Midnight Play

by Lisa Marie Perry

  “You know, Dex,” she said, “men have gotten a bad rap for waiting too long to call a woman.”

  “When we want to call a woman, we don’t wait. Is your offer still on the table?”

  “It is.”

  A pause. “You sound sad,” he said softly.

  “Ah. And you have experience with sad women?”

  “Plenty,” he said, not sounding proud at all. Just how many female hearts had he broken on his way to football glory? she wondered.

  “Good to know. But you called me for a reason, and it ought to have something to do with what I can do for your career. So, did you decide?” She sensed hesitation. “Okay, Dex. How about this? Let’s, for the rest of this call, put everything on the table. No holding back, no strategies. If you’re going to take me up on my offer, then you’ll need to trust me. And if I’m going to stick my neck out for you, I’ll need to trust you.”

  At least somewhat. I trust no man completely. Not anymore.

  Danica cleared her throat, forcing herself to focus on her project rather than whether he was still dressed in his suit…or dressed at all. “Change isn’t easy, Dex. You imagined putting on a red-and-silver uniform this season, eventually retiring as a Slayer and making yourself a legend. But just because you want to be safe and settled somewhere doesn’t mean that’s how things are going to be.”

  “Safe and settled? Are we still talking about me, or the bridesmaid who ducked for cover when a bouquet was about to land in her hands? I saw you. I heard what your friend said to you earlier.”

  “I’m divorced. It’s an adjustment. But what in life stands still, anyway?” If she couldn’t keep the quaver out of her voice, she’d have to end the call.

  She didn’t want to do that. It was ridiculously late, she was tired and frustrated with the world, but she didn’t want to lose this connection. “Meanwhile, you didn’t seem to mind that your ex found somebody.”

  “Samantha and I never loved each other, or anyone else.”

  “Must feel nice, to spare yourself that kind of hell.”

  “You say nice. Others say empty.”

  Danica fell silent, and was still considering this when he said, “I don’t know how to trust that somebody else has my back. Going into this, please don’t expect me to.”

  “Then you’ll do it?”

  “I want to play this season. If you can make it happen, then the answer’s yes.”

  Victory! “We’ll get started ASAP. No time to waste. But there’re some rules. Rule number one—no pursuing a gig with the Slayers. Rule two—no going behind my back. Rule three is the most important. No more of that ‘distract her with sex’ stuff.”

  “Distract?”

  “You look at me, and I get hot. When you touched me, I didn’t want you to stop. I forget who I am, forget what makes sense.” Her fingers moved to the nape of her neck, to where she thought she could still feel the press of his mouth. If she continued in this direction, they’d be in phonesex territory. “It’s pointless to build each other up if we won’t do anything about it. Which we won’t. This needs to be a professional relationship. Sex would only be trouble.”

  “I can’t figure you out.”

  “Because I don’t want to be figured out. When I do, I’ll send a mass email.”

  “Go ahead. Make the rules, Danica.” His pitch lowered; her blood rushed. “But I’ve got a habit of breaking rules. Just remember that.”

  *

  Call of duty. It was the only explanation Marion Reeves could assign to what he was doing. Patrolling the hushed street, he circled twice in his vintage Oldsmobile before idling in front of his ex-wife’s house longer than what was necessary—or sane, if he was going to be real about it. Performing a visual sweep of what could be seen of the three-storied house beyond its privacy gates, for twenty minutes—no, thirty now, his Rolex enlightened him—was unforgivable. At least, that’s how Danica might call it if she got the impulse to walk out her front gate and found him stationed on the street. She wasn’t in danger, was involved in nothing that would warrant anyone’s surveillance.

  The way she’d see it, there was no logical reason for the man who’d married her, then slept his way into a divorce that had been more than fair considering what she could’ve walked away with, to take up so much space in her life. Guilt was in control; he was simply a vessel. It clawed at his insides, sickened his heart, punished him for starting up a life that didn’t include her.

