He taps a pen on his desk. “I’ll be frank. I’ve done surgeries like this, and even when things go well, including rehab, some athletes never get back to full one hundred percent.”

My heart drops. I know the stats on shoulder injuries for quarterbacks. Even for a college player, once news of a shoulder injury reaches the NFL teams, it affects their draft status, pushing them down in the ranks. Few teams want to take chances on a player with an injury. For a seasoned player like me, it could be less playtime, early retirement. Fuck that. “I’m not most athletes. I’m the best. I’ve been using massage, needling, cupping, everything for the past few years. I even pay out of my own pocket for treatment. And those guys you’re talking about have the injury on their throwing arm. This is my left shoulder.”

“True, true. I just want you to know what to expect. If you take a hard fall again, even after surgery, you might injure it again.”

My stomach lurches. “Fine. Lay it out for me, then. What should I expect? Summer camp starts in June, and I want to be ready for it.” I pause. “Shit. I’m doing this play for the next month.”

“I saw that on ESPN. Nice touch.”

“Yeah. The fans like it.” Even though it makes me uncomfortable as hell, my image has improved slightly. I haven’t gotten any glares when I take my table at Milano’s lately. But fans are fickle. And if they knew I had a shoulder injury. Damn. They’d be ready for Coach to trade me in a heartbeat. They’d fall in love with Aiden. He’s poised and ready . . .

He continues. “Let’s pencil you in for early April. The first two weeks you’ll be moving hand to mouth only; then we’ll progress to driving around week six. After that, we’ll see about summer camp.”

“Damn.”

“I know you like to work out, Jack, but take it easy. Stick to running. It’s the off-season. Go on vacation like a normal person. Take it easy for a while.”

Take it easy? Yeah. Not gonna happen—not if I want to keep my spot.

“I’ll manage.”

He arches a brow. “You got someone to take care of you while you recuperate?”

Lucy, although I hate to ask her. She’d jump at the chance, but she has a new husband, and they’re planning a cruise around the world in April. There’s Quinn. I could ask Devon, too, but shit, he’s got his own life going on, and I hate for any of the players to see me weak, even him. Elena comes to mind, but I push that thought away. Not even going there.

“Yeah.” I stand up, feeling . . . shit . . . a little lost. Just the thought of not being able to play the game, to do what I do best in life, makes me feel like I want to barf. And I can’t even confide in anyone except Coach. I’m . . . alone.

The doctor rises up with me, and I guess he reads my face. “It’s not the end of the world, Jack. You still have some games left in you.”

“A Super Bowl?”

He laughs. “You come close every year . . .”

“Right. But never a trophy.”

He smiles. “Sure would be nice to have one for Nashville.”

I nod. “You do the surgery, and I’ll get us one.”

But as I leave his office and head to my car, I’m not nearly as confident as I sounded. Fucking Harvey. Even from the dead, he’s haunting me. My head goes back to that day, the memories tearing through me, those shots that took my mother’s life, the one he pointed at me. And he would have shot me again if I hadn’t somehow reached up and wrestled the gun out of his hand. I was so small then, a runt of a kid, a lot like Timmy, my muscles and strength not yet honed by dedication to football. I closed my eyes and pulled the trigger, and when I opened them, he was dead, a bullet in his forehead. I swallow, fighting that anxiousness that rises up whenever I picture him and Mom on the carpet, blood seeping. I ran to her and screamed until the neighbors ran inside the house. Then I cried in the ambulance when they refused to tell me whether she was alive, and it wasn’t for the pain in my shoulder but anguish for the only person who ever cared about me.

Only she hadn’t cared enough to leave him.

I hate that I came last with her.

I hate that her love killed her.

Who needs that kind of emotion? Nobody. Especially me.

“Stop torturing yourself with that game. I have news.” Lawrence sits across from me inside my apartment as I watch the video from the Super Bowl. He showed up after my doctor’s appointment, wanting to get the lowdown.

