Chapter 5
RAWLEY
Iwas stunned when Aiden told me the Sunday Magazine cover interview with Avery was a go.
“She agreed?”
“She did,” he said, sounding confused as to why I was questioning the news.
They asked if I could accommodate a date this week, given her game schedule.
Which is how I ended up here two days later, in a large open-concept studio space rented out by the paper.
When I walk in, she’s already here, scrolling through her phone. She’s wearing a navy sleeveless halter tee, with her abs on display again, and soft gray cotton pants that showcase the length of her legs.
Aiden is here too, but I don’t pay attention to what he’s wearing.
The room is teaming with a dozen other people I assume are staff from the paper.
“Hi, Avery,” I say in her direction, louder than normal to command her attention.
She looks up from her phone and raises a brow. “Rawley.”
I’d almost forgotten how striking she is in person. Those cheekbones, looking like she should be on the cover of magazines for a living.
Her dark eyes take me in, the barest hint of mascara there. Her lips look shiny and full, the only obvious makeup she has on otherwise.
I take two steps closer to her. “Funny seeing you here.”
C’mon, be more cheesy, Battle?
“Ha.” She drops the hand holding her phone and turns her attention to me fully. There we go. “Looks like you didn’t get disappointed after all.”
What does she mean by that? Oh…
“Yes, more time with you. I’m not complaining. I can’t believe you agreed to do this.”
Her eyes crinkle the slightest bit. “I was cornered.”
“I’ve seen you play, that doesn’t happen often.” Damn, I’m corny as fuck today.
A small grin sneaks onto her face. “Not on the court, it doesn’t. But when it comes to my mom and media requests…”
“Ah, it’s like that?”
“No, not really. She’s great. I’m not big on the press side of the job.”
“Same.” I let out a big sigh.
“That bodes well for our interview,” she says archly.
“Oh, today is different for me. I’ll be your most enthusiastic subject.” I wink at her to punctuate my words.
She rolls her eyes in return, and then lets out a little laugh. “I’m sure.”
In my peripheral vision, I see Aiden watching the two of us chat, a quizzical look on his face. I did mention that I’d met her, but maybe he hadn’t really absorbed it then.
“Hi, everyone, I’m Farah, the editor of the magazine,” a blond woman says. She points to a thirty-something man with a shaved head. “This is Isaiah, he’s going to be our photographer today.”
“Hey, man,” I say to him, and he dips his chin in return.
“The interview part will come next, but first we want to take the pictures for the cover,” Farah continues.
“In our uniforms, right?” Avery asks. They’d given us a heads-up so we’d bring our gear.
“Yes. There are a couple of dressing rooms if you want to get changed.”
With that, we go our separate ways. They wanted me to wear pads, so I get fully suited up other than my helmet.
Once I’m done, I head back out into the open room, and Avery is already there, in her Surge jersey and shorts. She has heavier makeup on now, as you’d expect for a professional photo shoot.
She’s also pulled her hair up in the ponytail she wears for game days. I might know this from stalking her social media profiles the night after we met at the gym. But I’ll keep that to myself.
“Is this good enough?” she asks a woman who I think might be from the Surge staff.
“Yeah, the makeup looks great too.”
“Thanks, we’ve had enough family photo shoots over the years that I’ve picked up a few tricks.”
There’s a ball in Avery’s hand, and she’s twisting it in the air a few inches and then catching it.
Suddenly, Isaiah’s voice interrupts my observations.
“Okay, great. Rawley, you’re ready too. Can you both head to the green screen area over there?”
“Sure thing,” I respond, and we both walk to the spot he wants.
“Avery, you stand to the left of Rawley, and keep your ball. Rawley, here’s a football.”
Isaiah chucks it to me, and I catch it one handed.
Avery watches me with an eagle eye. “Showing off?”
“I’m not the one who smoked a bunch of high school kids in a pickup game of my own sport,” I tease her.
Oh crap, hope she isn’t offended at that.
I watch her absorb what I said, and she looks amused instead. “Fair. I was just going stir crazy at home that day.”
“I get that. Where’s your place?”
“I have a townhouse in a new development, about twenty minutes from the arena.”
“Nice.”
We’re interrupted by more instructions from Isaiah.
“Nothing complicated today. We plan to take straightforward shots of you two facing the camera, side by side. If you want to play around with the positions of the balls, that’s fine. Keep things dynamic.”
“With serious expressions,” Farah says. “We’re focusing the article on how you two are going to help your teams in their title runs, so we want the energy of the photos to match.”
As Isaiah gets us started and the clicks from his camera begin, I keep a game face on, which is easy to do in my pads. Looking straight ahead, I barely see Avery out of the corner of my eye, but she’s making a similar expression.
It only takes about fifteen minutes before Isaiah says we’re good.
