Payoff Pitch (Philadelphia Patriots) (3 page)

What a freaking awful day this was turning out to be.

Since her elbow burned like it’d been bitten by a swarm of fire ants, she looked there first. Her shoulder had taken a heavy impact but didn’t hurt much and seemed intact as far as she could tell. The elbow, on the other hand, was trashed, as was much of the back of her forearm. The gritty infield surface had scraped away a good chunk of skin, leaving a bloody, dirt-encrusted mess that needed to be cleaned up as soon as possible. She could do that at the Bennetts’ house.

But that shouldn’t be her priority. She should she just wrap a dog towel around the scrapes and get on with searching for Buster. She could stand the pain, and it wouldn’t get infected that quickly.

Yeah, she could stand pain, because she’d dealt with a lot worse.

Teddy glanced down at the middle finger of her left hand—or, actually, the mostly empty space where there had once been a middle finger. When she was six, an old, unguarded grain auger had lopped off that finger and badly injured two others when she was stupid enough to stick her hand in the chute. There had been no hope of re-attachment since the finger ended up somewhere in her father’s silo, surrounded by about fifteen tons of grain.

Now,
that
had been pain. This little scrape was nothing.

She took a couple of quick swipes at her jeans to knock off some of the dirt and dust and then jogged toward the park entrance. A young woman—almost certainly a nanny—was pushing a big-wheeled double stroller the size of a small car. She gave Teddy a curious look as she approached.

Teddy managed a quick smile. “Hi, I’m looking for my dog.” She pointed toward the west, the direction from which the woman had apparently come. “Did you see a Siberian Husky running loose by any chance?”

The woman, a pretty Hispanic in her mid-twenties, about the same age as Teddy, shook her head as the blond twins in the stroller gazed up at her. “No, miss, I didn’t see any dog. I’m sorry.” Her eyes zeroed in on Teddy’s bleeding arm. “Are you all right? Do you need some help?”

Teddy ignored the pain radiating from her elbow and smiled. “It’s just a little scratch. But thank you.”

“I’ll watch for your dog,” the woman said.

“Thanks.” Teddy crossed to the other side of the road and picked up her pace. She’d made up her mind to ignore the injury for now and focus completely on the search for Buster, so the sooner she got back to her car, the better. But she’d only made it about twenty yards down the road when she caught the purr of a car approaching behind.

“Hey, lady—want a lift?” Mr. Hot Neighbor gave her another panty-melting grin.

Teddy hadn’t thought she’d see him again so soon. And before she could answer him, she heard a
woof
and a dog’s head poked into view from behind the man’s broad shoulders. Buster was sitting on his haunches in the passenger seat, a look of demented excitement on his face. His long, pink tongue was hanging out of the side of his mouth as he panted, and his blue eyes seemed to be saying
hey, Teddy—isn’t this is the best day ever?

She should be furious with the mutt but instead she started to laugh, going weak with relief. The laugh came out sounding kind of hysterical, but she figured she’d earned it.

“He’s one happy dude,” the guy said with an answering grin. “He just keeps licking my face like I’m his long-lost owner or something.”

I kind of envy him, since that’s exactly what I’d like to do to your face, too, right about now.

In gratitude, of course, she told herself.

His gaze zeroed in on her arm and he frowned. “It looks like you banged yourself up a bit. Are you okay?”

Teddy had tried to keep her elbow turned away from him so he wouldn’t ask what happened. She felt like an idiot for stumbling on what was pretty much level ground.

“It’s nothing. Where’d you find the escape artist?” She moved closer to the idling car, tucking her injured arm backward.

“Not that far away, really,” he said, giving Buster an affectionate muzzle rub. “I kept on going past the tennis club, then wandered around a bunch of crescents and courts until I hit South Roberts. When I was passing by the Presbyterian Children’s Village, I spotted him meandering across the grounds. By the time I made it up their long drive, a couple of girls had already corralled him.”

Buster crawled over into the guy’s lap, trying to hang his head out the window.

“Aw, he wants you to pet him and tell him it’s all right,” the guy said. “Don’t you, pal?”

