by Leslie North
That’s when he heard a commotion by the defensive players’ lockers. At first, he thought it was a scuffle. Then he heard a familiar voice.
Her voice.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Even in a noisy locker room, her question came audible-loud.
“Ho-ho-ho.” Keane snagged her as she stormed past him. “Hold it, there, ClaireBear.”
She kicked free of Keane’s hold and shoved players aside, rather fruitlessly, a fiery little dark-haired package in a sea of massive white shoulder pads. When she reached Marcus, she gripped his jersey number and shoved him back a few steps.
And what had been the chaos of an NFL locker room at halftime became a rapt audience—somewhere between the intensity of an MMA weigh-in and the silence of a golf tournament, final putt.
“What are you going to do? Swell up like the blimp out there and play a crappy second half? Not help your team? Tell them, Marcus. Tell them or I will.”
He cringed. All the heat trapped inside his physically-taxed body went to his extremities. His head pounded, his hands gripped the front collar of his pads. Hard.
“Not here, Claire. Not now.” The words snaked through his clenched teeth.
“That day in the film room, the day we kissed…”
The room went from rapt audience to rowdy gentleman’s club, complete with cat calls, whistles and a crescendo of “wooooo” as irritating as the Jets chant at kick off. Marcus’s cheeks flamed until they felt like pre-season, Miami, August, full gear.
Marcus grabbed her hand and tugged her out into a side hallway. A handful of faces peered around the corner, and a cacophony of shushing filled the locker room.
Claire was unfazed. “You said you learned a long time ago to let people come to you, to challenge you, to be honest. I won’t stand by and let you do this. I love you, Marcus. You matter. Not just in this game, but in life. You’ve achieved so much greatness on the field. But if you go out there, like this, you’re risking your greatness at everything that comes after. You matter. And if you can’t see that then you aren’t the person I thought you were.”
He breathed fire but couldn’t move or speak. He couldn’t do anything but stare into her eyes. Colorless now, but no less beautiful. And he was back in the film room and the practice field and The Hive and the greenhouse and a dozen other places where she had reminded him of who he was when he took off the helmet and pads. She could see it; he just wished he could.
Someone called time. Players donned their helmets. The locker room thinned.
He wanted nothing more than to draw her close, drink in her scent like a balm, and feel her whispers brush his lips. But eclipsing it all was his hurt—his shoulder, his head, his heart. Throat muscles clenched, threatening to choke out his last effort to prevent any further pain.
Marcus backed away.
“Go back to your numbers, Claire.”
He jogged through the locker room, scooped up his helmet, and caught up to the stragglers of his team, trying desperately to forget the hurt that surpassed them all.
The hurt in the eyes of the woman he loved.
The Seahawks offense went three and out. As pleased as Marcus was that his team’s defense was unmatched, their toughness meant more offensive clock time. His shoulder had transitioned to a state of numbness, not unlike his focus.
Woman like that gets under your skin, we are all screwed.
He jogged onto the field. Much of his gift was memory, muscle and otherwise. He leaned heavily on rote memory now, because all he could think about was the last time he disappointed Sol. The day of his injury last season. Sol would have wanted him in the Super Bowl, what Marcus believed he had to do to repay him for all he had done, sacrificed, loved. Fourth and goal, scrimmage at the goal line. Marcus would rely on no one else to make Sol proud. He dove over the pile. His shoulder paid the price. Sol had witnessed his selfishness, three other options on the field, guys open. Marcus didn’t get a chance to apologize, explain. Sol had died the next day.
This may have been the beginning of a drive, first down, but it felt the same.
At the huddle he relayed the play. The field tilted slightly. Sweat drizzled from the tip of his nose to his lips. He didn’t remember his core temperature so high in the first half. Since his first game back from injured reserve, Claire had transitioned him from temporary wires to wireless sensors. He wished he had the wires to rip free. Claire would be freaking.
“You don’t look so good.” Keane’s stare pinched hard behind his facemask, eyes directly on Marcus. “You okay, man?”
No. He was far from okay, but he covered it with a joke. “I will be if you catch this.”
The journey to the place behind his center felt out-of-body. Half of his mind readied for the play, no audible necessary. The other half flashed images like a highlight reel on fast-forward: the paper sack under the fire escape, Darius, touch football with Claire in the park, firing a gun and watching a body fall, Claire beside him and beneath him, reminding him of his worth, and Sol speaking to him as if he were there—a man’s greatness can’t be found between the uprights.
“Set.”
The play clock wound down.
Five seconds…
Marcus squeezed his eyes closed. The pain in his shoulder crippled. The pain of failing his team, his mentor, himself—again—was greater.
He backed away from the snap and signaled a time out.
Whistles rent the air.
The offensive line straightened, their helmets tracking to each other, to him, to the sideline. In his ear, Coach Bana said, “Jesus, King, what the hell?”
