RUNNING GAME (A SECOND CHANCE SPORTS ROMANCE) (21 page)

“That’s right. He’s going to choose Pritch over you because you’re the loose cannon football star.” Jess threw her hands up as she spoke. “Sure, you have the prestigious record, the respect, and the wins under your belt… even if the National Team hasn’t won the World Cup beneath your leadership.”

“The National Team hasn’t won a World Cup since 1966,” I clarified.

“Oh, I’m not saying you aren’t a capable leader, by any means,” she backtracked. “But you haven’t given him that hole-in-one. You’ve been National for, what, three years now? If you’d led the team to international domination, that’d be one thing…”

“Not everyone on the team is as good as me.”

Jess caught the primal, irritated tone beneath my voice. “Be that as it may… we’d be having a
very
different conversation right now if they were. Instead, the Head of Public Relations needs to make the wiser choice for corporate sponsorship.

“Sounds like both of his highly-qualified options are: the popular, arrogant playboy, practically a force of destruction both on the field and off… and the defiant but grounded, beloved subordinate, who is
still
a pop culture icon and a member of the National Team.

“Who’s he logically going to pick?”

I grit my teeth.

“
Unless
you show him something else.”

“Something like Riley.”

“That’s right,” Jess schemed. “No more of these ridiculous one-night stands, public intoxication feats, and making my job a living
nightmare
,” she told me. “You’ve got to settle down. Find yourself a nice girl. An
American
could work… it’s an interesting but believable choice for you. Someone who challenges you… someone who can keep you in line.”

“And I have to marry her?”

“Of course not!” Jess laughed. “But getting a girlfriend out of her is a step in the right direction, wouldn’t you think?”

I dwelled on this a little longer.

“You think it’s her?”

“From the way you went all googly eyes when we were talking about her?” Jess asked, standing up from the chair and straightening out her outfit. “She’s a girl you sound like you actually
respect.
I think she’s a probably a good start.”

U
nsurprisingly
, the English guy had turned out to be an arrogant prick.

And the sex had been phenomenal…

Isn’t that how it always worked?

It wasn’t all bad… It’s just a shame that I didn’t have a chance to cut my proverbial tether and bolt before the woman showed up.

I wasn’t sure who she was.

A wife?

A girlfriend?

It didn’t really matter. I’d gathered up my things and just pushed my way out the door and the asshole didn’t even try to stop me.

It wasn’t hard to navigate down to the ground floor and out the door. He was staying at one of the halfway-decent hotels in the area, and within a couple of minutes I was already on my way back home to my apartment.

Oh well
, I thought to myself.
At least I got myself a great fuck in there before the sky came crashing down.

The further away from the hotel I walked, the more that I considered the night. It had been more than just sex. Lex had pushed me to my very limits. The Englishman knew just how to excite me in the best ways, ramping up my passion before letting me dangle precariously at that precipice… letting me drift back… and then pushing me again and again, teasing me, until I finally begged for release.

When the release came, it crushed me.

I didn’t reveal the fact, but I experienced my first multiple orgasm that night. Most guys hadn’t really been particularly useful in the orgasm department, either finishing too quickly or not at all… but it was rare that I got to ride the climax myself.

With Lex, I’d lost count of the amount of times he’d thrown me over the cliff.

He was so brutishly rugged, and then there was that English charm of his. Every breath of his accent excited me, forcing me to hang upon his every last syllable. When he asked me to come for him, I couldn’t help but oblige… and my fingernails had dug into his skin, riding out the intense heat between us.

And then he came inside me. It was the most incredible feeling in the world…

“Oh fuck,” I thought aloud.

I came to an actual stop on the sidewalk and considered the implications.
What if he had been lying?
I thought to myself.
He told me that he was clean, and that he’d had a vasectomy… I had completely believed him without question.

What the fuck, Riley?

So maybe I wasn’t the first girl who made a mistake like that… I was better than this! I’d just cross my fingers and get myself tested. How did I let this happen?

I continued strolling back towards my apartment. After twenty more minutes of walking, I was ascending the stairs up to my humble abode and clicking the key through the keyhole.

It was time to see if my little taste of England had worked for my creative side… For the rest of the day, I decided to try painting. I needed something special if I wanted any chance of earning the attention from the one woman in the world who’s opinion really mattered…

Gloria Van Lark.

Van Lark was a legend in the museum world. As the head curator for the
Spinnoc
museum in San Diego, she was known for her tall, hawkish appearance and her fiercely volatile temper.

