by Kata Čuić
But me? I’m just the guy who busted my ass to get where I am today. I don’t come from football stock. I don’t sleep around. I play the game I love, and I’m sure as hell grateful for the obscene paycheck that allows me to provide for my family.
I can’t screw up this chance before my body gives out, but I don’t want to give up my freedom and privacy either.
“Do you, uh… Am I supposed to make a statement about these shots to clear up any misunderstandings?”
“No,” Tori answers, her gaze downcast and her shoulders slumped. “We’re going to run with them.”
Maybe I should confess my concussion diagnosis to the team docs because nothing this woman says to me today makes any sense. “I don’t understand. We’re running with what, exactly?”
“I’m your distraction against any bad press for this season,” she repeats slowly. “There aren’t too many of these photos floating around the internet, but management wants to blow on these embers until they’re flames elevating you to the next level of celebrity status.”
Oh, hell no.
I let myself whack off to fantasies of Tori’s naked body exactly once a week, and that’s it. I’ve given in enough. There’s no way I can afford to have her temptation shoved in my face for the entire season. I’ll never make it.
“Absolutely not.” I put the pictures back in their folder, crushing them a bit for good measure. “If you’re telling me we’re supposed to fake a relationship just to give the fans something to talk about that isn’t related to my stats, then no way. I watched football slowly crush my best friend for years. I won’t let my sisters anywhere near my teammates. I’m never going to willingly sign you up for this shit.”
Tori nods slowly, but she still won’t meet my gaze. “You have every right to tell management you don’t want me to be your fake girlfriend.”
“Okay.” I stand up so fast the chair goes rolling back into the wall behind me. “Who do I need to talk to?”
She sticks her tongue in her cheek and finally makes direct eye contact. “The CEO of the Albany Wolves.”
“I’m going to miss you so much, sweetie,” Kaylie croons as she watches me shut down my computer for the last time. Adding insult to injury, she’s been assigned to escort me from the building after ensuring I don’t steal any confidential team documents.
“No, you’re not.”
She scoffs. “Honestly, Tori. You were an intern. It’s not like you’ve ever been a permanent part of the team. You weren’t even happy about being signed onto another season, and you’re always going on and on about how you can’t wait to get started on your master’s degree. Well, now you can! I’m happy for you that you finally get to move on with your life and do whatever you want!”
She’s not wrong. Except that I’m going to have to find another job until I can apply for a program next year. All the spots are already full for the upcoming academic calendar. Basically getting fired from this internship means I can’t use it on my resume. No one here would give me a glowing recommendation either. I’m back to square one. The past year has been a waste after all. I cringe just thinking about my brothers saying I told you so when I return home with my tail tucked between my legs.
I take a deep breath and continue shoving the few personal mementos from my desk into a small cardboard box. At least I can leave with my head held high. I am not sleeping my way to the top, no sir.
I am going to miss my friend though. If I had any doubts about the nature of our relationship, Mike’s insistence he would not put me through anything he wouldn’t want for Evie or his sisters erased them.
A horrible, awful thought slinks into my brain. One I should have considered earlier in spite of being too shell shocked to absorb anything other than the impossible directive assigned to me.
“Who’s taking over Mike’s PR now?”
Kaylie grins.
My stomach drops.
“You have to be careful with him,” I warn her. “He doesn’t want his family involved, and you need to respect that. He values his privacy and that of his friends. If you don’t prove to him that he can trust you, you’re not going to get anywhere, no matter what top-tier media campaign David has planned. He’s sensitive, Kaylie. He’s a good man. Don’t think of him like a big, bad professional football player. He’s more like…like…a teddy bear!”
She rolls her eyes. “If he wants to take his place at the top of the league, then he’s going to have to learn how to do what he’s told.”
“You’re not going to be his fake girlfriend, right?” My words speed up as panic freezes my veins. “Because that’s a horrible idea! If his fans think he’s in a relationship with me, then moving on to you is only going to be the wrong kind of press we want for him, right? Right? I mean, it’s not like David has a list of women waiting for him to run through like the kind of player we don’t want to market him as. We want him to make the team and the league look good, not bad. We don’t want him to seem like…like…well, like Alex Fossoway!”
Kaylie gapes at me like she’s dealing with a raving lunatic. “You’re really putting a lot of thought into this considering you never wanted this assignment.”
David appears at Kaylie’s side. “You put so much thought into last season’s assignment that you won another, and yet now you are giving up without a fight. Explain that to me, darling.”
“David!” I latch onto the lapels of his jacket. “Oh, thank God you’re here! You have to talk to Mr. Gallo. This is the wrong way to go with Mike’s career, and he wants no parts of it. Kaylie can’t be his fake girlfriend!”
David disengages my hands from his likely expensive jacket the way one would pick up a dead bug to dispose of. “Unlike you and Mr. Mitchell, the rest of us realize we do what the front offices demand if we want to be paid. However much I agree with your sentiments, I do not question Mr. Gallo’s direct orders.”
