Hard Tackle: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (4 page)

T
raining flew by in a daze
.

I expected to get an earful from Gordon for taking it easy, but instead he congratulated me on giving one hundred and ten percent. My body was covered in sweat, so I guess I must have put in some effort after all. Somehow I managed to spot the runs and throw the ball, all the while thinking about all the dirty things I planned to do to Kristi when she finally gave in to me.

Kristi was a good motivator. I’d seen her before training, and I’d be seeing her after I’d showered. I considered skipping the shower, but she didn’t strike me as the type to be impressed by a sweaty body—at least, not one that had been earned on the football field.

I’d promised her sex within two weeks, but it had already been three days, and she was no closer to begging for it. In fact, she’d displayed a remarkable ability to spend time with me without trying to get her lips around my dick.

Kristi had been with me nearly everywhere I went, but I was running out of excuses to keep her around. Training was getting serious, so there weren’t as many parties. I’d been invited to one of Doug’s, but I usually did anything possible to avoid spending time with him. I didn’t even like passing him the ball, and subconsciously, I think I sent him slightly shakier passes just so he wouldn’t make a clean catch.

Three women were waiting by my car after I’d finished showering, but I ignored them all and went straight to the woman standing awkwardly a few cars down.

“What do you need me for?” Kristi asked. “I’m really busy and need to be back at my apartment to wait for the repair guy.”

The other women all looked in our direction, but didn’t come over. They knew I’d be back for my car eventually. They appeared to all know each other—that meant a foursome was on the cards if I wanted it. All I had to do was walk over and let them in my car.

“I want you to come grab a coffee with me,” I replied.

“Why? Surely even you can’t get in trouble just buying a cup of coffee.”

“Oh, you’d be surprised. Where there’s a staff room and a horny barista, there’s a way.”

Kristi rolled her eyes, and opened her car door. “Goodbye, Barton.”

“No, wait,” I said quickly, shutting the car door before she could step inside. “I have to catch up with sponsors, reply to a few press requests, that kind of thing. I could use your help.”

“I’m not your secretary, Barton. You’ve had me following you around all week while you run errands. That’s not what you’re paying me for.”

“Do you really want me to respond to journalists without you looking over my answers first?”

Kristi sighed. I knew she was annoyed with me, but every time I heard that sigh, I thought of the noise she’d make as I plunged my cock deep inside her for the first time.

“You draft the responses, and then I’ll review them,” Kristi said. “Like I said, I have to be at home this afternoon.”

“Okay. We can work together on it at your place.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“What’s the problem? Don’t you trust yourself around me?”

“No, I just don’t trust you.”

Damn, that stung. I didn’t trust myself around her either, but that wasn’t the point. I’d kept my word so far. I hadn’t once propositioned her for sex. I was still waiting for her to beg, although that was looking less and less likely as the days went by.

“Sorry,” she muttered. “I didn’t mean that. Fine, you can come back to my place. I warn you though, it’s not quite as nice as yours. You want to follow me in your car?”

I looked back at the women still waiting expectantly by my car. “Nah, how about you drive and I’ll get a cab back here later.”

Unless you come to your senses and demand a good fucking
.

How long could she wait this out? I was fit to burst.

“
K
risti
, there’s a naked man in your house.”

“What?”

Kristi was arranging the shoes by the door and hadn’t noticed the naked man walk out of one room and into another. Probably from the bedroom to the bathroom, or vice versa.

Had this been Kristi’s plan all along? She could have set this whole thing up. I’d never once asked if she had a boyfriend, I’d just assumed she was single. Now she could yell “surprise!” and go jump on his dick while I stood there like a complete tool.

I could take him if I needed to. The guy had some muscle on him, but nothing like mine. I also had an advantage in the third leg department. If it came to it, I’d show Kristi just who she should be begging for dick.

“Kristi, is that you?” a female voice yelled out from the room the naked dude had just walked in to.

“Tasha? You said you’d be at work all day.”

“So did you,” Tasha replied.

“No,” Kristi insisted. “I said I’d be working from home because the repairman is coming to fix the air conditioning.”

That explained why it was so damn hot in here.

