by Katy Kaylee
I thought I’d taken on the client of my career when I decided to revamp Ryder’s image, but this situation would test everything I knew about PR, and my ability to control the press. It would be my biggest challenge to date because not only was Ryder’s reputation at stake but mine too.
16
Ryder
When she first told me she was pregnant, my heart stopped and I couldn’t breathe. That was the type of news that I’d long dreaded hearing from a woman. But almost immediately, there was a sense of calm. My fears about an unplanned pregnancy had always been around women wanting to trap me. But Katie wasn’t a random hook up or a friend with benefits. She was a woman I cared for. Having a baby with her gave me a sense of peace.
For a moment, my world teetered on perfect. Katie was a woman that I craved who also centered and grounded me. And now we were having a baby. I felt like Superman. Not in a virile caveman way, but like I’d done something really stupendous. Being revered for throwing a ball didn’t make me a good person. But creating life with the woman I cared for; that felt like a fucking miracle.
Then, like Katie always did, she started tossing out the obstacles and challenges. It would look bad because we weren’t married. To my mind, there was an easy solution. The answer was to get married. The idea was more than appealing to me. For a moment, I thought I’d have it all by sunrise tomorrow; a great career, a smart, beautiful wife, and a baby on the way.
But then she popped that dream bubble by saying it would still look bad PR-wise. So what? Why did the whole world have to revolve around what the public would think? I wouldn’t be the first footballer to get a woman pregnant. Hell, Brady left his pregnant girlfriend for another woman, now wife, and he survived. He even has endorsements.
What it really came down to though was that she didn’t want to get married. Would I be proposing right now if not for a baby? No. But that wasn’t because I couldn’t see my future with Katie, because I could. The truth was, the barrier between us was what happened with Danny. But now, a baby changed everything. Except for Katie. I couldn’t decide if she just didn’t care for me as much as I did for her. Or maybe it was because she still didn’t trust me. And that irked me. What did I have to do to prove I wasn’t the man Danny made me out to be?
I wanted to be there for her and the baby, but as we stood out on the terrace, the idea that she didn’t want to marry me because she found me lacking started to fester. Sure, she housed it in bad PR or wanting to get married for marriage’s sake, but through our entire relationship, she’d said and done things that indicated I wasn’t quite up to standard. The past with Danny continued to give her doubts about me.
“Do you think there will ever be a time that you trust me?”
She looked up at me. “Why would you say that?”
“Because I don’t think you do. I think Danny and Phoebe are still between us and always will be .”
She flinched and her reaction ticked up my anger. I realized she was less worried about my image and more concerned about how Danny and her family would react to her being pregnant by me.
I laughed derisively. “What is Danny going to say when he learns you’ve been sleeping with me? That I’ve knocked you up?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t say it like that.”
“Why not? That’s what it is. You said so yourself. That’s how the world will see it because Ryder Malloy is only capable of doing things backward or wrong.”
She pursed her lips in annoyance at me. “Ryder, don’t start feeling sorry for yourself.”
Her words cut my heart in two. “Says the woman who never thinks about the man I am. It’s only ever about the man the world sees.” Pissed because she was partly right, I was being a pussy, and partly because she could never treat me like a regular man, I walked into the house.
She followed me. “I do see you, Ryder. But you hired me—”
“Not to sleep with me or have my baby. That’s completely separate, Katie and the fact that you can’t separate the two is pissing me off.”
“I can separate the two, but that doesn’t mean we can ignore how this will impact your marketability.”
God this woman was maddening. “Fuck it. Fuck it all, Katie. If people are going to hold it against me that I made love to a woman I care about and made a baby, then fuck them all. You can’t marry me because it will be bad for PR. What if there was no baby, and I asked you to move in with me or marry me, would that decision be made based on public opinion too? Will you take a poll? Do you think Ryder Malloy is marriage material? Choose A for yes, B for no.”
She simply stared at me, her mouth agape.
I sneered back at her. “I guess that’s B for no.”
She found her voice. “Maybe I should go.”
“Maybe you should.”
She walked to the door, but before she left, I called after her. “I don’t know what will happen with us, Katie, but I promise you, I’m going to be a father to that baby. Be sure to put that in your PR calculations.”
I thought I saw tears in her eyes, but I didn’t want to be swayed by them, so I turned away. When the door shut, I found a bottle of twelve-year-old whiskey and drank. I tried not to think about Katie and that my relationship with her was probably done, instead I focused on my anger that she’d turn something that could have been so wonderful into something sordid and bad for my image.
I may not be the best father in the world, but I’d be a helluva lot better than my old man, and nothing could stop me from that. Not negative public opinion and definitely not Katie.
The next morning, feeling hungover, I worked out, and then I contacted my lawyer to get information on how to change my will and plan to care of Katie and the baby. Whether or not she and I stayed together, I’d do what was best for my child.
It wasn’t an easy task since I had to keep the purpose of my questions a secret. I told him it was part of my plan to change my life and image, and since I was ready to find a woman and settle down, I needed to know the legal and financial ramifications of that. Hopefully, he bought it.
