Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Chloe
Before I get out of bed, before I brush my teeth or pee, I snatch the phone off the charger on my bedside shelf and, sitting up, watching the sun rise over the murky water beyond the sliding glass doors across from me, I dial up Tate Fontanna.
It’s only six a.m. and I smile like an evil kitten as I stretch.
I have to call him early—to make sure I catch him before practice, right?
Not because he’s a living dream and I can’t get him out of my head.
The phone rings twice on the other end as I sit up against my pillows.
Tapping my fingernails against the back of the phone as I wait through rings three and four, I make a mental note that I need to make an appointment for a manicure.
Problematic since I’m new to town and I have nowhere to go. I’ll ask Cat at lunch today.
After ring five, Tate’s voicemail comes on.
I listen to his voice through the whole message because it’s as gorgeous as the rest of him.
Dear God please give me an aneurism to get these lusty thoughts of him out of my head—not really.
I don’t leave a message because what’s the point?
He’s not going to return my call. I wouldn’t if I were him. He hates me.
I’m used to putting people off, and I’m also used to winning them over. But this guy? He has me unsure and it’s a foreign and uncomfortable place, especially since I’m already a fish out of water getting used to a new environment.
Think like a shark. This mantra didn’t come from Dad. It was something Grandma used to say—my mother’s mother, surprisingly—the original Southern belle. She hid an iron core underneath a pretty layer of ruffles and refinement. I loved and lost her too.
Tossing the phone, I jump from bed and get ready for the day, inspired by Grandma and all the ghosts from my past guiding me through life now. How can I possibly feel alone when I have so many memories haunting me?
I didn’t want to chance an in-person confrontation, although my girlie parts are titillated at the prospect of seeing him because now I have no choice.
I have to resort to ambushing him at the stadium.
It should be easy since Cat is having the guards let me in.
Smiling at the traffic as I drive to the studio, I plot.
The ambush will happen in the team dining room where they’ll most likely be.
I’ll catch him before I go to Cat’s office—as long as the security guard doesn’t escort me.
Tate Fontanna will be very surprised, the poor devil. But I need every advantage I can get since we’ll be on his home turf with all his teammates backing him up. Or witnessing his submission. I want to purr, my panties feeling moist as I turn the corner to arrive at my building.
Once inside, I sit at my computer and it’s business as usual until Sarina Wallace, NESH’s top on-air talent, aims herself straight for my desk. I want to turn around to see if Henry’s standing behind me because I don’t know what she wants with me.
Fuck, no. There is one reason she might want to see me.
But Henry wouldn’t do that to me—Sarina can’t be the one he’s given my story to, the one who I’m supposed to assist by doing all the grunt work.
I hide my horror even as my gut pitches around my insides like a curveball gone wild.
She reaches my desk and extends her hand to shake mine. I have no choice, so I do.
“You’re Chloe Smith. I’m Sarina Wallace. Thank you so much for agreeing to assist me with the NFL player injury exposé. Henry told me you volunteered. We’re calling it Project Perspective,” she says.
Popping a smile into place through my gritted teeth, I promise myself to wait at least a day before I talk to Henry about his fucking Project Perspective.
Because it should be my so-called project and if anyone was going to give it a name, it should have been me.
And I would have given it a snappier name than that for damn sure.
“Nice to finally meet you,” I say. “I’ve been in and out of the studio these past few days since I got here.
” Doing the work to set you up for my damn exposé.
But it’s not her fault, so I unclench my jaw and sit back down in my seat.
When Henry put Sarina in the middle of this, I’m sure he didn’t mention to her that the project was my idea.
Taking a breath, I let go of the animosity. I could use some friends around here.
“Oh, I totally get it,” she says. “It’s tough when you’re new to town and figuring things out.” But she doesn’t follow up with any offer to show me around or introduce me to anyone. For instance, she does not introduce me to the young man she says hello to when he pauses as he’s walking by my desk.
Sarina is gorgeous and hosts a popular nightly show covering the Militia, teamed with a couple of ex-players.
