Shooting for the Stars (12 page)

But when Bear reached the corridor outside Hank’s room, he heard Alexis’s voice inside. She was easy to identify. Stella wasn’t wrong when she said that Alexis had one of the more annoying voices God ever gave a woman. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking,” Alexis whined.

Bear halted outside the door so as not to intrude.

“Hank, I’m going to Utah tonight because I have a race tomorrow.”

Hank’s answer was almost too low to hear. “I know.”

“But…” Alexis heaved a sigh. “Baby, I’m not coming back.”

What?
Bear thought, his phone halfway out of his pocket.

“What are you trying to say?” Hank rumbled.

“Look, I know you’ll hate me for this,” Alexis whimpered. “But the next eight weeks could be the most important of my career.” Alexis, a moguls skier, had already been named to the Olympic freestyle team. “And I need to focus on the skiing. And only on the skiing. You
know
how it is, Hank. I’m sorry. I just don’t have the… space for this right now.”

Bear didn’t breathe at all during the silence that followed. What Alexis had just done was unconscionably cruel. He wanted to go in there and
shake
her.

When Hank finally spoke, his voice was as rough as Bear had ever heard it. “Better not miss your flight then.”

“I’m sorry. I’m really sorry,” Alexis babbled.

“Just go already.”

A few seconds later, Alexis trotted out of the room, face red, head down. She practically sprinted for the exit.

Bear made himself wait there for a minute before he went in to check on Hank. Poking his head into the room, he looked at his friend’s pale face. “Hey,” he said stupidly. What did you say to a guy who’d lost everything, and then a little bit more?

Hank turned his face toward the window. “Hey.”

“So…” Bear cleared his throat. “I brought you something to watch.”

Hank did not even turn his head.

Bear decided to drop the illusion that he hadn’t just heard what Alexis had done. “Look, maybe she’s just really freaked out right now.”

“She won’t be back.” The words were almost too soft to hear.

“Well…”

“I don’t want company right now.”

Of course he didn’t. Because sometimes a man just needed to suffer his latest indignity in peace. “You need anything…?”

“
No
.”

At that, Bear turned and left the room, closing Hank’s door softly behind him. He briefly considered putting a fist through the hallway wall. Not that it would help. But his frustration was off the charts. Hank could not catch a break. And all Bear could do for him was to leave him be, or offer him a cookie from the god-awful cafeteria.

He needed some air. Badly. So he marched down the corridor and out the back door.

Unfortunately, when he stepped outside, there stood freaking Alexis, jabbing a manicured finger at her phone.

That’s when Bear kind of lost it.

“What the
hell
was that?” he spat without a preamble. “Jesus Christ! It hasn’t been a week since he realized he’s fucking
paralyzed
, and you drop him like a brick?”

Alexis whirled on him. “Where do
you
get off? For a
year
you’ve wished I’d disappear. You and his sister
and
his mother! All of you are so sure that I’m not good enough for the amazing Hank. Are you going to stand here and pretend that’s not true?”

Bear’s fury rose up in his throat, nearly choking him. He would never scream at a woman. But it took all his effort not to. “I think you just proved it.”

Her eyes glittered with anger. “You don’t know a goddamned thing. I had two choices. I can be cruel right now, or call him every night from the
fucking Olympic village
. Is
that
what you want? You want me to give him hourly updates on everything he’s about to miss? Gosh, Bear, if I make it onto the podium, I can fly home and let him hold my
medal
.”

“You could have just
stayed
,” Bear said. But even as he spoke the words, he realized he was in no position to suggest it.

“And miss the Olympics. That’s what you mean, right?”

He nodded.

“I’m not that girl, okay?” Alexis heaved a giant sigh. “Racing is all I have. Even without his accident, Hank and I wouldn’t have lasted a year.”

“You don’t know that,” Bear argued. He did, though. He’d suggested the same thing to Stella in Tahoe.

“I
do
know that. So I ask you — what was I supposed to do? Be a giant bitch right now? Or throw away my only chance to be an Olympic medalist just so that I could hold his hand for a year until we both remember we’re not all that compatible. All my choices are bad ones, Bear. All of them.” A taxi wound its way toward the two of them, and Alexis picked her bag up off the ground. “Whatever you’re thinking about me, just go ahead and think it, okay? Because if Hank and I stay together just because he had an accident, he’ll just be
settling
for me. And we both know it.”

