He pointed at the playground behind his old school, tiny as a postage stamp from their high vantage point. “We all used to play there, me and my brothers, Pete, and Andrew. We, uh…we—”

  “What?”

  Andrew. Charlie swallowed hard, a lump rising in his throat. That was the one downside of coming back here. The memories were everywhere, not just in the cramped hallways of Lockhart Bend General. Some of them were good ones of him and Trevor, Mom, and Dad. Some were embarrassing, like the time he flew over his horse’s head into the pond. Others snuck up on him like midnight assassins and had his heart bleeding before he knew he’d been stabbed.

  “Nothing,” he said. “Just, lots of memories. Old friends, y’know. Bet you were a smokeshow in your prom dress.”

  Dylan jostled him with her elbow. “Do you always do that?”

  He jostled her back. “Always do what?”

  “Use cheesy pickup lines to change the subject.”

  Charlie thought about denying it, but yeah. Yeah, he did. “You love it,” he said. “And I bet you were hot.”

  “I was.” She smirked. “But, speaking of changing the subject, I wanted to talk to you about your next PT session.”

  Charlie’s good mood faded. “You want to talk about work? This is supposed to be a date.”

  “And it is,” said Dylan. “But this matters, too.”

  Charlie sighed. He knew his knee occupied the forefront of Dylan’s brain most days—hell, it occupied the forefront of his brain, considering his career depended on it healing—but something about the shift in conversation didn’t feel right. Not here, not now, when they’d both just been so open.

  Dylan was more to him than a hookup or a means to a Super Bowl ring. He thought he had made that abundantly clear on their outing today, but maybe she required a clearer signal.

  He caught her around the waist and pulled her against him. Dylan came unresisting, a warmer look of affection threatening to overtake her more clinical expression. Overtake away, Charlie thought, as he caught her chin and lowered his head for a kiss.

  The touch of her full lips still took his breath away, the rush as intense as it had been the first time. If he kissed her a thousand times, he couldn’t see that changing. Dylan pressed her hands into his chest, but not to ward him off. It was a signal of surrender, even encouragement. When his tongue threaded along the seam of her lips, she opened to him with a sigh, and her arms slid up around his neck.

  “What I wanted to talk about isn’t a bad thing,” she said, when he pulled back at last. “I want to sit in on your next PT session. I’ve already cleared it with your therapist. I just need you on board.”

  Charlie’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”

  “To check on your progress.”

  “What are you saying?” Hope sparked in his chest. “If I do good in my session, you’ll clear me to play?”

  “I’m not saying that,” Dylan said. “But—”

  “You’re not not saying that?”

  “Don’t put words in my mouth.” She took him by the shoulders and held him still. “But Charlie, I’m happy with the effort you’ve been making. With how you well you’ve been sticking to your rehab program. I want to check in on how that’s paying off.”

  Charlie tried to listen, but the little kid in him was jumping for joy. Dylan was pleased with him. He’d been doing well. What could that mean, besides good news? Besides Charlie Wild getting back in the game?

  “You’re on,” he said. “And I’ll knock your socks off. And then we’ll celebrate, just you and me.” He leaned in and kissed her before she could rain on his parade. She was his doctor—she had to be cautious. But Charlie could feel it. Things were turning around.

  9

  DYLAN

  “When you said you wanted to sit in on our session today, I didn’t realize you’d be changing the venue.” Charlie grinned as he closed the stadium gate behind them. “Man, it feels great being back on the field. Even if it is just for PT.” He paused to sniff the air. “That smell gets my blood pumping, every damn time.”

  Dylan frowned. “What, old sweat?”

  “Old games,” said Charlie. “And games yet to come. Touchdowns I’m gonna make—” He mimed a touchdown, and Dylan caught his arm.

  “Careful you don’t strain yourself before we even get started.”

  Charlie made a pfft sound, but he settled down. Dylan watched his gait as he headed for the football field. He was hiding it well, but she detected some tension in his right hip. Compensating, she thought, as Charlie stopped walking.

  “Oh,” he said, spotting his therapist waiting on the field. “I’d hoped it’d just be the two of us. Maybe we’d christen that fifty-yard line…”

  Dylan groaned and kept walking, refusing to rise to the bait. She had to admit, the field was impressive. No one with two working eyes could ever miss that much green: the grass stretched before her like a great carpet, over a hundred yards long and as lush and verdant as a golf course. The Teamsters had spared no expense maintaining their field.

