by Cindi Madsen
“What do you want me to do? Call him up and beg him to come back?” Lance shook his head. “I don’t know if I can do that. It’s not my style.”
“Just apologize and see what he says. Are you really going to let your pride get in the way of a decision that’d benefit the team?”
He growled.
She tilted her head. “Growl all you want. Doesn’t change the facts.” She gestured to her computer screen. “I’ve gathered everything I can, but I’m not sure it’ll be enough. You’re asking me to do the job of two people—two huge jobs that usually require assistants. It’s…too much.”
The cushion dipped as he scooted to the edge of the couch. She thought he was going to stand and storm away or go to pacing like he did when he talked on the phone. Instead he raked his hands through his hair and cast her a sidelong glance. “I’ll think about it.”
“Sooner would be better than later.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” He scrubbed a hand over his face and reached for the empty pot of coffee.
“It’s gone, but I can order more.”
“No, I’m already too hyped now anyway. It’d probably make it worse.” He undid the bow tie, slipped it out of the collar, and flung it aside. “Did you get a hold of Galen Michaels?”
It’d been before the coffee delivery and the email with the bad news, and so much had happened it almost seemed like it was days ago. “Yeah. He’s running a football camp back in his hometown—something about an old mentor who died and left it to him and his friends. He said it was complicated, but that even if he didn’t have that going on, he wasn’t interested. The NFL lifestyle never was his thing.”
“Too bad.”
It was. The world could use more guys like him, but so could the low-income kids he and his buddies would be doing the camp for.
Lance unfastened his cufflinks, tossed them on the coffee table with a clink, and then rolled up his sleeves. “How’d sorting through the résumés go? Any potentials there?”
“Good. I scribbled notes all over them, and there were a couple that sounded promising.” She reached for the pile on the other side of her and handed him the ones she’d gone through.
He began flipping through them, and she sank farther into the cushions, fighting off a yawn. Her head felt too heavy for her neck, too. Was it always so freaking heavy?
That’s better, she thought when her head hit the top of the couch. Just a minute or two to rest and she’d finish up the last of the résumés.
The next thing she knew, she was diagonal, her cheek braced against something solid yet surprisingly comfortable. The scent of Lance’s cologne invaded her senses as her sloggy mind tried to work out where she was. Her eyelids didn’t want to open, but they fluttered enough to see that yes, yes she was leaning on Lance’s shoulder.
“Sorry, I didn’t realize,” she said, starting to push herself up.
He curled up his arm, placed his hand on the side of her face, and guided her cheek back to his shoulder. “Relax. You’ve been working nonstop all day, and I need you here in case I have any questions about your notes. It’s not against the rules to use me as a pillow.”
“Pretty sure it is,” she mumbled, but with that firm, warm shoulder underneath her, she was having trouble convincing her head to lift. The drag of his fingers across her cheekbone and jaw made it even more difficult to fight the tug of sleep.
And suddenly she couldn’t recall why she was fighting it in the first place.
…
Lance skimmed to the end of the final résumé and finished reading the last of Charlotte’s notes. Her stats, her comments—they were all spot-on. Just as he was wondering about something, she had a note about it, as if she were in his brain, already aware of exactly what he wanted.
Her silky hair brushed his jaw as he glanced down at her, so calm now that she’d drifted to sleep. It often felt like she was holding back, only occasionally letting her walls slip. Usually that was when she fled.
This evening she’d been too exhausted, and while he felt bad about that and knew it was partly on him, he couldn’t help taking a second to enjoy the moment.
Affection stitched its way through his chest, a thread tethering him to her, and he wanted to place a kiss on her forehead. Unfortunately, that’d be against the rules, and not something he’d do unless she was awake enough to consent to it. For now, he’d simply enjoy her soft breaths and the scent of her shampoo or perfume or whatever she used that made her smell so damn good.
Gradually his eyelids began to droop as well, his mind and body hitting the wall. Today had been a blur of calls and so, so many photos. Then the mess with the crybaby coach. If only another team would snatch him up and help pay off the rest of a contract he never deserved. Unfortunately, the crap timing meant most coaches had been swapped or secured about three months ago.
Lance relaxed into the comfort of the couch, wrapping his arm around Charlotte’s shoulders and tucking her closer without thinking. Her hand slipped down, falling high on his thigh, and desire coursed through his veins, bringing the reality of the situation to the surface.
He forced himself to jerk awake and lift his arm from her shoulders to the back of the couch. If they slept here they’d both be sore, and she’d be sore at him, too.
“Charlotte.” He gently squeezed her knee. “Let’s get you to your room.”
Her eyes fluttered open, and she gave him a smile that he felt deep in his gut. Then dawning crossed her features, her eyes going wide. She moved to sit up, but her hand drifted higher on his thigh and then pressed right into his crotch.
He grunted, automatically curling in on himself.
“Oh shit,” she said, and he’d point out she was the one swearing now if she didn’t look so distraught.
“It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not! My hand just violated section three of the handbook!”
“Accidental brushes happen.”
Her cheeks flushed deeper as she shook her head. “It was embarrassing enough to fall asleep on you. Now I’m grabbing your crotch.”