“All set from my end,” he indicates to Farah.
I relax my posture and flip the ball in the air before catching it one handed, like earlier.
“Hmm,” Avery says. I look over, and she’s peering at me, a brow raised, the ball sitting on her right hip. It’s like I can read her mind calling me out for “showing off” again.
“I doubt a flip of a ball is going to impress anyone, let alone you,” I remark. She smirks, like she knows I guessed her thoughts. “What would impress you?”
“A sense of humor. Loyalty. Humility.”
“That’s quite a list.”
Her lips turn up a fraction more as she continues. “A solid fifteen-foot jumper.”
“Oh man. I’m screwed then, as you saw the other day,” I joke.
She gives me a full smile. “You—”
Farah clears her throat. “Sorry to interrupt, but if you want to change now, we can move on to the interview.”
“Sounds good,” Avery says, her expression muted again.
We both head in the direction of our dressing rooms on either side of the studio.
“You two are quite chatty,” Aiden observes as I pass near him.
I stop to respond, not sure where he’s going with that. “Probably a good thing for the interview.”
“Yes,” he says. “I represent her brother, you know.”
“Oh, yeah? But not Avery?”
Aiden gives me a small smile. “I might have that conversation with her and her mother eventually. But no, not yet.”
Aiden seems to be grabbing up top Florida sports talent like a kid collecting candy on Halloween.
“Don’t let me hold you up,” he says. “Go get changed.”
Once again, it takes me longer because of my pads, and when I come out of the dressing room, Avery’s seated at the table that’s been set up. She’s back in that little shirt and comfortable pants, but her black hair is still in the sleek ponytail.
In front of her is a recording device, and on each end of the table is a sheet of paper with our list of questions.
All of the questions are scripted. The answers are scripted in a way too, I just need to remember all the notes Jim gave me last night. Goody.
“Hey,” I say as I approach her from behind. “You ready for this?”
She turns around, and I see her eyes move quickly up and down my body.
I swear, this woman keeps checking me out.
She turns back to sit squarely in her seat as I settle into my own opposite her. “If I’m not, we’re in trouble, aren’t we?”
Face-to-face now, I notice that while she’s scrubbed most of the makeup she had on for the photos earlier, her lips are still glossy.
I want to respond with something clever, but the chair they’ve given me to sit in is so uncomfortable it pulls my focus. I switch positions to get cozier, and I see Avery’s eyes drop down to my leg.
What’s she looking at now?
Ah, my shorts rode up a little when I moved around and one of my tattoos is showing.
She seems curious, but doesn’t ask about it. Her eyes move back up to mine.
“Yeah, I have a tat there,” I say to satisfy her unspoken question, and then pull my shorts up a couple of inches higher. Her eyes snap back down to my upper thigh. “I got it after my final bowl game in January. It says Better Together.”
“What does that mean?”
I pause. “Should we save the questions and answers for the recording?”
“Somehow, I don’t think our teams want us talking about our tattoos in the article,” she quips, her lips turning back up.
I chuckle. “Good point. It’s a saying that my siblings and I came up with when we were younger. Our parents had a messy divorce, and it became our motto to represent that we always have each other’s backs.”
“And do you? Always have each other’s backs?”
Her question inspires a flood of memories of my siblings bailing me out. “More than I deserve,” I say softly.
Intrigue hits her face when she processes my answer, but she doesn’t follow up. Instead, after a couple of beats, she twists around, and pulls down the collar of her shirt.
“Can you see that?”
I see the top of her tattoo, but I can’t tell what it is. “Sort of. What is it?”
“It’s a saying too. ‘Born Ready.’ My brother used to chant it all the time growing up before games, and it’s not a full-blown family motto like yours, but I got the tat in honor of him.”
“It’s a good one.”
She turns back in her seat, facing me squarely again. “Yeah, the phrase fires me up every time. Still to this day I can hear his voice yelling it around the house.”
“Are you guys close?”
“I mean, I can call him anytime, but we’re both so busy. He has a daughter, and she’s only four, so between that and basketball, he has zero time.”
“A daughter, wow, yeah, that’s a lot.” He must have had his kid really young.
“It’s fine though. I’m closer to my mom.”
“That’s cool.”
“You said your relationship with your brother was…what did you say at the gym? ‘Complicated’?”
I’m more interested in hearing her open up further than breaking down my dynamic with Landon, so I deflect. “Yeah. But I’m really close to my youngest brother, Connor. He’s finishing his freshman year at Princeton.”
“Smart kid.”
“A fucking genius.” I shake my head. “School was not my friend, but he got me through—”
“Okay, you two good to go?” Farah interrupts.
I look around to find all eyes on us.
Shit, I forgot what we were even doing here.
We got lost in our conversation.
Huh.