Chapter 9
ALEX WAS ALREADY UP AND MOVING AROUND THE BEDROOM when Penny opened her eyes.
She could hear him rustling through dresser drawers and digging through the mess on top of his nightstand to find his watch.
Just like every morning lately, her first instinct was to point her toes and then rotate her ankle.
She waited for the pain, the dull ache that accompanied the movement, but there was nothing, just her ankle twisting in a circle, one way and then the other, but no pain, not even a twinge.
She flung her legs out from under the covers and planted her feet firmly on the floor, then waited again, pushing a little at the injury.
Nothing. So, she stood up, making sure to keep her weight evenly balanced, and then leaned her full body to the injured side.
The tiniest of twinges, but then it held strong.
“Alex,” she said, staring at the joint, not sure if she was still dreaming.
“Yeah, love?” he called back distractedly.
“Would you mind if I took up some of your practice time today?”
“What?” He spun around, his hair still sticking up from the night’s sleep. “Are you sure?”
“It feels…” She trailed off, rotating the ankle again to make sure. “It feels good.” Or at least it felt better than it had since she’d hurt it.
Alex crossed the room and tapped her shoulder, guiding her back to the bed.
Kneeling in front of her, he took her leg in his hand, cupping her foot by the heel.
His thumb pressed into the joint, increasing the pressure and looking up at her for a reaction.
Her smile grew with every moment she didn’t feel pain.
Leaning forward, she took his face in her hands. “I’m training today,” she said before brushing her lips over his.
His hands came up to cover hers and he squeezed gently. “You’re going to stretch and wrap it tight and take it easy, but yeah, you’re gonna train. My mum is going to meet up with you before the final tonight, so no overdoing it and using that as an excuse to get out of it.”
“Me? Never,” she said, and he ran a finger up the bottom of her foot, one of her few ticklish spots. She fell back onto the bed and let out a squeal, pulling her foot away. Alex came with her, landing on his side, propping himself up on his elbow.
“Dom’s gonna kill me for letting you work out without him.”
“Dom’s a big boy. He’ll get over it.”
“You promise me you’ll take it easy.”
“Promise.”
“You want me to hit with you?”
“Nah, you need to put in a tough workout. I know exactly who to call.”
As soon as she walked out onto the Queen’s Club practice courts, it was pretty obvious that word had spread about her taking up part of Alex’s hitting session.
Reporters were lining the edge of the court, kept back by the fences and security.
Photographers had their cameras poised, looking for any sign of weakness, a limp, a grimace of pain, anything to write about and call into question her chances of winning Wimbledon.
“Penny,” Natalie Grogan said, jogging up to her as she stepped onto the court. Natalie was young, sure, but she was tough as nails. After watching her train yesterday, Penny knew she’d be the perfect hitting partner.
“Hey, glad you could make it.”
“Oh my God, of course! I was so excited when my dad told me you called.”
“You ready to get started?” Penny asked, testing out her ankle one last time.
She had stretched out fully in the trainers’ room after getting her ankle wrapped up tight, so she was pretty much ready to go and didn’t want to waste any more of Alex’s practice time than necessary.
“Just moving around the court a little bit, get some serves in, baseline and then net work.”
“Sounds good to me!” Natalie said, sprinting to her baseline.
The grass was a little slick after a few days of the tournament players using it far more than the usual club members, but it felt good under her feet, solid and a little cushioning.
Natalie was a good player, a little rough around the edges still, but they gave each other a decent workout.
Penny tried to put her ankle out of her mind, but as the workout progressed, she began to feel it growing a little worse with each impact.
It was only the first day, though, so she felt okay about how long it held up. She waved Natalie to the net.
“That’s good for now.”
Natalie’s face fell a little bit, but then she seemingly shook it off, racing to her racket bag and pulling out her phone. “Can we do another selfie?”
“As long as you don’t mind us looking like a sweaty mess,” Penny said with a laugh.
“Please, I’m always a sweaty mess.”
“Me too, up until recently. It’s actually nice to feel like this again.”
“Are you kidding? You always look fabulous. Vogue had that whole thing about your off-court style. Flawless.”
Penny grabbed Natalie’s phone and held it out. “Okay, most ridiculous face you can imagine,” she said, twisting her mouth into a snarl and crossing her eyes. Natalie blew her cheeks up like a balloon and she snapped the pic. “Okay and now duck face.” They pursed their lips and took another selfie.
