Scoring the Keeper’s Sister
Mr. Match Book 1
Delancey Stewart
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Prologue
Max Winchell
There are a few things you need to know about me. Besides the fact that my last name is the same as the once-ubiquitous and always-tasty doughnut chain, which is certainly an indication of my desirability.
Thing number one: I'm pretty much a genius. Yeah, I know that's not totally cool to say out loud, but here's the thing—staying humble about your rocket-science smarts doesn't make them go away. And it's not like I hang out in produce aisles chatting up women about my intellect while they fondle bell peppers, right? So it's cool.
And if I was just telling you I was smart, that would be arrogant. But there's a point here. Which I'm totally getting to. Right now.
Thing number two: I've created the single most successful matchmaking algorithm known to man. Or at least to the internet. And I've built it into a statistically reliable, money-back guaranteed online service, providing the lonely hearts of the greater San Diego area with dates that are practically a sure thing, not to mention excellent potential for the real deal—marriage and all that whiz. If that's your jam. All for the low monthly price of ... let’s just say its enough to cover my bar tabs when I go out with the team after games. And then some.
And that's thing three...
I'm the star striker for the South Bay Sharks, San Diego's league-leading pro soccer franchise.
I like to keep my eggs in multiple baskets. You know, in case any of the eggs ever crack. Cuz in my experience? Eggs get cracked.
But that's another story.
Oh, and by the way? My identity is San Diego's best-kept secret.
Chapter 1
Hello and How Do You Do
Fernando
My friend Max Winchell is supposedly some kind of genius. At least according to him. But I don't give two squirts of piss about that if he's not focused on his main job, which is scoring goals. And tonight? He was not focused.
We were still debating the last play of the game, where something distracted Max just as he was poised to score the final shot—losing us the opportunity, though not the game. That would have made this a far more serious discussion. As it was, we were rehashing the final moments over beers at McDaughtry's, our favorite Gaslamp District hang out spot.
"What the hell was that, Max?"
Winchell shook his head, gave me his trademark non-committal Winchell smile. "I felt sorry for them."
"Bullshit," Hoss huffed out. He leaned in over the spot where Max sat at the bar, getting in his face. "You had it, Fuerte here was set to bury it, and then you blew it. And that's not your style, man."
Max moved back, out of range of Hoss's angry glare and his even worse breath. "We were already ahead by three. And it’s pre-season."
I shook my head. Max wasn't going to tell us the truth, which was par for the course. The guy got weirdly secretive at times, but I guessed we all had stuff we didn’t share. "Dude. I get being distracted, but not during a game, okay?"
Max shrugged and downed his beer.
In truth, it had been only a scrimmage with the guys from Los Angeles to warm up before the season really started. Still. It made me worry about the season to come. I looked around to make sure no one else was nearby. "Please tell me it wasn't that website distracting you."
Max narrowed his eyes and looked offended. He straightened up, pushing his dark hair out of his eyes. "First, don't make me sorry I told you about that. You are literally the only person in town who knows. Well, besides my sister and my mom. And Xavier, but you’ll never hear it from him since his lips are permanently attached to my sister, which can make it hard to talk. Second, the thing runs itself, I don't need to worry about it."
"Must be nice," I scoffed. "Taking money from all those poor lovesick fools month after month."
Hoss had sauntered off to talk to some of the other guys who were busy hitting on anything with breasts that moved inside the radius of the bar, and Max turned to me with a quizzical look on his face. "If you're so skeptical, why don't you try it, Fernando?" He asked.
I choked at the suggestion, which led to a coughing fit, and I was forced to apologize to Erica, one of my teammate's sisters, after coughing loudly pretty much in her face.
"Nice," she said, glaring at me with icy blue eyes. Erica's brother was keeper, and Erica was hot. But she was also a royal pain in the ass, had announced publicly that she would never date a soccer player (like any of us had even asked... though, really, we would have. Did I mention how hot she is?).
Erica ran public relations for the team, so actually, it made sense that she was in a perpetually bad mood, especially given the owner's recent divorce and his ex-wife's attempt to muddy anything related to the Sharks. Some of her trouble might have been related to me, too, but honestly I didn’t feel like that was my fault.
"You're disgusting, Fernando."
"Hey, I did apologize. Winchell made me choke and you just happened to be right in front of me. I wasn’t aiming at you.” I was honestly sorry. Even though she gave me the cold shoulder more often than not, I kind of liked Erica. I respected her at the very least.
“He did apologize,” the girl standing directly to my right said, leaning toward Erica to make her point before turning to smile up at me. “I heard you,” she said. Then she stuck out a hand with long pointy bright red talons to shake. “I’m Sandy.”
Erica watched all this with something like hatred bubbling in her narrowed eyes. “Do me a favor, Fuerte,” she said. “Try to keep whatever this is—” she waved between me and my new friend Sandy, “—out of the media.”