“Oh,” Tasha replied quietly. “Well, uh, I took the afternoon off.”

“So I see.”

“Want to introduce your guest?” Kristi asked.

“No, not really.” She looked back into the bedroom and told the guy that he had served his purpose and should now get dressed and leave. A few minutes later, he squeezed past us on his way out.

“So then,” Tasha said, arms crossed as she eyed me up. “You want to introduce
your
guest?”

“You know who he is,” Kristi grumbled.

“Damn right I do.” Tasha walked over and stuck out her hand. “I’m Tasha, Kristi’s older sister. Not much older though.”

“Hi Tasha, I’m Barton—”

“—Fenner, yes I know.”

“Okay,” Kristi said loudly. “Now that you two know each other, Barton and I have some work to do.”

“Exciting,” Tasha said, as she winked at her sister. “I’ll just hang out in the lounge with my headphones on. Don’t mind me. I won’t be able to hear any noise that comes from the bedroom, if you get my drift.”

“We need to work in the lounge,” Kristi replied.

“Oh, when you said work, I assumed you meant work that you did in the bedroom.” Tasha added another wink for good measure, but all she got was an eyeroll from Kristi. At least I wasn’t the only one who got them.

“I don’t mind working in the bedroom,” I butted in. “I do my best work between the sheets.”

“I bet you do,” Tasha said.

“We’re working in the lounge,” Kristi insisted. “Tasha, go back to work or hang out in your room please.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tasha replied before disappearing to her room.

“She seems nice,” I said. “A real… free spirit.”

“She’s a writer,” Kristi replied. “She even does serious journalism sometimes, but not if it gets in the way of screwing. She always finds the time to screw guys that she has nothing in common with.”

“You know what they say, variety is the spice of life.”

“You’ve had enough variety for five lifetimes. Come on, let’s get down to work.”

“
T
hose answers make
me sound really boring,” I said to Kristi, as we fired off an email to the journalist.

“Better than making you sound like a sexist pig.”

“I still don’t think it’s sexist to say that I chose to play in California partly because the women are prettier. Can’t you people take a compliment?”

“I stand corrected. You’re not sexist at all.”

I stared at Kristi as she typed up some notes on her computer. I’d become a footballer because I loved having half-naked women throw themselves at me. I now realized that working in an office might not be all that bad after all.

The repairman hadn’t shown up to fix the air conditioning, so Kristi eventually slipped off her suit jacket and opened a few buttons on her blouse. If I looked at the right angle, I could see the tops of her firm breasts, and even caught a bead of sweat slowly drip down between them.

I wanted to bury my head between her breasts, stick out my tongue, and lick the bead of sweat as if it were the succulent juices between her legs.

“Can I help you?” Kristi asked.

“Huh.” I looked up to see her staring at me. Damn, I wasn’t usually that obvious. Quarterbacks had to be good at misdirection, and I prided myself and being able to check out a woman without them noticing. Not this time. “Sorry, lost in my thoughts.”

“I don’t want to know.”

“Yes, you do. I was thinking about how you might want to open a few more buttons on that blouse, what with it being hot and all.”

“I’m fine like this, thank you.”

“Yeah, you’re fine all right. You know what just occurred to me?”

“No, you’re not having a threesome with me and my sister. That’s gross.”

“I wasn’t thinking that, but it’s good to know where your mind is. No, I was thinking about what a coincidence it was that you brought me back here when the apartment just happened to have no air conditioning. Anyone would think you wanted an opportunity to get half-naked in front of me.”

“Oh my God, do you really believe half the crap that comes out of your mouth? Or do you just say it out of habit?”

“You can’t deny that it’s a coincidence.”

“Look at this place,” Kristi said, motioning around the apartment with her hands. “It’s a dive. I count myself fortunate on the days when we have electricity, let alone air conditioning.”

“It’s not that bad,” I said honestly. It was a two-bedroom apartment in San Francisco. Those didn’t come cheap, regardless of the quality. Tasha must do alright for herself, because Kristi probably didn’t earn anything right now.

Talking about the heat made me realize that Kristi wasn’t the only one sweating. “Mind if I take off my shirt?” I asked.

