“So, you implied that your mother has been the one taking care of you all for the past ten years? Since you were seventeen, right?”
“And since my brother was fifteen, that’s right,” I said. I wasn’t going to let slip just yet how much Mom depended on my income. I don’t know if she was even ready to admit that, and that didn't bother me--the family being happy was what I was much more interested in. Maybe keeping them in mind was what kept my ego in check today. “She was hurt in the accident, and I think the whole thing was a reality check for my brother and I. But nobody kept it together like Mom. I admire her strength a lot, and I don’t think I could be where I am today without her support, even if she does worry. Don’t worry, Mom, I won’t let myself get hurt too bad out there,” I added, and Danielle grinned a little as she jotted down my shoutout.
“Alright,” she said, “I think I’ve got enough for a pretty substantial follow up here, especially after the cliffhanger we left the last one on.” She looked up at me with an appreciative smile. “Thanks, Mr. Michaels.”
“Great, but really, I’d rather go by Kieran,” I said. “Being formal kind of makes me uncomfortable, so I’d like to get that out of the way if we’ll be working together long-term.”
She tilted her head back and forth thoughtfully for a few moments before conceding. “Alright, I can work with that, Kieran.”
“Anyway,” I said, leaning forward as she put her pen and pad away, “I think we might have gotten off on the wrong foot last time we met.” She gave me a look with raised eyebrows, and I could tell she was agreeing with me silently. Maybe that stubbornness was what was keeping me from giving a straight-up apology. “But I mean, if you were able to slap tog- er, write out such a good article with what little I gave you last time, I’d love to see what you can do with a genuine interview.”
She gave a small smile. “Well, I like to think I earned my position. But thanks, I appreciate it,” she added sincerely.
I stood up along with her, taking a few steps closer. “And look, I know you’re busy--you’ve got to be, if your job is to keep up with guys like me--but hey, if you really think we could end up working together for a long time, I think it would be good to meet up sometime outside of work.” That caught her off-guard, and she stopped packing her things to look up at me with a blinking expression. Those bright green eyes of her looked even more hot when she was wide-eyed, I thought.
“What do you mean?” she asked in that same prodding tone she used so much in her interviews, and I smiled a little, feeling like she was testing me to see how much I’d ask of her.
“Just that you really seem like someone I’d like to get to know on a personal level,” I said. “It’s your whole job to have conversations with me, right? Why don’t you just think of this as a way of brushing up on interviews with me, if you really want to keep it professional,” I added, and I could see her restraining the urge to roll her eyes, but there was something in those eyes that seemed to be considering what I’d offered with a little more serious than she might have last time. “I mean,” I continued, “you seem to be getting to know a lot about my background. Personal stuff, you know?” I gave a boyish grin. “Only fair if you do the same favor for me.”
“I…” she started, slinging her pack over her shoulder and looking up at the ceiling thoughtfully before I took a piece of scrap paper from the table and jotted down my number and held it out to her, to which she blinked.
“Here,” I said, “take my number. I know you’ve already got me on caller ID, but consider this an offer to call me up anytime. I know a few restaurants around town that aren’t half-bad.”
She bit her lip as she looked at the number, then reached out to take it, tilting her head back and forth, her indecision teasing. “I’ll think about it,” she said at last, and her tone told me she knew exactly what I was implying.
“Or hey,” I added jokingly, “if you change your mind, you could always sell that number off. Plenty of people would kill to have a pro football player’s personal number.”
“Plenty of people would kill to get an interview with one, too,” she said back with raised eyebrows, “but here we are.”
“You must be better than plenty of people, then,” I said, and my heart felt a skip of triumph as I saw I’d managed to evoke a little color in her cheeks.
I walked out to her car with her, and as she unlocked her vehicle, she glanced back at me with a curious expression. “So I have to ask, why the change in heart, Kieran?”
“What do you mean?”
“After last time, I honestly figured we wouldn’t see each other again, for better or worse. I don’t see change happen this fast in most sports personalities like you.”
A smile tugged at my lips. “You could say I took some good advice,” I said before adding with a wink, “and I’m not the kind of guy to leave someone hanging after the first date.”
Danielle’s eyes regarded me carefully before she climbed into her car with a coy smile and a wave. “We’ll just have to see how far that gets you, then.”
“Take it easy, Dani,” I said, and she pulled away and out of the parking lot.
I took a deep breath, feeling a swarm of mixed emotions in my chest. Fuck, I had it bad. But I think that went better than I’d imagined it would. Maybe there was a time to hold back on the showmanship, after all. It was just so bizarre to me. Everything I did on the playing field and in interviews in the past had rewarded acting out like I did. This was a world of big personalities, big emotions, and big action. Acting like I did around my family was going to make things feel...well, I wasn’t sure how it made me feel yet.
But when Danielle would call me back, I’d be ready to dazzle her. Now that she saw I was capable of being more of a down-to-earth guy, I figured it would be good to show off all the benefits that could come from hanging with a football star. I had a few upscale restaurants in mind, but maybe that bar that had me hungover at our last interview would be a good place to start.
