Playing By Her Rules (Sydney Smoke Rugby Series) (11 page)

She wasn’t exactly doing herself any favours, either, but he’d blinked first and that’s all she cared about. As if acknowledging her success, the song came to a close, and couples around them broke apart to clap and cheer.

The bubble around them burst as they followed on automatic pilot, clapping with a great deal less enthusiasm.

“That’s all for the dancing for now folks.” The emcee’s voice boomed around the room. “The band will be back later, but right now its auction time. Let’s hear a big round of applause for our celebrity auctioneer, Tanner Stone, captain of the Sydney Smoke rugby team. Where are you, Tanner?”

Tanner blinked, clearly still dazed from the dangerous game of chicken they’d been playing on the dance floor.

“Oh,
Christ
,” he said, turning to her, a fake smile on his face as the crowd on the dance floor parted, the whole room clapping madly as the spotlight hunted him down. “Can you tell I have a raging hard-on?” he whispered.

Matilda dropped her gaze. Well…
she
could tell because she knew, because she’d rubbed herself against the hard, thick press of it. But maybe others wouldn’t?

“Better do your jacket up just to be sure,” she murmured, the spotlight hitting him as he fumbled with the buttons.

She had to give him points for the grin and wave he gave as the light pooled around him, and for his energetic bounce up to the stage. If he was as sexually bamboozled as she was, he deserved a bloody Oscar.

Matilda made her way back to the table along with everyone else, her head spinning from what had happened out on the floor. She was pleased about the distraction of the auction and the running commentary from Valerie, who seemed to know the ins and outs of the charity and about half the people in the room.

“Does the Smoke call upon Tanner to do this kind of thing very often?”

She supposed, as captain particularly, he had certain commitments that the Smoke lined up for him. Sporting codes were always yammering on about giving back to the community and it was especially loud when one of them found themselves in disgrace.

Valerie frowned. “He’s not doing it for the Smoke. This is just one of about a dozen charities Tanner supports in a multitude of ways.”

Matilda blinked. “He does?”

“Sure. He comes from a rural community, so Farm Aid is important to him. He also supports several charities who try to reach disaffected youth through sport, then there’s the soup kitchen in the Chapel, as well as a couple of literacy ones and a domestic violence shelter. He’s probably the most involved with a charity that builds alternative housing for younger people with disabilities requiring care that’s traditionally only been available in nursing homes.”

Matilda glanced up at the stage as Tanner, his golden-blond hair like a halo under the lights, bantered with the emcee trying to drum up interest in some landscape painted by someone she’d never heard of.

Why hadn’t he mentioned any of this? They’d discussed a lot of his life to date, and he hadn’t mentioned any of his charity work. She’d just assumed that the soup kitchen he’d taken her to had been a thing he and probably all the other players on his team did every now and then to demonstrate rugby had a social conscience.

There hadn’t been anything she’d unearthed online, either. Which didn’t mean it wasn’t there, but with so much material available about him, inconsequential stuff like charity work probably wasn’t a high priority for the run of the mill person who just wanted to look at him with his kit off.

Why look at who the guy
really
was when shirtless
Hey, Girl
memes of him were the first thing that came up in a search engine?

And that included her. She could have dug deeper.

Suddenly Matilda knew the focus for the next feature. Imelda had called him the playboy saint. Little had Matilda known how true that was. She’d been focussing on the playboy bit. Now it was time for the saint.

“Okay, folks, we’re down to the last lot in the auction, and you can see from your programmes it’s an anonymous item. Now, Tanner, I understand this is from your teammates at the Smoke who wanted to donate for the auction tonight?”

Tanner gave a nervous laugh, and Matilda glanced up from the table where she’d been mentally writing the opening lines of her feature.

“That’s right. And all I can say is…apologies in advance,” he said. “It was Linc’s idea, and we should know by now never to listen to anything Lincoln Quinn has to say.”

The crowd laughed and cheered. “But, anyway,” Tanner continued, clearing his throat, “the other guys thought it’d be a bit of a hoot, too, and ran with it.”

“Well, show us then,” the emcee urged. “Put us all out of our misery.”