I lifted a shoulder. “Fair enough.” Erica probably did spend more time than she should on cleaning up some of my image issues, though I honestly thought the media treated me a little unfairly. Any time I was seen with a woman, someone sent a photo to the press and it was a guarantee that the slimiest shiny tabloid would run some incendiary story within the week:
Sharks Striker Fuerte knocks up local waitress and leaves! (If by “knocked up” the piece meant “ordered food” then it was factual.)
Fuerte Fire strikes again, seen with three women at once in downtown club! (Three drunk girls were leaving the club at the same time as me and I helped them into a cab.)
Love ‘em and Leave ‘em Fernando Fuerte…a retrospective. (In this one, they dragged out every photo they’d ever shot of me with a woman.)
“He’s a player,” Erica said to Sandy. “You’ve been warned.”
Sandy grinned at that, potentially thinking Erica meant “soccer player” or possibly finding the idea of “landing the player” a compelling challenge, and wrapped her taloned hands around my arm.
“It’s nice to meet you Sandy,” I said, stepping out of her grasp. “I’m just hanging out with my boys tonight though. Can I maybe get your number?” I had to ask. It was the only way to let her down easy. But I had no intention of using the digits she typed into my phone with a sly smile.
“Call me,” she said, and slinked away, back to a table of girls on the other side of the bar.
Erica had already moved away, going to stand with her brother Trace near the bar. A little flicker of fire lit inside me when she swept her long dark hair over her shoulder and turned away from me, stomping off with her crew of friends in tow.
"Such a charmer," Max said. "I can see you don't need my help."
"It's just her. She hates me no matte
r what I do," I said. How could I explain that the girl who loathed me most in the world also starred in my dirtiest fantasies? The way she hated me turned me on—there was nothing for it.
"You just met Sandy, right? I do just fine," I told him. It was true. I had no trouble getting dates. That seemed to be the case when you played pro sports. At least it was true with soccer. Definitely baseball and hockey and football, too. Maybe not bowling. Not sure—are pro bowlers hot? They've got those fancy hand guards and usually bring their own balls in that shiny big purse. "Hey, Max," I said, wanting to share my thoughts with a like-minded teammate. "Do you think pro bowlers do as well with the ladies as we do? You know, they've got the balls, and the..."
"They've definitely got the balls," Max said, giving me his what-the-fuck face. "Stop dodging the subject."
"What? You think you can find me one woman who will make me want to settle down?” In truth, it sounded kind of nice, but so far I’d never met a candidate. “There’s no match in your little database for me, dude. Plus, if you put me in there, it won't be fair to the other guys. All the ladies will want some of the Fuerte Fire." I waggled my eyebrows at Erica, who was looking at me over the tops of her friends, and felt a rewarding little flip in my stomach when she lifted a hand to give me the bird.
"That," Max said, watching us. "Is not a rewarding interaction with a woman. I dare you to try Mr. Match. Who knows? Maybe you’ll end up like Isley over there." We both glanced over to the corner table where Adam Isley sat with his wife as they both nursed beers and gazed at each other over the tabletop. She'd had a baby just a month or two before, and they were like a friggin' Hallmark movie every time they were together.
"I don't think I could handle throwing up in my mouth that often," I said, faking a gag as I turned away from them. In reality, I did want what Isley had. But I doubted Max's site could do it when twenty-eight years of touring the country and old-fashioned dating hadn't. Girls figured out who I was, made the assumptions that go with pro sports figures, and that was pretty much the end of any potential for anything real. They sought me out for the photo ops, the car, and the money. It had been years since I’d met a girl who didn’t know I was the Fuerte Fire, and I'd decided that was okay with me. If they wanted me for what I offered on the surface, I'd be happy to take them for the same thing. Surface was easy. Surface kept your heart safe, too.
"Tell me you doubt my algorithm can find you the perfect match."
"God, you're sexy when you talk about math."
"Shut up," he said. "I dare you to let me match you."
"Oh, you dare me, do you?" I swigged my beer. I was actually tempted. What was the worst that could happen?
"If it doesn't work, you can hold it against me for the rest of my life. Wouldn't that make you happy?"
I squinted at him. "Winchell, I don't want to hold things against you. I don't swing that way. And if this thing is so fucking foolproof, why are you still single?"
"This isn't about me," he said, his voice low and dark. Kind of like Val Kilmer's Batman voice. Weirdly off-putting and awkward enough to make you never want to hear it again.
"Okay fine," I said, putting my empty beer on the bar and signaling for another. "Sign me up, Winchell. But I promise, I'm going to break your little matchmaking algorithm. You'll see. There is no match for me."
"You're so fucking full of yourself, Fuerte. You’re on."
“One more question though,” I said, leaning against the bar as I looked at him. “Why do you care?”
Max shrugged, “I’m a nice guy. What can I say?”
I laughed. “Fine, but if I do this, you quit getting your heart all hurt when the other team’s losing. No more sacrifices, Max.”
Chapter 2
Hate is a Strong Aphrodisiac
ERICA
The bar was getting loud, and my brother Trace was getting drunk, which meant it was just about time to leave. I stepped up close to him, taking a shot from his hand and replacing it with a glass of water, and whisper-shouted, “Time to go!”
