Pinned Down: A Triple Threat Sports Romance

by Cross,Lexi

  We continued talking while we ate, and our conversation eventually left all the serious stuff like work behind. We started joking and laughing with each other, returning to a more playful kind of conversation.

  I realized I had made a good decision by agreeing to work with him on his image in order to help me with Older Brothers. I wasn’t comfortable being under the spotlight with him, but I figured we could continue to see each other on the side while he worked with a Younger Brother. A Younger Brother might appreciate the spotlight a little better than I did.

  I just hoped Lucky would be able to teach him how to handle it before it went to his head. So many successful young people didn’t know how to handle success. They blew it on drugs, alcohol, and women. While Lucky seemed to enjoy spending money, and he damn sure enjoyed women, he was also able to keep his wits about him.

  Maybe a Younger Brother would be enough to distract him so I could get in and win him over, I thought.

  Chapter Six

  Lucky

  Before the official start of the season, Mr. Stevens decided to have the team and staff over at his house for a barbeque. It was a very different atmosphere from what I was used to. This new team was more of a family than my previous team. We had all been out there on the field for ourselves. It worked for us. We had championships and everything. These guys had championships, too, but they approached their team building a little differently. They played for each other, not just for themselves.

  Luckily, I was just the kicker. I didn’t have to do a whole lot of working with the rest of the guys. I just showed up when they needed me. Of course, off the field was a different story. I was still expected to participate in all of the family-oriented things they did.

  I figured it was a good time to show Kendra off to the rest of the team, especially the owner. He’d been the one pushing me to have a steady girlfriend. I wanted to show him that I had one. She wasn’t really my girlfriend, but he never said she had to be.

  The tabloids had tried to make a scandal out of our relationship at first, but it was starting to mellow out. We’d been seen doing little things around town, from the night out to simple stuff like grabbing a cup of coffee in the middle of the day. In fact, running out of the club that night had worked out in our favor. According to the papers and tabloids, she wasn’t having a panic attack from being bombarded by the paparazzi. Instead, I was trying to keep our relationship private. One of them had even mentioned trying to find where we went, but we had disappeared.

  I hated to admit it, but there was something to the whole steady girlfriend thing, something I had missed out on by running around from girl to girl. There were things that I just didn’t get to do with the other girls. It was all focused on sex, so we didn’t do things together. We just did each other. While it hadn’t seemed boring at the time, it was definitely boring in comparison to how much I’d done with this beautiful woman I wasn’t sleeping with.

  Of course, we were the only two people who knew we weren’t sleeping together. When we arrived at the owner’s mansion for the barbeque, everyone looked at us like they just knew we were fucking. I couldn’t deny that it would have been nice to bag the woman on my arm.

  She wore a light blouse over a white tank top and shorts that showed off her long, thin legs with sandals over her petite feet. I could tell when we got there that she was worried she might have underdressed for the occasion, but the other women in attendance had all worn different degrees of casual clothes.

  Kendra was the only girlfriend. I was shocked. The other guys were married. Talk about culture shock! I missed Harley and the trouble we would get into together, even after losing Jake to a happy marriage. I was hanging out with a bunch of goody-goodies, and I didn’t know how to take it.

  I stood back with a glass of champagne while the other guys crowded together on one side of Mr. Stevens’ pool. I watched both groups, the players and the wives. Mr. Stevens worked over the grill, cooking up hotdogs, hamburgers, and barbeque chicken. He had a couple of the younger staff members standing around. I couldn’t tell if they were helping or if he was trying to teach them how to grill.

  The wives accepted Kendra right into their group. The guys eyed me suspiciously. They were probably right to. They probably knew I was faking it for the owner. I wondered how obvious I was. I figured I must have been pretty obvious. They all had that look on their faces.

  “Lucky!” Coach Anglin came over and grabbed me by the shoulder. He was carrying a red plastic cup. He was the only person I saw with something to drink besides champagne.

  “Where’d you get the other drink?” I asked him right away. I felt a little strange drinking champagne at a cook-out.

  “By all means, son, follow me. I’ll get you fixed right up,” he said in a jovial tone, but as soon as we were out of earshot he dropped the act. He was stone sober. “Yeah, Mr. Stevens likes for everyone to drink champagne when they’re here. No way, man. We may be a pretty successful team, and the owner may be filthy rich, but I still like my cheap light beer, man.”

  He walked me into the house where he had a cooler behind Mr. Stevens’ bar. I felt like we were connecting, bonding, on some rebellious level.

  “He lets me bring my own beer and stash it back here. Also, if you want something stronger, he’s got damn near anything you can imagine back here at his bar,” Coach said as he opened the cooler and pulled out a tall boy. He grabbed a cup and some ice.

  “I’m fine with just a beer,” I told him.

  He cracked open the can and started to pour. “Good man. I see you brought the lady from Older Brothers with you. Again, good job, kid. I’d like to take a swing at that. Damn, Lucky.”

