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Bridget cleared her throat. “We’re going to talk later. He’s in the middle of stuff.”
That sounded lame.
Jo’s jaw clenched. “I’m sorry,what? You told him you’regrowing a lifeinside you, and he said I can’t deal with that now because I have to play agame?”
Bridget shook her head because that wasn’t fair to Ryan. He worked hard—through pain and sacrifice. Especially over the last couple of months.
“Jo, it’s not a game; it’s hisjob. He and I are going to talk later. And you said you’d stay out of anything to do with us.” She grabbed her purse and hurried down the stairs.
14
His phone buzzed again.He was done. He’d taken Bridget’s call because he’d take hers no matter what, but he couldn’t talk, and he’d been short with her. He wasn’t naïve enough to believe he hadn’t pissed her off. He’d apologize, send flowers, grovel, all that shit tomorrow. But his arm was swollen after warming up, and he was fighting not to get pulled from the game.
The buzzing didn’t stop because his sister was fuckingannoying. After dismissing the call again, he ran his hand through his hair.
“I can do at least four,” he assured the pitching coach.
“Can you?” Ben raised a skeptical eyebrow.
Dr. Mitchell had just left the room after throwing around the words pitcher’s elbow and injured reserve list. The doc seemed to think if Ryan pushed too hard, he’d have problems down the road, but Ryan had never missed a game in his entire career, and he wasn’t about to start now.
It took everything in him not to smash his phone against the wall when it vibrated again less than a minute after he’d dismissed the last call.
“Can I get five minutes? My sister’s called six times. Just want to make sure there isn’t a family emergency I don’t know about.”
Ben nodded and left him alone in the room.
“What?” Ryan snapped when he answered his sister’s seventh call.
“What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Right now, I’m trying to convince them to keep me on the roster. My elbow is worse than I’ve been letting on, and they’ve figured it out. They want to put me on IR.”
Jo growled into the phone.
“Look Jo, I know she’s mad at me, but I have stuff too.”
“What stuff? What kind of stuff trumps Bridg when she really needs you?”
Had she said that? He didn’t remember her saying anything was wrong. He replayed Bridget’s words. She just said she missed him, right?
“Wait. What are you talking about?” But a trickle of unease moved down his spine.
There was a long pause on the phone before Jo cleared her throat.
“You’ve been worried about her, haven’t you?” Her tone softened. His sister had shifted out of attack mode.
“You know that. It’s why I asked you to check on her. I’ve been texting Aidan too.” To Ryan’s relief, Aidan had been home last week, but he’d left for California for lacrosse training yesterday.
“Because she’s tired. She seems almost sick lately.”
He shifted the phone to his shoulder and cracked his knuckles. Pain shot down his arm, and he flinched.
“I guess, but she insists she’s not sick.”
“She’s been more emotional than normal. Tired, moody, throwing up…”
Oh, fuck. The night of the fundraiser. It might have been the best sex he’d ever had, but they hadn’t used a condom. He hadn’t thought about it that night, and she hadn’t mentioned it either but—
