Page 221 of The Locker Room

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down for probably the only time Xander had seen her. Her makeup was

done, and she was finely dressed in a black pantsuit, but she was missing

her trademark earrings, and her mouth was tight and tense. Even Alicia,

it seemed, had fallen in love with his boy. “Now put it into gear,

Clifford, they don"t know when he"s coming out of surgery.”

“Surgery?” Xander asked, waiting for the details. When Cliff was

done giving them, Xander had to make him pull over to the side so he

could throw up.

The Locker Room 191

Alicia handed him a bottle of water wordlessly from the back when

he was done, and he rinsed and spit, and then came a little box of breath

mints. Cliff pulled the Lexus into traffic, and Xander looked behind him

gratefully.

Alicia gave a thin smile. “If it was Cliff, I"d need sedation.”

“Dammit, Cliff!” Xander started, but Alicia cut him off.

“Oh, honey—I figured it out a long time before Clifford did.

Nobody pines the way Chris was pining for just his „bro", right,

Clifford?”

“Right, honey,” Cliff said, so automatically that Xander felt a

surprised, rusty chuckle rattling his throat.

Alicia had been called a ball-buster by most of the NBA. People

said she was a bitch, and Clifford was P-Whipped, and her name was

used as a cautionary tale among players and fans alike when they were

warning against the wiles of the opposite sex.

But one look behind him and the note of tenderness in her voice as

she said, “I knew you"d agree, Cliff,” made Xander think that his buddy

was a lucky man.

THE family had made it there before him—Xander figured they would.

Penny had dragged Mandy along, and the two girls were clenching white

hands, as Jed and Andi sat together on a little couch in the private

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