  What did it matter that when they’d gotten together, he and Danica had been nothing more than children in love with the bragging rights that came with being married and responsible for uniting two strong, respectable families? She’d believed in the dream up until the night he’d had to wake her up. Honesty, coming clean, was supposed to be a humane end to the suffering.

  All it did was crush the heart of the woman who’d stuck by him through college and careers and red-carpet fame. And since he’d been the cause of it, it was up to him to fix the mess he’d made.

  Somehow. Dragging his gaze across the top of the house again, noting that there were still lights on and figuring she was drenching herself with work, he exhaled. Divorced for a year, and still he wasn’t free. He’d thought that he couldn’t be with her. Damn, he couldn’t be without her, either. But she didn’t want him. She’d been insisting that for months, pushing him away, but now he accepted it as true. The difference shone in her eyes. Danica was an expert at disguise when it suited her purposes, but he’d known her intimately for so long that he could always find the truth in her eyes.

  She was longing for someone else.

  He tried not to let that suspicion bother him. But every time he got close to letting himself forget how he’d hurt her, or think that it was safe to move on, he’d be reminded that he had a duty to watch over the woman he’d married.

  Marion aimed a vicious glare at his phone as it vibrated on the dash. “Not now. Don’t call me again tonight,” he growled to the caller. Stabbing the power button, he tossed the phone into a cup holder, stomped the accelerator and jetted down the street.

  Danica would rush to the front windows, and stare through the darkness for the source of the noise. But he’d be long gone.

  Chapter 7

  Checkmate. Danica had wanted to say the word to her father since before she’d stopped believing in Santa Claus. Her mother wasn’t a worthy opponent at chess; Danica had defeated her at age nine and soon lost interest in challenging her. Tem didn’t seem to mind, as she’d preferred playing pool since her beauty-pageant years. Over twenty years and hundreds of matchups later, Marshall was still the chess champion of the Blue household. He held back his superb skill for no one. While her sisters weren’t as interested, Danica was like Captain Ahab hunting Moby Dick. She couldn’t let it go.

  To her, the relentless ache to be victorious was about more than chess. With each loss, Danica was reminded that she could be predicted, outsmarted…bested. Winning would be a rite of passage, proof that she was mentally strong enough to do what neither of her sisters was capable of—beating Marshall.

  Danica shifted in the Gothic striped visitor’s chair that she’d pushed up to her desk, second-guessing her move as she looked across the antique chessboard to her father. You’d think by now she would’ve figured out how to read him. But no. Marshall was relaxed, his jacket over the wide back of her executive chair, his skin glowing a dark sienna as he sat behind her desk with that same hard-eyed, frowning expression that intimidated strangers and loved ones alike.

  He looked bored as hell.

  Today, Marshall and Tem had called a press conference in the aftermath of their starting QB’s being pulled late in Sunday’s game. Their head coach, Kip Claussen, had shown common sense in sitting out Brock Corday, who’d aggravated the rotator-cuff injury he’d suffered during this season’s training camp. As Danica had gathered from reports and the films, Brock had had nothing more to give in the game and would be better off rested and then prepped for the next game.
Their second-string backup had performed well enough to lead the Slayers to a win—and that’s what mattered.

  The media weren’t easy to pacify and were hungry for details about the currently undefeated team’s stability. Inviting them for a midweek Q&A at the stadium had been Martha’s suggestion—which had, as was typically the case, been batted away. Then, as an afterthought, Marshall and Tem had reconsidered and given her mere hours to prep the staff and organize the chat. She’d pulled it off, though not without first throwing a few things in her office, then recruiting Danica and a janitor to clear away the shattered glass.

  A pre–press conference chess match had been Marshall’s idea—something to occupy his idle time until he, Tem and Danica would join the head coach and their starting quarterback in the pressroom.

  As with every match with Marshall Blue as the opponent, Danica felt it was less of a game and more of a test.