Matilda craned her neck to see what Tanner was holding up. It was something in a frame she couldn’t make out from here, and she thanked God for the big screen either side.

People were already laughing and clapping by the time Matilda computed what was it was—two pairs of white, women’s underwear. On the front there was something that looked like a glowing green rock of some description and on the back, printed across the booty was
kryptonite
in block capitals, the lettering done in flaming orange.

Valerie whooped and hollered, laughing as she spontaneously hugged Matilda. “They’re perfect.” She grinned. “Linc’s a genius.”

They sold for eight thousand dollars.

Chapter Eleven

The following Friday, Tanner sat in his car outside Tilly’s apartment block for an hour before he saw her pull up outside. It should have been a useful heel-cooling period, but he was just as ticked now as he had been when he read her feature article over breakfast.

How fucking could she? He hadn’t given her permission to print any of that stuff about his charity work. Hell, he had no idea she was even planning it. He’d foolishly thought after he’d made her come hard and fast, and she’d
almost
returned the favour on a
public
dance floor at a
charity
event, that she was done with pissing him off.

Sure, it had been a bit one step forward, two steps back with her, but he’d sensed things had changed on that dance floor. God…she’d been magnificent, taunting him the way she had. All he’d been able to think about since was her on her knees.

Swallowing.

But apparently, she wasn’t done screwing him with yet. She just preferred to do it with her keyboard. And his pants on.

Ever since he’d been press-ganged into this asinine publicity caper by the powers that be, he’d cooperated. Because for some damn fool reason he’d believed the focus would be on football. And yet, so far, he’d had the size of his ego—and his dick—called into question, and suffered through the kryptonite panties debacle.

Not that he’d been particularly bothered by either. Despite what Tilly had written about the big and the
small
of him, Tanner had always been able to laugh at himself, and both had been objectively funny. He’d borne the good-natured ribbing from his teammates and sports journalists with his usual grace and quick-witted smack talk.

Hell, he really only cared what people wrote about him as it pertained to rugby. The rest was like water off a duck’s back.

Until today.

He didn’t do his charity work for recognition, and he sure as shit didn’t want it splashed all over the newspapers.

Christ.
Tanner Stone the playboy saint
?

She’d actually called him that. The suits had loved it, of course. Social media had gone nuts. The bloody hashtag #playboysaint had been trending on Twitter all frickin’ day.

He wasn’t any saint.

If she knew how much he’d like to throttle her right about now, or how close he’d come to throwing her over his shoulder and doing her against the nearest wall at the Farm Aid thing the other night, she’d never have called him that.

His first instinct had been to ring her with a piece of his mind. But that was too distant for him—his anger had been too great, demanding a ringside seat as he confronted her. He wanted to see in her face that she understood how pissed off he was.

So he’d taken his ire out on the football field at training, much to the delight of Griff, who was happy to have him back, and the alarm of his teammates, who he’d run ragged and ploughed through at every opportunity.

And now he was here.

He waited ten minutes before he followed her up to her apartment. He might be ticked, but he wasn’t going to get into a slanging match with her in the middle of the street. What he had to say was private and personal, and there were too many bloody people with mobile phone cameras for his liking.

He tempered the urge to bash her door down, giving one brief, loud knock, his heart crashing around his chest while he waited for her to open the door.

“Oh, hey,” she said with a big welcoming smile that hit him right in the chest. “If it isn’t the playboy saint,” she teased. “Come in.”

Tanner blinked as she slunk away from the door. Her feet were bare, half her leopard-print blouse was untucked from her skirt, she had a glass of wine in one hand, and she’d smiled at him
.

Genuinely.

And invited him into her apartment without any kind of caveat. Who was this chick? Had she been drugged? Body snatched?

“Do you want a beer?” she called as she headed in the direction of the kitchen.

Tanner’s gaze dropped to the swing of her ass encased in a tight skirt.

Fuck.
Why would he even notice that shit when he was so mad at her he could barely think straight? Couldn’t she, at least for tonight, be her usual wary and standoffish self instead of warm and welcoming?

“Tanner?” she called.

