Taking a Risk

by Jen Talty

  “I do.” Jessica smiled, then turned her attention to Lilliana, who seemed to force a smile. Jessica tried to use her eyes, shifting them toward Brad to coax Lilliana to ask him out, but by her tight lips, it didn’t seem like that would happen.

  Brad turned toward the door, then glanced over his shoulder. “So, how about we go have drinks or something tonight. We can laugh at the people either trying to pick someone up or out on their first awkward date.”

  “All of us?” Lilliana asked. Her face tightened even more.

  “Well, I suppose, but—”

  “I can’t go tonight.” Jessica didn’t think the invitation included her, so she did them both a solid and backed out gracefully.

  “Too bad.” Brad smiled. “How about you, Lilliana?”

  “Tonight?” Lilliana stood, setting the bag of chips on the desk. The lines in her crinkled forehead disappeared, as did the rigidity of her lips.

  Brad nodded. “Armory good for you? Say around seven?”

  “Perfect.” Lilliana swayed toward the door. “I best get back to my office.”

  Before Lilliana and Brad could get through the door, Nolan stepped in, pushing himself between the couple.

  “What the fuck is this?” He lifted up his phone in Brad’s face. “Did you take these?”

  “No.” Brad reached out to take the phone but retracted.

  “What is it?” Jessica wanted to tell Nolan to shut up, but she’d learned over the course of the last couple of years that when dealing with football players and the coaching staff, it was better to find out what got their tail in a ruffle.

  “It’s a picture of you and Nolan in the parking lot yesterday,” Brad said, shaking his head. “Another one of you, Nolan, and a little girl, and the last one is Nolan with the same little girl sporting a pink cast on her arm.”

  “What the hell? Posted somewhere?” She quickly pulled her laptop closer, pulling up all the social media feeds.

  “Everywhere, according to my sister who sent me the link.” Nolan inched closer to Brad. “If I find out you took these, I’m going to—”

  “Back off,” Jessica said as she scrolled through some of the feeds, glancing at the comments. “Brad wouldn’t do this.”

  “He’s the only one with a camera around here.” Nolan inched back a tad but still stood a little too close to Brad, who didn’t back down, but the fear of being pummeled was etched in his soft eyes.

  “I might have a camera, but I don’t post any of the pictures I take for the team. It’s in my contract. Team use only.”

  “Doesn’t mean you wouldn’t take something like that to sell for a quick buck.” Nolan’s face turned bright red.

  “Shut up, Nolan,” Jessica said, focusing on the negative comments and how to fix this preseason scandal. Two comments in the posts she’d read disturbed her the most.

  Is the man ashamed of his crippled child? #deadbeatdad

  He could have put her in that brace and broken her arm himself. #childbeater

  “Nolan, sit.” Jessica waved to the chair once occupied by Lilliana. “You other two, leave.”

  “He’s not leaving.” Nolan pointed to Brad. “Not until he can prove he didn’t take those pictures.”

  “He has nothing to prove.” Jessica tried to keep her voice calm, but inside her vocal cords shook. Her heart raced in one continuous beat. Half of her wanted to scream at Nolan that he’d brought this on himself. She understood wanting to protect his family, but keep a little girl tucked away in a glass bubble? That made him less than a man.

  “Maybe you told him to follow us. Take the pictures. Create a scandal to get more likes or press or whatever, and in the process tossed my family under the bus.”

  She sucked in a deep breath, letting it out slowly, counting to three because she’d never make it to ten. She waved Brad and Lilliana out of the room as she stood, closing the door behind them. “That was uncalled for and rude. I won’t be treated or talked to like that in my own office. Now, sit.”

  He inched forward, standing so close she could feel the rage pouring from his veins. “No thanks to you. I can’t believe you put my little girl right out there in the middle of my family dealing with my mother dying. This doesn’t just hurt the team, it affects my father, his practice, me, and my daughter. I’ve worked very hard to protect her, then you show up with your stupid little game, and now I’m being called a deadbeat and child abuser. Not to mention I could end up losing my job over all this.”

  “You’re upset. I get it.”

  “Upset?” He kicked the chair. “I’m fucking furious.”

  Oh, did she want to lay into him, but she decided to deal with the situation as it related to work, not how she wanted to call him a lying loser.

  She adjusted the chair, then stepped behind her desk. “I don’t care what you think, but I didn’t do anything.” She sat, staring at the computer screen. “You can take it out on me all day long, that’s fine, but we have three tasks to achieve before you walk out of this office and have to face the media.”

  He paced between the door and the chair, and it damn near drove her insane.

  “What three things?” he asked.

  “Come up with a team statement. Come up with a personal story that puts this in perspective.” She glanced over her laptop. “One that you can live with, protects your family, but more importantly, shows the real man that you are, not the rash judgments people are making.” She absolutely knew he didn’t lay a finger on his daughter, but the embarrassment part? Why else would he keep her a secret?

  She quickly sent an email to all the appropriate people within the organization, including the spokesperson, that she was aware of the situation and that Coach Greer was in her office. “We’ll have company in about twenty minutes, so let’s figure this out before they get here.”

