“I hate this.”
The PR lady (I was quite sure her name was Ava) gave me a steady look that told me everything I needed to know. Before she broached this topic with me, she damn well knew what my reaction would be. It was well known to the team that dealing with the media was my least favorite part of this job.
“It doesn’t matter if you hate it or not. It’s a huge opportunity.” Her eyes were the same green as the practice turf, and I closed my eyes from the steely reserve I saw there. “When’s the last time Sports Illustrated wanted to feature us on their season kickoff article?”
Never. But I swallowed that word down like I had a gun to my head.
Behind me, Jack was practically vibrating with excitement. “Come on, Piers, this is huge.”
Slowly, I rolled my neck. “I don’t want to do it. It will turn this team into a three-ring circus.”
“Or,” Ava said, “it will get our fans excited. The league is eating this up.”
I gave her a dry look. “Of course, they are. If it can increase ticket prices or gain more sponsors, they love any sort of controversy.”
“It’s not controversy,” Jack, the idiot, butted in. “She just happens to be hot. Hot people sell magazine covers. It’s not rocket science, dude.”
Ava pinched her eyes shut at his complete lack of tact. “Clumsy phrasing aside, he’s not wrong.”
From behind me came her voice. “Of course, he’s not wrong.”
It was my turn to shut my eyes, but against my arm, I felt the whisper of air when she stood next to me. Even though she didn’t touch me at all, I felt her like a static charge. As if she had her own energy field that I had to plant my feet against or be pushed back by the force.
“Miss Sutton,” Ava said warmly, giving Allie a respectful greeting even though they were the pretty much the same age.
“Allie, please.” When I dared to glance at her, she was smiling at Jack. “And you’re Jack Coleman, right?”
The kid puffed up like a peacock, extending his meaty paw as if he was bestowing a gift upon her. “That’s right, ma’am. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” While they shook hands, his smile spread even further. “Or can I call you boss? I like that better.”
The fact that he’d called her ma’am at all was ridiculous. Dressed in slim, dark jeans and a simple white T-shirt with some thin gold jewelry around her neck and wrists, she looked no older than he was. I’d long learned that the most dangerous of women were the ones who could wear something simple and look like they’d stepped from a magazine. No frills, no embellishments, just them. That was how you knew they were beautiful, and you knew they knew it too.
She cocked an eyebrow. “Allie is just fine.” Briefly, she looked at me and sent a subdued—albeit polite—smile. “Luke.”
I nodded my chin.
Allie turned back to Ava. “What are they asking for exactly?”
“They want to feature you, Luke, and Jack on the cover to kick off the NFL regular season. The article will be about you, as the new owner, and how you’re stepping into a system that’s been in place for years.” Ava scrolled through something on her phone, and with every word out of her mouth, my skin crawled even further. They’d want me and Jack shirtless, no doubt, and Lord knows how Allie would be dressed, draped over both of us.
“Why just the three of us?” Jack asked.
Ava gave him a casual once-over. “Well, you’re not hard on the eyes, and you two are easily the Wolves most recognizable players. Even casual football fans know the star offensive players at a glance.”
“Who’s the photographer?” Allie asked, and I gave her a quick look. Even in the team meeting, this was as business-like as I’d heard her.
Ava hummed and scrolled further down on her phone. While we waited, Jack spun the football in his hands and gave me a wide-eyed look of disbelief. I’d been on the cover of SI before, but it was a shot taken on the field of me hoisting the Lombardi trophy over my head. No photo shoots, props, makeup, bright lights, or reporters asking us questions for the sole purpose of digging for some juicy tidbit.
Hadn’t I said this was my nightmare? Because this was my nightmare.
When she found what she was looking for, Ava said the name, and Allie lifted her eyebrows appreciatively.
“Is that good?” Jack asked.
“It is,” Allie answered. “He does a lot of fashion photography too. My friend Paige has shot with him before. Said he’s great to work with.”
Against her denim-clad thigh, her perfectly manicured nails beat a furious rhythm. Ava noticed it, as did I.
“What are you thinking?” she asked Allie because I sure as hell would not.
Before she spoke, Allie glanced at me, then at Jack. There was a determined jut to her chin that I’d never seen before, even when she was chewing me out after that first meeting. Around us, the guys practicing gave her sideways looks as if she was an exotic animal let loose among our ranks. What made it even stranger—their watchful curiosity, the impression that they were all circling her warily—was that every single one of them were used to seeing beautiful women.
Beautiful women were a given, an expectation when you reached the level that we were at. Teammates were married to former Playboy bunnies, models, socialites, actresses. But she was more than that because of her position. Just take this small, private conversation as an example of how different Allie was when it came to what we were used to within the walls at work. The moment she showed up, the dynamic shifted.
The moment she showed up, we all deferred to her. It made me as wary as my teammates because it was usually a position that I held.
“Call them back and let them know that we’ll agree.” When I made a small sound of dissent, she lifted a hand, her eyes holding mine. “On the condition that they only photograph me. The guys can be there for a few questions, make sure I don’t make a fool out of myself if too many football-specific questions come up, and we’ll do a behind-the-scenes featurette for their website that includes the three of us. Something light, something funny. Something very shareable to drum up interest for the article.”
