Chapter 9 Declan
DECLAN
Iclear my throat and say, “I’m Declan Printz, guilty as charged.” I grin because here I am, reunited with my best friend, and I can’t help but joke around.
A subtle smile plays on her lips. “Nice to meet you. I’m Maggie Byrne, your new lifestyle coach.” She scans a piece of paper in the folder like she isn’t sure where to go from here.
I peer over her shoulder at the file, getting a lungful of that same, familiar sweet rose scent mixed with my cologne wafting from my suit jacket.
Up until now, I’d been nose blind to it, but mixed with Maggie’s fragrance, I can’t help but want to take a bath in the combination—or hose myself down in it with a pair of squirt guns.
Stealing a glance, her eyelashes brush the smooth crescents of her cheeks. Her forehead creases slightly as though she isn’t sure about what she’s reading. Wisps of her hair graze her neck and she twists one with slender fingers as the water drips onto her collarbones.
My phone vibrates again, catching me on a hard swallow and I cough into my fist. It’s from another of what Wolf would refer to as Declan’s Damsels.
Little known fact. There’s the public-facing version of me and the private one.
No one in the US, except Maggie, has ever seen a glimpse into that side of me, and even with her, it was limited.
I left the past in Ireland. But whether it’s geographical proximity, Maggie’s presence—sharpening the image of who I was when we first met like an old Polaroid photo coming into focus—or simply a change in the air, I feel an inner crackling like something is breaking open.
It’s a youthful, innocent, and fresh first-glance sense. The one I’d felt when I met Siobhan all those years ago—and haven’t come close to feeling for anyone since.
Maybe not until now.
Maggie’s voice floats back to me. “Welcome to Blancbourg Academy d’Etiquette of Concordia.”
If I’m not mistaken, by the way she stumbles over the school’s title, it’s the first time she’s spoken it out loud. I’m not going to lie. It’s slightly adorable.
She sucks in a deep, shaky breath. Is she nervous or steeling herself in case I get any wise ideas?
A brilliant plan forms in my mind. “Forget reform school. We’ll fake it. A double fake—pretend that we don’t know each other and that we’re going along with this etiquette nonsense.”
Ignoring me, she continues, “We teach social skills commonly known as etiquette. This will include in-person interaction, print, and online.”
“Listen, I know why I’m here, but don’t you think we could just go through the motions of the lessons and hang out instead?” Truthfully, I don’t want her to have to suffer through giving me the spiel. I know how to be a good lad, but often choose not to.
She lifts her chin slightly. “To be quite honest, it’s so I get a paycheck on Friday.”
“What?” I ask, taken aback by her candor.
She gives her head a dismissive shake like she forgot to be formal. “I meant to answer how it’ll help you. Sorry. As you know, it’s my first day.”
“I guess we’re all beginners at some point.” I recall how it felt when I arrived in Boston, started school, and my first time on the American football field. It was the same day I met Maggie Byrne. I step closer, intending to offer her comfort by bringing her gaze to mine.
She stiffens and doesn’t look up.
Taking the folder out of her hands, I close it and set it on the table. I pull out the chair for her. She drops in and then I assume a comfortable position with my legs wide and feet planted on the floor opposite her. “Like I was saying before, how about we help each other?”
“What do you mean?”
“How about we come up with a mutually advantageous agreement?”
She tilts her head. “I thought we agreed to start over and pretend we don’t know each other?” Maggie whisper shouts.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. But we can skip the details. You give me a glowing review, but you don’t have to actually do anything. You still get paid. I can do my thing.”
“Declan, what’s your thing?” A hint of mockery enters her voice as though she decided I’m still an overgrown teenage boy with a propensity for being a rascal.
“Hmm. My thing? Let’s see, bad-boy football star.”
She snorts. “I should probably just do my job. We have to perform an individual evaluation first, provide regular updates, and make a midpoint review followed by the final review.”
“Are you sure I can’t persuade you to change your mind? We can pretend to be making over my life. I’ll just do my thing.” I brush my hands together like it’s a done deal.
“Your thing?” she repeats, sounding scandalized like I suggest we make a prison break or go hang out in an unsavory part of town.
“Yeah. There’s a sunny island about a thousand miles south of here.” I waggle my eyebrows, not opposed to a holiday in lieu of reform school.
“If you say anything about a mankini, I’ll—”
A long beat passes as though she’s entertaining the possibility.
It gives me enough time to think about what my thing is.
Football, for starters. Training. Hanging with the guys.
Showing up at events, getting screen time, and shining in the spotlight.
Dating—though that’s off the table for the time being per the coach’s rules.
“My thing is having a good time. We could go sightseeing.”
As the moment stretches between us, I struggle to come up with anything—or anyone—that feels like a true anchor. A person who’d be my ride or die like they used to say when I was a punk teenager—a person who’d do anything for me. Someone I’d let see the real me.
I have the aforementioned stuff I do, but a peculiar thought breaches the surface of my mind. Were all the facets of my public-facing persona a way to create distance between myself and what I lost so long ago? What I believed I’ll never have again?
True love.
The only person who has come close to orbiting that hemisphere sits primly across from me as if she struggles between picking up our friendship where we left off and doing the job she was hired for.
But really, what’s my thing?
Maggie’s voice picks up where that last thought ended. “When you can tell me what your thing is, perhaps I’ll reconsider.”
My jaw ticks with uncertainty. Ordinarily, I’d bargain and work my charm to get her to reconsider right here on the spot.