  Nolan sat down, looking at his phone, deep lines forming on his forehead. Anger flared from his narrowed eyes.

  But she also saw raw pain.

  She shifted in her seat, watching the team social media feeds blow up and emails coming in from the organization. “The team has called a press conference for six. They will give a statement and need you to give one as well.”

  “Fucking clusterfuck,” Nolan muttered, then nodded.

  “I think the best way to handle the slanderous statement about you hurting your daughter is to deny it wholeheartedly since it’s not true and we can prove that. A short statement, direct and to the point. I’d go as far as to say that continued false attacks on your character could bring lawsuits. I can write it for you.”

  Again, Nolan nodded. His long fingers rubbed his temples. “I need to protect her from the public eye. She has a surgery scheduled in two months, and I don’t need a bunch of reporters hounding my family at the hospital.”

  Jessica swallowed, her fingers hovering over the keyboard. “I think you should also address Heather’s leg and what’s wrong.”

  “Absolutely not,” Nolan barked.

  “It will help make all this go away and show you in a more positive light if they know what you’ve been dealing with. Also, you might want to mention where Heather’s mother is.”

  Nolan stood and leaned over her desk, knuckles on the wood top, glowering. “I am not going to put my baby girl on display, nor will I discuss what happened to her mother. It’s private, not to mention painful.”

  Jessica understood Nolan’s need to exert his power and desire to protect what he holds dear, but his stubbornness was going to make things worse. She leaned back in her chair and stared into the deep-green eyes of a hurting man. “Like I said, the slanderous statements we can kill with the truth. But the fact that not a single person knew you had a daughter, who has a problem that no one knows about, makes you look like a man who’s ashamed of his daughter, and that is just as bad, if not worse in some ways. The press will have a field day with you about that forever.”

  “Is that what you believe? That I’m ashamed of my baby girl?” He leaned in c
loser. His nostrils flared. “Come on, Jessica. Tell me. No, I dare you to tell me.”

  She jutted her chin. “You want to play that game. Fine. I’d be lying if it didn’t cross my mind.” She pointed to her door. “And everyone else is out there thinking the same thing, wondering what other deep dark secrets Nolan Greer has. You want to shut this down and get the press off your ass? Then be a man and show them you’re only trying to protect your pride and joy.”

  He opened his mouth but then slammed it shut, holding her gaze.

  A long awkward moment followed.

  “Nolan,” she said softly. “Sit down. We’ve got a little bit of time, and I can push back the PR team and spokesperson for a little bit. Tell me about your daughter and why you felt it best for her to keep her hidden, and I’ll tell you what I think you should put out there so we can protect your reputation, career, the team’s, but also and more importantly, your daughter and family.”

  He closed his eyes, his chest rising and falling as he breathed so deeply it could be heard a mile away.

  “Heather’s mother died two years ago.” Nolan blinked, his eyes moist with tears. He turned, leaning against her desk, his back toward her.

  “I didn’t even know I was a father until she called me on her deathbed. We barely knew each other. Dated for all of two weeks, then never spoke to each other for nearly two years. I was stunned. Didn’t want to believe it, but every time I looked in Heather’s eyes, I felt the connection.”

  “Did you—”

  He raised his hand. “This is not an interview, so don’t interrupt me or ask a single question. I tell this my way.”

  “Understood.”

  “Gina, Heather’s mother, was a diabetic and having a child after having a kidney transplant is probably what killed her, a guilt I’ll carry for the rest of my life.”

  Jessica wanted to reach out and put her arms around Nolan. Hold him tight. But he’d probably fling her across the room, considering how harshly she, and the rest of the world, had judged him.

  “Heather had been born with a hip deformity that will probably never be completely corrected, but we’ve come a long way. When I first met her, she’d yet to have the first surgery because her mother had been so sick and had very little family. Heather could barely crawl at a year old, and without surgery, she’d probably never walk. Broke my heart, but before I took on the role of full-time dad, I needed to know for sure. We did all the paternity tests in a different state. I was living up north, and my career was iffy at best with the injury, so once her mother died and I knew she was mine, I moved back home. Around the same time, my mother was diagnosed. I didn’t tell the world because I didn’t want to make a spectacle of my kid or my mother’s illness. The news about my injury and retirement had been a media circus, and I wanted to quietly accept this job and have a fresh start.”

  He wiped his face with both hands before turning to face her. The contradiction of sadness and joy filled his eyes.

  “The press hounded me right after the injury, and they all thought I went underground, which I did, but for my daughter. I let everyone believe I couldn’t face my injury when in reality, I was trying to get to know my daughter. I never meant to keep her a secret. I’m certainly not ashamed of her, but I don’t talk about her because…” he paused, letting out a long breath.

  Jessica leaned forward, placing a trembling hand on his biceps, but he shrugged it off. Recoiling, she pushed herself farther from the desk, folding her arms.

  “When Heather first came into my life, she had no idea who I was. Do you have any idea how hard it is to deal with something like that? My daughter, who needed a complicated and dangerous surgery, and I was barely able to comfort her because she was having a hard time understanding I was her dad, and all she wanted was her mommy, who had just died.”