  I laughed. I felt a little more comfortable talking candidly with Coach Anglin. “That’s how I got my name, Coach, getting lucky with the unlikeliest ones. Where’s Mrs. Anglin?”

  “Not for me, kid,” he said, sliding the cup to me across the bar. “I just keep all of mine quiet and out of the picture.”

  I sighed. I envied him right then, but at the same time, I wasn’t so sure anymore. I could see through the windows looking out onto the patio that Kendra was having a good time with the wives. I wanted to tell him he was missing out, but I was sure he would have seen it differently.

  “You got it bad, man. Come on, let’s get you out here with the guys before you get too far stuck up your old lady’s ass.” He grabbed me and pulled me with him, forcing me to hang out with the rest of the team.

  After a few sips of the crisp, cold light beer, it was easier to approach the team with their suspicious, accusing stares. I was the new guy, the scandalous outsider. I didn’t fit the mold, but I had made an impression on the coach, and possibly the owner as well, so I stood a chance at getting in with the guys, I thought.

  It was the oddest team cook-out or get-together I’d been to. No one got plastered. No one even entered the pool. It never really fell into full-on party mode. It was very calm and reserved. By the time we left, I felt a little more comfortable around the guys. I knew what was expected of me.

  I also knew I wanted to go home and get out of this good guy boot camp. I wanted a team where even if I was married, I could still raise a little hell at parties. We said our goodbyes and hit the road when it was all said and done.

  “How’d it go?” Kendra asked, smiling from ear to ear.

  “Not nearly as well as it did for you, I see.”

  “You didn’t have a good time?”

  “My god, Kendra, these guys are dull,” I groaned.

  “Not their wives. Wow.”

  “What did you talk about?” I asked her.

  “Girl stuff. You probably don’t want to know,” she answered, shaking her head.

  “You’re right, but I’m glad you had a good time.” I reached over and grabbed her hand while we drove back to her place. Her touch was electric, and I wanted nothing more than to go upstairs to her apartment for the rest of the evening. We didn’t even have to sleep together or anythi
ng. I just wanted to spend time with someone I could talk to.

  The guys had talked about sports, but they talked about it from a more analytical standpoint. They didn’t talk about it the way players and fans would have. They talked like they were all future coaches, managers, and owners. And maybe that was what Mr. Stevens wanted, to create a culture of ownership and entrepreneurship among his players. I wasn’t interested.

  Kendra and I parted ways at her door. I thanked her for coming out. She thanked me for having her there, and I could tell she meant it. I told her I’d call her when it was time to get together again. She said she couldn’t wait.

  After dropping her off, I thought about calling one of my girls from before on the way home. I wasn’t ready to go home alone and not get laid. There was Cherry. She lived nearby. When I was back home, we’d come through this town a couple of times, and I’d nailed that little piece to the wall once or twice. It would have been nice to reconnect with her.

  A strange thought suddenly occurred to me. What if I tried to take this arrangement with Kendra to that level? It would have been better than possibly stirring up some drama by calling up one of my old girls. I decided to wait and see what I could make happen with Kendra before calling anyone from before.

  I went home and fell into my routine over the next few days. Kendra and I spoke here and there, checking on each other, keeping in touch just enough to keep the ball rolling. With the official start of the season just a week away, we ramped up our practice schedule. We had fewer meetings and ran more drills, leaving less time for goofing around in between sessions. The tabloids started asking if we were breaking up, falling apart, or just fizzling out. From what I could tell, we were both ignoring them and focusing on our lives.

  We were running some pretty serious drills. Things were getting more and more intense. I was surprised these guys hadn’t walked away with a Super Bowl win every year. They trained like some kind of military Special Forces. It was ridiculous, but it was good. It was definitely a confidence boost and a team building exercise to be out there on the field with these guys every day trying to break our bodies.

  Then, something did give. It didn’t break, but it twisted, and I was out for the day. My ankle was done for a while, and just a few days before the game. We had a backup kicker who would be subbing for me until I could literally get back on my feet. The team physicians put me on crutches right there in the practice facility. I couldn’t even walk.

  It was my right foot, so I couldn’t even drive. Someone had to take me home. I hoped I could make a speedy recovery and get back to doing things for myself pretty quickly.

  I didn’t know who else to call once I got home from practice that day, so I called Kendra. I had to vent to somebody. I certainly didn’t want to let Jake or Harley know that shit wasn’t working out on the new team. And I wasn’t in a position to shoot the breeze with any of the other guys yet. Kendra was the only person I knew, and certainly the only person I felt comfortable talking to.

  “Are you okay? Do you need anything?” she asked after I told her what had happened.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. I think. I’ll be able to manage. It’s not my first injury, but it sucks, you know. It’s tough. I’m over here trying to prove that Mr. Stevens and Coach Anglin made the right choice by giving me a chance, and if I’m not screwing up off the field, I’m getting screwed on the field.” I shook my head. I couldn’t believe I was opening myself the way I was to someone who was almost a complete stranger to me.