Alexis shot him one more glare and then climbed into her taxi.

Bear watched the tail lights disappear into the December darkness. Then he sat down on the freezing bench beside the hospital door. Until ten days ago, there were laws of nature which had always held up in his life: Hank was destined for greatness. Stella was untouchable. Bear would muddle along.

Now everything was turned on its fucking head.

The December chill seeped through his jeans, and Bear considered heading home. But then he spotted Stella coming up the hospital walkway. Her dark hair blew in the breeze, and her eyes were cast down toward the sidewalk. At the last second, she lifted them, finding Bear on the bench before she reached the doors. “Hi,” she said, coming over. She sat beside him.

“Hi.” Another brilliant greeting. But these days there were
two
people he didn’t know how to talk to anymore.

“Are you okay?”

Not hardly
. “Yeah,” he said. Because that was the answer a man gave, whether it was true or not.

“I’m worried about you.”

He looked up fast. “Why?”

She shrugged. “You’re avoiding me.”

“Not true.” But
Christ
, he was. Because Stella was yet another uncertain thing in his life. He didn’t know what to do with the way she made him feel.
 
Hot and cold at the same time. As if he’d been taken apart that night they’d slept together, and the reassembly had gone just a little wrong.

Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest, probably because she was cold. “We should talk, Bear.”
 

Oh, hell
. “About what?”

He expected her to roll her eyes. That would be typical Stella. But instead, she looked worried. “Something happened in Tahoe, and you’re trying to pretend that it didn’t.”

Busted
. Pretending was just the right word. It allowed him to carry on as if she hadn’t taken pity on him. “I don’t see what there is to talk about.”

Her eyes dipped. “I knew you would say that.”

Bear had no idea how to respond. He’d assumed Stella would be embarrassed about their night together. But if that assumption was wrong, then he was even
more
confused.

Stella’s dark eyes studied him for a long time. “I think…
hell
. If I tell you right now that it meant a lot to me, you’re going to argue, aren’t you?”

Oh, boy
. Was there any answer to that question that would not get him in a world of trouble?

She lifted her perfectly kissable chin. “Maybe if our timing hadn’t been so awful, you wouldn’t be freaking out right now.”

“I’m not freaking out,” he argued.
Yeah, you so totally are
.

“Really? Then why do you avoid me? Whenever I show up at the hospital, you suddenly think of some errand that needs doing.”

Ouch
.

“I think…” She hesitated. “You don’t want to hear that I think we could be good together. I can see it on your face.” Her eyes got a little shiny. “But I had to bring it up. Because I’d regret it if I never did.”

Whoa
. Bear had to be very careful with whatever he said next. There was nothing in the world he wouldn’t do for the girl sitting a cautious few feet away. In fact, he’d happily gather her up right here on the hospital bench and hold on tight.

But that wouldn’t help Stella, not really. She was under a shitload of stress right now, and obviously seeking comfort from him. And he couldn’t allow her to do that. Making Stella a part of his life—and a fixture in his bed—wasn’t something he’d take lightly. It was
definitely
a bad idea when emotions were running high. Neither of them had gotten a solid night’s sleep since…

Since Tahoe.

Nobody was thinking straight. And if Stella had convinced herself that being with him would make her happy, that was just the tragedy talking. When the bad shit happened, people clung to what was safe and familiar. Bear knew this firsthand, because he’d clung to the Lazarus family after his mother left.

And they weren’t his to keep.

If Stella, in her sorrow, took Bear as her personal security blanket, her parents sure wouldn’t approve. Not to mention Hank…

Bear swallowed hard, just imagining that conversation.
Even though you think your life is over, and your girlfriend just dumped you, I’m shacking up with your baby sister, because pain has clouded her judgment. Kay?

He wouldn’t do that to Hank.

Anyway, a year from now, Stella would be back out in the world, kicking ass and taking names. She wouldn’t need him anymore. And what would
that
blow feel like? Bear didn’t want to know. Shutting down Stella’s misguided attraction to him was the only thing to do.