Jack was staring at her in a way that could only be described as awestruck, and I wanted to smack the worshipful look off his face. Even if I felt a streak of appreciation for the way she’d read between the lines of what I wanted. Or didn’t want.
“And if they push back?” Ava asked. Her fingers were flying over the screen of her phone.
Allie was confident when she answered. “They won’t. Let’s face it, this is the biggest story the league has right now, and last season, ratings were down by almost ten percent on every network that aired games. That’s a huge hit for advertisers to the tune of millions of dollars, including outlets like Sports Illustrated. If people don’t care about the stories, they’re not buying magazines, and they’re certainly not tuning into the games. If they’re smart, they’ll latch on to anything that will get fans excited to watch. And the fact that they reached out to us means they’re very smart.”
It was my turn for my jaw to pop open, and Jack snickered when it did. I snapped it shut, thankful that Allie didn’t seem to notice. Seemed she was doing more studying than the team roster.
Ava’s hands froze over her phone, and she was studying Allie the same way everyone else was.
Who the hell was this woman?
When she snapped into motion, her movements were brisk and efficient, crackling with energy. “You’re sure as hell right about that. I’ll let you know what they say.” She looked at all three of us, giving me only the slightest warning with her eyes. Don’t screw this up, was what I read loud and clear.
On the field, they all relied on me with complete trust. It was off the field that I tended to cause a few ... participation issues. I hated post-game press conferences, especially when we lost. I’d answer a few questions, but I wasn’t the guy to joke with reporters or go the extra mile to make them feel like they knew me.
If anyone would pu
t a wrench in this agreement, Ava damn well knew it would be me.
When I didn’t say anything right away, Allie turned slightly, giving me a patient look that seemed to non-verbally remind me of our tentative truce. Even though my very bones ached with the desire to just focus on football, focus on plays and games and offensive schemes and tape of my opponents, I promised that I would try. And I hated that that patient look was going just as far into me as anything else.
Then she lifted a slim brow like she was daring me to argue.
“Fine with me,” I told Ava but kept my eyes on Allie. Her bare, pink lips curled slightly at the edges.
“Hell yeah,” Jack said. “And umm, if they just want me on the cover with you, Allie, I’d be game even if the grumpy old man isn’t.”
She broke the connection when she turned toward Jack, laughing as she did. “I’ll keep that in mind. Maybe they’ll let us take a few snaps just for fun.”
“Are we finished here?” I interrupted, voice gruff and clearly annoyed. Ava gave me a surprised glance. Jack rolled his eyes, and Allie just studied me as if I was the wild animal, not her.
She wasn’t completely wrong because I felt itchy under my skin, the anticipation of sitting behind some bright lights and watching her pose with Jack skittered like bugs I couldn’t scratch away. Which was stupid. Completely, utterly stupid.
So why did it piss me off so much?
“We’re done,” Ava said. “Allie, if you could come with me, we want to get some stuff for the website and our social media.”
The two women walked off, and I watched them until they left the practice field. As soon as the door snapped shut, the volume increased back to normal. As if the guys were tempering the level at which they spoke in her presence.
Nothing felt normal.
“Toss me the ball,” I told Jack, and he did. “Slant route, about twenty-five yards.”
Not needing any further explanation, he took off, and I dropped back. The ball between my fingers settled my skin, my brain clicking into the natural rhythm. I danced to the left and heaved the ball to where Jack was crossing the field.
It was just past his fingers, falling with an awkward bounce onto the turf. Like it never happened, he scooped it up and tucked it against his midsection, running toward the end zone where some defensive linemen were working out.
“Shit,” I whispered.
After a few mediocre seasons, playoff disappointments when we did make it to the post-season, it had been a while since the Wolves were the center of the NFL media attention.
I didn’t like it. Not like this.
I wanted us to be the focus because we were winning. Because Jack and I had developed an unstoppable offensive cadence because our defense hammered our opponents into submission. Not because the most interesting thing about us was that we had a pretty face at the helm of the ship.
“I’m going to go hit the showers,” I told Jack, suddenly exhausted. Coach watched me from the sidelines but didn’t stop me as I walked out of the building. The hallway leading to the locker rooms was empty, but when I turned the corner, I heard the buzz of chatter.
A handful of reporters were standing off in their designated area, media badges around their neck and cameras in their hands if necessary.
“Pierson,” one called. I kept walking like I didn’t hear him, mainly because I couldn’t stand the guy. He looked like a rat and always managed to ask questions that pissed me off. Most reporters weren’t like him. Most were fair and respectful, but I think he had a history of paparazzi somewhere in him. The slime covered him like a coat he could never quite shed.
“Come on, Piers,” he said in his nasally voice. “One question and I’ll leave you alone.”
With a sigh, I stopped. “What?”
His thin eyebrows raised slightly. “Aren’t we friendly today?”
“If you have a question about football, just ask it. Otherwise, I’m not talking. We’ve got enough distractions around here to think about anything else, including my mood.”
When he smiled, I should have been nervous because he held up his hands. “Nope. I’m good, thanks.”
