Harlequin Superromance May 2016 Box Set

by Janice Kay Johnson

  The original caller sounded to Brooks like the waitress, but when she asked the waitress wouldn’t say anything about the incident.

  From talking to different people, she knew most of the first-string guys had been gone by then. Ramos was too wrapped up in his wife and kids to be drunk in public. Jonas had been with her. The coaches, from what she could piece together, were all out of the restaurant by nine. That left a few rookies, one or two special teams guys and Parker Jamieson.

  The man who had stumbled his way through the door just before Brooks and Jonas had left for the night.

  The newcomer to the team.

  The tight end ranked fifth overall in the league, but he had been mysteriously let go during the off-season.

  Brooks didn’t like it.

  She hit the record key on the computer in the live truck at the training camp complex, recorded her voice-overs and emailed them to the producer at the network. She’d been chasing this story for two weeks with no results. Her only consolation was that no other reporters had gotten anywhere, either.

  Scratch that, there was another consolation: that Jonas wasn’t involved.

  And one more: that there had been no other incidents throughout the camp.

  The team was coming together, and that was exactly what Jonas needed.

  Leaning back in her chair, Brooks studied the ceiling of the van. Chances were, if something else was going to happen it would be once the players were released from camp in another week.

  * * *

  RAMOS KNOCKED ON the door to Jonas’s room. “I’m hearing rumblings.”

  “What kind?”

  “The kind that means we’re going to have to break lockdown protocol.”

  Crap. “I’m too old for this college crap. We’re professional football players. Did he not get the memo?”

  Tomorrow was the last day of training camp; he’d thought they were home free. No training camp incidents, and although Parker was still dropping passes and Jonas couldn’t be certain, he thought the other player had been high during a few practices. Not what the team needed, but at least it had been contained to the facility.

  “I don’t think he cares about the memo.” Ramos sat down on the desk chair. “Knew something was off with that kid.”

  “He’s not a kid. He’s Brooks’s age. Two years younger than me. Four younger than you.” He flexed his hands. He still felt guilty for lying to Brooks. Or at least not telling her his suspicions.

  “He’s still a kid.”

  “What’s he into this time?”

  “No clue, but he and Vance from the O-line snagged a set of van keys while the coaches were in line at the snack table tonight.”

  Why steal a coach’s keys? Parker made less and less sense as the pre-season went on. “Where are we going?”

  “I figure we start at the club. He seemed to really like that place.”

  Twenty minutes later Jonas and Ramos pulled up to The Last Yard. Bass pounded from the speakers inside, shaking the ground. A long line of patrons wound around the outside of the building, but the bouncer, a well-muscled Samoan, motioned Jonas and Ramos directly inside.

  Where Jonas saw Parker in the middle of the dance floor doing backflips off a table. How he’d gotten a table in the middle of the dance floor Jonas had no idea. Everyone stood a few feet back, watching the man flip over and over and over. A couple of women pulled out their cell phones and began taping him.

  “You take left, I’ll take right?”

  “Gotta give it to him, the guy’s got great balance.”

  “He’s a regular Fred Astaire,” Jonas said dryly. “Now if he could just catch a damn ball. Come on, let’s get him out of here before he breaks something.”

  At the edge of the crowd Jonas called out, “Hey!”

  Parker grinned at him, did a backflip and then immediately flipped forward again. “Jonaaasss,” the tight end slurred his words, “and Ra-Ra-Ramos. Shouldn’t you two captains of the gridiron be all locked up in your little beds by now?”

  Jonas grabbed Parker’s hand. The other man jumped down from the table. “We have a curfew, Jamieson.”

  “Curfew.” Parker rolled his eyes. “I haven’t had a curfew since I was fourteen. I’m a grown-ass man.”

  “It’s one more night. After tonight, you’re the only one who has to deal with your own idiocy. This happens tonight and it’s a team problem because our team is still at training camp. Save the drama for your own time.”