  Dylan dropped her duffel bag and wandered onto the field. She stared up at the open dome ceiling and the brilliant blue patch of Austin sky. The sheer scale of the cathedral-like structure overwhelmed her senses. She managed to keep her mouth from falling open as Charlie joined her with a knowing look. This place was sacred to him, and now she could see why. She gave herself a moment to revel in it all, though she found herself unnerved by the empty bleachers. That many vacant seats felt somehow wrong.

  “Have you ever been here when the stadium’s been empty like this?” she asked. “I imagine you always have coaches and press and hangers-on around you.”

  “Oh yeah.” Charlie spun his key ring on his finger.

  “Oh yeah, you’ve done this before, or oh yeah, there’s always a crowd?”

  “The crowd. Teamster players can gain access to the field pretty much whenever we want, but yeah—there’s always at least a security guard or groundskeeper around. How’d you pull this off?”

  “I arranged it with the team beforehand,” Dylan explained. Smitty was all too happy to help—he was in favor of anything that got his biggest client back on the field ASAP. “You’re going to run through your exercises on the field you play on, and I’ll be watching to see how your knee handles the grass. How you’d hold up in a game situation.”

  Charlie turned in place, scanning the empty seats. “This is weirder than I expected, being here all alone. Even for training, it’s not empty like this.”

  Dylan took another minute to soak in the feel of this temple to sports, then shook her head to clear it. She pointed down the field, where Charlie’s therapist stood waiting. “Better get on with it. Remember, don’t push yourself too hard.”

  “I only do hard,” Charlie teased as he piled his blond locks up into an expertly arranged man bun. He raised an imaginary football over his head. “Go long,” he instructed.

  Dylan turned, laughing, and sauntered down the field. She found a spot and sat down, and her smile slowly faded. Charlie’s excitement had rubbed off on her, but there was something she hadn’t told him about today’s session: it was a test she didn’t think he’d pass. She was ninety-nine percent positive he wasn’t ready to return to the team. Today’s session would either prove that or…Well, he’d need a miracle.

  She sat back as he warmed up, running through his stretches. Maybe it had been a bad idea, bringing him out here, getting his hopes up just to crush them to dust. Maybe she was just prolonging the inevitable disappointment. But she wanted to be sure before she broke his heart. Who knew—maybe the invincible Charlie Wild would manage to pull a rabbit out of his hat.

  “Even after all we’ve been through, you still don’t believe in me.” Charlie looked up from his stretches, his brows drawn together. “I see you frowning, making your notes.”

  “I’m just concentrating,” said Dylan, biting back guilt. Charlie grabbed a football from his training gear. He flexed and tossed it, and Dylan caught it. “I do believe in you, Charlie. I know there’s more to you than all this show and machismo. So go on and prove it. Let’s see what you’ve got.” She hauled back and threw a perfect spiral. Charlie caught it, grinning, and got back to his training.

  At first, Dylan thought he might’ve done it after all, conjured a miracle by sheer force of will. He moved through his paces like a well-oiled machine—powerful, impressive, more god than man. But as the session went on, his clay feet showed through. To a layperson, his form would’ve seemed flawless, but to Dylan’s trained eye, his struggle was clear. He was compensating well for the strain on his knee, but he was compensating, first a little, then a lot.

  “Lean into it,” said his therapist. “Don’t lead with your hip.”

  Dylan bit her lip, hoping against hope. Sometimes, athletes got so used to compensating, they’d do it by habit even once they’d healed. But Charlie wasn’t doing that. His weakness was real. He might get through a game or two with his knee like it was—he might even power his way through a whole season. But one day he’d put weight on it and his knee would just go, and he’d have bigger problems than being out of the game.

  The session wrapped up, and Charlie trotted over to join her. He plopped down beside her, and her heart hurt.

  “Do we have to leave right away?” He watched as the therapist gathered his gear. “I’d like to sit here a while, if we don’t have to book it.”

  “We’ve got a while,” said Dylan. Now the moment was here, she couldn’t do it. “Charlie, uh…”

  “It’s weird,” he said, “when nobody’s looking at me. Not just here on the field, but being back home. Being out of the spotlight, no reporters in my face.”

  Dylan laughed, surprised. “I thought you liked it that way, everyone knowing everything about Charlie Wild. Your whole bad boy rep. I thought that was your thing.”

  “That’s not me, though,” he said. “Or, not all of me. There are certain things I like to keep private.” He leaned close to Dylan and tipped her a wink. “You know more about me than all my fans combined. You think I’d let them see my MRI scans?”

  Dylan pulled a wry face. “When they say it’s what’s inside that counts, that’s not what they mean.”