Hot Neighbor didn’t seem the slightest bit perturbed by having a big, panting Husky crawling all over him. He was clearly a dog lover, and that only added to his considerable appeal as far as Teddy was concerned.

“You know he’s the Bennetts’ dog, right?” she said.

“Sure, and you’re their dog walker. I noticed you out with the dog a couple of times.”

You noticed me?
Teddy instantly gave herself a mental slap down for her girly-girl reaction.

She gave him a weak smile. “Sorry about Buster using your lawn as a potty.”

“He’s a dog, after all.” He nudged Buster off his lap. “Come on, get in and we’ll get you two back home.”

“Thanks, but I’ll just meet you back there.” The last thing she wanted to do was leave blood and dirt in his expensive car, and they were just a few minutes’ walk from the Bennetts’ house.

When he shrugged his broad shoulders, her gaze helplessly zeroed in on the biceps that bulged out from his tight black T-shirt. Suddenly, she barely noticed the pain searing her elbow.

“See you there,” he said and sped away. Teddy watched him go, telling herself to stop drooling like some teenage idiot.

She broke into a jog again. Though she and her pal Emma had been doing the home pet care thing for a couple of years now, she had to admit that nothing topped the last half hour for the most interesting incident of her career.

As soon as Noah turned off the car, he reached over and gave Buster another good rub behind the ears. He supposed he shouldn’t be making a fuss over a dog that had given his poor walker such a scare, but he’d always been a sucker for a bright eye and a wagging tail. And this Husky seemed like a real sweetheart. Buster looked nothing like Toby and Sadie, but he had a lot in common with them, especially Toby—a certain playful nuttiness combined with a syrupy sweet nature and an obvious need for human affection.

When Noah tracked him down at the Children’s Village, Buster was treating the pair of twelve-year-old girls that had grabbed onto him to a thorough, sloppy face-licking. Maybe he’d exhausted himself by then with all the running, because when Noah picked him up and deposited him in the back seat of his car, the dog hadn’t struggled at all to escape. That hadn’t meant he wasn’t still ramped-up, though. By the time Noah opened the driver’s door to get in, Buster had leaped over the console and installed himself in the passenger seat, his tongue hanging out and a goofy look on his face as he sought Noah’s approval for his latest coup.

Noah had just laughed.

The pretty dog walker should be mighty pleased with his efforts in thwarting the escape. It hadn’t taken a genius to figure out she was in something of a panic as she dashed out in front of his car. And the fact that the near miss had barely slowed her down told him something had to be very wrong. In those circumstances, he’d have offered his help even if she hadn’t had one of the cutest bods he’d seen in a while. But, hey, he’d be lying to himself if he didn’t acknowledge that her form had probably given him a little added motivation to roll down his window. At the time, he’d been on his way to a solo lunch at his favorite diner, and a series of rumblings from his stomach kept reminding him that half a pot of coffee hadn’t been much of a late breakfast.

He glanced to his left just as the babe came jogging into view. She might be dusty and a little messed-up but, damn, she was still seriously hot. Maybe mid-twenties with a trim, lithe physique, copper-colored hair, and a generous pink mouth that had brought forth lustful images of hot kisses as soon as he got a good look at her. Noah also had to admit he looked forward to a closer examination of how she filled out the tight little T-shirt that had her company logo stenciled across her very nice breasts.

Dog Nanny Pros.
Plural. The first time he registered the logo on her car—the day he got back from Texas—he’d made a mental note to check the company out, along with others that provided home pet care services. Now he made a mental note to check
her
out. And not on the Internet or telephone either.

For starters, he was going to get to the bottom of what she’d done to her arm. Though she’d said it was nothing, Noah wasn’t buying it. He’d glimpsed blood, and the state of her clothes made it obvious she’d hit the dirt at some point in her pursuit of bad-ass Buster. She looked a little bit like a ball player after a hard, head first slide into second base. Actually worse, because most baseball slides didn’t draw blood.

Not wanting to have to manhandle Buster any more than he already had, he waited for her to catch up before getting out of the car. Since she was a dog walking pro, she’d no doubt have a leash in her car or would go inside the Bennetts’ house and get one of Buster’s.