Dislike plumes up in me again, knowing she’s going to be the one zeroing in on Fontanna, but I instantly roll my eyes at myself—inside my head.
Cliché jealous woman much? No way she’ll be talking to Fontanna or doing any of the grunt work on this.
She’s the sit-in-the-studio talent to be spoon-fed the story, strictly a narrator.
I need to get my head out of my pussy. Maybe I need some serious vibrator therapy.
More likely I need a hunky man not part of the Militia, but someone manly enough to take my mind off Tate fucking Fontanna, someone who will make me scream in a cosmic climax until I don’t even remember my own name, let alone his.
“So I hear your father was a legend? Oscar Smith?” She snaps my attention back to the moment at hand.
I nod, not liking the direction of this conversation even if I do expect it.
I expect to have the same conversation with every last person at this studio eventually.
Probably why I haven’t gone out of my way to meet or engage with anyone, why I refused to allow Henry to introduce me at a meeting like he’d planned to do.
Although avoiding the elephant in the room is a losing strategy and I’m behaving like a teenager in denial of her crazy parent. And I was never that girl. Ever.
“Must be hard having to live up to—”
“It’s a blessing really,” I interrupt. “I loved my father and learned a lot from him. The only hard thing is having lost him.”
“Oh—I’m sure. Sorry for your loss—I didn’t mean—”
“Did you need anything in particular right now, Sarina? Because I have some calls to make.”
She cools off, but she has a way to go before she reaches my temperature at about a hundred and fifty below zero. Why not two hundred below? I smile at my silly mind-reference to the line I gave Tate. I’d underestimated the level of difficulty it would take to throw him off.
“Of course,” Sarina says. “I’ll email you my list before the end of the day.
Once again, I appreciate your taking point on the background research.
” She turns and walks off, leaving a wake of insecurity behind her swaying ass.
I feel kind of sorry for her and make a note to let her off the hook.
Later. I don’t want to be her enemy and even though I didn’t start the patronizing banter, I know I can put an end to it. Disarmament is my specialty.
I’ll reassure her, ease her discomfort at the legendary status which has been unjustly bestowed on me.
But my generosity flags when I check my e-mails later.
She’s sent me a list of tasks and detailed special requests like she’s the queen of all motherfucker micromanagers.
As I skim the list I’m surprised pick up my dry cleaning isn’t on it.
Not giving my blood a chance to boil over, and with relish, I stab the delete button with the chipped nail of my index finger.
List gone. Problem solved. I know how to do my job and I’ll make her look damn good in spite of herself.
After parking in the employee lot at the stadium as Cat instructed me to do, I get out and walk through the entryway to be greeted by a receptionist and two security guards. After checking in, one of the guards shows me to the door and makes like he’s coming with me.
“I know my way, sweetheart. No need to take you away from your post on my account. I’m sure you have far more important things to do.
” I lay on the Southern accent thick with a big smile.
I look harmless. He nods and glances back and forth between a television screen showing some kind of sports show and the long corridor ahead of us.
I pat his arm and give him a wink to push his decision over the edge. He nods.
“You sure you know where you’re going?”
“Absolutely. Cat is an old friend of mine,” I say.
This mollifies the uniformed man and he goes back through the door.
Trying not to skip for joy, I move fast through the corridor in the general direction that I think leads to the players’ dining area.
It’s a long way around, but a quick check of my Apple watch tells me I have about ten minutes before I’m scheduled to meet Cat.
But that’s all I need to set a metaphorical bomb.
The smell floors me when I arrive at the team’s dining room. It’s a glorified cafeteria, well appointed and oversize. And currently filled with the scents of sweat-soaked men and broiled meat combining to create a scent stronger than anything I’ve ever encountered in a locker room.
Moving past the threshold, heart pounding because this is bold even for me, I head into the heart of the loud, bustling room, spot Tate Fontanna three tables away, and head in his direction.
For whatever reason, I have a particular nose for him, a sense of where he’s at.
The general din in the room gets quieter as I approach, as some of the men notice me, stop what they’re doing and stare.
A man I don’t know sitting next to Fontanna nudges him and he looks up.