Marcus ripped off his helmet and ran straight for the sidelines, straight for Eggert, who was warming the bench with a Gatorade cup in his hand. He grabbed the kid’s jersey with his left hand and hauled him down the sidelines and into the tunnel to the locker room. No audience, no cameras. Just Marcus and Colin.
And seventy-thousand fans who had gone funeral-quiet.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Colin wrestled out of Marcus’s grip.
“You’re going in.”
“What?” His voice dragged and cracked on the word, a note of complete disbelief.
“Right now. Rest of the game. You have what it takes. I’ve seen it. Team’s in good hands.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Maybe not, but you will. Keep the team first priority. Help those who come after.”
“What if I blow it?”
“You won’t.”
Marcus extended his hand.
Colin shook his head like he was shedding disbelief. His lips pressed into a tight line. Moisture clouded his eyes. He accepted Marcus’s hand and pulled him into a hug.
“I learned from the best, man.”
Marcus smiled.
Coach Bana eclipsed the light at the tunnel’s opening. “I hate to break up this little love fest, but we have a game to win.”
“Eggert’s your man, Coach. That second-quarter hit took me out. I’m headed in for imaging.”
Marcus had never once told a coach how it was going to be. When you eat and sleep and breathe football, there isn’t much room to think about anything else. In his decision, Marcus found room for other things. His health. His legacy beyond the game.
And maybe, just maybe, the love of a woman with the mad skills of a defensive tackle and the courage to storm into an NFL locker room and admit she had put him ahead of her numbers.
13
With two minutes left in regulation time, Rogues up by eighteen, Marcus pulled a disappearing act. Dressed in the athletic pants and team shirt he had donned after the doc wrapped his shoulder, he grabbed a security guard and took staff corridors to a private elevator that accessed the floor with the stadium suites. No doubt he would run into press, who filled the closest of the boxes, but he didn’t care. He had to get to Claire.
Marcus charged into the room. Everywhere, coaches and staff surrendered their headsets and seats and shook hands,
all smiles. Members of the press crowded after him, a few lugging network cameras on their shoulders. He scanned the room.
Claire’s friend Jo stood in her place, packing electronic equipment.
“Where’s Claire?”
Jo’s mouth fell open. She stammered a bit, her eyes shifting to the coaches and the ambushing press.
“She’s…she’s gone.”
Marcus’s body felt sacked all over again. Brick wall. This time, his heart took the brunt.
“What do you mean ‘gone’?”
“She left to catch a flight to D.C. Said she wasn’t always so great with first chances, but she intended to make something of her second.”
“How long ago did she leave?”
Jo’s mouth caved into a frown. “Plane left ten minutes ago.”
A blond reporter with too much makeup crowded his face with a microphone. “Marcus, can you tell us what was behind the decision to come out early in the…?”
The roar of the crowd drowned out the remnants of her question.
Game over.
Claire pitched her tech to a starchy room of nine men and one woman. Collectively, they wore enough colored bars on their brass-buttoned dress jackets to rival a greenhouse full of orchids. They represented all five branches of service, her final shot, her ultimate goal. She began her presentation at the opening of a horseshoe-shaped conference desk that filled a yawning room in the Pentagon’s east side, but she didn’t stay there. She wanted the video Jo had painstakingly put together to take center stage.
The idea had been Jo’s. She reminded Claire that people bought into technology with their hearts, not with their minds. Tech was simply the vehicle to connect people and stories and struggles and triumphs. Over tears and hugs the night Claire returned from meeting Clay’s Army buddies, she convinced Claire that heart was where her first pitch failed. The same night, while Claire curled beneath the covers and said goodbye to Clay, Jo met up with Fletcher, Benoit, Hernandez, and Calloway to shoot video, to help sell Claire’s mission—not of tech, but of life.
Claire was thankful she had been in the privacy of her hotel room the first time she watched.
Nathan narrated as if he were Clay, speaking about his family, his love of country, reading from letters Claire’s team back in California had found under her bed. He narrated about his service, his brotherhood in the United States Army, and the events of the day he died. As Clay, he spoke about how things might have been different had they all been wearing Claire’s tech. His warm, accessible voice and soft strains of orchestral music ensured there wasn’t a dry eye left in the sterile, cavernous space.
They offered her a contract on a trial basis to outfit a small contingent of Special Forces they agreed would most benefit from her wearable tech. Meetings over the next few months would ensure she designed the hardware and software to their precise needs. After handshakes and heartfelt condolences, Claire packed up her laptop, surveyed the empty room, and grinned.
No more sidelines.
Her smile, tempered by thoughts of all she had lost to reach her goal, faded. Someday, when enough time had passed for a shot at forgiveness, she might even tell Marcus the end result of all those sessions: some great code, a little confidence, and enough courage to surpass grief.
The soldier at the door escorted her from the building.
She walked out into the blinding sun, thinking of the future. Portland had grown on her. Trees and rain and cloudy days seemed to refresh her in a way California never had. She fished in her bag for her sunglasses and rental keys. When she looked up again, her gaze landed on a familiar face.
And her heart skipped a beat.