“You don’t have anything on underneath.”

“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before.”

“Fine,” she muttered. “Screw it, I’m getting changed as well.”

“You’re going to take off your shirt?” I asked excitedly.

“Yep. And then I’m going to put on another one.”

Kristi disappeared to the bedroom and came back out in a large, baggy t-shirt that was so big I almost missed the shorts she’d also slipped into. I now had a great view of her legs, but couldn’t see any of her chest. Win some, lose some I guess.

I peeled off my shirt, and sat there casually wearing only a pair of shorts. Other women were usually desperate to get at my dick at this point, but all Kristi wanted to do was keep working. It was like to she was oblivious to the perfect male body.

“I’ve been thinking,” Kristi said, putting her laptop down on the coffee table.

“About what it would like to have my cock inside you?”

“We should do a Q&A session on Twitter for the fans. They can all send in their questions, and we will answer the best ones.”

“Let me guess, the answers will all be boring and safe?”

“Of course. But it’ll be good for your image.”

“Just to be clear, you don’t want to know what it will feel like to have cock inside you?”

“I’ve had cock inside me, thank you very much,” Kristi replied.

“I guarantee you’ve never taken a cock as big as mine before.”

“Clearly you’ve never seen my toy collection.”

“Is that an invitation?”

“Definitely not. Now, are we going to work, or are you just going to keep being lewd all evening?”

“Can we do both?”

“No. You log into your Twitter account while I start preparing some canned answers to give to your adoring fans.”

“The only thing they want to know is the size of my dick, and whether I’ll fuck them.”

“Good to know,” Kristi remarked, picking up a pen and paper and making some notes.

“By the way, those toys under your bed, they can’t do what I can do.” I moved over closer to Kristi so that our legs were touching. She didn’t move away even though there was plenty of room on the other side. “A vibrator can’t pull your hair while fucking you from behind.” Kristi gasped, but pretended to ignore me. “It can’t take your nipple between its teeth and bite until the pain mixes with pleasure and has you screaming at the top of your lungs.” Her breaths came short and quick. If I reached between her legs, I’d find her wet and ready for me. One touch and she would be mine. “It can’t finish all over your face, leaving you covered in a sticky mess of excitement.”

Kristi turned her face ever so slightly in my direction. She was holding her breath now, her fingers gripping the pen and threatening to snap it in half.

A loud knock at the door snapped us both out of our trance.

“Maintenance,” a man yelled.

Kristi exhaled a short breath and then took in a deep one. “Just coming.”

Yeah, I bet you were
. She put the pen and notebook down on the table and went to answer the door.

I went to log into my Twitter account when I saw the notes she’d made on the page.

“Hey,” I yelled out. “It is not five and a half inches, and I will not fuck anything that moves.”

T
oday was a rare day
. Today I had a meeting with Leona, and I wasn’t absolutely terrified.

The Twitter Q&A session had gone about as well as could have been expected. Barton tweeted out that he was taking questions, and they soon flooded in. Between all the questions about penis size, and requests for sex—not all from women—he did get some sensible questions that in turn received sensible responses.

Barton even paid attention for some of it. He had the attention span of a small child, but between watching baseball and staring at my thighs, he did provide some constructive responses. I refused to tweet out his penis size though. Nine inches sounded like an exaggeration.

Leona had emailed me that night, and set up a meeting for first thing in the morning. Finally, I’d done something worthy of recognition besides remembering how she liked her coffee.

“You should have run that Q&A session past me first,” Leona said, before I’d even sat down. I should have known a ‘well done’ was too much to hope for. “You might be working with the client, but I’m still in charge.”

“Sorry,” I replied. “I’ll double check next time. I thought it went well, though.”

Leona should look happier. I’d made Barton look good, and that made her look good. Her dad was a founding partner of the firm, so all she had to do was not fuck up and she’d be partner too one day. Having a happy client like Barton Fenner should have brought out her positive side. Maybe she didn’t have one. Maybe this was as good as it got.

“You certainly did a good job crafting those responses for him,” Leona admitted. “Perhaps a little too good. I can’t imagine many people believed he said those things.”

“He did come up with a couple,” I replied. “Are you annoyed that the responses were too fake?”