But Maggie isn’t the kind of person to haggle.
Once she makes up her mind, she sticks with it, and she’s nothing if not honest. Mostly.
There was the time she and I snuck into the gym, made off with the school mascot—a giant ear of corn with eyes—and when questioned, she said she knew nothing of the missing item.
Later, we used it as a pinata at a seniors-only party.
My shoulders drop. Not seeing a way out except potentially getting her in trouble with her new boss, I resign myself to going along with etiquette classes taught by none other than my best friend.
A part of me, however small, is slightly curious about what that might look like, including her life makeover plans, especially if she’s part of it. Perhaps, I’ll find my true thing with Maggie’s help.
She closes the file. “We’ll have an initial assessment, as I mentioned, followed by a week or so of lessons tailored to what you most need to improve.
That also includes grooming. After that, we’ll move out of the classroom and into the world, so to speak.
All the while, I’ll be evaluating you. This will culminate in a task for you to demonstrate that you’ve learned your lesson and will, ahem, keep your pants on. ”
I can’t help but chuckle as she stops laughter from lighting up her face.
“Despite the unfortunate consequences, Moon-Gate was the biggest publicity event of the year. Game tickets and merch sales spiked in the last few days. When money is moving in the team’s direction, no one complains.”
“Except your commissioner.”
“Right. Him and protecting the innocent and delicate eyes of his daughter, Elyse. Let me tell you, she’s no stranger to the locker room.”
“Do you know that firsthand?”
I tuck my chin toward my chest. “No. Starkowsky, or Starky for short, has been wanting to teach us Bruiser boys a lesson for a while, reform things, make us more of a family brand like we used to be.”
I suspect it has something to do with Chase’s family.
His grandfather had been a power player in football—on the field in his youth and then behind the scenes later.
Chase doesn’t talk a ton about it, but something happened somewhere in history that colored Starky’s opinion of the winning Boston team as a bunch of bruisers.
Then again, that is in the name. Or it could just have been that we always won.
Rumors abound in pro ball that the games are fixed, much like professional wrestling back in the day.
I’m on the field and know firsthand that no faking or kayfabe is going on.
But if someone wanted to pay him off so we’d lose and their team would win, it would be easy enough to shift our championship trend if they stash away the star players at reform school.
Maggie clicks a pen and then flips to a page in the folder. “Shall we conduct this interview?” she asks.
Even though she’s still damp from my foolish prank, I notice, possibly for the first time, she holds herself with the grace and poise of a princess. Either that, or she’s just really committed to her job.
She asks me routine questions that I’ve answered a million times: name, birthday, and so on.
I reply with lazy answers because she already knows them and because, in addition to the composed princess side, Maggie has a peppy energy just below the surface, biting to get out.
It’s like she’s aching to shoot water guns and moon a bunch of strangers, but in the time since we were last together—going on a few years now—she boxed it up and stashed it in a storage unit back in Boston.
“So, what would you do?”
“Huh?” I ask, dazed, entranced, lost in memories of us, traipsing around the city, making memories.
I straighten, dismissing the crackling and an odd longing that suddenly fills me. Is it because I don’t want to be here? Boredom? Because I’m an independent operator and have been told to follow certain rules, aka the playbook?
The playbook. I’m a jokester, a rascal if there ever was one, but no way can I do anything to compromise the guys on the team. Especially not Grey. The game is all he has left.
On second thought, in many ways, it’s all I have too.
Maggie tilts her head to the side. “Declan, if this is going to work, you have to pay attention.”
That’s part of the problem. For some reason, right now, all I can pay attention to is Margaret Pearl Byrne and it scares me, so I’m better off letting distractions keep me from probing too deeply about what that might mean.
She explains the personality test that will help her better understand my motivations, desires, and behavior. “It says here that if you don’t know how to answer, think back to when you were a teenager.”
I shift uncomfortably. That’s the last thing I want to do, unless it starts with when she and I met in high school.
She closes the folder. “Or not. We can just sit here in silence until you’re ready.” Her eyes narrow and her mouth puckers like she wants to scold me.
“Okay, ask away.” I gesture with a flutter of my hand.
She huffs.
For the next half hour, I comply and answer all her questions that have to do with how I’d respond or react properly in polite company.
Formally greet people until indicated to do otherwise? Check.
Speak clearly and succinctly? Check.
Keep a tidy appearance? I run my hand across the rough edges of my beard.
Thankfully, I don’t have to delve too deep into the past because my manners were rubbish until Aunt Maureen changed that.
“For now, you can go get settled in your room. I’ll have your results when we meet in,” she consults the folder, “the Seaview dining room at seven for our first meal together.”
“Like a date?” I blurt.
Her cheeks tint a light shade of rose. “No, you goofball, like an evaluation.” She stands to leave, holding her chin high even though she’s still wet from my water guns. “And no pranks allowed.”
I can’t help it, my lips curl into a smile, but I quickly wipe it away.
I didn’t intend for her to be the victim of my water gun spree.
I may routinely disregard rules, but pranking Maggie has always been off-limits.
I was protective of her like a sister. But in the years that passed since we last saw each other, we’ve both grown up.
It’s impossible to think of Maggie as a sibling. Don’t have one of those.
Inside, there’s that crackling.
A twinge of interest.
I should make those feelings off-limits.
I can’t afford to get attached.
I ought to keep it to friends only.
Or faking that we’re not friends.
I have to think of the team. But I won’t deny that I am looking forward to spending more time with My Magg-ola.