17. Gideon #2
Ace laughed. I was wondering about those hideous feet.
He pointed to my sandals; my tanned feet were crisscrossed in scratches of varying shades of red.
“I think it’s overkill, but the doctor has to cover his butt.
And, look, you’ve got an entire week off.
What are you going to do with yourself if you can’t play hockey? ”
I thought about asking Ace to stay with me; we could make up for lost time.
I could show him around the city, we could go to the beach, but he had a life, a faraway one with Goldie and Morton.
A life that involved daily hockey practice, something that he was missing as Nurse Ace.
“I’ve got a few books to read. Maybe I’ll train C.C.
to scratch the tree instead of the couch and my legs.
” The idea of sitting idle for an entire week was overwhelming.
“Do you want me to pick up some knitting needles and tea?” He stuck his arm out of the car, and his hand undulated in the wind.
I stepped on the accelerator hard, and Ace’s head jerked back against the headrest.
“Ow.” He returned his arm to the safety of the car and dramatically rubbed his elbow.
“Does a grandma drive like this?” I laughed.
The doctor wanted me to rest and see a physiotherapist before he would sign the papers to get me back on the ice. He also refused to give me a timeframe, but I couldn’t imagine it taking longer than a week. We reached my laneway, and I pulled up to the garage.
“What’s that?” Ace pointed to the front door. “It looks like a cooler.”
While the garage door whirred and clicked upward, I leaned past Ace. “It does look like a cooler. That’s weird.”
“I’ll get it.” Ace hopped over the side of the car without opening the door. “What’s that?” He pointed to the floor and leaned into the car, kicking his feet in the air like he was stuck.
“You’re an idiot.” I laughed and shook my head, making a mental note to tell Ace that I loved him before he went back to Toronto.
He returned his feet to the ground, and his face was flushed as he tossed some envelopes on the seat. “You’ve got some mail.”
“Mail?”
Piper. She’d tucked her mail in beside the seat the first day we’d gone for a drive together.
I decided to leave it on the seat and drop it off to Reggie at the guardhouse.
Piper had made it very clear she wasn’t going to break our agreement.
Would it be neighborly to return some mail?
Yeah, probably. But if Piper wanted space, I’d give it to her.
I parked the car, and the second I walked inside, Ace was playing a song with the doorbell. “Coming,” I groaned.
“Housekeeping!” he shouted from the other side.
Shaking my head, I opened the door. He held up the cooler. “It’s food.”
“Food?” I followed Ace into the kitchen. “Is there a note?”
Ace piled the glass casserole dishes on the counter. The ice packs that had kept the meals cold sat melting in the kitchen sink. “A-ha.” There was a ripping sound, and he held up an envelope. “This note taped to the back. Do you think that it’s from the team?” He stuck his finger in to rip it open.
“Give me that.” I snatched the envelope from his hands. “What if it’s, I don’t know, some weirdo who cooks with arsenic? This isn’t rural Michigan. People don’t just drop by with casseroles for their neighbors.”
Ace’s eyes widened. “Ohhhhh.” He poked me in the gut. “I know who it’s from.”
“Who?”
“Don’t play dumb, Gideon. It’s from your neighbor, the hot one.”
I shook my head. “No. It’s not. Why would she make lasagna and whatever this is.” I took off one of the plastic lids and inspected the casseroles. They looked and smelled amazing.
Ace opened another. “Ooh, this one is apple crisp.” (make them have a discussion about apple crisp earlier in the book) We both inhaled the spicy cinnamon and apple dish.
Piper knew that I loved apple crisp, but why would she leave a care package for someone she didn’t care about?
Ace grabbed a wooden spoon from the container beside the stove and proceeded to dig into the dessert. “I don’t care if it’s laced with laxatives. It smells amazing.” He shoveled a huge bite into his mouth. “It is amazing.” He spoke through a full mouth.
“Get a proper spoon.” I opened a drawer and handed him an appropriate piece of silverware. Although I had to agree, it smelled incredible—and I wanted to eat it. To do that, I needed to confirm that it wasn’t left by a serial killer baker. I opened the letter.
Gideon,
Heat up the casseroles at 350 for thirty minutes.