“Yeah? It better be good.” I’m tense, watching the screen, preparing myself for that last interception I threw. Shit. I wince as I fire the ball to Devon, overthrowing his outstretched arms, a Pittsburgh lineman catching it and running it all the way downfield for the touchdown that ended the game for us.

“Sophia reached out to me this morning.”

Flinching, I turn to look at his smug expression. “What the hell did she want?”

He grins. “Seems she’s broken it off with the hockey player.”

I arch a brow. “Am I supposed to care?”

“She wants to see you.”

I frown. “Why? We’ve skillfully avoided each other for a year.”

He shrugs. “She says she wants to make amends. Make her apologies. There’s a charity gala next week, and she’d like to be your date.”

I bark out a laugh. “Amends? Hard to take back a book she published, Lawrence. That deed is done. We are done. I care nothing about seeing her again.”

“Hmm, but she’s still dangling that Cosmo article. She says you might be able to convince her not to write it. Weird, right?”

Very. I ponder it. I can’t trust anything she says. “She’s up to something. Tell her to find some other sucker.” I flick off the TV and stand, heading into the kitchen to grab a Gatorade and chug it down.

He follows me. “All that is true. She’s not worth your time, but if the media could see you together . . . being friendly . . . well, it might put some of those rumors of you beating her up to rest.”

Elena pops in my head. She believed me when I told her that I didn’t hurt women.

We’ve spent the week rehearsing together, and she’s been polite, yet keeps her distance, her only emotion the feelings she puts into Juliet when we’re on stage together. Last night Laura made us go over the balcony scene three times until we got it right. My hand clenches as I remember how I stood beneath her balcony window the prop guys had made, hearing her profess her love for Romeo. My heart pounded as I listened to her words, even though I knew they weren’t for me. We were face to face, our eyes clinging to each other, saying those flowery lines, and shit, shit, I felt every one of them like a prick to my heart.

But as soon as those lines were done, she pointedly didn’t look at me, talking to everyone but me. I like her ethics. I like that she knows what she wants and doesn’t play into my hands.

But . . .

I can’t stop thinking about if this were a different world, and I could let myself just . . . let go.

A long exhalation comes from me.

“Are you even listening to me?” Lawrence asks, eyeing me quizzically. “You’re thinking about that play again, aren’t you?”

“No.”

“So what about just walking in with Sophia at the gala? I’m not saying you have to get cozy, but I’ll sneak some pics, and we can spin it as ‘Old lovers now turned friends.’”

“No.”

“Dammit, Jack! It would help, and I’m sure you can turn on that charm of yours and convince her to not write that article. Would it kill you to pretend like you like her?”

I throw my Gatorade in the trash. “She ruined any trust I have. Never going there again.”

He crosses his arms and is about to speak when a knock comes at the door.

I march over and open it, shaking my head at the person there. “Shit, Aiden, don’t you have better things to do than annoy me? And how did you get my address?”

“Hello to you, old man.” He barges past me and enters the den, taking in the spacious apartment, the modern leather furniture, the artwork of the city skyline on the wall, my Heisman Trophy on the bookcase along with several MVP plaques. He does a circle, looking at photos of me in high school and college. He faces me. “Nice digs. I need a decorator. Moved in across the hall this week, by the way—couldn’t resist the proximity to the stadium. I was surprised when the real estate lady said she sold you yours a few years back. Guess we both have great taste. And before you go all ballistic on me, I didn’t know you lived in the same building. There isn’t a lot of upscale real estate close to the stadium. I got lucky. Devon around?”

I walk in after him. “You moved into the building? Good God. You stalk me in the gym and now here? You need a life, Alabama.”

He snorts. “We both know all I want to do is work out. And I want you to help me.”

I snort and cross my arms. “Why would I help you?”

Aiden loses some of that charm on his face, color rising on his cheeks. “Because you said I fucking hesitate! I can’t stop thinking about it, and if you don’t help me, then I’m going to be knocking on your door every damn day until you tell me what I’m doing wrong.”

I smirk, plopping down on my leather armchair. “You have a quarterback coach for that, punk.”

“He’s on vacation! And no one’s as good as you.”