CHAPTER 12 JOLENE
I feel like I’m going to throw up.
I’ve done exclusive interviews before. I interviewed Coach Thompson dozens of times, and I’ve interviewed players and other coaches, too.
But that’s when I was a sports beat reporter. This is my first interview as correspondent.
And on top of that, I have this sinking feeling that the new head coach is Lincoln Nash, and the fear of seeing him again after nearly twenty years is knotting my stomach.
When fear takes over, I jump into fight mode. Not fight-or-flight…no no, right to fight. I’m not just terrified of seeing him again.
I’m terrified I’ll fuck up this brand-new job because of him. Of all the people in the world to be hired the same time I get my dream job, it had to be him.
And my hunch it’s him has only been confirmed by the fact that his house in Los Angeles just sold in under twenty-four hours a few days ago.
I’m pacing the small conference room where we’re holding this interview while Dave, my camera operator, gets set up. I review my questions—the same list of questions I’ll ask no matter who it is, and I draw in a deep breath.
“What’s going on with you?” Dave asks, breaking into my thoughts.
I like Dave. We’ve worked together lots of times, and the station assigned him to work with me this season—a promotion for both of us, but he won’t be traveling with the team or making besties with the new coach like I will.
Dave is in his late twenties and single, and he loves to regale me with all his tales from the clubs. I live vicariously through him since that’s not really my scene so much anymore—not with a seven-year-old at home, though I do take advantage of the occasional night out with Sam when the boys are at their dads’ houses and she’s not pulling a late shift.
“Nothing’s going on with me. Why do you ask?” I halt in my pacing at his question.
“You’re walking back and forth like you’re caged in here. It’s like you’re nervous, and I have never seen you nervous to do an exclusive. Ever. And it’s making me nervous.”
“I’m not nervous,” I snap at him.
He raises his brows as if to tell me I’m proving his point, which I probably am. I take a drink of water. I look out the window. I force myself to recenter, to focus on the task at hand. Maybe it’s not Lincoln and I have nothing to worry about.
And then the door opens.
Jack Dalton is standing there, a force to be reckoned with…and he’s blocking my view of the new coach. I force a smile.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Dalton,” I say, and he nods politely with a smile.
“I’m pleased to introduce you to our new head coach,” he says, and he moves into the room so the new coach can stand in the doorway next. “Mr. Lincoln Nash.”
My heart drops into my stomach when I see him in person for the first time in nearly twenty years.
Time stands still as we face off across the small room.
Memories plow into me.
It wasn’t just his dad hurting my dad and taking him out of the game forever. It wasn’t just the friendships between our families torn apart from one event. It wasn’t just the hatred and animosity my father spewed at the Nashes.
It was the fact that in the midst of all that uncertainty, the person I loved more than anyone or anything in the entire world shattered my heart.
And now he’s standing in front of me again, a smug smirk on the handsome face that time has been very, very kind to, and I have to interview him. According to my boss, I have to become his best friend. I have to act professional when I can’t stop staring at him.
When I can’t stop feeling the feelings that rushed over me every time he walked in any room back when we were together.
He’s twenty years older now than the last time I saw him in person, and my God is he attractive.
A scruff lines his jaw that wasn’t there in his younger years, and his dark eyes seem to pin me to my place as they land on me. His dark hair looks freshly cut, a longish, spiky crew cut with a tapered fade, and he wears a suit ahead of the press conference.
Lincoln Nash in a suit is a fucking sight to behold.
If I didn’t hate him so much, I’d have the urge to let him toss me on top of the conference table and have his way with me.
I push those thoughts out even though my mind dwells on that first time for a beat.
I was only fifteen. He was only seventeen.
And despite our youth and inexperience, I can’t say it was bad. And I imagine that like a fine wine, he’s only gotten better over time.
Not that I’ll ever find out.
All I associate with him is the explosive ending to what was the best thing in my life. We can’t go back and change that.
No matter how hot for him I feel just from seeing him walk into the room.
If he’s surprised to see me here, he hides it well. In fact, he seems wholly unaffected by me while I’m trying my hardest to pull it together. Maybe he doesn’t remember me. Maybe he’s bedded so many women now that I’m just a face from his past, and that thought makes me even angrier.
Or maybe Jack forewarned him. Maybe he knew he’d be seeing me in here today and he had time to prepare. My only preparations came in hunches and speculations.
Heat climbs up my back, but I have to keep my temper in check. I’m just not sure how when all I want to do is scream at him for the way he treated me back then.
He may have been my first…but he wasn’t my last.
I shouldn’t hold so much anger over what happened. Maybe that’s his deal…he simply moved on while I’ve been stuck holding onto this giant suitcase filled with a grudge that sometimes feels so heavy it’s going to knock me clean off my feet.
I can’t help a tiny glare at Jack for the blindside, but he’s smirking, too, so I feel like he knew what he was doing. It all feels like a setup, as if I’m the butt of their joke. Ha-ha, she’s a girl trying to fit into this man’s world. Let’s show her that women are just emotional creatures and see how she runs with it.
I let these errant thoughts take over. I let them wander down to the heat climbing my spine, and the flames ignite.
I won’t prove them right.
“Mr. Nash, what a surprise. Congratulations,” I say, and this would be the time where I should walk over and shake his hand, but hell if I’m allowing any part of my body to touch any part of his.
“Thank you, Ms. Bailey,” he says, his voice the same voice I remember murmuring to me while he made love to me but somehow…raspier. His eyes don’t leave mine for a beat, and I try to read what’s there, but it’s like a book in a language I no longer know the words to.
Still. He knows my name. He didn’t forget who I am.
I don’t know why I thought he would. What we shared was once in a lifetime. What we shared was supposed to be forever.
Somehow that snuffs one of the thousands of flames now leaping toward my neck.
Dave clears his throat, and I glance over at him. He raises his brows as if to say let’s get this show on the road.
Oh, right. We’re here for an interview. Lincoln is the new head coach of the Vegas Aces. I have a whole list of questions to ask.
And I pray I don’t ask the one that’s just on the tip of my tongue.
The only one I really want to ask.