  “You’ve seen where I come from,” said Charlie. “Ridden my favorite trail.” He tilted his head back to look up at the sky. “And here’s another secret about me. I don’t like hospitals. You were right about that.”

  “Nobody likes hospitals.” Dylan managed a smile. “But you don’t seem to have a problem with doctors.”

  “Not the hot ones,” Charlie conceded. “Even if they do chap my ass every chance they get.”

  “You make it too easy.” Dylan knew she should stop teasing and tell him the truth. The longer she waited to pull off the Band-Aid, the worse it would sting him when the time came. But when she opened her mouth, another question popped out. “Can I ask again why you hate hospitals?”

  Charlie reached for the football at his feet. Dylan watched his fingers slide meditatively across its stitches. He must know them so well. Would there ever come a day where his touch, gliding along her dips and swells, would be just as familiar? The ache hit her with the force of a Teamster linebacker. Whatever Charlie had to say, she wanted to hear it. She wanted to know everything about him and vice versa.

  “My best friend. Andrew. He, uh…He died.”

  Dylan’s chest tightened. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but it hadn’t been that. Charlie struck her as someone who’d led a charmed life. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I had no idea.”

  “Yeah. Not a lot of people know about Andrew.” Charlie set down his football in the manicured grass. She didn’t know what instinct inspired her to do it, but Dylan reached between them and took his hand.

  “You know Nicholas? The kid who rushed me outside your office? A few more years, and Andrew would have looked just like him. The personality, too. Little scamp reminds me of him more than I can describe.”

  Dylan cleared her throat. “Andrew…He died young at the hospital? At Lockhart Bend General?”

  Charlie nodded slowly. “When he was five. He was allergic to beestings, but nobody knew. We were playing at the swimming hole, and one crawled up his sleeve. When he put his shirt back on…it hit just like that. He barely went ow and suddenly he was gasping for breath. Mom ran back to the house, and she called for help, but by the time the ambulance got here, it was too late. He never woke up again, and…He was like our fourth brother.”

  “God, Charlie, I’m so sorry.” Dylan squeezed his hand. She was used to giving and receiving bad news at work, but this was something private, something just between them. “I’m glad you had Trevor and Trent to get you through it.”

  “Yeah.” Charlie returned her squeeze with one of his own. “That’s the thing with brothers, we might fight like cats and dogs. But when the chips are down, we’re there for each other.” He let out a long sigh. “It was a long time ago, and we’ve all had the time to move past the worst of our grief. Still, you’re the first person I’ve shared that with, outside the family. Care to share your own secret with the class?”

  Dylan did have a secret, but how could she tell him now? Piling new grief on old…It didn’t seem fair.

  “If you don’t have a secret, I’ll settle for a kiss.” He started to reel her in, and Dylan pulled back.

  “Oh, you’re incorrigible!”

  “Or you’re just that tempting.” Charlie reached for her, but she squirmed free of his hold. She jogged away from him, and Charlie gave chase. She knew he would catch her, but she wasn’t expecting the tackle. Charlie plowed into her hard from behind, swept her up in his arms and spun her around. She let out a breathless shriek as he flopped down on his back, her legs kicking wildly as he clutched her to his chest.

  “Charlie, I swear to God—”

  He rolled her off him, then rolled on top of her, his ridiculous, grinning face just inches from hers.

  “Charlie, get off me.” Despite her protests, Dylan’s heart was pounding.

  “I can’t,” he lamented. “My knee.”

  “Oh, fuck off!” she exclaimed with an incredulous laugh. “That’s the last thing you’d say if it was true!”

  “If you insist, Dr. Rose.” Charlie’s hand slipped beneath her shirt and ascended, skimming her skin and tracing the cup of her bra.

  “If I insist on…what exactly?” Why was her breath coming so short? She’d just run a few steps, hardly a workout.

  “I think you know what,” Charlie replied. His finger skimmed the fabric of her bra to find her nipple already taut and waiting. He pinched it and teased it between his fingers. Dylan squirmed, her whole body tingling with pleasure.

  “This—we’re on the fifty-yard line!” she exclaimed.

  “We had sex in your office. How is this worse?” Charlie dipped his head to taste the sensitive spot between her neck and shoulders. Dylan clamped her lips closed on a moan. The world spun behind her tightly shut eyes.

  “That was different,” she managed. “That was behind closed doors!”

  “The stadium is closed,” Charlie reminded her. “Come on. You know you want to.”

  Dylan did want to. She hadn’t been with Charlie like this since that stolen moment in her office, and the distance between them had been driving her crazy. And maybe her hard news would fall easier on postorgasmic ears.