  “You know what? I’m getting out of here early today. Let me run by the store and grab a few things. I’ll cook you dinner tonight.” Kendra went into protective, caring girlfriend mode right away, like it was nothing.

  As embarrassing as it was, I accepted her offer to help. It wasn’t often that I was willing to admit that I needed help.

  “Damn, Lucky,” she said, laughing a little. “I’m sorry, it’s not funny. It’s just your name.”

  “Yeah, yeah, laugh it up. I’m not feeling very lucky right now.” Or maybe I was. Maybe I was feeling very lucky indeed.

  Despite hobbling around on crutches, hearing Kendra’s caring attitude towards me made me feel like I was definitely going to get lucky with her. I was going to try to take our arrangement to the next level, and I knew it would be best to try it at the height of her sympathy for me.

  When we hung up, I sat and waited with a cunning grin on my face. I was about to have my cake and eat it, too. And Kendra was about to get all the Lucky she wanted.

  Chapter Seven

  Kendra

  I picked Lucky up at his house. For someone who had moved in a bit of a hurry, I was shocked to see the house he’d purchased. It was a mansion on par with the one Mr. Stevens, the team’s owner, owned. He wasn’t kidding when he called himself Lucky.

  I pulled up the circular driveway and stopped at the steps to the front door. From the height of the wall surrounding his property, the size of the wrought iron gate that opened automatically to let me in, and the lush gardens between the wall and the Italian stucco house, I was surprised to see him standing by himself. I figured he would have had drivers or other house staff to help him down the steps to the lawn.

  I went to get out to go around and help him into the car, but he waved me back in and opened the passenger side door himself. He slid into the car with his crutches, managing to tuck them between himself and the door.

  “I can manage,” he said. “Thank you, though.”

  “No problem. Now, let’s get you back to my place so I can cook for you and take care of you.” He was full of surprises. I was still reeling over the fact that he’d called me to let me know about his injury and vent a little of his frustrations over it. We got along fine, but I had just assumed we were business partners and not actual friends or anything. I felt like the phone call took us up to a new level.

  So far, this had all been Lucky’s game. We hadn’t really made any progress yet in getting him to connect to a Younger Brother. We hadn’t even talked about it other than when we set up our agreement. I was still trying to work things out on my end and make sure I wasn’t making a mistake by trying to get him involved. On the surface, he seemed like a good match for some of our boys. On the surface, he looked like he had put his running around aside. He looked like he’d given up on his old lifestyle. But that was just the surface, and surfaces could be deceiving. I took my job very seriously and wasn’t going to let him screw me over if I tried to put him in with one of our boys.

  “Thanks for this,” he told me in the car.

  “Don’t mention it, Lucky. What are girlfriends for? Even fake ones,” I joked.

  “Even fake ones.” He laughed with me.

  We took the elevator up to my floor, and I let him into my apartment ahead of me. It wasn’t anything special. I had a one-bedroom apartment on one of the top floors of one of the oldest buildings in the city. It was about a hundred years old. There had been buildings older, but they’d been torn down over the years to make room for more modern structures, or lost to fires. Each apartment had high ceilings, hardwood floors, central air and heat that mostly worked, and window units that doubled up as air conditioners and heaters in case the central air went out.

  “Now, you go have a seat, and I’ll start on our dinner. How do you like your steak?” I motioned over towards the couch in the living room for him and started walking towards my open kitchen.

  “We’re having steak?” he asked me with a surprised tone.

  “Of course. It was the first thing I thought of when I decided to cook for you. Steak, potatoes, and asparagus. So, how do you like your steak, and would you rather have baked or mashed potatoes?” I asked.

  He let out a taunting little laugh. “You know what? Surprise me. Cook it the way you like it, and I’ll let you know what I think after we eat.”

  “Now that sounds like a challenge,” I replied.

  “It’s okay if you don’t think you’re up for it.”

 
“Oh please, Lucky. I may not be an athlete but I can still rise to the challenge when I need to. You just sit back and relax. Let Kendra take care of you. Want a beer?” I looked up from my work in the kitchen to see him staring at me from the couch.

  “And cold beer, too? Are you trying to win me over or something?”

  “Funny. Here.” I grabbed a can from the fridge and tossed it to him. I may have come from a wealthy family, but I had learned how to do things on my own over the years, especially since I found myself in positions of having to do those things for others often.

  “Thanks.” He cracked the can open.

  A moment of silence passed between us. I was working in the kitchen, getting everything ready to start cooking. I was going to do baked potatoes instead of mashed just to save some time and energy. I was going to cook the steak in a pan on the stove so it would be a little closer to the way I liked it. I preferred it grilled, but I didn’t really have anywhere to stash a grill.