“No, that’s not it. Look, this isn’t your fault. It’s mine. I never properly explained the situation to you.”

“What situation?”

“The situation with Barton Fenner, and the work we are supposed to do for him.”

“I know I’m inexperienced, but so far things have gone smoothly. Anything has to be better than those pictures that did the rounds after his last party.”

Leona shook her head. “You really don’t get it.”

“Perhaps if you explained it to me….”

I knew I was stepping over the line, but it was damn irritating to be told I was doing it wrong when I’d made it perfectly clear that I shouldn’t have been given the responsibility in the first place. What did she expect from an intern?

“Do you know why we were hired for this job?” Leona asked.

“To make Barton look good. Or at least to stop him looking like an ass. His football team is strict on that kind of thing.”

“His team didn’t hire us.”

“Barton is paying us directly?” I’d always assumed that the team would end up paying the bill, but I suppose they could make Barton pay. They held all the power in the end. Well, that wasn’t quite right. The team needed Barton almost as much as he needed them, especially with the other quarterback out injured.

“Barton isn’t paying us,” Leona replied. “His agent is.”

“Okay, so what difference does that make?”

“Barton and his agent earn a fortune from sponsors, and they’ll earn even more in the next few years. It will dwarf the salary he gets from the team. In other words, sponsors come first, and the team comes second.”

I struggled to imagine Barton agreeing with that. I’d replied to a few of Barton’s sponsor emails yesterday, and he’d barely shown any interest. So far, his priorities seemed to be football, then women, then fans, then money. Or maybe
women
, then football, then fans, then money. Either way, he didn’t seem to bothered by the money.

“Does it matter?” I asked. “The sponsors and the team want the same thing anyway.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Leona replied. “Sponsors might occasionally bang on about ethics, and wanting players to appear reputable, but for the most part it’s complete BS. Barton acting like a dick brings in plenty of media attention. That gets the sponsors plenty of airtime. You remember that photo of him with his hand… where it shouldn’t have been?”

I nodded. I could barely forget it.

“He was wearing a watch from his sponsor that has now been seen by millions of people. You can’t buy that kind of publicity.”

“What do you want me to do?” I asked.

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“Well, look busy, and make an effort, but don’t be too successful at it. The team insisted that Barton work with you, but that doesn’t mean it has to go well. Ultimately, he’ll earn more money by carrying on the way he was, and he’ll have a lot more fun in the process.”

That’s why she put me on this job. Leona and the firm didn’t want me to succeed. The worse I do at my job, the better for everyone. Everyone except Barton.

“He doesn’t know, does he?” I asked. “Barton has no clue.”

“His agent’s job is to do what’s best for his client. I believe he determined that it would be best Barton not know. Listen, if you’re not capable of doing this, then I know plenty of people who are.”

Jessie wouldn’t hesitate. She wouldn’t have to do any work and could screw Barton all summer. She’d be in heaven.

Leona was giving me an out. I could walk away and never see Barton again. Except then I’d never get a job after college, and Barton would be screwed, and not in the way he liked. The team would eventually drop him and he might end up on the scrap heap.

“I can do it,” I replied.

Now I just had to make Barton look good, but without anyone realizing I was doing it. And I couldn’t tell Barton what was going on. That might prove a challenge.

“
D
o you ever work
?” I asked Tasha.

I snuck out of the office early on the pretense of needing to see Barton, but really I just had to get out of there. After my meeting with Leona, I felt dirtier with every minute I sat at my computer.

“I had to meet a source today,” Tasha replied. “It finished early, so I decided to work from home.”

“When you say work from home….” I poked my head in her bedroom, expecting to find a new man in there.

“I
mean
work from home,” Tasha replied. “Although if you want to set me up with a footballer, it wouldn’t go amiss.”

“The only footballer I know is Barton Fenner, and trust me, you wouldn’t want him.”

“I certainly would, but obviously I’m not going to step on your toes.”

“You’re perfectly welcome to him. I’m not interested.”

“Oh come on, how many clients do you bring home? You have a huge office downtown to entertain clients, and you just happened to bring him back here on a day when the air conditioning didn’t work?”