“Awesome.” Natalie took her phone back. “How’s your ankle feeling?”
Glancing down at it, Penny said, “Wrapped so tight I don’t even know. I’ll ice it and see how it feels later.”
“If you need a hitting partner again, just give me a call. I mean, I know you’ll probably want to hit with Indiana Gaffney when she gets here tomorrow.
She’s like your best friend, right? But I thought she might be busy because she’s playing doubles qualifying with Jasmine Randazzo and singles, too, so if you need anyone, I’d love to help out. ”
“You’ll be my first call, Nat. Promise.”
“Great! Oh, and is your brother coming tomorrow, too? Everyone online was saying that the OBXers were, but they didn’t say anything about Jack, and my dad wanted to talk to him about some business stuff, I think.”
Penny brightened. Natalie and her father had been playing it close to the vest on who they were leaning toward. Jack would be thrilled. “He’ll be here tomorrow, too. Hopefully, they can get together.”
“Yeah, that’d be awesome. I’ll see you later.”
Penny showered quickly and pulled on her favorite white eyelet dress, letting her hair air-dry, the dark brown curls falling down her back, and completing the look with brown leather sandals, gold metal fixtures near the toes that wouldn’t interfere with her ankle wrap.
Now she just had to get through the match without embarrassing herself any more in front of Alex’s mom.
“Well done,” Anna Russell said as Penny took the seat next to her at the edge of the practice court while they waited for Alex and Paolo to arrive.
“Oh, you were watching?” Penny asked. “I didn’t see you.”
Shit, she should have assumed Anna might arrive early and made sure to say hello. Warmth flooded her cheeks.
“I only arrived as you were finishing up,” Anna assured her with a kind smile. “You were very focused.”
“Thanks. It’s nice to get back out there. Sorry, I should have noticed…”
Anna waved away her concern with a flick of her hand. “Nonsense. You were training. How does your ankle feel?”
Penny glanced down at the large ice pack wrapped securely around her foot, numbing the joint. “I can’t feel it right now, but it’ll be sore tonight. Shouldn’t be too bad, though. Not like it was in France.”
“It was extraordinary, what you did there. I was on the edge of my seat for that last game. I haven’t felt that way during a tennis match in a long time. Not even when Alex was playing.”
“Thank you.”
She didn’t know what else to say, and the silence hung in the air like a dead man at the end of a noose. Death a foregone conclusion, just the agony of waiting for it to happen remained.
Thankfully, Anna knew how to make small talk. She pushed through the awkwardness like one of her son’s serves. “How do you like London so far?”
“Haven’t really seen much of it. Just the airport, the courts, and Alex’s house.
” She cringed and felt the heat rising in her cheeks, but speak of the devil, there he was, finally, he and Paolo stepping through the gate and already heckling each other as they started to stretch out.
He waved at them and they waved back; Paolo blew them a kiss and Anna laughed.
“You’ve been here before, though, haven’t you?” she asked, once the guys began to hit.
“A few times. I lost in the quarters last year.”
“You won here as a junior, rather spectacularly, if I recall.”
“I did.” She didn’t know Alex’s mom had seen her play before, and it made her strangely happy to know this woman who would become so important to her had seen her play all those years ago.
“I can’t wait to see you play this year. My current bias notwithstanding, you’ve been one of my favorite players to watch for some time now. Truly.”
“Thank you.”
The conversation stalled again. Penny had never felt like this before. There were no words, nothing to say that wouldn’t be completely mortifying, because the only thing left to talk about was… how they’d met. She should be braver, be the one to bring it up, but she just… couldn’t.
They watched Alex continue his warm-ups, he and Paolo trading groundstrokes on the practice court and keeping up their verbal sparring match at the same time. Their usual routine, half in English, half in Italian, inside jokes and cheap shots without an ounce of real zing behind them.
“Penny, you don’t have to be embarrassed around me, sweetheart.”
The tension broke, and Penny chewed on her lower lip before responding. “Yes, I really do.”
“You think that’s the first time I’ve walked in on Alex and one of his girlfriends?”
Penny winced. “That’s the thing. I don’t care what the press thinks or what other people think, but I don’t want to be just another one of his girlfriends. Not to you.”
“You’re not.”
“Feels like it. I mean, not that you made me feel that way, just that… I don’t even know what I’m saying.”