Marcus laughed aloud as he signed a piece of paper. Beside him a security guard had that look. Totally enamored. Dressed in a suit with pops of magenta at his tie and pocket square, the quarterback had never looked sexier.
Well…
Claire failed to suppress her grin. Her forward progress stopped on weakened legs. She had trouble assimilating Marcus, here, now.
The security guard motioned toward her. Marcus repositioned the familiar lenses on his nose and glanced up.
His hand stalled on the autograph. It took him a moment to recover. He quickly scrawled off the remainder of his signature, gave the guy a hearty bro-style handshake, and walked toward her like he had just won the biggest game of his life.
“You come all this way to convert Redskins fans?”
Marcus’s hearty chuckle filled her.
“There’s only one fan I care to convert.”
“And who might that be?”
He leaned down and captured her lips. His kiss had the vulnerability of an apology and the sincerity of a vow. She never wanted it to end.
“Does this mean I’m forgiven?”
“For telling my boys we got busy in the film room? I’m pretty sure that makes me a legend.”
Claire dissolved into laughter, warmed from the inside, nothing at all to do with the sun. “Lucky for you, I have the data to back up that claim.”
He straightened the knot of his tie, his mouth tugged into a sly, irresistible grin.
Her smile sobered a bit. Marcus being here was nice, considerate. Something a friend would do. She needed to hear him say this was more.
“Why did you come?”
“Biggest play of your life? I wouldn’t miss it.”
“And all the plays after that?”
Marcus removed his glasses and slid them into his pocket. His gorgeous blue gaze locked onto hers. “I love you, Claire. For the first time ever, I feel worthy of this feeling. Of you. I want you on my team. Not just now, but for life.”
He pulled a photo from his pocket—the group picture taken the day they played football in the park, trimmed to wallet-size around Claire. He held her image, side by side, with the black and white photo he had carried all these years.
“You’re my Irma.”
Her eyes misted. Her feet felt stuck in concrete, but her heart lost gravity. How could an honor so weighty make her feel so light?
“You’ll need a new photo,” she laughed through her tears. “You have a little bit of Oliver in there.”
“He can be my Irma, too. Dude had some serious game.” He commandeered her heavy tech bag and rested the strap on his healthy shoulder then linked his hand in hers and led her to a sleek black car with a waiting driver. “I want to hear all about your meeting.”
Maybe Jo’s next project should be a Sir Galahad, after all. He was certainly endowed with all sorts of knightly characteristics. Claire fought valiantly to hide her grin.
And failed.
He smiled, his eyes shifty, self-conscious. “What?”
“Nothing. Just thinking I need to get yarn. Lots of extra yarn.”
Marcus shook his head. “Someday you’re going to have to let me in on that joke.”
Claire couldn’t think of a better day than today.
Game on.
End of Wired
Book One of the Solomon Brothers Series.
Book Two, Celi-bet will be released on November 17th 2016. To be notified of the next release, sign up to my mailing list!
PLUS: Do you like your men tough and your romance with a bit of action? Read an exclusive excerpt from Leslie North’s bestselling novel The Fighter’s Fierce Temptation (Burton Brothers Series Book 1) below.
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The Fighter’s Fierce Temptation
(Burton Brothers Series Book 1)
Blurb
Alice hates fighters.
They're arrogant, broody, and have an ego to match their hulking muscles. Not to mention her scumbag ex was one of them…
But when her dad, a legendary MMA trainer, suffers a stroke and the medical bills start piling up, she's forced to start training one of the infamous Burton Brothers. All she needs to do is pretend to be her dad for a few days. But from the moment Bryant Burton shows up at the gym, all bets are off. With his taut muscles, steely gray eyes, and simmering strength, fighting his pull is going to be the biggest challenge of all.
Bryant can't understand his cravings. If the desire he’s feeling for "Coach Anders" wasn’t disturbing enough, the man’s daughter is starting to make him forget why he came. Her creamy skin, petite body, and full lips are driving him insane with need. And the fact she keeps disappearing doesn't help either. If he’s going to be ready for his championship fight, he’ll have to do something to satisfy his urges and get his head back in the ring.
One kiss is all it takes to ignite their chemistry, but with Alice’s deception and Bryant’s short fuse, things are bound to go up in flames...
Download The Fighter’s Fierce Temptation (Burton Brothers Series Book 1) Here!
Excerpt
Time. Therapy. Healing.
Those words had become Alice Ander’s lifeline over the last two weeks. Her dad was home—thank you, God—but under doctor’s orders to take things slow for the next twelve weeks. His therapist was scheduled to come to the house every day. Alice was glad of it—she was committed to seeing her dad get better. Terry Anders would live to keep on fighting—and keep on training fighters.
She heard laughter and turned to watch a group of teenagers leaving her dad’s gym. Alice sighed. They were the only source of income for the whole camp at the moment. Picking up the unopened mail, she carried it into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of iced tea. She headed into the sunroom off the back of the main cabin.