He doubted replying that he was okay with her grabbing his crotch would make her feel any better. He’d rather she be gentler next time, but— Yeah, don’t go there.
“We should fill out a form.” She stood and glanced around, as if she expected one to appear out of thin air. “I’ll print one out tomorrow and we can get it on the record, and…yeah.”
Like he wanted that on the record.
Charlotte snatched her purse off the floor and straightened. “Okay, so goodbye.”
“Wait,” he said, pushing to his feet. “It’s late. As soon as I get my sixty seconds recovery from the crotch shot, I’ll walk you to your room.” He’d hoped it’d lighten the situation; instead he got a scowl. A really cute one that made him want to cup her face and kiss it off her.
“You don’t need to walk me there. You wouldn’t walk me back if I was a dude, or one of your other employees, would you?”
“Sure I would.”
Skepticism pinched her features.
“I’m serious! Those three hundred-pound defensemen are big babies—they’re scared of everything.”
Her head tilted another half inch, but her mouth trembled against a smile. He gestured her ahead of him, snagging his hotel key off the coffee table as he walked past. He held the door open for her, and as they walked down the hall, he placed a palm against her lower back.
“Before you call me on it, this is how I walked the guys home, too.”
“Shows what you know.” A smile that managed to be both haughty and flirty flitted across her lips. “I was going to let it slide.”
In that case… He splayed his hand and walked a little closer.
She slowed in front of her door and turned to face him, and his heart thundered in his chest. This woman had gotten under his skin, ridiculously fast at that.
He figured they’d already skipped a few bases, what with the hand on her butt to boost her over the bal
cony the other night and her accidental crotch grab moments ago. Even though he was a football guy, he hated to skip bases.
He braced his palm on the door by her head, and her throat worked a swallow, turning him on and pushing him to go ahead and voice his thoughts. “I have to confess something.”
“To your HR rep?”
“No, just to you, James.”
He leaned closer, his gaze locked on her tempting lips. “I really want to kiss you right now.” He felt every inch between them. The only thing keeping him from giving in to the urge to flatten his body to hers was the knowledge that moving too fast would scare her off and screw everything up. “To be honest, I’ve been thinking about it since you made your first touchdown and jumped into my arms. Now I’m looking at you, and all I can think about is how much I want to kiss you.”
She licked her lips, and he suppressed a groan. His body reacted, and it was a good thing the hallway was empty, because they were about to put on quite a show. Her hand came up on his chest, her fingers curving as if she was going to grip his shirt.
He could see the battle going on in that amazing brain of hers, whether or not she should fight the pull.
Don’t fight it, he wanted to say but realized that wouldn’t make her feel less conflicted about the situation, so he searched for the right words to reassure her. “I want you to know that whatever you say or do next has no bearing on your employment. I’d never do that, and you’re way too valuable to the team for me to ever let you go. But if it’ll make you feel better, I’ll sign any paperwork you want.”
“I appreciate that. It’s not that I’m not tempted, or that I don’t feel a certain pull…” A couple of blinks and a different expression descended upon her features, her hand flattening and holding him at bay instead of grabbing and pulling him closer. He froze in place, waiting for her to make the move, silently urging her to even though he’d felt the shift. “But it’s still a bad idea. There’s no way it won’t upset the power balance, and it’d look bad to the rest of the employees and to all the people out there watching you so closely. And with you coming in and firing so much of the staff and the wrongful termination lawsuit hanging in the balance, we don’t need any more bad PR. In fact, you should be playing up the eligible bachelor thing for extra publicity.”
“I don’t give a damn about PR,” he said. “Once we rebuild the team and they start winning, the rest won’t matter, either.”
“But that’ll take time and money, and that means we need some good PR anyway.”
He grunted, and she sucked in a breath, her chest rising and falling. Not fear. No, that was desire. But it didn’t change the fact that she had to say the word. He nodded and slowly dropped his hand, even though everything in him balked at the idea of stepping away from this. “Think about it. And I guess since I’m the one in the so-called power position—although I’d argue that you’ve been in charge since the moment you stormed into my office—you’ll have to initiate any kissing.”
“Sure, if you want it to be awkward,” she murmured.
He lowered his voice, his gaze returning to the lips he so badly wanted to taste. “I don’t care. I just want it. Whenever you’re ready, know I’m all for it. Forms, blood samples—whatever you decide is needed—I’m game.”
She sucked her bottom lip between her teeth, and he groaned again. He took the key from her hand and opened the door for her, a gentleman with very ungentlemanly thoughts.
For a few torturous yet amazing seconds, she stared at him, the chemistry snapping and sparking between them.
She reached out and squeezed his hand, a silent thank-you and good night. Or maybe an apology that she couldn’t cross lines.
Then she slipped inside, and all he could do was retreat to his room and hope that sometime before they returned to San Antonio, where his life would only get crazier and more hectic, she’d take him up on his offer.
