Play Maker (7 page)

I
tried not
to think about James, but it was another slow night at the bar and there was plenty of time for my mind to wander. And wander it did. In fact, my mind wandered all the way back up to his suite and took great pleasure in imagining in vivid, erotic detail, all the things I could be doing with the hunky soccer player if I had promised to meet him again after work. I got so lost in my fantasies that I didn’t even hear Maya when she came over to count the tip jar and start closing the bar.

“Wow, he must have been really good in bed,” she observed when she had to jostle me out of my x-rated thoughts. She had been on the other side of the bar when James had come in with his friend, Ethan and though we hadn’t spoken about it, she had sent me a questioning look after he left and I could tell she had been dying to ask me about him since then.

I shrugged, trying to remain casual, though my face felt hot. I chomped on my gum, trying to distract myself from my own naughty thoughts. “He was alright.” It was such a bold-faced lie that one look at Maya caused us both to start laughing. I felt some of my tension lift. “Ok, ok, it was incredible. Really, really incredible.”

She leaned forward eagerly. “Tell me everything.”

Though I kept the more, um, personal details to myself as we closed, I recounted the night I had shared with James, including how I had turned down his offer not just for more sex but also for the waffles that Maya loved so much.

“You are crazy, you know that right?” She locked the door and we headed towards the garage where her car was parked. “No woman in her right mind would turn down those waffles.” She winked at me. “And another chance with that hot British piece of ass.”

“But the code!” I insisted. “It’s there for a reason.”

“Uh, yeah, to keep unworthy men away from us. Not to deny yourself pleasure you most definitely deserve.” She turned to face me. “Look, the whole point of the slut code is to put yourself and your needs first. What are you gaining by saying no to a guy who rocked your world? Let him rock your world again. And again. And again! Then when you’re done, set him free.” Maya mimed releasing a bird into the wild and I couldn’t help but laugh.

“We just come from such different worlds.” I chewed at my lip, thinking about the way that he lived, versus my own. I had hated the way my apartment had seemed so small and dingy when I got back to it after our one night stand. That had never happened before and I disliked getting swept up in the luxury and opulence of that kind of life style. It never helped anything.

“Well, honey, you’re not going to marry him.” Maya pointed her keys at me as we reached her car. “You’re just going to fuck him. As often as
you
want.”

I got in the car, letting her words sink in.

“Look.” She looked over at me. “If you don’t want to sleep with him again – don’t. But if you keeping thinking about him – and I know that you are – and the only thing keeping you from going back for another round is some dumb code we thought up years ago to keep us from getting into relationships with guys who didn’t deserve us, then you need to let the code go.”

Maya pulled out of the hotel parking garage. Downtown was quiet and empty, one of the rare times in LA where there was no traffic waiting for us,

As we merged onto the freeway, I rolled down my window, enjoying the warm night breeze. I didn’t know what to do.

“I just don’t know if it’s a good idea. I don’t want him to get attached,” I told her, even though a part of me was worried that
he
wasn’t the one at risk here.

Maya patted my knee. “He’s a soccer star from the U.K, babe. He can’t get attached. Because no matter what, this thing has an expiration date. So what if your one night stand becomes a two night stand? Or even a three night stand? Enjoy yourself, Nicole. For the first time in your life, really put yourself and your needs first. And try those damn waffles.”

Easier said than done. But if anyone understood what it was like to have people counting on them, it was Maya. She had been supporting her mother for the past ten years, ever since a car accident put her in hospice. All of Maya’s paychecks went towards the expensive care that her mother required, while she lived in a crappy studio apartment in K-town and drove a beat up Toyota that had seen better days. All while putting herself through grad school. She, more than anyone, understood what it was like to take care of the people around her without being able to take much time for herself.

And she was right. The slut code had been created after too many ex-boyfriends had broken her heart, and mine, when they realized that our families came first and that there were only so many people we could take care of. Men didn’t like to hear that they weren’t the center of someone’s life.