Same with the dessert. Studies show that apple crisp has healing properties?
They don’t, but I figure it can’t hurt (winky face).
If you want some vanilla ice cream to go with it let me know.
I can have some hand delivered. (another winky face).
When you’re feeling up for a visitor, there’s something I need to tell you.
P.
I turned over the page, but it was blank. “What the hell is this?”
Ace wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Why are you angry? This is really good. That was really nice of her, Gideon. I think Piper is a keeper.”
Furrowing my brow, I put the dishes in the fridge and read the note again. “She’s giving very mixed signals. She didn’t even show up at the game last night.”
This time, it was Ace who looked confused. “What are you talking about. She was there.”
Was Ace trying to make me feel like I was losing my mind? I didn’t want to count the number of times I’d looked at the empty seats. It had to be in the hundreds. Piper hadn’t shown. “Um, no, dude. She wasn’t there.”
Ace got a beer from the fridge, cracked it open, and took a swig. He grimaced. “Coors doesn’t really go with apples and cinnamon.” Then he took another sip. “Dude, she was at the game. She also came to the hospital.”
I blinked. “The seats. They were empty the entire game.”
Ace laughed. “Oh, you didn’t hear what happened.”
“Of course I didn’t hear what happened, Acer. I was kind of occupied by, you know, a bunch of doctors making a big deal out of nothing.” Then I remembered that Goldie wasn’t in the seats either. “What… happened?”
Ace returned to the apple crisp with the giant spoon. “Some dudes were being assholes, and Piper’s old lady friend put them in their place.”
Old lady friend?
“They were moved to one of the boxes up top. She was there for the entire game. She saw you score the goals, which was impressive, by the way.” He took a bite from the heaping portion on the spoon, like a little kid.
“She sat with Goldie all night. Goldie gives her stamp of approval, by the way. And you know how good Goldie is at judging character.”
I nodded. She had an uncanny ability to know what people were thinking.
“Witchy Woman,” the Eagles song, started to play from the back pocket of Ace’s jeans.
“Speak of the Devil.” He grinned and answered the call.
While he chatted with his wife, I ran my fingertip over the note.
Piper’s wrote in lower case, no capitals.
My mind raced as I wondered what she wanted to talk to me about. My heart thumped with the thought of my cute neighbor showing up in her workout clothes, a tub of vanilla ice cream in her arms, biting her lip as she told me that our deal was stupid.
I’d tell her that I wanted to see her, and only her.
“Yo, Giddy.” Ace snapped his fingers in front of my face.
Blinking, my brother came into focus.
“Where were you just now?” He tucked the phone into the pocket of his jeans.
I took a spoon I’d set on the counter for Ace and dug into the apple crisp.
Since the hit, I hadn’t had much of an appetite, but the second that savory and sweet combination hit my tongue, I was ravenous.
After two more spoonfuls, as big as I could get on an appropriate-sized utensil, were shoved into my mouth, I tore a paper towel off the roll and wiped my mouth. “Damn, that’s good.”
“Like I said, she’s a keeper.” Ace grabbed the wooden spoon.
I shook my head and took the spoon from him, tossing it into the kitchen sink. “You’re going to keep that all for yourself? I thought the ‘my body is a temple’ Gideon Bailey doesn’t eat sugar, except for the honey in his tea.”
“Here.” I handed him a spoon from the drawer. “I can’t believe Goldie goes out in public with you.”
Ace stuck out his pinkie and took the smallest scoop of the dessert. “Better?”
“Much,” I chuckled. “What did Goldie want?”
“Oh.” Ace took a normal-sized bite and swallowed. “She was checking in on you. Her dad stayed down here for a couple of days. She wants me to take him out for dinner.”
I raised my brows. “What’s it like having your father-in-law as your coach?”
He shrugged. “I guess it’s cool. When he’s on the ice, he’s the coach. When he’s off, he’s my father-in-law. It’s an unspoken thing, and I think it’s working out fine. He’s a lot less stressed-out with only one Bailey Brother on the team.”
My lips narrowed involuntarily. The feud between me and Ace had almost ruined the entire season for the Toronto Tigers.
“I wish I could go back in time…” My voice trailed off.