This was a woman who was not to be trifled with, and who took her time very seriously. Just obtaining enough of her attention for an audience got you accepted into a number of distinguished museums around the country.

Then, there was the significant hurdle of
actually impressing her.

Gloria Van Lark didn’t care for resumes and histories. The fact that I had been gifted with an artistic scholarship to Finland, allowing me to take a full year to pursue an isolated artist’s retreat, would mean precisely
nothing
to her.

Neither would the gamut of smaller museums that
already
carried some of my work, or the fact that I’d been fully supporting myself through my painting since I was a young teenager.

All that Van Lark cared about was the final product. After all, that was all that her clients and customers would see. It was probable that none of them would know these pieces of trivia about me, not unless I wound up with an exhibit, somehow…

But
that
was wishful thinking too high for even
my
lofty dreams. Exhibits were mostly reserved for dead artists… And I was still very much alive.

I found it hard to concentrate on the painting with my thoughts wrapped up in my irritation with Lex, and my fears that Gloria would never consider my work…

After blowing the entire day trying to focus on three different paintings — a beach at sunset, a forested mountain at night, and a small child crying – I eventually gave up on the prospect. Instead, I tossed my pallet down in frustration, washed my brushes, and kicked it back onto the couch.

It was starting to get late in the day. I realized that I hadn’t eaten anything, and I thought about seeing if Reiko or Connor wanted to grab a bite to eat.

I vetoed Connor immediately, on account of how standoffish and jealous he’d been about the Englishman at the bar. It had been clear from the start that he was passive-aggressively furious about the perceived competition.

I really didn’t like that.

As for Reiko… I remembered that she was closing the sandwich shop tonight and working late on some payroll issues. She’d had to fire her assistant manager for trying to steal money, and that meant going through the finances and double-checking
everything
, just to be sure.

Oh yeah… she’d be doing
that
all night.

I made myself a quick sandwich to tie myself over, flicked on the Netflix, and then watched a few episodes of one of the millions of shows I was way behind on. By the time I was about done with that, it was getting pretty late, and I needed to decide whether to cook, order delivery, or venture out and grab a bite.

I decided on the latter.

Halfway towards the local Lebanese place, I felt drawn back towards the bar. I tried to ignore the sensation, knowing what was probably waiting for me there, but as I sat down and unwrapped my chicken shawarma
dinner, the compulsion stood its ground.

That’s why, after I finished my dinner, I decided to say
fuck it
to myself and mosey over a few blocks. With a little bit of luck, I’d just pop in and out, and then immediately move on with the rest of my life.

I wasn’t that lucky.

As I’d expected, Lex was sitting at the bar in his usual spot. Some woman in a fancy dress was sitting next to him, laughing away and putting her hand on his shoulder.

I almost turned and walked out…

But he shrugged his shoulder free, glancing away. I could tell that he wasn’t particularly enjoying her company, but she wasn’t taking the hint. It was only when he leaned in with a cruel smile on his face and muttered something that she understood, pulling away indignantly.

She slapped him across the cheek, rising up from her chair and storming off.

Well… now or never, I guess.

Before someone else could try their luck, I sat down next to him. He looked honestly surprised, doing a brief double take before finally settling back into facing forward, both hands around his tumbler of liquor.

“What will you have?” He asked.

“Bloody Mary.”

He gave a crisp nod to the bartender, who wandered over our way. A few minutes later, he was dropping off a glass at my fingertips, filled with a delicious concoction of vegetable juices and liquor.

“Thanks,” I nodded towards the bartender in appreciation. He offered a quick smile before stepping away to take another order.

“I’m glad you came,” Lex told me, still facing forward. I could see his fingertips slide further around the glass, constraining it within his grasp.

“Who was that woman from earlier today? The other one of you with the English accent?” I asked suddenly.

“That was Jess.”

“Jess…” I traced the syllable with my lips. “Is she your wife?”

He actually laughed, breaking his composure to cover his eyes with his hand. “Never in a million years,” Lex smiled softly.

“Girlfriend, then?”

“Jess enjoys a good power complex. She only dates the younger folk… expendable idiots who can keep her attention for a brief while, before she inevitably expels them,” he chuckled. “Jess is the best damn friend I’ll ever have, but that’s all that we will ever be.”

“Oh,” I murmured.

It hadn’t occurred to me that she might be anything less than his lover, and I suddenly felt rather silly in the head. It wasn’t a sensation that I enjoyed, although I knew that I deserved it this time.

“So, what is she, then?
Old friends?
What’s that supposed to mean?”

