write. She wondered if he cared.
Before she closed her laptop and turned off the bedroom light for the night, she Googled plastic surgeons in the Seattle area. She paid attention to where they’d gone to school and how many years they’d been in practice. Mostly though, she looked at before and after pictures of breast reductions. She wasn’t a jealous person, but envy stabbed her soul as she studied the photos. For many different reasons, she wanted so badly to be reduced from her double-D cups to a C. She wanted to run and jump without pain. Not that she would, but it would be nice to have the option. She wanted to be taken as seriously as average-sized women. In Hollywood, she’d been hired to fill out the costume, not so much for her acting ability. And in L.A., everyone automatically assumed she had implants, which had always kind of irritated her.
She’d like to have sex without her heavy breasts bouncing around. As she was now, she preferred to have sex with a bra on. It was more comfortable, but not all the men she’d been with liked it.
She’d been a double D since the tenth grade. It had been humiliating and painful, and probably the reason Bo had such a difficult time finding men she trusted. Even now, sometimes men and women took one look at her and Bo and assumed they were nymphomaniacs. It still baffled her to this day. She didn’t know what having large breasts had to do with sexual promiscuity. The truth was that because of the size of her breasts, she was more uptight about sex than other women she knew.
One of the biggest reasons she wanted a reduction was that she’d like people to talk to her face, not her chest. She’d like, just once, to meet a man who didn’t stare at her breasts. A man like Mark Bressler.
A frown dented her forehead. Mark Bressler might not stare at her breasts, but he was a jerk in many other ways. Many just as offensive ways. Like insulting her clothes, her intelligence, and her driving skills.
“Hey.” Bo stuck her head in the room, and Chelsea shut her computer so Bo wouldn’t see the breast reduction befores and afters on the screen. “Jules just called and wanted me to ask you if Mark was going to play in the Chinooks’ celebrity golf tournament in a few weeks. He’s always played in the past.”
“Why doesn’t Jules ask him?”
“Because Mark doesn’t always answer his phone.” Bo smiled. “But now he has you.”
“Yeah. Lucky me.”
“Last night I visited a Web page that the Chinooks set up n Bnooks safter the accident. Your fans can log on and send you a special message. It’s really nice.”
Mark sat at his desk and looked over the real estate property that his assistant had pulled up on his computer. He was only going along with her plan because he actually did want to move. He’d spent more time in this house in the last month than he had in the last five years. Or at least it seemed like it. The house was a constant reminder of his past and the walls were closing in on him.
He scratched the stubble on his chin with his left hand as he leaned forward for a better look at the square footage of the house on the screen. He’d showered earlier, dressed in his usual T-shirt and jogging pants, but hadn’t bothered shaving because he wasn’t planning on leaving the house today.
“Did you know about the page?”
He shook his head as he maneuvered the mouse. It was difficult with the bulky splint on his right hand. Maybe someone had told him about the page. He didn’t recall. Whether from the drugs or from the hit to his head, his memory of the last six months was sketchy. “Like a memorial page?”
“No. Like a place where they could send you their best wishes for your recovery. Over seven thousand hockey fans have written letters and notes to you.”
Only seven thousand? Mark glanced up from the computer monitor on his desk. He looked over his shoulder and raised his gaze past his assistant’s big breasts covered in shiny gold ruffles, up her throat, and into her blue eyes. Today she wore a short, crazy-colored skirt, probably “Pucci,” and a pair of big wedge sandals that clunked across his floor when she walked. Her clothes were toned down, for her.
“Are you going to answer them?”
It wasn’t that he didn’t appreciate hockey fans, he certainly did, but he hated writing a short grocery list let alone seven thousand e-mails. “No.”
“You could send out one mass thank-you. I really think it’s the decent thing to do.”
“Good thing I don’t care what you think.”
She sighed and rolled her eyes. “I’ve also been asked if you plan on playing in the Chinooks’ celebrity golf tournament this summer?”
She was like a gnat buzzing around his head, annoying the hell out of him. Too bad he couldn’t swat her. If he thought for one minute that a good swat on her ass would offend her and she’d go away, he might be tempted. It was just after eleven A.M. and he was tired as hell. His physical therapist, Cyrus, had stopped by earlier and they’d worked out for an hour in the gym upstairs. But that wasn’t the only thing causing his fatigue. He hadn’t slept well the night before because he hadn’t taken his sleeping medication. Partly because he wanted to see if he still needed it and partly because he didn’t want any more freaky dreams where the assistant popped up.
She tilted her head to one side, and the ends of her bright reddish-pink hair brushed one side of her soft neck. “Did you hear me, Mr. Bressler?”
“Unfortunately, yes.” He turned back to the monitor and looked at the real estate property in Newport Hills. It was on the water andht=the wat he wasn’t interested. Living close to any water was damn buggy. “I’m not playing this year.”
“Why? You’ve always played in the past.”
“I can’t play one-handed.” Which wasn’t necessarily true. If he wanted to play, he’d play holding a club with his teeth.
“I could help.”
He almost laughed, and clicked on the next property she thought might interest him. “Yeah? How?” Stand in front of him and hold the club with her right hand while he held it with his left? He thought of her back pressed against his chest, his nose in her hair, and his hand just above hers on his nine iron. His brain skidded to a halt at the double entendre, and an odd weight settled at the top of his stomach.
“I could look into special clubs.”
The weight was so unexpected it disturbed him. Probably because he recognized it. He hadn’t felt anything like it in a long time, but he knew the heavy pull for what it was. “A club for disabled players? No thanks.” The last thing he wanted was to feel any sort of anything for the assistant. It wasn’t like he was opposed to feeling desire for a woman again, just not this woman.
She leaned forward and pointed to the condo on the screen, and he was forced to look at her small hand and the smooth skin of her fingers and palm. She kept her nails short, and without any sort of color. Usually he liked color. His gaze slid to the delicate blue vein of her wrist. She was so close that if he wanted, he could press his mouth to the inside of her bare elbow. She was so close that he was surrounded by the scent of her perfume. It was kind of flowery and fruity, just like her.
“The view out the windows is spectacular,” she said and leaned a bit closer. Her hair fell forward and her soft breast brushed the back of his shoulder. The weight in his stomach slid a few inches lower and if he didn’t know better, he’d suspect that he was about to get turned on.
“I don’t want to live downtown. It’s too noisy.”
“You’d be high and wouldn’t hear it.”
“I don’t get the good drugs anymore. I’d hear it,” he said, and brought up a house in Queen Anne. Maybe the feeling in his stomach had to do with his medication.
She laughed next to his ear. A soft, breathy little sound that tickled his temple. “I meant high as in elevation.”
He almost smiled. Showed where his mind tended to reside these days.
She leaned forward a little more, pressing into him. “This house is almost four thousand square feet. It has a great view of the bay and is all one floor. I thought it might be perfect for you.”
He wondered if she was doing it on purpose. Women had been pressing and rubbing up against him since his rookie days. Letting him know they wanted sex in not so subtle ways. But he didn’t really think his little assistant was rubbing up against him because she wanted him to push her down on his desk and have sex with her right there.
Or did she?
“The kitchen has been completely renovavieletely ted and modernized. What do you think?”