  Jessica found herself taking in short, tight breaths, fighting her own tears. She understood him and why he’d kept his private life so private. She’d probably do the same thing in his shoes.

  “I can’t imagine,” she whispered. “It’s been a rough couple of years for you, and I get it, I do, but now we have to deal with the problem, and I think I have the solution if you’re ready to hear it.” The words sounded crass, but he’d pushed her away when she offered support. What little she knew of the real Nolan Greer, she knew to back away when any part of his body had a smidgen of anger.

  He shook his head and chuckled, though it sounded more like sarcasm laced with a stick of dynamite. “Go ahead.”

  “We focus on the why. Simply stated: You didn’t think it would be good for your developing relationship with her, and you were concerned about her long-term recovery, and you didn’t want it done under the scrutiny of the public eye.”

  “When you put it that way, it doesn’t sound so bad.”

  Jessica heard footsteps coming down the hallway.

  “We’ll work with the team, write a statement that you can give. We can make it a no-questions press conference, and then you can go home.”

  “What about the images of us kissing? What do I say about that?”

  She swallowed her breath. While she didn’t like having her private life tossed under the bus, it wasn’t important in the grand scheme of things. “Nothing. No one cares. A few comments trying to say you care more about a blonde bimbo than your kid, but that thread is long dead.”

  “If I’m asked?”

  She shrugged. What was there to say? She certainly had a preference to how he handled it, though she would not tell him what to do. “Say whatever you want, but I doubt you’ll be asked. If you are, you don’t have to answer.”

  “I could tell them you basically assaulted me to make your ex jealous,” he said with a dark tone, the kind intended to hurt. “The one who cheated on his wife with you.”

  She forced herself to maintain eye contact, even though she wanted to lower her head in shame. “You could and there’d be nothing I could do about it since it’s a true statement. Go right ahead if you need to hurt me so badly.”

  “Maybe I should, so you know exactly how this feels.”

  6

  The only thing worse than a press conference was having a catheter pulled out by a twenty-something intern.

  Nolan looked around the crowd of people who’d gathered. Cameras clicked rapidly in the background. Reporters shouted questions at the team’s spokesperson, who chose to answer a few, then stepped away after introducing him.

  Nolan stepped to the podium with the well-written speech from a team of highly trained experts. He scanned the area outside of the main doors to the stadium, searching for Jessica. He found her sitting off to the side on a concrete step, laptop out, tapping away. He’d been amazed by how she could handle so many social media feeds at once and still make intelligent observations and conversation with all the team’s followers.

  But that didn’t change the fact that she’d judged him, and then after he poured his heart out, she went right into business mode.

  Clearing his throat, he glanced down at the paper.

  “It is sad that I have to stand up here and defend myself against accusations that come from speculation and gross neglect for finding the truth before turning a trip to the Urgent Care unit with my daughter, who fell in the backyard playing with her grandparents’ dog, into something it isn’t. To be very clear, I will take legal action if this continues. The facts have been presented on what happened, and it will end there.”

  He took a deep breath, glancing up at the reporters with their microphones. Flashes of light hit his eyes, making him blink. He fisted the paper he’d been reading from. The next part he had to do his way. Didn’t matter how great the speech was, if he was ever going to get the press to see him as a loving father instead of man with a temper, the words would have to come from his heart.

  “I’m going to go off-script here.” He held up the wadded piece of paper. “The words on this page would do well enough to explain the situation with my daughter, but they aren’t my
words.”

  He swallowed. What the hell was he doing?

  “I’m not ashamed of my beautiful little girl. She’s the best thing that has ever happened to me, and I’d walk away from all this if I thought it was the right thing for her.” He took a few deep breaths. Having tears sting his eyes during a press conference was not something he wanted to experience. “I didn’t know that Heather, that’s my daughter’s name, existed until she was a year old. Her mother had just died, which is when I first met Heather.”

  A few reporters yelled, asking why Heather had been kept from him. The last thing he wanted to do was toss Gina under the bus. She had her reasons for keeping Heather from him, and while he didn’t agree, they were hers, and she wasn’t here to defend herself. “That is not my story to tell, and I want, out of respect for my daughter, her mother’s memory to be honored with the respect she deserves.”

  The clicking of the cameras had stopped, and the front of the stadium became painfully quiet. God, he hated having this many eyes on him and being aware of them, something that didn’t happen on the football field.

  “My mother always told me to never judge others, not only until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes, but also, you never know what quiet battle someone is living, and we all have one. My daughter lost her mother, met her father, who was a complete stranger, and needed a series of major surgeries to correct a birth defect. What would you have done in my shoes? Because I bet most of you would have done your best to spend every waking moment getting to know your child and helping them through some difficult times. I will not apologize for wanting to do that outside of the public eye.”

  The stunned crowd stared at him with questioning eyes. He had no idea if he’d accomplished anything and didn’t care if he got fired for going off-script at this point. He said what he needed to, and he said it from his heart.

  His mother would be proud. Right before the conference, he’d spoken to his dad, who gave him the green light and so did his mother.