As he saw her slow and turn into his long driveway, he got out and met her at the rear of the BMW. “You got a leash somewhere? We don’t want Buster making another break for it.”

The girl nodded, obviously a little out of breath. When she raised her right arm to swipe away the beads of sweat on her brow, Noah got a good look at her dirt-encrusted scrapes.

“That elbow needs attention right away,” he said, frowning. “Let me help you fix it up, okay?” He nodded toward his massive house set a hundred feet back from the road. “I’ve got a little training facility inside, and believe me, it’s got everything you’d ever need to disinfect and bandage a wound.”

Her brow furrowed as she took a good look at the damage. After sucking in a deep breath, she nodded again. “Well, I don’t know what the Bennetts have in that regard, so I guess that makes sense.” You’re not some kind of serial killer, are you?” she said with a charming, lopsided smile.

Noah smiled but didn’t laugh, even though he found it kind of funny to think about a serial killer whose MO included chasing after runaway dogs. “No, but you can take the guard dog with you for protection if it’d make you more comfortable.”

Her eyes widened—in amusement, he thought. “Hah! Maybe he could lick you into submission?”

No, but I think maybe you could, babe.
He got a quick mental flash of her long, red hair freed from its scrunchy and flowing over his naked body.

Get a grip, man.

It was about time they got formally acquainted. “My name’s Noah Cade,” he said. “I’m a pitcher with the Patriots.”

He figured that should help alleviate any concerns on her part that he might be weird. Maybe she’d even heard of him. He got a fair bit of press in the city, like all the pitchers on the squad. But then again, given the bad press a lot of pro athletes got these days, his profession might not cut any ice with her.

Her eyes widened again for a brief moment, then she pinned on a polite smile. “Ah, I’m Teddy Quinn. The Bennetts’ dog walker, though I guess that’s pretty obvious, isn’t it?

“Nice to meet you, Teddy.” When he offered his hand, she gave it a quick shake. “
Dog Nanny Pros,
right? I saw the logo on your car, too. I like the name.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You’re pretty observant, aren’t you?”

“When I want to be,” he said meaningfully.

That had her dropping her gaze to her sneakered feet. “It’s an, uh, okay name, I guess. It wasn’t our first choice, but it’s all about the web site, right? You have to have a name that somebody else hasn’t already snapped up for their domain.”

“Absolutely,” Noah agreed, nodding wisely.

But in truth, he knew as much about web site management as he did about calligraphy. Close to zero. In fact, he felt increasingly out of touch even in the clubhouse these days, as more and more young players—and a few of the veterans, too—were constantly hauling out their smartphones and tablets to tweet some crap to their legions of followers. Noah had no interest in social media—the less the fans knew about his private life or what he thought about anything, the better. He liked to interact with fans in person and always signed autographs, but he valued his privacy, too. The media gave him enough grief as it was, running photos of him and his dates every time they went near a nightclub, a beach or just about anywhere else. He knew that sort of garbage went with the territory for pro athletes, but he’d never gotten used to it and probably never would.

He shook his head. “Let’s not stand around jawing while you’re bleeding.”

She seemed pleased by his concern. “You go ahead. I’ll get Buster squared away and make sure he can’t get loose again. Then I’ll knock on your door.”

“Nah, just walk right in. I’ll leave door unlocked.” Noah had been working hard not to rake his eyes over her sweet body, but he let them stray down to her chest for what must have been a fraction of a second too long because she blushed and looked away.

He thought she was totally adorable.

If Buster knew he’d been a very bad dog, he certainly didn’t show any sign of it. As soon as Teddy got him back in the house, he pranced over to his food dish and sat on his haunches as if to say,
Now that I’ve had my exercise, Teddy, it’s time to eat!
Then again, Buster pretty much always thought it was time to eat.

Teddy wasn’t about to reward him with an unscheduled ration of kibble, but the first thing she did after quickly dabbing away some of the gunk on her arm with a couple of damp paper towels was to put some water in his bowl and toss him a few dog cookies, all of which he caught with practiced ease. Instead of calling one of the Bennetts, she decided to leave a brief note instead, omitting the gruesome details of the chase and capture. Still, she again strongly recommended that they escape-proof their poop yard once and for all or risk losing their pet.