“No,” he said stiffly, pulling the door shut with a bang as he followed her into the kitchen. “I don’t want a goddamn beer.”

She stopped with her hand on the fridge door and turned with a frown. “Are you okay?”

“No.” He glared at her as he halted on his side of the kitchen counter. “I’m not.”

“O…kay.” She moved to her side of the counter and put her wineglass down. “You look kinda mad.”

“Oh, I’m not
kinda
mad,” he growled, a hot ball of anger burning in his gut. “I’m blindingly furious.”

Her brow furrowed deeper. “At…me?”

“Yes.” He shoved his hands on his hips. “At you.”

The relaxed line of her body seemed to straighten before his eyes, her gaze growing wary. “You didn’t like the article?”

Tanner snorted. “You could say that.”

She rubbed her forehead, her face blank, looking genuinely perplexed. “But…I was really nice.”

“You were really frickin’ out of line, that’s what you were.”

She blinked. “
What?
”

“I
did not
give you permission to write that stuff about me.”

“What do you mean?” She shook her head, clearly confused. “What stuff?”

Tanner’s hands dropped to the countertop. “About my charity work.”

She was gaping at him now like he’d lost his mind. Tanner kind of felt like he had. How could he be so pissed off and yet so…
distracted
by her all at once?

It did not improve his temper.

“You
didn’t
want me to tell the country that the guy who kicks a ball around a field for a stupid amount of money actually spends a shitload of it, as well as his time, on a variety of charities who think you’re the second coming?”

“That about sums it up.”

Her lips parted slightly as if she wanted to say something but her brain wasn’t cooperating. “I…” She shrugged helplessly. “Don’t understand.”

“That stuff is
private,
” he rasped, through gritted teeth. “
Nothing
to do with anyone else.”

“So, you just want them to think you’re some…dumb, one-dimensional
jock
who only cares about his rugby and doesn’t have any kind of life outside of football?”

“Yes,” he hissed, flattening his palms on the benchtop. “That’s exactly what I want.”

She swiped her wineglass up and took a gulp, eyeing him over the rim, the amber flecks in her opal eyes starting to heat and glow. “Well,
God forbid
,” she snapped, clunking the glass down on the bench, “that someone of your status can also have a social conscience!”

“You don’t understand.” He shook his head, a pressure building in his chest as he tried to articulate why he was so pissed off. “I don’t want any of the charities or the people who work in them or who are a recipient of their work to think I only do this to look good in the goddamn newspaper! Or for some kind of
saintly
social cred. It means more than that. It’s not just lip service to me.”

“So, why act like it is? What’s wrong with exploring that side? I’m doing a six-part feature series about the man behind the image, for crying out loud! What’s wrong with saying Tanner Stone isn’t just a damn good rugby player? Increasing your charity profile can only be to their benefit, surely? So why are you acting like I just announced on Twitter you like to wear women’s underwear? What exactly are you afraid of? Are you ashamed of being anything other than a hard-ass footballer? You think this makes you soft somehow? You think people knowing this stuff will diminish your popularity?”

Tanner snorted, shoving a hand through his hair. She couldn’t be serious? “You think I give a
crap
about popularity?” he demanded.

Her eyes bugged. “I think you do when it suits you,” she retorted. “I think our friend the maître d would agree that being popular has gotten you a shitload of perks not available to the rest of us mere mortals.”

Tanner’s face heated as her well-aimed barb found its mark. She was right. It was a bit rich to protest his celebrity when so much of what came to him was
because
of who he was.

And he hated being called on his shit. Especially by Tilly. Especially after that article. But she had him all wrong if she thought he threw his name around willy-nilly.

“God.” He shook his head in disbelief. “You seriously don’t know me, do you.”

“I know you’d rather people think you were just some jock with a pocketful of cash, playing musical women.”

“And is that what you think?” he demanded.

“You don’t leave me a whole lot of choice.”

“Damn it, Tilly,” he bit out, thumping his fist down on the benchtop. “You
know
that’s not me. Look me in the eye and tell me you know, because if you can’t, I’ll have to wonder if you ever really knew me at all.”