Beside him, wearing a very guarded expression on her pretty face, Stella was waiting for him to say something. Even now she wasn’t acting like herself. The Stella he knew didn’t wear a pining expression for anyone.

What was it that Alexis had said less than a half hour ago?
All my choices are bad ones. All of them
.

Yeah. That was eerily familiar.

He turned his chin and looked right into Stella’s eyes. “It was just sex, Stell.” And it was. Sex that shouldn’t have happened.

“I see,” Stella whispered. She stood up suddenly. “Thank you for clearing that up.”

“Stell…!” He hesitated. An expression filled with hurt crossed her face.
Shit
. It didn’t mean that he didn’t care about her. Was there any way to explain?

That’s when she’d turned and walked away.

Now, as he steered into Hank’s driveway and killed the engine, he thought about all the times Stella had avoided him since that ugly day ten months ago. It was probably as many times as he’d spent wondering if what he’d said had been a total fuck-up, or exactly the right thing.

Hopefully, Stella was over whatever temporary feelings she thought she had for him. She probably snubbed him just for pride’s sake, and he would have to live with that.

Meanwhile, Hank had barely mentioned Alexis, even when she won a silver medal at the Olympics. But he must have seen her big news, or heard about it from a friend. Just because her name never came up didn’t mean that Hank had forgotten his ex, or the awful way they’d parted.

Tonight, he hoped he could get Hank’s mind off those old troubles, and try to get him to think about filmmaking. They were going to have good tequila. And they were going to have a little talk.

He hopped up onto Hank’s porch and let himself in after a quick tap on the front door. “’Sup, Hazardous?” he called. His eyes did a quick sweep of the room. Since Hank had a housekeeper who dropped by a couple of times a week, the condition of the room didn’t always tell him what he needed to know.

His eyes landed on the man himself, sitting on the sofa in front of the football game. Bear gave him a quick once-over. Jeans. A T-shirt reading “Jackson Hole.” And a freshly shaved face.

Bear had expected worse, given the news Hank had just received. There were days when he showed up to find Hank hunched over in his wheelchair, staring at the TV in his underwear. And that was on days without ugly news about his ex-girlfriend.

Now, Hank muted the football game and tossed the remote aside. “Why do football pundits exist?” he asked. “They’re never right, anyway.”

Bear didn’t want to talk football. He passed Hank by and walked over to the bar dividing the kitchen from the living room.

With a quick press of his arms, Hank transferred himself from the couch to the wheelchair and followed Bear. He lifted the bottle of tequila and examined it. “Conmemorativo. That’s the good shit. Are we celebrating something?”

“Maybe.” Bear reached for a couple of shot glasses in the drawer. The kitchen had been completely rebuilt to accommodate Hank — with clever storage in reach of a seated person and a tiered countertop surface. “Hazardous, let’s do this right. Do you have any limes?” There was a single plate in the sink and a whiff of supper in the air. Hank seemed to be doing okay today, even if his expression was flat.

That was encouraging, right? Bear allowed himself to hope that maybe today was the day when they both turned the corner. He cut limes and rehearsed the speech he wanted to give Hank in his head. For once he’d hit upon a project which had the potential to pull both of them out of the swan-dive that was their lives. Finally.

Once they were set up, drinks in hand, Bear took a breath. Leaning forward, he tried to tamp down the excitement in his voice while he told Hank his plan. “I want to make a feature-length snowboarding film,” he told Hank.

The inevitable silence followed, during which he tried to read Hank’s face.

His friend’s first response was a thoughtful one. “Hasn’t that been done before?”

“Not by us,” Bear said. “You’re going to be the face of the project. I can make a great film, but I need your cred.” It was perfect, really. He and Hank could stay close to a sport they both loved, without having to be the center of attention.

But Hank began to look bitter. “I don’t have any cred. I’m a cripple. I have cripple cred.” He reached for the tequila.

That was exactly the attitude Bear needed to correct. “Listen, asshole.” He held the bottle out of his friend’s reach. “You’ll narrate it, and I
guarantee
we’ll have a blast. Guys want to hear what you have to say about the amped-up shit I’m going to film. And the ladies would throw their panties at the screen. You and I would get a couple of free heli trips out west. What’s not to love?”