The misunderstanding had not only ruined our friendship for a year, but it had also ruined an almost perfect setup—the two of us on the same team together.
Ace put his hand on my arm. “I didn’t mean it like that.
Like Goldie says, everything works out for a reason.
You’re here, the star of the Barracuda, sporting a tan that would make Laird Hamilton jealous, and getting care packages from your neighbor.
Oh.” He held up his finger. “Goldie wanted to know if you two have come to your senses yet.”
“What the hell does that mean?” I took the spoon from Ace and put both of them in the dishwasher.
The two of us could’ve easily demolished that tray of food, but like Ace said, I didn’t really eat sugar.
That and part of me wanted to savor the dish, to come down in the middle of the night with Piper in our underwear and stand in the light of the refrigerator, feeding each other a midnight snack.
My cock pulsed as I imagined her lips on the spoon.
She would shut her eyes and make the cutest little moan when she tasted it.
“It means… Fuck, I don’t know.” Ace laughed.
“It means I should make a house call and thank her for this.” I patted the cooler. “I need to return her mail anyway.”
There it was. I had two excuses to stroll up the long laneway to Piper’s house.
Ace looked at his raggedy watch. “I’m going to meet Coach for dinner.
I’ll call you when I’m back. One of us needs to wake you up every hour tonight, although maybe we should call the doctor and see if you can just stay up all night doing other… stuff.”
I highly doubted an all-night sex marathon was part of my rehab plan, but I had to admit, it sounded like a good idea.
The throb in my dick thought so too. “Grow up, Acer. I’m going to deliver some mail and thank my neighbor for being neighborly.
I’ll see you when you get back from babysitting your father-in-law. ”
Ace laughed. “Well, you go fulfill your neighborly duties”—he used air quotes—“and I’ll meet you back here. Can I take the—”
I held up my hand. “No. You can take the SUV.”
Ace groaned and proceeded to stomp his foot like a toddler. “But the Escalade isn’t a convertible, and it’s Florida, Gideon. Florida.”
“Fine,” I said.
Ace blinked. “What?”
“Fine,” I repeated. “I trust you, brother. Take the Porsche, but let me get the mail out of it first.” I dodged C.C. as I took the keys from the hook and tossed them to Ace. He snatched them out of the air. “Go ahead, I’ll meet you in the garage.”
Ace put on his sunglasses and disappeared into the garage without asking any questions.
“You’re just returning her mail,” I whispered to myself, but that didn’t stop me from swiping on some fresh deodorant—and grabbing an entire box of condoms from my nightstand.
My heart hammered in my chest, and blood whooshed in my ears.
I steadied myself on the handrail until the ocean sound in my brain quieted.
Brushing it off as excitement, I tucked the box of Magnum condoms into my backpack, grabbed the mail from the car, and zipped it inside as Ace gunned the engine a couple of times before putting the car into reverse.
“Easy.” I grimaced as I walked into the sunlight.
“Gideon, are… you okay?”
I leaned into the car and opened the glove box, pulling out a spare pair of sunglasses. “I’m fine. I just need these.”
His eyes followed my every move as I put on the sunglasses. “Gideon. Do you have a headache?”
“No.” It wasn’t a lie. I didn’t have a headache, just every once in a while, my head hurt. They were two different things. “It’s just bright.” I patted the side of the car. “Drive it like it’s—”
“Stolen?” Ace laughed.
“Like it’s your older brother’s.” I shook my fist at him.
Ace saluted. “Have a good night, mailman.”
My smile was involuntary. Ace was the funny brother, and I was okay with that. “You too…” I paused, trying to think of something witty and funny, but the best I could come up with was “coach-sitter.”
“Ooh, burn.” Ace clutched at his chest. “Good one.” He rolled his eyes, put the car in first gear, and stalled it. “Whoopsie-daisy,” he shouted, started the car, and then left two trails of rubber down the interlocking stone driveway as he peeled away.
I couldn’t be mad. He was helping me. So what if I was temporarily out of the game. I had an amazing brother and a sexy-as-hell neighbor who made me casseroles and had something important to “talk to me” about. I was going to get cleared to get back on the ice. Life was good.