After last night, settling down probably wasn’t in the cards, at least not with Katie, but I meant what I’d told her. I was going to be present and loving in my child’s life.
Once I had my notes, I organized my thoughts and made a plan for how I’d take care of them. Then I drove up to Los Angeles to Katie’s office. She was going to know just how serious I was about being involved with the baby in case she had some notion that she could raise it on her own. I didn’t think she was the type of person who would keep me from my child, but then again, I hadn’t thought she was a person who’d put public perception over personal happiness either.
“Hey Malloy,” another of Katie’s colleagues named Alan called to me. “How’s the shoulder?”
“It’s throwing like a rocket.” I tried to smile, but chances were it looked like a grimace as I headed to Katie’s office.
He laughed. “Good. I think I’ll be heading to the Super Bowl this year unless you get a big endorsement.”
Huh? “Okay.”
He cocked his head. “Kate didn’t tell you? We’ve got a wager. You get a big deal, I pay for the Super Bowl tickets. If not, she pays. I’ll admit, she’s got you looking better than you were, but I still don’t hear any companies calling. I’d figure she’d told you… you know to motivate you.”
I wasn’t just a job but a bet? My heart dropped like a lead to the pit of my stomach. No wonder she was so concerned about the baby and my image. She was worried about losing a bet. “Katie in?”
“I think so.”
I wanted to barge in, but knowing I needed to keep my cool, I knocked, and when I heard the “come in” I opened the door. Yesterday, I’d have locked it, and then given her a long kiss. Today, I shut it but didn’t lock it. I strode to her desk and tossed the envelope on it.
“What’s this?” She looked at the envelope and then me.
“It’s plans to take care of you and baby.”
I worked to keep my voice professional considering in the end, that’s what our relationship was. PR trumped everything according to Katie.
Her eyes narrowed. “You don’t think I can take care of myself and a child?”
What the fuck? “I told you, Katie, I’m not going to be left out of this.”
“I have a good job, with health insurance. I don’t need your money.”
I jerked back as I realized that she didn’t just not trust me, but also that she intended to raise our child on her own. That she didn’t trust me to be a good father.
Giving up on trying to be professional, I glared down at her. “I wonder if the reason my image isn’t doing better is because you don’t believe a thing you’ve been telling the world about me. It’s going to make it hard for you to win your Super Bowl bet.”
Her breath hitched. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, you can’t make me look good when you still think I’m a piece of trash punk who betrayed your brother.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re going to sing that old song again, Ryder? For a big strong man, you sure have weak self-esteem. Not everything is a slight against your character.”
I leaned over her desk toward her. “Tell me I’m wrong. Tell me that you don’t think I’m unworthy or that a part of you still thinks I fucked Phoebe? You believe lies because that’s all you deal in. All this PR shit is just lies.”
She stood and looked me in the eyes. “And what is the truth, Ryder? The truth is that you don’t want the world to see you as anything but a trash punk.”
Blood roared to my brain at her words. I leaned over her desk and to her credit, she didn’t flinch. Good, because I had a hard truth for her too. “The truth is, Katie, you’re no different from Danny. All he believes in are lies too.” Having had enough, I walked out.
17
Katie
When the door shut behind Ryder, I stood behind my desk, not sure what to think or feel. I was trying not to feel guilty. He was doing the right thing for me and the baby. Why was I so resentful of that? Initially, it felt like he thought I couldn’t take care of us, but he had every right to make arrangements. This was his child too.
His comment about Danny hurt, and I had to admit, I didn’t know what to believe about Danny. Since our reunion, that was the one thing we’d never talked about and it was the one thing that stood between us. Great sex or not, until we dealt with what happened four years ago, we’d never have a chance. If there was going to be a chance. After last night, and again today, it seemed unlikely. Especially now that he knew about the bet. It seemed like a harmless wager, especially since I made it when I still hated Ryder. But the truth was, I’d be hurt too if someone had put a wager on me. I was turning out to be the bad guy on all fronts. Still, while Ryder made some good points, he still stormed off. That always seemed to be his MO when things got hard. He left after the incident with Danny. He’d stormed off countless times when angry with me.
I dropped into my chair, trying to wrap my head around all the craziness in my life. My computer dinged with an alert and I forced myself to get back to work. I turned to my computer and saw the notification was about a new article posted about Ryder. Taking a breath to steel myself against something negative about him, I clicked the link.
Ryder Malloy’s Secret Life
Oh shit. That couldn’t be good. I read the opening bit that talked about his childhood in Missouri.
The rumor is that Ryder’s mother put him on the bus on his first day of kindergarten and then left the family, never to be seen or heard from again. His father stuck around, but it’s questionable if that was a good thing. He was an alcoholic who abused Ryder until he was big enough to defend himself. There’s a story told by regulars in his father’s watering hole, a seedy bar on the outskirts of town, that a seventeen-year-old Ryder, came down to escort his drunken father home after a call from the barkeep. While there, his father was hassling a waitress, and in response, Ryder laid his father flat with one right hook.