I mulled the ideas over while I got into my own car and headed out. It was a crimson sports car, the kind I’d dreamed about when I was a kid. There were a lot of things within my reach now that I’d only considered distant dreams as a kid, including my career. My car, my looks, my fame, and especially my ability to support my family.
Sometimes, though, my mind drifted to the idea of supporting a family I myself started, like Carter. I wondered what it was like to come home to a loving wife instead of an upscale house. Not that I could complain.
And as I made my way towards Vegas proper, I started wondering what kind of childhood dreams Danielle would like to see become reality. I shook my head. There was that crush-driven imagination again. But now, at least, maybe there was the possibility of finding out what kind of person she really was.
Right now, though, there was another dream that I was driving towards. I felt a familiar sense of home-away-from-home wash over me as the sign of the Fighting Chance gym came into view, and I pulled up in the parking lot. Gym bag in hand, I headed inside, smiling around at the sights and sounds of the place, and a familiar face greeted me on his way to the reception desk.
“Kieran, was wondering if you were gonna make it today!” Jamal Carson made his way over to me and clapped me on the back as I came in for a bear hug.
“Wouldn’t miss it, man, just had to wrap up an interview.”
“You’re kidding! Same one that ran the last one about you a few days ago? Me and Andrei were just talking about that, the interviewer made you look good. Real good.”
“Yeah, well she knows a few things about looking good herself,” I said with a grin, and Jamal raised his eyebrows at me.
“Now that’s the kinda talk we need to save for the bench. Come on, Andrei said he’d spot you when he got in today.”
Jamal was my martial arts trainer. The short dreads he’s sported since college have been seen at the Fighting Chance for a long time, but now in his mid-thirties, he only teaches, these days. H
e used to be a hell of an MMA fighter, and he still might be, but a nasty head injury put him in a coma for a month. Scared his wife and kids out of their wits, and worried all of us here at the gym to death--even those of us where were new meat at the time, like I was. He made a full recovery, save for a few light-sensitive migraines that made him wear those sunglasses indoors more often than not, but he promised his family he wouldn’t fight anymore, so he moved on to teaching people like me.
And that was something I didn’t mind at all. Football was my lawful wife, but martial arts were my mistress. It had been a dream of mine since I was a kid to be able to master martial arts. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to take the skills into the ring, but I knew I wanted to have them. And Jamal was just the man to make that happen.
Today was weight training day, though. I approached the bench and saw Andrei standing there, checking something on his phone. He looked up at me and gave me a nod as I approached. That mountain of Russian wasn’t much of a talker, but I knew he meant well under all that bulk and surliness.
“Kieran,” he said in his light accent, “well done landing that interview. The article was good.”
“Our man just got back from Interview #2, in fact,” Jamal said with a smile, “and it sounds like he’s a little more interested in the what the reporter has to say than what she has to write,” he added with a meaningful look to Andrei, who glanced to me with a hint of a smile.
“Dating the press is dangerous,” he warned, and I nodded as I sat down on the bench, rolling my shoulders in preparation for the mountain of iron he’d be putting on me in a few minutes.
“I know,” I said, “but it’s...kind of a complicated situation. I think I was a little too forward in that first interview. In a lot of ways.”
“Kieran Michaels, the guy who paraded around the whole endzone in his last game’s winning touchdown, too forward?” Jamal teased, crossing his arms with a grin. “Can’t imagine.”
I rolled my eyes. “Alright, alright, don’t sound too much like my Mom. Anyway, let’s just say she knows I’m interested. I still can’t believe she managed to put together a good article after the first time I talked with her. She was pretty much in her rights to smear me in public, but she didn’t.”
“Surprising, for the press,” Andrei said, and I nodded.
“Took a little advice from home and made today’s interview a little different, though,” I said. “And she seemed to appreciate it. Like, genuinely. I don’t know, but I didn’t imagine she’d be willing to even speak to me again after the first time so I figure...maybe there’s something there, you know? Anyway, I gave her my number, so I guess I’ll see how it works out. I’m thinking-”
“You’re thinking of wowing her with all that football money and taking out on the most extravagant night of her life, complete with a club and a good time in the back of a sports car, aren’t you?” Jamal cut me off, and that knowing look he gave me drove me crazy, but shit, he knew me better than me after all these years.
“Well, I don’t know about all that, but…” I smiled, trailing off, but Jamal laughed and shook his head.
“Your heart’s in the right place, Kieran, I can see that. You just wanna give this girl the kind of time you wish you could have had before all this fame and fortune happened, right?”
“Well, what’s the point of it all unless you can give it to someone else?” I responded, genuinely perplexed.
“No, you’ve got the right idea,” Jamal said with a smile. Jamal was one of the very few people in my professional life who actually knew that I didn’t have as much money at the end of each month as even some of my less well-paid teammates. A ton of my money went to supporting my mom, so when I spent big, it meant something to me. “But you can’t lay on all that flash and glam right off the bat. Imagine how leery you’d be of someone if they’d offered you the world on a silver plate on the first date.”