  Tem swept into the office, all Chanel No. 5 and Diane von Furstenberg, holding an amber vase. Placing it on a shelf, she then buzzed about the room, rearranging knickknacks. “Danica, won’t you let your mother redecorate this place? I feel the need to say a prayer before I come in here.” She made a show of poking a moon lamp shade to see if it would sprout fangs and snap. “I do love this picture, though.”

  Danica observed her mother trace the frame of the coloring-book art she’d held on to for years. Danica’s crayon strokes were neat, careful. Charlotte’s were heavy-handed and sloppily outside the lines. Martha’s were off the page.

  Tem turned away from the art, and her gaze stalled on her daughter’s crossed legs. “Marshall, did I ever wear leather pants with zippers up the ankles? Or a blouse that leaves so little to the imagination?”

  “No,” Marshall answered, prying his attention from the chessboard to smile slowly at Tem, “but it’s not too late to start.”

  The idea of classic, couture Tem rocking skyscraper stilettos, leather pants and a sleeveless button-down made Danica giggle. The in-your-face getup was for the late night of barhopping she’d promised her assistant, Lilith. But after work and before bar stop number one was the private get-together she’d been looking forward to all day. She’d stayed up to much too long talking to Dex on the phone after the reception, but somehow, in those quiet predawn hours, it hadn’t mattered.

  “Who’s the leather for?” Marshall asked. “The press?”

  Tem moved so light-footedly that she practically floated across the room to hover over his shoulder. Without even thinking, Marshall brought his hand up to clasp her arm lovingly. “Or a date, Danni? I heard that you had no escort to Veda’s wedding.”

  “Who told you that?”

  Marshall made a move. “Checkmate.”

  “Marshall, you shouldn’t annihilate your girls in chess,” his wife advised. “It’s not good for their self-confidence.”

  “I certainly don’t want him to let me win, Ma.”

  “About your leather pants…”

  Danica smothered the urge to roll her eyes. “I dress for no one’s satisfaction but my own these days. I’m going clubbing with Lilith. We’re meeting up at the Marquee at midnight. But before then, I’m meeting Dex Harper.”

  “Harper? Is this about the QB position?” Marshall demanded. “Corday sits out the fourth, we call a press conference and now Harper wants in with the GM?”

  “No.” She helped put away the chessboard because it gave her a fantastic excuse to avoid eye contact.

  “Then, what could he possibly want with you?” Tem asked.

  Well, damn. Obviously the woman who couldn’t keep her husband satisfied couldn’t hook a pro-football playboy, right? Marion had women accosting him with seduction in mind on a daily basis. Dex wasn’t any different, unless every one of the paparazzi’s photos showing him with a barrage of women was a trick of Photoshop.

  “It’s what I want with him,” Danica said brightly. “I think he’s being truthful about what went down with Alessandro Franco and the team. The man got screwed, he wants to play and he needs a push in the right direction. I’m going to help him look good for another team. Free advice for him. A can’t-miss project for me.”

  “Dex has been clear about getting back what he says was taken from him,” Tem said. “You know what he wants from us. You also know what we want from him. The names—”

  “Ma. Pop. I’m not asking him for names. We should start interviewing all of last season’s Slayers again. I’m talking about interrogating. Grilling. Because we’re not using Dex to sift through our roster.” At Tem’s series of blinks, and Marshall’s twitch of a frown, she softened her approach. “We wouldn’t want outsiders to get the impression we need someone no longer affiliated with our franchise to help us manage it. It’ll show shallow faith in our staff and in your competence.”

  This was met with nods and murmurs of agreement. And back on their good side, she was. Close call. Thankfully she’d figured out by now how to push back without them quite realizing it. While everything seemed to be changing around Danica, the one constant she clung to was her relationship with her parents. She would never jeopardize one of the few things in her universe that still made sense.

  “The trade deadline is right on our asses,” her father said. “No time to beat around the bush with last season’s men. Get Tem the contracts of each player by tomorrow start of day, Danica. The three of us will make some decisions in the p.m.”

  Which meant tonight’s barhopping would be cut short if Danica intended to sleep before gathering the material and delivering it to her employers. “Yes, sir. Anything else?”