“She’s
sort of
my agent.”

“Your agent? What are you, a movie star?”

“I’m not a movie star,” he replied, sipping from his drink. “I play football.”

“Football? In England?”

“It’s not
your
football,” he mentioned offhandedly. “You’d call it
soccer
. But to the rest of the world, what I play is called
football
.”

“I see,” I replied.

“You sound disappointed,” Lex observed.

“You’re one of those meathead sports players,” I told him. “I could never stand athletes. They’re always just so full of themselves. Always thinking they need to dominate everything around themselves.”

Lex thought on that for a moment, but he didn’t respond, which I found rather telling.

“So, what are you doing in America, then?” I asked, surprised that I even really cared. “You’re a long way from England.”

“Just passing through.”

“I think you mentioned that before,” I recalled. “And you brought your agent? On a quick jaunt through New Orleans?”

“She can never turn down a good trip. Always loves to get out of England as often as she can. She has to stay close to me, especially when I’m playing internationally.”

He suddenly looked disappointed with himself, as if he’d fumbled and revealed some major detail to me.

“You play other countries?”

“Sometimes,” he responded coolly.

“Well, you must be a big deal, then.”

Lex smiled wistfully. “Nah… just a guy.”

We sat in silence for a moment, sipping from our drinks while we thought on things.

“I heard something about a contract this morning. What kind of contract?”

“Just some promotional thing,” Lex replied absentmindedly. “Jess swung by to tell me that there’s another player that’s in the running for it, so I might miss out on it.”

“Is it important?” I asked.

He chose his words carefully.

“It’s very important to me.”

I didn’t particularly understand, but I nodded anyway. It seemed like the appropriate thing to do, given the circumstances.

“So, what do
you
do?” He asked.

“I paint,” I answered noncommittally.

“You paint? Any good?”

“A little,” I told him modestly.

He nodded, and the silence resumed between the two of us. I was starting to regret coming back here and seeing him again…

“I was given an academic scholarship for painting when I was younger,” I eventually added. “Had the opportunity to go on an artist’s retreat… holed myself away in a cottage in Finland for a year to study myself and my craft.”

“That’s interesting,” he replied, turning his gaze to face me. “You must be plenty good to score something like that.”

“Maybe I am,” I confidently told him. “I’ve been selling my own paintings since I was fourteen. A couple of years later, I was supporting myself entirely through my artwork.”

“Have anything up in the galleries?” he asked.

“Lots of my older stuff. My work is hanging in a dozen galleries here in town, including some of the more respected museums. I’m a little harder to find outside of Louisiana, but some places carry my work. Some state museums in New England, a few places out west… last count? Upwards of a hundred galleries carry at least
something
of mine.”

Lex considered this. “That’s impressive, Riley. Now that you mention it, I can see you sitting in front of an easel… You’re good with your hands…”

“Thanks,” I answered noncommittally, giving him a sideways glance and a bit of a smirk.

“So, what do your parents think of that?” He asked, casting me a studying glance as he sipped his glass of beer.

“My parents… aren’t exactly part of the equation,” I shrugged, holding back the emotions.

“Oh,” he commented. “I’m sorry to hear it. I don’t want to drudge up any painful memories…”

“My mother left when I was very young,” I told him, surprising myself. “As for my father, he died in a motorcycle accident a couple of years later.

“I can’t possibly imagine,” he sympathized.

I continued on. “I passed through foster care for a while until a family took me in. They supported my art, and were proud of me… but they were Ivy League material, and I wasn’t. When I decided to not follow in their footsteps, things got a bit… messy. So, when I came back from Finland, I was able to scrounge myself up a decent place to live, worked on my art, and here I am.”

He nodded, reflecting on these words. “You’re not in contact with them?”

“I have a phone number for my mother that may or may not work,” I offered. “My biological mother, I mean. The last time we chatted, it turned into a massive argument. I haven’t bothered with her in years.

“As for my foster parents, no. I burned the bridge. I’m on my own… just how I like it. Not having to rely on anybody but myself.”

“You enjoy your solitude.”

“I enjoy being in control of my life,” I clarified. “It’s a rewarding feeling to not need to depend on the kindness of others. I get what I need from people, offering them a little of myself in return, and then that’s that. Besides my couple of friends, of course.”

“The two from the other night. The Japanese girl and the thin, skittish guy.”

“Yeah, Reiko and Connor. I’ve known them since we were kids… since before I began supporting myself. The two of them have been there from the beginning.”

“They sound like strong friends.”