I bobbed my head thoughtfully, frowning. “Well, I don’t want to show her a dull time.”
“First off, from what it sounds like, she’s just got your number,” Jamal said. “You can’t rush into things like this, Kieran. You’ve got a good heart, but romance isn’t a football field. Strutting around and throwing your fame up in the air for everyone to see is just gonna reel in more gold diggers like that last girl you went out with.”
I raised my eyebrows with a nod at the unpleasant memory.
“If this girl is a little cautious going forward,” he went on, “it sounds like you might have someone worthwhile on your hands.”
“So what do I do?” I asked, looking up at him at a genuine loss.
He smiled. “Just be yourself, man. Don’t sell the real you short. Take it easy, and have the kind of laid-back good time you’ve talked about wanting so much.”
I gave a little laugh, but nodded, knowing him to be right. Maybe I should reel it in a bit. Worked for the interview, might work here, too. “Alright. Maybe I just will. Thanks, Jamal.”
“All good,” Andrei spoke up, having been watching the exchange silently, “but for now, the ‘real you’ needs to work on his arms, and these weights won’t lift themselves. Let’s go.”
CHAPTER 5 - DANIELLE
“Okay, I gotta ask: what’s with all the interest in my personal life?” Kieran questioned, leaning back against the stadium wall. He looked like a damn marble statue, all sinewy length and bulging muscles. There was just the slightest sheen of sweat on his forehead, as he’d just finished a long, intense practice with the team. His blond hair has formed tight, adorable curly tendrils at his temples and forehead from humidity. His chest was still heaving slightly from the exertion of bolting endless laps around the football field.
I sat across from him in a fold-up chair, my legs crossed at the ankles. I looked up from my notebook to sneak another glance at his unbelievable physique and found that he was staring right at me, an expectant look on his gorgeous face. I felt myself blush.
“Well, you’re an interesting figure, you know,” I answered dodgily. “But everybody already knows your stats and what have you. I want to show more of who you really are. The guy behind the jersey number.”
Kieran tilted his head to one side and a bemused smile hitched itself to his tempting lips.
“You’re not trying to dig up dirt or anything, right? Not planning some half-baked exposé, are you?” he teased. I instantly relaxed, realizing that he didn’t actually suspect I would do anything to hurt him or his career. Still, I could tell he was genuinely curious. It probably wasn’t often that an interviewer cared more about his past than his future.
“Of course not. I just know you’ve got to have an interesting story. Anyone who can make it this far into the big leagues as quickly as you have has got to be hiding some great secret. You’ve got to pull all that strength and determination from somewhere,” I explained with a shrug. He nodded slowly, sizing me up.
“Well, I can assure you there’s no big secret. I’m much more boring than you seem to think I am,” he said with a chuckle.
“I never thought I’d hear you say something like that,” I commented, gently poking fun at his macho all-about-me public persona. “You’re surprisingly humble, Mr. Michaels.”
“Kieran,” he corrected me with a brilliant smile. I was still trying to get used to the fact that he wanted me to use his first name. I was on a first name basis with this fiercely talented, nationally recognized, rich, and powerful guy.
Oh, and he happened to be absurdly, impossibly attractive, too.
“Right, sorry. Still not used to that,” I replied, sheepishly tucking my hair back behind my ear. It was a nervous habit I’d had since I was a child, fidgeting with my hair. It was a dead giveaway to everyone around me that I was either stressed out or embarrassed about something.
“So, what was your original question again? I apologize for throwin’ us off track,” Kieran said, shuffling his feet and combing his curls back out of his face. I wondered if he was subconsciously picking up my
habits. Messing with his hair. Apologizing too many times. We had been spending a lot of time together, to be fair. I was interviewing him multiple times a week now, meeting up with him at coffee shops, public parks, the Fighting Chance gym he frequented, and today at the stadium itself. It was an honor to be allowed in to watch the football team practice. I knew how much work went into keeping the team in tip-top shape and formation, but it was still a really humbling experience to watch them hard at work.
“Oh, right. It was…” I trailed off for a moment, referencing my notebook to jog my memory. “Yes. There it is. I asked you where you draw your inner strength from. What inspires you to work this hard and never give up? What-- or who-- keeps you going even when you’re exhausted and feeling burned out?” I asked, rephrasing the question almost for my own benefit rather than his. I made a mental note to remember that phrasing for the article. I liked how it sounded. I looked up at him and waited patiently for his response.
Kieran looked to be deep in thought, which was to be expected with a kind of loaded question like that. I was used to my interview subjects clamming up as soon as things get too mushy or sentimental. In sports, everything was about the numbers-- the records, the stats, the jersey numbers, the years of training and experience. But I cared more about the faces and minds behind those numbers, pulling it all together.
Game On (A Bad Boy Sports Romance) Page 4