Her indrawn breath was audible as she skewered him with her indignant gaze. Clearly he’d pushed her too far. She was magnificent in her anger. Two high spots of colour stained her cheeks as her gaze narrowed, her chest heaving in and out, her eyes glittering.

How could he be so angry yet so turned on?

“Oh, I know you,” she yelled. “You’re the kind of guy who not only cheats on his girlfriend but brazenly
flaunts
his infidelity in front of all and sundry,
completely
”—she jabbed the kitchen bench with her index finger—“uncaring about publically tearing my heart out and
humiliating
me in front of everyone we knew.” Her face was twisted into a mask of contempt. “I
know
you, Tanner Stone. I know the
real
you.”

Tanner’s heart pounded hard as her bitter words hit his chest like bullets. He’d thought he’d been making such progress with her, but the events of eight years ago obviously still seethed beneath the surface.

She was still mad.

Well…
so was he
. Today particularly.

Mad that she could be so quick to condemn him, the person she’d
supposedly
loved, without so much as trying to ascertain what had gone down, without
demanding
a single explanation.

He’d been relieved back then that she hadn’t, but a part of him had also been disappointed. And hurt—
yes, hurt
—that she’d been so quick to believe the worst of him.

So quick to turn her back.

And right now, angry from the article and her holier than thou attitude and how much, despite all that, he wanted to bend her over the kitchen bench, it still stuck in his craw.

He’d been keeping his temper relatively in check until now but it snapped suddenly with a twang she could no doubt hear. “If you’d
really
known me,” he yelled back, “you’d have never believed that
bullshit.
”

She gaped at him, confusion clouding her gaze, but he didn’t care. He pushed away from the bench, turning on his heel, and stormed out of her apartment.

…

Tanner woke the next morning considerably calmer than when he’d gone to bed. He grimaced at his behaviour. It might have felt good at the time to yell and get it all off his chest, throwing that last cryptic comment at her face, but with some time and space he could admit to being a bit of a dick.

She was right. What did it matter if people knew about his charity work? He may not have wanted it splashed around—and it
wasn’t
because he was ashamed or worried about his popularity or being looked upon as
soft
—but it was hardly the end of the world, either.

He had wanted to keep his involvement in the different charities largely on the down low, largely behind the scenes. The Farm Aid gala had been one of the few exceptions. But maybe she was right. Maybe now he’d been outed, his charities
could
use his name a bit more to their advantage.

Maybe that was the silver lining in this whole frickin’ mess he’d caused by storming in and out of her apartment last night with a head full of steam.

Like a total dick.

Christ, but she knew how to push his buttons. Needling him and calling him on his shit. Not backing down or giving him any quarter. Spewing all her still palpable hurt and anger all over him.

Pissing him off and turning him on all at the same time.

Remembering it even now with the benefit of some space, it stirred his pulse
and
his frickin’ loins, the confrontation hanging over him like a thunderclap. He didn’t need that. He had a game this afternoon, and he couldn’t go into it like this. Being angry could sometimes give him an advantage, a focus, but it was more likely to ruin his concentration when he knew that he was to blame for their argument.

And Griff, his team, and the club needed him to be at his best.

He needed to make it right. He certainly needed to apologise.

He swung his legs over the side of the bed and reached for his phone. He scrolled to her number then hesitated. Would she even pick up when she saw it was him? Something in his gut told him she wouldn’t so he’d have to try a different approach.

He smiled as he tapped on his Twitter app. At least his tweeps were on his side. He quickly scrolled through his notifications then opened a fresh tweet, deliberating for a couple of minutes as to the best approach. After starting and discarding several, he settled on something simple.

Forgive me @MatildaK??

Yep. He liked it. It was to the point. And sincere. He sent it out into the ether before he could change his mind, a dozen notifications lighting up his feed almost instantly. Most of them were retweets and of course, rugbybunny1, always quick off the mark, had her say—

Uh oh #playboysaint what did you do to
@MatildaK ?? #holysmoke #mightnotbelove???

Curiously, a tweet from Matilda was the next in line. Tanner’s pulse kicked up a notch or two. Matilda had never responded to the speculation about them on Twitter, and she’d never responded to him directly.