  He spread his arms wide. “All the time is my time.” And then he walked directly into a small, red headed woman wearing a pink dress.

  “You’re acting like a candy-ass jerk,” Ramos said when Parker pushed the woman away. If Ramos didn’t have quick hands she’d have fallen. As it was, she looked unsettled and a little frightened. Jonas heard the mechanical clicks of a few cell phones.

  “We’re leaving.” A couple of flashbulbs went off. Jonas shielded his eyes. “Sorry, folks, we’ll be out of here in a moment.” Parker sat down on the floor, crossed his legs and didn’t budge. “Let’s go, Jamieson,” Jonas said, putting steel into his voice the way he’d heard Earl do over the years.

  “You really think it matters if we’re locked into dorms for three weeks? It’s bullshit,” Parker said. “We’re professionals. We know how to prepare for game situations. Playing sleep-away camp doesn’t do a damn thing for our prospects on game day.”

  “It’s a team-building experience. And you’re not acting like a professional,” Jonas said through his clenched jaw. “You’re acting like a drunken, high buffoon.” He motioned Ramos to Parker’s left and he took his right. Together they lifted the other player off the floor. “It’s not about being in our bunks by nine and asleep by nine-fifteen. It’s about trusting the guy in the room next to you is working just as hard to get ready for the season.”

  “Damn, he’s heavy,” Ramos grunted.

  “And he stinks. When’s the last time you showered?” Jonas asked.

  “What day is it?” Parker asked. Jonas groaned.

  They made it to Ramos’s van, put Parker inside and buckled a seat belt around him. By the time they were at the city limits, he was snoring in the back.

  Jonas drove the rest of the way to the facility in silence. Whatever was going on with the other player, it was starting to affect the rest of the team. There were annoyed grumblings about the length of lockdown, more pushing and shoving than usual when someone tanked a play. He glanced in the rearview mirror. Parker slept with his chin practically on his chest, back straight and feet flat on the floor. He looked like an overgrown kid, tired from a day at the amusement park.

  He wasn’t a kid, though, and he needed help.

  Jonas just hoped the team could give him what he needed.

  * * *

  THE PHONE RANG just before 6 a.m., jerking Brooks out of a sound sleep. She picked it up and blearily asked, “What?”

  “You better get down here. We are full-on tabloid crazy right now,” Kent said, his voice higher than usual.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Someone has video of Jonas Nash and Matt Ramos carrying Parker Jamieson from a club downtown last night—”

  “They’re still in camp.” Brooks tried to interrupt but Kent kept talking. She grabbed a blue top and khaki capris from her closet as he spoke and slid her feet into wedge-heeled sandals.

  “They broke curfew. We don’t have video of this part, but witnesses say Parker was as high as a kite before Nash and Ramos got there. Doing backflips on tables, acting like a circus clown. It’s some weird, weird stuff. The network wants us on-air for the morning shows.”

  “I’ll be there in five,” she said, rushing from the barn. She got in the car and sped down the lane. Once on the highway, she used voice recognition to text
Jonas.

  What the heck is going on down there? Girlfriend asking, not reporter.

  A little while later she pulled into the parking lot of the facility to see several other television crews already on the premises. Brooks found Kent on the field setting up the camera so the Kentuckians logo would be centered behind where Brooks would stand. He handed her a sheaf of papers filled with news reports from big agencies. She read the details, and then pulled up the online footage.

  The faces of Jonas and Ramos were as clear as the Kentucky sky after a thunderstorm. Anger emanated from them as they bodily carried Parker out of the bar. Then the footage skipped to Parker doing flips on the dance floor. Another clip popped up, and she heard Parker rant about being on lockdown for training camp. The footage switched back to Jonas, holding one hand in front of him as if to block the camera, while he and Ramos dragged Parker out of the bar.

  “Sweet Jesus,” Brooks muttered.