I closed my eyes as LA sped by, entertaining the fantasy, just briefly, of someone else taking care of me for once. What would that be like? My mom had definitely helped ease the load since she showed up, but I had been taking care of Mikey since I was sixteen. And we still struggled to make ends meet. What would it be like to have a fraction of the luxuries that someone like James probably had? Hell, I would sell my left tit for a washer/dryer in our apartment so I didn’t have to spend my days off at the laundromat.

But there wasn’t much I could do about it. I didn’t know any other way to live and besides, even if I won the lottery – which was extremely unlikely considering I never bought a ticket – the money would go to help out with Mikey. So barring the appearance of a magical lotto ticket, things would probably keep going the way they had always gone. So it was best not to think about another kind of life. It was nice, but foolish. Maya was right. Why not indulge in a fantasy I had at my fingertips? Would another night with James really be so bad? After all, it was just sex.

E
than shot
me an apologetic look across the conference table as I listened to the third group of men in suits present me with a public relations plan for their charity. Two hours of this, of listening to the commercials I would be doing or the galas I would be hosting or the schmoozing I would be doing with donors. Not once, at any point in any of their presentations, had they mentioned interest in me beyond how they could use my image to promote their fundraising events. And I got it – charities needed money. They often needed a lot of money. And money was something I was happy to give. But I wanted to do more. I didn’t want to be a shill for some charity – I wanted to be working with them directly – ideally working with the people that they were helping. There had to be some group out there that was interested in what I could do on the ground, not just with donors.

But that was part of the problem, it seemed. I had cast too wide a net. I didn’t know who I wanted to help and without much guidance, Ethan had done his best to find people who were willing and excited to work with me. I was betting that all the latest headlines about my sexual conquests weren’t helping some of the more conservative-minded groups.

I tried not to let my frustration show as I shook hands and told them, as politely as I could, that I was still looking around, but I would get back to them as soon as I had made my decision.

Once they were gone, I collapsed back into my chair.

“Ugh,” I groaned, knowing that I had no one to blame but myself. “Make sure to write each of them a check as a thank you for their time,” I told Ethan. It wasn’t their fault. It wasn’t his fault. It was mine.

“Not what you were hoping for?” He leaned on the table, arms crossed. He had tried to tell me, on numerous occasions, that I needed to be more specific about what I wanted. And not just in this instance. For years he had been trying to get me to focus. To make decisions. I had never seen the point of it. After all, that’s what he was for, wasn’t? And he was way better at it than I was.

But now I was starting to see the value in his advice. I had been flying by the seat of my pants for way too long. And now I was coming to a fork in the road. I needed to figure out what I wanted. And soon.

“You know, I’ve gotten another offer from the team here,” Ethan said casually.

I glanced up at him. “They’re really not going to take no for an answer, are they?”

“Well, I haven’t told them no,” he reminded me. “Because you haven’t formally made the decision to retire.”

He was right. I thought that I would find the right charity immediately and that would confirm that I was doing the right thing. Because as of this moment, I wasn’t so sure anymore. After all, the whole reason I wanted to get out of football was because I was tired of being treated like a promotional tool. I was tired of all the photo shoots and the magazine articles and the tabloids. Especially the tabloids. Rick might have thought it was all fun and games, but he didn’t have his mum calling him every time a new issue came out, asking who the woman was. I wanted to be in the papers for something I had actually done. For something I was proud of. But if these charities just wanted a poster boy, well, then maybe I should just stick to football. At least I’d get to play the game I loved, even if I was tiring of all the traveling and partying.

I put my face in my hands, feeling very boring all of a sudden.