Chapter Fourteen
Charlotte knocked on the door to Lance’s suite revoltingly early, hoping she wasn’t waking him before he wanted to be up and going. When he didn’t answer, she took out the key he’d given her and tapped it against her thigh, debating whether to use it or retreat to her hotel room.
Where she’d just had a worrisome call that made her want to throw herself into work. If she hadn’t been so tired yesterday evening that she’d left her laptop in their “office,” she could easily put in a few hours in the lobby or find a corner table in the resort restaurant to occupy.
I’ll just sneak in and grab it, along with a few folders…
Right now she needed to lose herself in stats and football players and résumés and basically anything that’d take the edge off her panic. All that money and time, and he…
Not going there right now. Decision made, she slid in the card as quietly as possible and eased open the door. Lance wasn’t in the living room area, but the door to the bedroom was cracked open.
On her way to the coffee table, she caught a glimpse of the king-sized bed through the open bedroom door, sheets and covers rumpled and thrown back.
She paused, listening for the sounds of a shower. The bathroom door was also open, no sound coming out. “Lance?”
After a few seconds of ringing silence, she called again, louder this time.
No answer. A quick look around confirmed he wasn’t there.
Maybe last night after he dropped me off, he found a woman who was willing to kiss him. To do more… Her stomach pitched at the thought, a toxic burning coming along for the rocky ride. It couldn’t be jealousy.
More like it shouldn’t be jealousy. But there it was anyway, the bite and the sting.
It wasn’t like she hadn’t wanted to kiss him—she’d nearly come unraveled when he’d told her he wanted to kiss her, and that he’d been thinking about it since she made her first touchdown. Her lips and body had been shouting that they were definitely ready and willing, her common sense was just stronger. Although right now she was cursing her stupid brain for not letting her give in to her racing hormones. How often did insanely hot, wickedly smart men want to kiss her?
Wasn’t the beach like Vegas? What happened there stayed there?
Only idiots truly believe that—of Vegas and the beach.
The other woman would be beautiful and have one of those bodies made for string bikinis, no need for a skirt. Was she currently snuggled up next to Lance? Running her hand over his scruff?
That line of thinking is nearly as toxic as the one that sent me running here in the first place. Stats. Paperwork. Rules. They’d save her, the way they always had.
What the company needed from her right now was a solid football team. They had a whole crew who analyzed players before the draft—correction: they’d had. The reports were kept in a big Google doc, so she grabbed her laptop and began poring through them. She read through report after report, comparing what they’d said and the stats in her head, trying to get a fuller picture.
On the screen it was hard to do, though, so she dug through her bag and found the stack of index cards she used on the corkboard in her office whenever she needed to write herself reminders and memos and such.
Luckily she had a roll of tape as well, in a shoe-shaped dispenser, no less—and to think she’d wondered if it was silly to have packed it, just in case.
The project took over, pushing other thoughts far from her mind, and she began furiously scribbling on the cards. The whiteboard Lance had brought in their first day was covered in his handwriting. Since she wasn’t sure if he still needed the information, she flipped it to the other side and taped the cards there, connecting lines and writing extra notes in marker.
When she’d filled every inch of that, she taped the index cards to the wall around it. Marking up the walls wasn’t an option, so she simply numbered each note to correspond to the ones on the board.
Within thirty minutes, she’d transformed the area into her very own war room. Sure, it was much smaller scale than the massive one back at Mus
tangs’ headquarters, where the staff compiled lists for the draft, but impressive all the same.
The beep of the door sounded, and Charlotte braced herself to see Lance in his walk-of-shame clothes and pretend she didn’t care.
He stepped inside shirtless, mesh shorts slung low on his hips, sneakers on his feet, and a sheen of sweat covering his entire body. It highlighted every muscle and made it impossible not to gape at him. The scent of beach and cedar and him filled the air, and desire hijacked her system.
Clearly, she hadn’t prepared herself for the right image.
Not that she believed there was any way any heterosexual woman could fully prepare herself for the sight of Lance Quaid after what’d clearly been a strenuous workout.
…
Lance hadn’t expected Charlotte this early, and as she stared at him, all the deep breaths he’d taken to calm his rapid pulse had now been done in vain.
His heart hammered against his rib cage at the sight of her standing in his hotel room, her eyes wide and—if he wasn’t mistaken—flooding with lust.
It made him want to stalk across the room, watch those endlessly green eyes widen even more, and claim her mouth with the predatory flare she awoke in him.
His feet took him a couple of steps before he recalled telling her that she’d have to initiate. Why the hell had he gone and done that?
Because that’s what she needs.
If he kept staring at her, though, it’d be that much harder to keep the grip on his control, so he glanced away.
At the madness on the whiteboard and the wall. “Whoa. It’s like A Beautiful Mind erupted in here.” His gaze flicked back to her. “Is there an imaginary friend in the room I should know about?”
That seemed to break the spell, and she cocked her head, that admonitory pinch to her lips. “Very funny. I just woke up early, and I felt restless, so I came to the”—she made air quotes—“‘office’ and dug in.” There was a hint of sorrow in there. Something that didn’t quite ring true, although obviously she’d done a lot of work. “How was your…run? Along the beach, I’m guessing?”