  “Get it across to Harper that he won’t have his hand on any part of this organization.”

  About that. He’s already had his hand on me, but neither of you would believe me if I told you. Keeping that snarky nibble to herself, Danica made a grab for her purse as two firm raps sounded at the door.

  She swiveled toward it, grateful for the interruption. Opening the door, she met Kip Claussen with a benign, reveal-nothing smile. Working closely with him, she knew more about the head coach than she knew about any of her nonfamily colleagues. The consequence of that was on the flip side, Kip knew a great deal about her, too, so throwing him off seeing what she didn’t want him to was that much more difficult.

  Fresh from a practice, he was all hard-nosed coach in jeans, a team-issue sweatshirt, a ball cap and possibly the tenth pair of designer sunglasses she’d seen him wear since first meeting him months ago. The man was notorious for taking out his frustration on his eyewear. “Got a minute, Danica?”

  “For you? Always.” Danica snagged the opportunity to escape Marshall and Tem’s drill-sergeant approach to management.

  Kip wasted not a moment as they took to the hallway that was peppered with business-casual front-office staff, IT experts in graphic tees and frayed jeans with ID tags dangling from neon-colored lanyards, and catering staff in snazzy jackets decorated with the Slayers Club Lounge logo. “The passing game was shit today.”

  Not what Danica wanted to hear. “Give me the injury update. What do Whittaker and the other trainers advise?”

  Pulling off the cap and dragging a hand carelessly through his short golden hair, Kip grimaced. “Brock Corday’s iced and wrapped. He won’t be at the press conference. Rest today. Light on practice tomorrow.”

  At the elevators she punched the down button. “And Sunday? Can he be relied on to start?”

  “He’s probable. If his form and accuracy straighten out in tomorrow’s practice, then yes, he’ll start. It’s a slight aggravation, Danica. Not nearly as severe as the original injury. Still, Corday wants more strength than he has, and if he pushes himself too damn far, he’s going to go from starting to warming a bench. Marshall, Tem and I discussed this already, but I want to stress to you that it’d be a good idea to give our second and third guys more snaps.”

  There was no other feasible option if Brock Corday couldn’t play. The Slayers had spent economically, considering the names the
y’d acquired. A rising star like Corday, not to mention highly sought-after draft picks, hadn’t been cheap. Danica’s concentration was split between the ball club’s budget, contract clauses and acquisitions as she preceded Kip into the pressroom. Taking a seat at the table, she closed her hand over the mic in front of her and meaningfully raised an eyebrow at the head coach. Today’s developments would not be made public.

  The live broadcast began once Marshall and Tem got seated onstage. As at the start of every press conference, they both sized up the gathering of columnists, reporters and photographers, and reminded Danica of a king and queen observing their subjects. Would that make her a princess or a lady-in-waiting?

  A sportswriter from the Las Vegas Sun directed his question to Marshall. “Brock Corday was benched in the fourth. What’s the likelihood that he’ll play Sunday?”

  “He’ll play.” Marshall’s imposing stature and the buoyancy in his voice lent Danica comfort. Her whole life, he’d slain her every dragon and had been the one to emphasize the importance of success. Anything she wanted could be hers if she found the right way to go after it. She believed it, believed in everything he and her mother preached. If he was confident that Corday would play, then her worries stopped there.

  “It’s a preseason injury that’s still healing,” her father was reiterating. “For optimum results, and for the longevity of Corday’s career, he’ll rest when he needs to. Twenty–ten score. I think we can all agree that Cruz Shankman tied up the game nicely. Next.” Marshall jabbed a finger toward a news reporter at the far left of the room.

  “Question for the general manager.”

  Danica sent the reporter a coy grin. He faltered for a moment, backlit by the flashes of cameras, but that fleeting hesitation was all she needed to know she could handle whatever he dished out.

  “How satisfied are you with TreShawn Dibbs?” the reporter asked, referring to the kicker Danica had hired in spite of his checkered past and the firestorm of talk about his prior experiences with performance-enhancement substances.