And even though I loathed to admit it, my ego was feeling pretty bruised. I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about Nicole and our hot night together. The slide of her lips against my cock, the way her legs had wrapped around my waist, pulling me deeply into her. The way her entire body had shuddered when she came. And fuck, had she come. Over and over again. I couldn’t remember the last time I had been with a woman who threw herself into sex so completely. And of course, as soon as I thought about her, I was reminded that she had turned me down afterwards. Twice! I didn’t understand why she was so resistant to a repeat performance. More importantly, though, I didn’t understand why it bothered me so much. Was my ego really that fragile?

“We’ll widen the search,” Ethan said and when I looked up, he was already on his phone, no doubt finding charities right at that moment.

I was pretty bloody lucky to have a manager like him. To have a friend like him. I probably wouldn’t have survived my first year as a pro footballer without my best mate keeping my ego in check. Hell, I might not have survived primary school without him. I was the one who jumped first, asking questions later. He was the one who asked questions before deciding if he wanted to jump in the first place.

It had been the two of us, taking on the world together, for as long as I could remember. Both of us were only kids, which meant we were like brothers. Had always been. We needed each other. It was amazing we became friends in the first place, since we were so different, but we seemed to balance each other out. Me with my problems at school, with focusing and paying attention and Ethan with his tendency to withdraw from everyone and everything completely. He gave me direction and I forced him out of his shell. Which wasn’t always easy.

It made sense, though, his tendency to withdraw. After all, Ethan had had a pretty rough time before he came to the U.K. He had been in the foster care system in the U.S. for the first five years of his life. Things changed a lot when he was adopted by his folks, but some things stuck around for a long time afterwards. It wasn’t something he liked to talk about, but I knew he wished things had been better during those early years.

Suddenly something clicked. I knew what I wanted to do. What I could do.

“Hey, mate,” I crossed my arms. “What if we didn’t widen the search?”

Ethan glanced over at me with his patented “what the fuck are you talking about” look and waited for me to continue.

I shrugged. “You’re always the one who says I need to focus,” I reminded him.

“Sure, I just never thought you were actually listening,” he put down his phone and regarded me seriously. “So you don’t want to widen the search. What the new plan, then?”

“Focus the search,” I told him, my excitement building. “I want to look at charities and programs that help foster kids. Here, in the U.S.” That last part came out before I even thought about it. Of course I wanted to help kids like Ethan, but I hadn’t really thought much about staying in the states. But now that I’d said it out loud, I liked the way it sounded.

Nicole’s smile flashed in front of me. As well as her other appealing bits. I tried to push that tempting thought away. My impulse to stay here had nothing to do with her. I just had grown fond of Los Angeles. I liked their tacos and, well, I’m sure there were other things I’d like about it once I had more time to explore. And it was time for a change, wasn’t it? Go big, or go home, as Rick always liked to say. It was the first time in a while that I had found his kind of advice worth taking. Nothing was less like cold, wet London than sunny, bright SoCal. Maybe I’d take up surfing. No, I quickly retracted that. That was going too far.

Ethan’s eyebrows had gone all the way up.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his hand hovering over his phone. I could tell he was itching to start researching charities with my new parameters. My best friend could be such a nerd sometimes. I needed to get him laid. Hadn’t there been another woman at the bar where Nicole worked? Maybe she would be interested in a bloke with a lousy British accent and an obsession with numbers and planning. I tried to remember what she looked like, but my mind kept returning to Nicole and her sexy, tight vest.

Now I couldn’t get her out of my head. Not like she had ever been that far from it. A woman like that wasn’t someone you forgot easily. Especially since she had turned me down. A jolt of confidence flooded through me and I felt my familiar stubbornness return. I hadn’t let a disappointing set of meetings stop me from figuring out my future, had I? Why should I give up on something – or someone – that I wanted? I wanted Nicole bad. And she wanted me. That much was obvious. I just had to remind her how good we had been together and I had a pretty good idea of how I could do that. I could be pretty damn irresistible if given the chance. And this was a chance I was more than eager to take.

“Hey.” I glanced up at Ethan, whose attention was still focused on his phone. “Where’s the closest liquor store?”