“I wanted to be in for the repairman,” I insisted. A repairman who had arrived not a moment too soon. Barton’s whispered attempts to seduce me got closer and closer to the mark. One more and he would have hit the bullseye.

I’d always hated crude, vulgar men, but Barton managed to get away with it. He didn’t sound like some immature frat boy—he sounded like a man with every intention of carrying out his promises.

“How did it go?” Tasha asked.

“Fine,” I replied. “Hence you’re no longer sweating in here all the time.”

“I meant the date with Barton.”

“It wasn’t a date, it was a client meeting.”

“Funny, because I spoke to John this morning—”

“John?” I asked.

“The repairman. Did I mention I hooked up with the repairman a few months ago?”

“No, you didn’t.”

“Oh. I hooked up with the repairman a few months ago. Anyway, he mentioned that when he came in you were dressed like you’d thrown on some clothes after sex, and Barton was barely dressed at all.”

“It was hot,” I pleaded.

“Okay,” Tasha said, holding up her hands. “I’m just saying that I’ve had a lot of client meetings in my time, but I’ve never got changed into casual clothes, and watched the client strip. Not during the meeting anyway.”

“We have rules about dating clients,” I protested. Why did I keep saying that? As excuses went, it was a shitty one. I should have said ‘I’m not interested in him’ and left it at that.

“And I’m not supposed to screw sources or the people I write about. Darling, rules are there to be broken.”

“I really need to stop introducing you to people as my sister. People might think I’m like you.”

“Don’t worry, no one will think that. You’re too boring.”

“Just because I’m not screwing Barton doesn’t make me boring. He’s just not my type.”

“He’s everyone’s type,” Tasha insisted. “He wants you, I can tell.”

“You’ve only seen him for a few minutes. You can’t possibly know that.”

Damn it, Kristi. Again with the silly responses. How hard is it to just say “I don’t care?”

“How often do you think someone like Barton spends the evening working?” Tasha asked. “Be in denial if you like, but please Kristi, if he offers it to you on a plate, promise me you’ll consider it.”

Barton wasn’t going to offer sex on a plate; he was going to make me beg for it instead.

“Fine,” I replied. “If Barton makes a move, I’ll think about it.”

Tasha raised her eyebrows in pleasant surprise and then narrowed them in suspicion. She knew it couldn’t be as simple as that, but I stared back at her, confident in my ability to slip this one past her. She didn’t need to know Barton had promised not to ask for sex.

“Alright,” Tasha said. “That’s good. I’m going to crack on with some of the work I missed this afternoon. Remember, if you happen to bump into any of his hot footballer friends, put in a good word for me.”

“Like how you’re an uber-intelligent and successful journalist, funny, witty, et cetera?”

“God, no. Tell them I’m a slut, and will try anything once. Twice if they buy me a nice dinner.”

Not for the first time, I wondered how the hell Tasha got away with being such a sl— free spirit, while managing to write great stories that got her paid big bucks. If she worked full-time, she would earn more than enough to buy a nice place instead of renting this crappy apartment.

I often wondered how many of her colleagues knew what she was like outside of work. Only me and our parents knew what she was really like, and none of us gave her a hard time, so long as she was safe. Even Dad was cool with it. He was one of those new-age feminist types, and Mom had more in common with Tasha than me.

I couldn’t bring myself to let go and have fun. I’d never talked about sex with any of my friends; I kept it behind closed doors at all times. Sure, I didn’t have a lot to talk about anyway, but I could have. It’s not like I’d never been hit on before. I’d even been tempted a few times, but I didn’t want to end up as another notch on the bedpost who got talked about in the locker room.

That’s why nothing could happen with Barton, even if I wanted it to. That man had so many notches on his bedpost, it looked like it had a woodworm infestation.

One day I’d meet the right man, and then we’d settle down and do the whole family thing. Tasha insisted I’d regret not having fun in my twenties, but I couldn’t have fun if it meant jeopardizing my career or getting my heart broken.

I would settle for a functional man, who could provide the three kids I’d always craved. That would be enough. I didn’t need a man like Barton in my life, no matter what talents he might possess on and off the field.