So, no one in this department actually cares what Mike wants. “He’ll never agree to it.”
David tsks. “He will. He doesn’t strike me as the careless type of player who would risk jeopardizing his contract or his playing time. It might be uncomfortable at first, but he’ll get used to the act. It only has to be public enough to generate some interesting publicity.”
I can’t believe my ears. I always thought football players were treated like gods who could do whatever they wanted. Isn’t that why they tend to generate bad publicity? According to David, they’re more like slaves.
“What’s going on?”
I jump at the low voice behind me.
“Mr. Mitchell.” David smiles, but it’s full of pity. “We were just discussing you.”
“You’re leaving?”
I turn toward the accusation in Mike’s voice with my shoulders hitched up to my ears from guilt that’s only getting worse by the second. “Um…”
“Mike,” Kaylie croons, stepping up beside me with her hand extended. “I’m going to take over as your new PR rep. And…we have plenty to talk about.”
Mike’s gaze darts between me, Kaylie, David, and my empty desk with the single box on top. His eyes return to my face, a frown pulling down his mouth. “You’re being fired.”
David steps up, his voice soothing and meant to deescalate. “Miss Russo has elected to give a more senior member of our staff the chance to represent you the way you deserve.”
One of Mike’s big hands wraps around my waist, then he drags me toward him, leaning down so he’s staring directly into my eyes with a focus that sends shivers down my spine. “Peaches,” he whispers on a rumble. “Do you want this job?”
At first? No. Now? I can’t just throw him to the wolves, even though that’s the name of the team that’s forcing us to make this stupid choice. “Yes.”
The kiss that I never thought I’d experience again has nothing on this one.
“You’re mad.”
“I’m not mad! I’m thinking!”
Sure. That’s why she hasn’t said a word to me in hou
rs. The last time she was this silent for this long, she was nursing a severe hangover and clinging to a shit ton of morning-after embarrassment.
We’ve been sitting across from each other in my living room ever since I dragged her away from her office, so we could huddle over these new developments.
She’s on the couch. I’m in my favorite chair.
This living room is huge.
“Are you mad because I over-helped instead of supported, or are you mad because I kissed you?”
She glares at me. “So help me God, if you apologize for another kiss, I will actually let them have their way with you.”
I smother the grin threatening to erupt on my face. Thanks to her night of drunken blabbing, I already know exactly how she feels about the first kiss. It wasn’t too much of a gamble to assume she wouldn’t hate a second. I would never have done it otherwise.
A drunk woman’s striptease is a sober woman’s thoughts and all that.
“Okay, okay…” She rubs her forehead. She’s been doing that a lot today. “Tell me again what Mr. Gallo said when you refused the fake relationship thing.”
Alex tried to warn me about this before we got into our public blowout that brought Tori into my life. He flat-out told me our teams own us, and we have to lick whatever they tell us to if we want to stay in the game. I didn’t believe him.
Now? I almost want to call him up and apologize for being wrong. And thank him. Tori might be a beautiful distraction I can’t afford, but I can’t imagine my life without her either.
“Mr. Gallo said he understood my reservations, but he didn’t see the harm in me having a little fun and enjoying my down time in a way that would make me seem more interesting than a sack of potatoes.”
Tori narrows her eyes. “I can’t believe he said that to you!”
“I can’t believe you were almost fired for refusing to sleep your way to the top.”
That’s the other reason I rolled the dice and kissed her in front of her co-workers. She would rather lose a job she deserves than have it for the wrong reasons. I can’t just sit by and let that happen.
She finally opens her eyes to me even though her shoulders slump. That’s another pattern from today I hate to see. “Just because you point-blank told them you won’t work with anyone but me doesn’t mean Mr. Gallo is going to give me my job back. We’ll have to wait and see if David’s able to smooth things over.”
“He will. Mr. Gallo wants this to happen. Even though they’re willing to go against what I want, he’s not going to rock the boat any more than he has to. He also wants me to cooperate, not be a sack of potatoes.”
Finally, a smile breaks free on her face. I even get a little laugh out of her. “For the record, I don’t think you’re a sack of potatoes.”
“I know.” Her smile lets my own free. “You think I’m a stud who kisses better than any man in the universe.”
She falls back against the couch, all laughter evaporating. Her voice is a whisper against my skin. “I honestly figured after that horrible display, that was the main reason you didn’t want me to be your fake girlfriend. And heck…I couldn’t blame you. I still don’t understand why you’re going to bat for me like this. Kaylie would be much better at this job than I am.”
She’s not wrong, but for all the wrong reasons. “That’s what you’ve spent hours thinking about over there? Trying to figure out my motives?”
She nods.
“Are you worried I only want to keep you around to get you into bed? Because I’ve already seen you naked?”
She shakes her head so rapidly, her hair flies around like a whip to her face. A burst of peach darkens her cheeks.
I lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees. Apparently, I need to be even more crystal clear. “I already told you, and I wasn’t lying. That night actually made me trust you more, not less. What if that had been Kaylie assigned to accompany me to the wedding, huh? How do you think that would have played out if she had caught me with my dick in my hand?”
I wouldn’t have been beating off to fantasies of Tori’s co-worker, but that’s not the point.
Tori flattens her brow and does her best to glare at me, but she can’t quite pull it off. “Kaylie would never have gotten stupidly drunk to keep you out of trouble. She would have used…other methods.”
“Yeah, and it wouldn’t have worked,” I admit. “So, I probably would have gotten into a fight anyway, and then she would have used my definitely marketable material against me.”
I’m between a rock and a rapidly hardening place. I can’t trust anyone as much as Tori, but no one else would be this dangerous to my focus on my job either.
Tori’s lips twitch with a smile she tries so hard to hold back. She cuts a quick glance to my crotch before her cheeks really flame. “If she didn’t get as drunk as I did, then she wouldn’t have been in the same hotel room with you to…see you…anyway.”
“You just said she would have used other methods,” I argue. I can guess pretty easily what those other methods would be.
“You just said those other methods wouldn’t have worked.” Tori raises her eyebrows.
Well, shit. We’re at an impasse.
“Fine.” I lean back in my chair. “I did. That doesn’t mean I still don’t think you’re the best woman for this job. I don’t want to work with Kaylie. I don’t want to have to refuse her methods. We’re actually friends, and you’ve already done great work for me. I don’t see why we can’t keep this going as long as we need to—for both our jobs.”
Tori sighs. “Whether I actually sleep my way to the top or not, it’s going to look like it to the media. As soon as I found out they were planning to run with the fake relationship thing with or without me, I intended to find you and warn you. I don’t want to tarnish my career, but I can’t let them steer yours in a direction you don’t want either.”
This is exactly why I meant what I said when I told David I wouldn’t work with anyone but Tori. Sure, she knows some of my secrets, but after today, I’m willing to bet the rest of the PR department knows everything about six degrees of Mike Mitchell, too. If they know the worst of it, there’s no one I trust more than Tori not to use all my skeletons against me.
“Anyone in marketing is going to understand the situation you’ve been put in. You don’t have to worry about me overstepping your bounds, so just keep doing the great job you’ve been doing all along.”
I’m patting myself on the back for not letting my dick override my brain, but Tori winces.
“I have to…confess something to you.”
Every muscle in my body snaps to attention. Dick? What dick? She’s about to castrate me like she could have that night if I’d confessed I was jerking off over fantasies of her.
“There’s a very good chance Mr. Gallo won’t rehire me because…I’m just an intern.”
I breathe a sigh of relief.
“I lied to you when we first met, and I introduced myself as your assigned PR manager. I only have a bachelor’s degree in marketing and business. I wanted to take a year off before pursuing my master’s to gain some real-world experience. My father landed me this position, and I honestly have no idea how. I never even watched football before I got hired by the Wolves.” She takes a deep breath then expels it in a rush I feel all the way across the room. “After your fight with Alex, I was assigned to be your handler. I was told to look pretty and be a good distraction to keep you out of any more trouble.” She shakes her head and casts her gaze to her lap. “I wasn’t willing to sell myself for a position I didn’t even really want, and I let my ego get the better of me when I tried to take matters into my own hands by running the sort of media campaign you wanted last season instead of the smear campaign against Alex that the rest of the department was ready and waiting with. I did just barely good enough passing off my curated content as yours to convince Mr. Gallo that I was worth offering to pay for my master’s degree in exchange for me signing on for another season.”
“So, you’re still in the same position you didn’t want to be in.” Damn. And I thought I had it bad.
She lifts her eyes, which are full of tears. “Out of everything I just confessed to you, that’s what you’re zeroing in on? Trust is everything to you, and I lied! To your face!”
I don’t want to make her feel worse, but I kind of figured out most of her confession on my own. I might not be the same sort of star player as Rob and Alex, but I’ve been around my fair share of media specialists. Tori’s methods have never been as devious and complicated. Like the one we’re caught up in now anyway.
I abandon my comfy spot and cross the room to sit beside her, taking her hand in mine to show her I’m serious. If she wants an easy out, then I’ll give her one. Maybe she can save us both. “If you want to move on and get your master’s, then I’m behind you one hundred percent. If you want to do that while getting your real-world experience, then I’ll just hire you privately as my PR manager on the side. Most players do. It’s kind of weird that the team assigned me one, in-house. I might not be the kind of celebrity the team expects me to be, but I do know that much. It was my own stupid behavior that caused all this in the first place. We’ll do whatever you want to do, Peaches.”
There’s a fire burning in her warm brown eyes I’ve only seen hints of until now. “I want to prove them wrong. All of them. About both of us. You are going to be a bigger football celebrity than even Alex without giving up a single thing you hold dear. And I’m going to get you there. I’m not selling out; I’m doing my job.”
My dick really hates being referred to as a job. My brain says this won’t end well.