Page 18 of Ruff and Tumble

“I’m thinking about it,” he admitted. “Will you hold me if I do?”

“Only if you promise I can be the big spoon,” Garrett joked, but the mood didn’t last. He knew too much about Cole’s struggles with his recovery to pretend otherwise. He’d been there when Cole took the hit that tore his labrum, visited in the hospital when Cole had his surgery, and pushed him through every physical therapy session that got him back to full fighting form.

The thing Garrett didn’t know, however—the thing thatno oneknew—was that Cole’s physical struggles were only part of the problem. A shoulder was a tangible thing, a thing that could be worked on, a thing that could be fixed.

Hisheart, however…

“Do you think they’re going to put you on limited participation for the rest of the week?” Garrett asked.

Cole grimaced. “No.”

“Shouldyou be on limited participation for the rest of the week?”

He shrugged. The fact that he could make that motion in the first place was a good sign that he was on the mend. If he pushed, he could probably ease up on the training and practice routines, but it wouldn’t go over well. Not with the curse looming overhead, and not when everyone was working so hard to keep him in fighting form.

The pain you feel today will be the strength you feel tomorrow. If you believe it, the body can achieve it. End zones, not comfort zones.Everywhere Cole turned, there were more of those stupid posters.

Where were the ones that would really help him out right now?Life doesn’t begin and end with football. You’re more than just an athlete. People won’t hate you if you decide you’ve had enough.

“No one else seems to think so. Who am I to question the authority of a team of doctors and therapists whose sole job it is to determine my physical viability?” It was a rhetorical question, and they both knew it. The amount of money that had been funneled into making sure Cole was operating at his best was enough to keep a small country running for several years. It would be an insult to the men and women who worked so hard to throw it away.

Not to mention the fans.Mostof the fans, anyway. One—who would remain nameless—wouldn’t have batted one of her long, sweeping eyelashes to hear that Cole Bennett was no longer operating at full capacity. She’d blush, yes. And stammer. And maybe even release one of those back-of-the-throat moans.

But that wouldn’t stop her from saying exactly what was on her mind.

“Let me ask you something… What do you think about my unnecessary hits lately?” Cole asked.

“Is this a trick question?”

“They’re bad, right?”

“I feel like this is a trick question.”

Garrett was rarely able to sit still for long. He was the kind of man who was always moving, always pushing, always strong. As if to prove his physical superiority, he motioned for Cole to join him at the squat rack and didn’t resume the conversation until the weights were in place.

“Does this have anything to do with that stunt you pulled in the elevator yesterday?” Garrett asked as he prepared to heft three hundred pounds. “I saw Reggie in the office earlier, and she didn’t seem too happy about it. She said you’re losing your focus.”

“Don’t listen to my sister. She has nothing but focus. She’s like a laser beam on top of a shark, and all her energy is pointed at me.”

“I wishmymanager were a laser-beam shark.”

Cole sighed and put himself in the spotter position. “No, you don’t. Trust me. At least you can turn off your phone and pretend you have a life. Reggie knows I have nothing of the sort. You can lie to your manager or your sister, but you can’t lie to a woman who’s both.”

For the next few minutes, Garrett didn’t say anything. He was too caught up in his repetitions, which he pushed out with the ease of a man who had never seen the sharp edge of a surgeon’s scalpel. As he hoisted the weights back on the rack, Cole broached the subject of his game play once again.

“You’d say something if you thought I was doing more harm than good out there, right?” Cole asked.

“Of course.”

“You wouldn’t hide the truth from me?”

“Never.”

“You’d put this old, broken-down horse to pasture?”

Garrett put his hand over his chest. “I’d lock the gate myself.”

Cole wished he could believe his friend. Once upon a time, they’d been college ball players together, both so full of themselves and their God-given right to dominate the field that no one else could stand being around them. Probably not the most auspicious way to begin a friendship, but it had worked for them. They’d gone through so many football rites of passage together that Garrett knew exactly what Cole was feeling on any given day—the highs and lows, the euphoria and exhaustion.