But I was too frustrated and too wrapped up in untangling the knots in my head into some semblance of normalcy, so I took the out when I was given it, going to the locker room for the coldest, quickest shower of my life so I could get the hell home.
If I’d known what would be waiting when I finally got there, I would have stayed in the shower all night.
11
Allie
For all of about ten minutes after I got home, I felt really damn good about my day. The Sports Illustrated cover, my interactions with Ava, Jack, and Luke, and the social media stuff we’d worked on afterward.
After letting myself into the house, I dumped my purse on the kitchen counter and made a beeline for my bedroom, where I stripped unceremoniously out of my jeans and top and changed into soft sleep shorts, a blue lace bralette, and a threadbare t-shirt that proclaimed my favorite color was pizza. The wine I poured in my stemless glass was plentiful, and the sigh that escaped when I sank onto the couch came from the depths of my very soul.
I was exhausted but exhilarated. It was a feeling I hadn’t had in a really, really long time. It was like ... like when you pull a couture dress down your body and realize that it fits you perfectly. Like the silk was made to fit you precisely, and the seams were measured for all your curves and edges.
That was when my phone buzzed with a Google news alert.
Against Ava’s suggestion, I’d set up a news alert with my name and the team’s name. Now I understood why she thought it was a shit idea.
Wolves veteran QB sick of ‘distraction’ of the new owner, wants to focus on football.
The news outlet was legitimate enough that I couldn’t dismiss it. But oh, how I wanted to.
I wasn’t someone who got angry. Upset, yes. Annoyed, frequently. But anger was not an emotion that I could easily label when I felt a strange, hot thrumming through my blood. From the top of my head to the tips of my fingers, I felt a fuzzy, indistinct sensation crawl through me.
Maybe that was why I couldn’t understand what compelled me to stomp down my steps into the lower level of my house, through the slider, across the patio in bare feet, and through that damn hedge into Luke’s backyard. It’d been about three hours after I’d last seen him and well past the point when the sun had disappeared out of the sky.
So many thoughts went through my head; many combinations of four letter words that I’d never strung together in one sentence in all my twenty-six years. All because I had the sticky, messy sense that I’d been duped.
As a branch scratched my arm, I hissed under my breath. “Football truce, my ass.”
The lower level was dark, so it was enough to make me hesitate before making my way up the steps to his deck. My anger, or whatever it was, ebbed with my indecision.
When I lifted my phone, the article was staring back at me, all ridiculous and infuriating. My eyes narrowed as my definitely unnamed emotion whipped back up like an icy wind. Just as I started across the patio toward the slider, a light turned on beyond the glass, and Luke came down the stairs with his own phone in hand and a frown over his chiseled face.
There was enough light on the porch that I slowed down, spread my legs, folded my arms across my chest, and waited for his traitorous ass to see me. He glanced up, then did an instant double take, but there wasn’t a moment of surprise anywhere in his eyes or the set of his wide, unsmiling mouth. I saw his broad chest expand on a sigh, almost as if he’d been expecting me.
From across his backyard patio, through the double slider, to where he stood at the bottom of his stairs, we stared at each other. A weird, crackling stalemate that I could feel through all those barriers between us. Then he was moving, swift and silent until he pulled open the slider.
“I did not say that you were a distraction,” he said hurriedly.
I lifted my phone as if it alone could pr
ove him wrong, being all the damning evidence I could possibly need. The way he glanced warily at it did nothing to soothe my raised hackles. It was a look of guilt. “Well, you said something, Luke.”
To my utter surprise, he growled and threw his arms out, muscles popping in his biceps as he did. “This is why I hate dealing with the media. They twist everything. This is why I don’t want to do that stupid Sports Illustrated article.”
“Stupid because they want to talk about me?” I snapped. “They’re journalists. Journalists cover the big stories, and whether you like it or not, this is a big story.”
His eyes darkened, and his jaw tightened, a pop of muscle where it took a sharp turn under his skin. “Oh, trust me, I’m aware.”
That tone. The way his lips curled around the words like they tasted bad, sour on his tongue, made everything inside me erupt, named or not.
“I didn’t choose this,” I yelled. He blinked in surprise, the heat in my tone knocking him back a step. “I didn’t know that any of this would happen, okay? I came home to bury my father, and all of a sudden, I’m in this place where ... where people like you hate me instantly, and I have to worry whether my suit shows too much cleavage before I talk to the team because someone might think I’m a whore if I do, and all it takes is one thing like this, and I ...” My breath was coming faster, shallow little puffs of air that didn’t inflate my lungs to the capacity that they should have, and it made my vision narrow dangerously with lines of black around the edges.
I placed a shaking hand over my mouth when hysterical laughter escaped past my unwilling lips, which were cold and disconnected from the rest of my body. Or that was what it felt like. All the pieces of me were separate, split apart from the panic pushing at my seams.
“Allie, stop,” Luke commanded, grabbing my shoulders with hard, hot hands. My head snapped up in surprise, and all I could see were his eyes, a lighter brown than I thought they were from this close to him. “Take a deep breath.”
Inexplicably, I complied. Just once.
He nodded. “Another.”
The Bombshell Effect Page 9