“I’m your new hitting partner or you’remynew hitting partner, whichever you prefer.” An easy smile spread across his face.
Penny’s eyes narrowed. That was the same smile he’d bestowed upon her that night in Australia. He’d smiled and asked her to dance.
“You’re training again?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “No, forget it. I don’t care. This is not happening.”
“And why’s that?” His eyes sparkled, actually sparkled, like he was some damned cartoon prince in a Disney movie.
“I don’t play against has-beens.”
The smile wavered and then disappeared completely. “A has-been?”
“Everyone knows the LTA dropped your sponsorships and your agent left you, but besides that…” She trailed off, her eyes lingering on his knee, an angry-looking scar surrounding the top of the joint. He was recovering from knee surgery and hadn’t played in a tournament since Australia, but she couldn’t bring herself to use that against him. It was every player’s worst fear, an injury that pulled them out of competition, maybe forever. He’d supposedly been lying low in London, rehabbing his knee and what was left of his reputation.
“Besides what?” he asked, forcing the issue. His expression darkened as he stepped closer, his chest nearly brushing against hers.
“Your knee… they said… everyone said that your knee was…”
Completely fucked.
“You should know better than to listen toeveryone.”
Penny swallowed. The implication was obvious. The tour had buzzed incessantly about how they’d left the Nike party together in Australia, but no one knew the truth. The storiesranged from outrageous to obscene, but the reality was even more embarrassing.
He’d asked her to dance, and staring into those eyes and that grin, it had been easy to say yes. They’d danced; their bodies pressed together, the bass of the music pounding through them, his hands trailing paths of fire over her skin, and she knew he was feeling what she was, an intense physical connection, burning hot on the dance floor, that would become an all-encompassing inferno somewhere more private. His mouth had pressed against her ear, pleading with her to leave with him. Taking a risk for the first time in her life off the tennis court, she agreed, and it had been one of the most incredible nights of her life. She snuck out the next morning, half out of embarrassment—she didn’t do one-night stands—and half because she had a training session.
The next night on the news came reports of a motorcycle accident. An Australian supermodel with an insanely high blood alcohol level had been treated for minor injuries and the man people once thought could become the greatest tennis player of all time had torn his knee to shreds.
Penny brushed off everyone’s questions, even Jack’s. Alex had given her a ride back to the hotel, she said, nothing more, and she was pretty sure Jack had believed her, even if no one else did. Rumors and gossip didn’t matter. It stung a little that Alex was with someone else the next night, but what really struck her to the core was that it just as easily could have been her in that accident. She could’ve lost everything, and at the time, the risk hadn’t even crossed her mind. That was the thought she’d taken with her onto the court for her quarterfinal match, and that was what distracted her enoughto go out in straight sets against a player not fit to carry her racket bag. Then Nike had pulled back their interest, and her reputation on the court—the only reputation that really mattered—took its very first ding.
She’d been working her way back ever since.
“Grab your racket.” Alex’s voice broke through her thoughts.
“What?” she asked, blinking up at him.
He walked to the bench just off the court and tossed his headphones and phone into the racket bag sitting atop the bench before pulling out a brand-new racket, still covered in the clear protective plastic. The distinctive redWwas easily visible against the tightly wound white strings. A Wilson racket, what he’d been playing with since he was a junior, not that Penny would ever admit she knew that.
“Grab. Your. Racket,” he said again.
“Why?” But she knew why, and the thought of facing off against him was both exhilarating and terrifying.
“I’ll show you exactly how much of a has-been I’m not. Let’s go. You and me, right now.”
“No.”
“Scared?”
Penny glared at him. He was pushing her buttons, yet her pride won out over the logical part of her mind that told her this was a bad idea.
“Warm up and you serve first.”
The confrontation had her blood pumping. Alex ran in place, swinging his arms around, stretching them over his head and behind his back before going through his serving motion, whipping it through the air. Penny slowly wentthrough her measured stretches starting with her ankles and wrists, then working her way inward. She kept her eyes focused on the clay, allowing each muscle to loosen up before moving on. Finally, she looked up at him. He was waiting at the opposite end of the court, racket in hand, bouncing a ball.
Penny pushed up onto her toes as she waited for what had once been the world’s best serve to catapult at her but then fell to her heels as a looping volley traveled over the net.
She straightened and caught the ball on her racket. “Has your game really regressed to this level? If it has, I’m not going to waste my time,” she called out, offended he was going easy on her.
“All right, then. Fifteen–love.”