He turned sad eyes on me and was about to say something in protest when two girls and a guy approached us, smiling and holding out a phone.
“Hey,” one of the girls said, staring up at Trace with adoration.
“Hey,” Trace replied, sounding impressively sober.
“Any chance we could get a selfie with you?” The guy asked.
I sighed, summoned up a smile, and put out my hand. “I can take it for you,” I said.
“Oh, that’d be great!” The little group crowded around my brother and I moved away, framing the shot and snapping a few photos for them. This happened at least three times every time we were out in public. I was used to it.
“There you go,” I told the guy, handing his phone back.
“Awesome, thanks,” he said. “Great game tonight, Trace!”
“Thanks man,” Trace said. When they were gone, he turned back to me. “What was I saying?”
“You said you wanted to go home,” I told him.
“Right, yeah. We should go. In just a minute.” He stepped away from me and I sighed, returning to sit next to my best friend as the team celebrated their win.
You probably think I'm some kind of soccer groupie, hanging out with my brother's team after games, working for the team, no less.
But you're wrong. And thanks a lot for jumping to conclusions.
I know how it looks, though. I'm never far away from all things South Bay Sharks, no matter how far away I might like to be. My brother Trace is keeper for the team. And in some ways, I'm his keeper. We're twins. And it sounds weird and needy, I know, but we don't like to be too far apart. It was just how things had always been—the two of us together. It worked.
Getting the job wasn't tough—I've been working in sports public relations since my sophomore year at UCLA, when I landed a prime internship in the school's athletic department. There was a major kerfuffle the following year involving some basketball players, a lot of alcohol, a few *ahem* older working ladies (if you know what I mean) and some cars lit on fire down in Westwood. We worked overtime trying to spin that one, and in the end all the players came out looking like heroes, saving those poor scantily clad ladies from those burning vehicles like that. There was a fair bit of luck involved there, I'll admit, but it pretty much sealed the deal as far as my career went. So when I got Trace's agent to pitch us as a package deal when the Sharks wanted him as keeper, it wasn't hard to manage.
The downside was that staying close to Trace meant staying close to all of his meathead teammates, including the infuriating Fernando Fuerte. The guy might have been one of the league's most promising players, but he was also about as full of himself as they came, and I spent half my time at work trying to tone down the constant tabloid stories that revolved around him and his latest conquest.
With that dark bronze skin, those luminescent green eyes and the wicked white-toothed grin, the guy was rarely unaccompanied at team events (note his new friend, Sandy). And maybe I'd have a bit of respect for him if he ever saw the same girl more than once. But the guy might as well have had "player" tattooed on his forehead and it was hard to muster up any admiration for a guy like that.
That said, he was absolutely, one-hundred percent, panty-dropping gorgeous. But I'd never get near him on principle alone.
Which isn't to say he didn't star in a few of my solo-time fantasies.
Not that I'd ever admit it to anyone.
I didn't date players—not soccer players and not player-players.
I didn't date much at all, if you wanted the truth, and part of the reason was because I didn't date players, and those were the only guys I ever saw.
The other reason I didn't date had as much to do with my brother as anything else...there just wasn't time or room in our lives. His schedule, his fame, and his career all came first, and it was my job to manage it. I was used to being the girl behind the scenes. My last relationship had worked that way too. And it had been enou
gh to tell me that I was better off on my own. I was a behind-the-scenes girl. That's why I was in PR instead of writing the pieces, getting the byline...or standing in front of the camera.
I left the spotlight to my brother and my best friend Beckie, who was an on-camera reporter for the local news station. We’d been in school together and had always planned to work together afterwards. I’d always thought I’d be on camera too, but that just wasn’t how it had come down. And it was okay. I was pretty happy staying behind the scenes most of the time, and working for the team wasn’t too bad. Fuerte's shenanigans excepted.
“Why do keep checking your phone?” Beckie asked, spinning a little on her stool at the bar. She often came out with me when I tagged along with Trace and the team. She lifted her drink to her lips, her wide dark eyes blinking at me over the rim.
I shoved my phone back into my pocket. “I’m checking email.”
“Don’t tell me you’re working. You’re literally always working.” She heaved a dramatic sigh.
“I’m not working.” I leaned a little closer. Besides Trace, I hadn’t gotten to talk to anyone about this, and I was kind of dying to share. “I’ll tell you a secret, okay? But it has to stay that way.”
Beckie’s eyes lit up and she put her drink down and then sat up straighter and brushed her hair behind her shoulders, as if she needed to be completely ready for this information. She leaned back in. “Okay. Go.”
“Trace suggested I join Mr. Match.”
Beckie grinned. “Seriously? But I thought Trace didn’t like you dating. Like at all.”
“We had a chat about that. I told him his overprotective tendencies were ruining any chance I’d ever have of meeting anyone, and he said he just doesn’t want me dating one of his teammates.”
Scoring the Keeper’s Sister: Mr. Match Book 1 Page 1