So that was it.
Not going to get back...
He should be wrecked. Run down by a beer truck trying to save a dog, and now unemployed. From living the dream—playing professional basketball, traveling with the team all over Europe, dating gorgeous women—to the end of his career at the age of twenty-eight. For the past twenty years, either he or Deacon had been playing at the top levels of the game. End of an era. The Fallon era.
“You okay?” Wes asked his brother.
“Shouldn’t that be my line?”
“Seriously, Deacon.”
“Seriously, Wes. You’re lying in a hospital bed, your career is over and, judging by the fact that this—”
Deacon pointed out an enormous bunch of pink tulips “—is from the truck driver who hit you, while this—” he pointed to a tiny cactus in a black, plastic pot “—is from Fabi, I’m going out on a limb to guess you no longer have a girlfriend.” Deacon held up his hand. “Not that I’m bummed about that because Fabi is a...well, you know.”
Wes did know. Fabi was living proof you can’t judge a book by its cover. She was gorgeous. Long legs, toned muscles, perfect skin, fantastic smile. Underneath the surface was a sketchy moral code and an endless appetite for Wes’s money.
He’d loved her brains, though, and her wicked sense of humor. But he hadn’t been surprised or heartbroken when she threatened to dump him if he got traded. He’d been more bothered when he realized he wasn’t going to fight for the relationship. What had he been doing with her if he wasn’t willing to fight for her? The not-so-subtle subtext of the cactus seemed to indicate that being hit by a truck was right up there with being traded to Serbia as a deal breaker.
This breakup fell squarely in the category of not missing things you never really had in the first place.
He wasn’t worried about losing Fabi, but Deacon was another question. He couldn’t remember a time when he wasn’t trying to get Deacon’s attention or make him happy. Their mom died when Wes was two. He and Deacon had been split up in foster care until he turned eight and Deacon, a full ten years older, got drafted into the NBA and immediately applied for custody of him. After the guardianship ended when he turned eighteen, Deacon had stayed fully involved in his life.
Mostly through basketball.
Now, for the first time, there was nothing tying him to Deacon. His brother had married his girlfriend, Julia, a little more than seven years ago. They had a full plate running the Fallon Foundation Centers and caring for the teenagers they took in as foster kids.
Without basketball, where would his relationship with Deacon land?
For that matter, what would his life look like? It had emptied out in the seconds after he got hit by that truck.
He could do anything. He’d owed a debt to his brother and he’d fulfilled it by playing as long and as well as he could.
“You want to go back to sleep?” Deacon asked.
“In a minute.” He tried to pull the sheet up, but the movement hurt too much. His brother took over, settling it around his shoulders.
“I’m going to get a nurse in here.”
Wes hoped the nurse would give him something to take the edge off the pain so he could sleep. “You sure you didn’t hear anything about a dog? Not in the accident report or anything?”
Deacon shook his head. “Nothing. I wish someone had told me about it. I wouldn’t have been so worried that—” He stood quickly. “Listen, Wes, Julia said I should wait until you’re feeling better, but I’m just going to lay this out there. You don’t have to say yes or no right away.”
Wes really wanted the drugs he was imagining the nurse would bring as soon as Deacon stopped acting out this Lifetime-movie moment.
“Spit it out.”
“I have this job and I want you to take it. I want you to come work for me.”
“A job?”
“Something to keep you busy.”
“I know what a job is. What do you have in mind?”
“You know the Hand-to-Hand pilot program?”
“Yes.”
Deacon and Julia ran the Fallon Foundation, building centers offering sports, arts and tutoring programs in economically depressed towns. The Hand-to-Hand program would make sister center relationships between Fallon centers and those in wealthier locations. The program’s mission statement said, Everyone needs a hand sometimes and everyone has something to offer.
“We have the site identified—it’s a town called Kirkland, right on Kueka Lake. We need the town to give us the lease on the space we’ve picked out, but it means getting a waiver from them. We’re in the last steps of negotiating a partner grant with Robinson University to fund a high-tech tutoring service to three other Fallon centers in New York State. I could really use someone on the ground full-time in Kirkland who can build goodwill and spread the word so we can close both those deals.”
Wes’s head had started throbbing. Hard work didn’t scare him, but he wasn’t sure what Deacon was asking him to do, let alone if he’d be capable of doing it.
“Don’t you want someone with experience?”
“Weren’t you the social chairman of your fraternity?”
“Yes, but you’re not asking me to hire a deejay. You want—”
“Shut up and listen. Didn’t the Madrid team make you do the press conferences after the games because your sound bites were more entertaining than half the games?”
He needed his brother to shut up so he could get some drugs. “What’s your point?”
“My point is, this job is about making people like and want to help the Fallon Foundation. You know our business and people like you.”
Wes stared at his brother.
“I don’t understand it, either,” Deacon said. “But they do.”
“Don’t you need a marketing guy? I majored in electrical engineering.”
“And I would trust you to rewire my toaster.” His brother nodded. “I would. I would also trust you to show Kirkland exactly what the Fallon Foundation Center is and why they need us in their town. If we get the Hand-to-Hand partnerships going, our ability to bring changes to other communities is going to double. Help me bring that home, Wes.”
Since he ultimately owed his life to his brother, when the rare opportunity for him to help came along, he never said no. He had very little understanding of what Deacon wanted him to do, but that was beside the point.
He nodded, which sent the throbbing inside his head off the charts.
Deacon’s jaw tightened. He leaned forward as if he was going to pat Wes again or maybe hug him, but he said simply, “I’ll get the nurse.”
A few minutes later, with what felt like a very effective painkiller finally pumping through his IV, Wes started drifting off again. Deacon was on the phone, talking softly.
“He’s going to do it, Julia. I know you wanted me to wait, but I needed to get him settled.” A pause. “He said there was a dog in the street. He was trying to grab it.”
Wes closed his eyes.
Deacon’s voice was almost a whisper. Wes might have missed what he said next, but he didn’t.
“How do I know if it’s the truth? I want it to be. He’s not going to tell me and you know it. We’ll keep an eye on him. What else can we do?”
*