None of this was new to me, and yet as I read it, I began to see Ryder with new eyes. His mother left and his father didn’t care about him, which made it easy to understand why he could never see his own worth. And apparently, his penchant for punching assholes started when he was in high school.
Was he right that I had a bias against him that made it hard for people to see the real him? Or that I was trying to sell a lie about him? I didn’t think so. I had plenty of ideas that would have helped, but he’d been too pig-headed to do them out of some sense that it would exploit others.
The article went on to outline all the good things he’d done that he never wanted anyone to know about. The visits to the vet community where he played football with the kids and hung out with the residents. The money he sent to support children’s causes, especially child abuse prevention. There was even a mention of money he sent back to Missouri to help support football camps for at-risk children, but only if they also let girls play.
There were no quotes or pictures of Ryder, which suggested he didn’t take part in the article. But when I got to the end of the article, it appeared the source was his uncle. I smiled, that is until I worried that Ryder would think I put his uncle up to it. Ah well. There was nothing I could do, except be happy that someone was sharing things about Ryder that the public didn’t know.
It also meant I owed him an apology. While I was still torn about what happened with Danny, I did know that Ryder would be an attentive and caring father. The fact that he believed that I didn’t think he was good enough bothered me. He was frustrating and stubborn, and I hated how he’d always walk off instead of finishing a fight. But he cared about people and there was no doubt he wanted to be in this baby’s life.
I grabbed my purse and headed out of the office.
“Did you see the piece about Ryder online?” Alan asked as I headed toward the door.
“I did.”
“How come you don’t have more on all that? I might have to take back my bet if pictures leak with him playing football with veterans’ kids.”
“Ryder doesn’t like living in the public.”
Alan laughed. “How the hell does he expect you to fix his rep if he’s not in the public?”
I shrugged, but inside I said, “It starts with my believing in him more.” What I said to him was, “The next time we have a bet, keep it to yourself.”
I drove south, the normal two-hour drive reached nearly three because of the afternoon traffic. When I arrived at Ryder’s house, I knocked on the door prepared to hash it out with him, once and for all.
He answered sporting the same scowl he’d worn when he left. “I’m not in the mood now, Katie.”
“Too bad.” I pushed past him into his living area. “Did you see the piece online about you?”
He snorted derisively. “I should have guessed that’s why you were here. I was ready to give you a piece of my mind, but apparently my uncle did that on his own.”
I ignored his barb about why I was there. I knew he believed I put PR above everything else, but dammit, he’d hired me to improve his image. “I had nothing to do with it, but it’s good Ryder.”
“It’s going to make people feel sorry for me.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you, Ryder and people won’t either. They’ll admire your ability to overcome a difficult childhood. It will inspire them.” I could see in his eyes he didn’t believe it. “Why I came here, though, is to apologize. I shouldn’t have gotten upset about you wanting to take care of the baby. Of course, you’ll want to do that. You’re the father.”
His expression suggested he wasn’t sure if he could trust what I was saying. “Then why did you?”
I sighed. “I resented you not thinking I could do it on my own.”
“I don’t think you can’t do it—”
“I know. That’s just how I took it. I’m sorry.”
The tension in his jaw lessened, but we were a long way from okay.
; “I also believe you’re a good man. I get annoyed at how hard you make my job and how you often perceive my actions as meaning I think you’re less than. I don’t think that Ryder. Truth be known, I’ve admired you since I was twelve years old.”
“Twelve?”
I nodded. “That was when I first started noticing boys. Or I should say, boy, because no one has ever compared to you.” I gave a wan smile. “You know it’s true. You were my first and so far, my only.”
He closed his eyes, and all the rest of the tension drained. When he opened them, his facial features were soft and gentle. “I’m sorry too. I know I’m soft skinned. And I shouldn’t have said all that about you dealing in lies. You’re important to me, Katie. You and the baby.”
I stepped toward him, hoping we were close to a truce. “You’re important to me too.” I pressed my hand to his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart. “And about the bet… I made that when Alan was baiting me.”
“I figured it wasn’t that important to you otherwise you’d have ignored my input and shoved me in front of cute puppies or children or something.”
Relief washed through me. “I wouldn’t mind beating him, but it’s not my focus.”
He let out a breath and then took the final step of wrapping his arms around me. There was still no talk about Danny and four years ago, but I knew, as he probably did, there was no way to go there without disrupting everything. As it was, our relationship was a roller coaster ride of conflict and bliss. We fought, we made up.
Knowing we might venture back into the fighting before we fully made up, I said, “You do have a secret life.”
His brows pulled together. “What do you mean?”
“You accused me dealing in lies, but you’ve been selling a lie too. The women and fighting—”
“Those weren’t lies per se.”
“But they’re not the truth either. You’re okay with that persona, but don’t want people to know the other side of you. You keep it a secret.”