Chapter Five #2
or anyone else. She wasn’t trying to be someone she wasn’t, only the best version of herself. Whatever that looked like.
“It’s not like that. I’m not tying myself in any knots, promise. I just—” She blew out her breath. Right now Cash was looking
at her like he didn’t quite believe her. “Do you remember how nervous you were before your first training camp?”
At three in the morning, he had called her, too keyed up to sleep. She’d kept him company all night, distracting him by forcing him to quiz her for her Gender, Media, and Diversity midterm.
He chuckled under his breath. “I thought I was going to hurl.” He wrinkled his nose. “I think I did, actually.”
“You knew you were good, that you were a first-round draft pick for a reason. But you wanted the coaches and the other guys
who’d been playing for longer to see that you were good. You wanted them to give you a slap on the ass and tell you, Good job out there, Curran.”
Cash burst out laughing. “Way to make it sound homoerotic.”
She raised both brows.
“Okay, fine,” he conceded, tipping his head. “It’s a little homoerotic.”
“Thank you.”
“So what you’re saying is, you want Rosaline Sinclair to smack you on the ass and tell you you’re doing a good job?” He smirked.
“Sounds kinky.”
Her cheeks burned. “No, but she’s the best of the best at what she does. She’s the GOAT. It would be like if . . . Johnny Unitas told you that you
played a great game.”
“Johnny Unitas died in 2002, Pop. If he told me I played a great game I’d get my head checked.”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine, it would be like if, God, I don’t know, Peyton Manning told you that you played your ass off on
the field. You’d have no doubt that you’d played a great game.”
Unlike Cash, Poppy wasn’t a first-round draft pick. Not even close. She’d been the equivalent of a free agent, hired only
because Cash had needed someone, and she was there, with the bare minimum qualifications required to do the job. She didn’t
have a track record of being great, just a burning desire to be more than a pity hire.
So, no, it wasn’t about approval or jumping through hoops to prove herself to Rosaline; it was about affirmation.
She didn’t need Rosaline or anyone else to tell her she was doing a good job.
She just really, really wanted to hear it so that maybe that awful, insidious little voice in her head, the one that whispered that just because
she hadn’t yet didn’t mean she still might not fuck up Cash’s career the way she had her own, would shut the hell up for once.
She hated that voice, would drown it if she could because . . . sometimes she worried it would drown her. The ultimate kill
or be killed battle, only it was her against herself.
“I get it.” The corner of his mouth twitched like he was trying not to smile. “There’s nothing wrong with having a praise
kink.”
A—seriously? “Why are you so obsessed with my sex life?”
“How can I be when you don’t have one?”
She set the glass down on her nightstand and snatched the nearest pillow, whacking Cash in the face. “This is bi-on-bi crime.”
He snickered and stole the pillow. “Oh come on. I don’t hear you denying it.”
“I am a professional.”
“A professional what?” he teased. “Simp?”
Without her pillow, she had to resort to using her fists, punching him in the shoulder.
“Watch the throwing arm!” He laughed.
“I can’t believe a guy who started listening to Cyndi Lauper for his girlfriend called me a simp.”
“Guilty.” He grinned, unrepentant.
“As I was saying.” She narrowed her eyes. “I am a professional. Rosaline Sinclair is my—my colleague.”
She wasn’t about to jeopardize her job or Cash’s career because of an all too unfortunate crush.
And dear lord, was it unfortunate, lusting after someone who thought the worst of her when they even thought of her at all.
But what else was new? She’d never wanted what was easy or good for her.
She was probably destined to die single and alone.
Maybe with a few cats who loved her if she was lucky.
“It’s hardly like you report to each other. And not that you need it, but if you’re looking for it, as your technical boss,
I give you blanket permission to bump uglies with Lyric’s publicist should the occasion ever arise.”
“Bump uglies?” Poppy wrinkled her nose. “What are you, twelve?”
“What do you want me to call it? Enjoy a little bangity-bang-bang? Shake the sheets? Cash in the Kegels? Partake in some hand-to-gland
combat?”
“Hand to—oh my god.” She stared, jaw hanging, horrified. “You’re a child. I cannot believe you bagged a girl like Lyric Adair.”
He smiled soppily. “She likes my dumb jokes.”
Like her grandmother used to say, there was a lid for every pot. “Well, whatever weird slang you want to call it? It’s never
going to happen.”
She wished she could say she had enough self-respect that today had quashed her crush, but if anything, she just wanted to
work that much harder to prove Rosaline wrong. Probably not the healthiest of motivations, but Poppy was nothing if not a
perpetual work in progress.
“Stranger things have happened,” he said. “I thought the same thing about Lyric and look at us.”
He was the exception, not the rule, drawing from a seemingly indelible well of good fortune, one of those rare people who
were lucky in life. Whereas Poppy didn’t so much have a well as she had a shallow puddle that was dry most months of the year.
“The point is moot. I don’t even know if she likes girls.” For all she knew, Rosaline could be straighter than a two-by-four.
“You want me to ask Lyric?”
“You can’t just ask if someone’s queer, Cash.”
He rolled his eyes. “I was going to, you know, be subtle about it.”
Unfortunately, Cash wouldn’t know subtlety if it bit him on the ass. “Your offer is both sweet and incredibly unnecessary.”
The last thing she needed was him meddling in her nonexistent love life and causing Rosaline to look at her like she was even
more pathetic. “I just want her to take me seriously. That’s it.”
He scooted closer, knee touching hers. “Don’t take it personally. Lyric says Rosaline is like this with everyone.”
But Poppy didn’t want to be everyone.
She was Poppy Peterson, damn it. She might not be the best or the brightest, but knock her down nine times and she’d—eventually—stand
up ten.