  Her phone bleeped and she grabbed it, hoping for a text from Jonas. It was the team, announcing a press conference in twenty minutes. Brooks scrolled through her messages. There was nothing from Jonas.

  Nothing at all.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  JONAS FLIPPED OFF the television, tossed the remote onto his sofa and checked his phone. The texts from Brooks glared at him. It was twelve hours since she’d first texted to ask what was happening. Several texts later, he still hadn’t answered her. Didn’t know how to answer her. The team had connected Parker with a rehab center as soon as he and Ramos delivered the man to Earl’s door, so that part of the problem was over.

  Still, the media were having a field day. Recalling all the times Jonas had led the party-hard charge, suggesting the problems with the Kentuckians were systemic throughout the entire league. One particularly annoyed anchor editorialized for nearly five minutes on the state of fairness, work ethic, player salaries and the “good old days” when men played for the love of the game. The anchor who “broke” the story about his injury insinuated Jonas was involved in the drinking as well as the dragging from the club, reminding everyone of his past indiscretions.

  He had avoided Brooks’s reports. While he admired the grit she showed at reporting only on the facts, he’d known that sooner or later she would have to bring his past into it. He didn’t want to hear those words coming out of her mouth. Not now. Not ever.

  The phone rang, startling him. Brooks’s face, muddy from the charity run, grinned at him on the screen. He almost put the phone down, but something wouldn’t let him.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey, yourself,” she said, sounding relieved. “I thought maybe you’d dropped off the face of the earth.”

  “Earl released all of us from camp early this morning. I’ve been at the farm.”

  “You okay?”

  He sighed. “Feel like an idiot,” he said.

  “This isn’t your fault.”

  “Me and Ramos carrying Parker out of the club—on video—isn’t helping the situation.”

  “Better than Parker being on his own and crashing into a tree or a family of four.”

  True. “How are you holding up?”

  “Tired. I’ve been on the story for thirteen hours now. One more segment and I’m through for the night.”

  He told himself not to ask. Reminded himself that she deserved better than him. But he couldn’t not ask because he wanted her, just her. She would make all the tired and the annoyed go away just by being in his house. Being with him.

  Damn the consequences. “Do you want to come here? Surprisingly, no media have found me yet. I figured they’d be combing through property records by now. Ramos found a couple of your intrepid compatriots at his back fence this afternoon trying to talk to his daughter.”

  “I hope he kicked their asses,” she said, venom in her voice. “Kids are off limits.”

  “He settled for kicking them off the property and taking his family to a hotel for the weekend. So, you coming?”

  She was quiet for a long moment. “I’ve got to get back on the air—”

  Was this a blow-off? “Brooks—”

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea. I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” she said and the line went dead.

  Jonas stared at the phone for a long moment, going over the conversation in his head one more time. She’d sounded tired, and a little angry. He paced the living room of the farmhouse for a long time, going over and over the conversation. Somewhere along the way, he’d lost her.

  Football would have to be enough.

  * * *

  “THANK YOU, BROOKS. We’ll talk to you again after the team press conference,” the anchor said. Brooks held her smile in place until she was certain the camera was clear and then slumped. It was just after 7 p.m. and she was exhausted.

  The team had released the players from camp early, and not one of them had agreed to talk on camera. She had press conference footage of Earl saying it was “an unfortunate incident” and assuring the press that the team would look into what had happened. A couple of sources confirmed Parker was now in rehab. The cloud over the Kentuckians should be dispersing. She put her hands to the small of her back and leaned to stretch the muscles. For most of the day she’d been in the remote van, sitting over a cramped editing station. She needed a break.

  Her phone rang, and Gary Jacobs’s phone number flashed on her screen. The cloud over her darkened.

  “We like what we’re seeing.” Jacobs’s voice rang clear over the phone line. “Good reporting, Miss Smith.”

  “Thank you.” But there were two reasons the network called at this time of night. Neither of them were good. Along with the photos from last night, a few reporters had obtained images of her leaving the same club with Jonas earlier that summer. With little else to report after the news of the rehab stint broke, the story began to include her. It was an uncomfortable feeling. “The pictures that have been circulating of me with Nash are from a few weeks ago. I want you to know my relationship with Jonas Nash hasn’t influenced my reporting.”

  “They won’t present a problem.” A low beep beep beep sounded through the phone line, and then a car door slammed. “Newer pictures could.”

  Relief washed over Brooks, followed quickly by a fresh wave of concern. “What...do you mean?”

  “We have distance at this point. I don’t like bringing this up, but you had been dating Bobby a few weeks before that story about steroid abuse at the college broke. Now there are pictures of you with Nash, at the same club where he physically hauled another player outside. You weren’t there at the time of the team incident, but parallels will be drawn. And before you tell me there are no parallels, I’ll tell you that I agree. You’re allowed to have a personal life, but you aren’t allowed to let your personal life affect your reporting.”

  “It didn’t.” She’d kept things clean. Other than her mistake in asking Jonas about that first report, she’d kept things between them completely separated. On the record she asked about expectations, the team, the camp. Off the record, they didn’t talk football at all.

  “It’s about appearances. An indiscretion happens once, people are forgiving. It happens twice, they start to look at you like maybe you’re part of the problem.”

  Brooks’s stomach twisted and she closed her eyes. “My reporting on this has been completely by the book. The involvement of Jonas Nash and Matt Ramos isn’t part of the problem. They were trying to get their teammate out of a bad situation—”

  “Or they realized too late all three of them were in a bad situation.”

  It wasn’t like that. Brooks had no illusions about the crazy stunts Jonas had pulled in his past, but the past was behind him. This was his chance to redeem his career. He wouldn’t throw that chance away, not for a night of partying at some club.

  “Look, I’m no
t saying that is what happened, I’m saying people will talk,” said Jacobs. “Gossip starts with one person speculating. We don’t want that for one of our rising stars. Which brings me to my next question. Do you want to be on the sidelines or in the booth on Sunday?”

  “In-in the booth?” Brooks’s head was spinning. In the booth, definitely. But she was the sideliner.

  “Ferguson’s kid caught the mumps at some sleep-away camp, brought them home and now Ferguson has them. He can’t analyze the game on Sunday, and all of our experienced analysts are assigned elsewhere. You’ve been with the team most of the summer, and you know your football. Do you want to see what life is like from the booth?”

  Yes, she wanted to see what life was like from the booth. “Definitely,” she said, trying to make sense of their conversation. The network didn’t care about her relationship with Jonas. People, whoever they were, might. And did she want to be in the booth. In three days. “I’ll start preparing tomorrow.”

  “Good.” Gary Jacobs was quiet for a long moment. “This isn’t a permanent gig, but it’s an opportunity for us to see what you’re made of. Don’t let this media frenzy around the Kentuckians bring your career down. We can’t tell you who to have in your personal life, but I will warn you that female sportscasters have gone up in flames for much more tame stories than this.” He hung up, and Brooks was left staring at the phone.

  Had he just made a threat? No, it was a warning. The network was willing to take a chance on letting her into the broadcast booth, but only if her reputation was sterling.

  Hers was sterling before she hit Kentucky at the beginning of the summer. Now it appeared the story with Bobby and now the cloud around Jonas were jeopardizing her future. She swallowed. She’d known reporting on a team when she was having a relationship with one of the players would get messy.

  She hadn’t expected that the consideration of walking away from the player would be this hard.

  She flicked through her contacts, considering calling Trisha or her mom. Clicked off the phone and put it in her bag. Brooks left the remote van, offering a tired wave to Kent who was tearing down their makeshift set for the night, and got into her car. She could walk away from Jonas Nash. They’d known one another for only a few months, and even though she loved him she knew she would be all right without him.