The Baller (2 page)

He pointed inside the locker room. “These boys? Nothing but ego. Don’t let ’em get to you. Okay, Dam?”

I took my credentials back from him with a nod and a hopeful smile. “I won’t.”

The first thing that surprised me as I made my way into the inner sanctum was its sheer size. I’d seen enough pictures to know locker rooms were large, but taking it all in from inside, the vast expanse had me instantly awestruck. Wide lockers lined the perimeter; the center was mostly open, with a few seating areas set up. Each seating area had four wide leather chairs and a glass table between them. Everything was just so pristine and organized. Lighting showcased the names above each locker, and players were chatting away with reporters all over the place. The mood was light and easy, most likely due to the score at the end of the game. The Steel had won twenty-eight to nothing. Nobody seemed to notice me—the lone woman standing in the center of the room. Or if they noticed, they didn’t seem bothered at all. My stiffened shoulders relaxed a little.

I found Nick, my cameraman, who was already inside, and saw that the Steel’s kicker wasn’t busy, so I headed over to ask him a few questions. He was still in his uniform, but he removed the rest of his padding as we spoke. It was an easy first interview to get under my belt, and the exchange made me confident.

“Thank you for your time, Aaron,” I said when the camera switched off.

“Anytime. And welcome. You replaced Frank Munnard, right?”

“I did.”

“Guy was awful. Glad he retired. He got half our names wrong even though they’re printed right above our heads.” His tilted his chin up to the large lettering above his locker. “And thanks for that last question about coaching my son’s football team. He’ll be excited I had the opportunity to mention his name on the air.”

I smiled, remembering when I was a little girl and my dad mentioned my name on the air. It made me feel like a celebrity. I hadn’t thought of it, but those memories may have had a lot to do with why I always made my last interview question a personal one. Watching my father week after week, the statistics talk got old quick. But the small glimpses into a player’s personal life always held my attention. It made them seem more like real people and less like hotshot athletes.

Moving on, I scanned the room. One area of the giant rotunda was packed, reporters lined up so deep I couldn’t even catch a glimpse of the player. But I knew who they were waiting for without having to look up at the name above the locker.

Brody Easton.

Everywhere the man went the media followed, mostly because he was an arrogant showman who gave them something to report. It didn’t hurt that the camera loved his handsome face and body, as did the women who frequently surrounded him in photos.

I hit a few other players, skipping the ones who were in various states of undress. A lot of skin was flashing around, but most of it was bare chest and ass. Almost all of the men turned and faced their lockers as they changed. My eyes might have feasted a second or two on Darryl Smith’s tight ass—
damn, that’s some muscular rear
—but I quickly caught myself
.
I needed to act like a professional, especially if I expected the players to do the same.

When the crowd circling Easton finally dwindled, I made my way over. He had a towel wrapped around his waist and no shirt on.
Holy shit.
Maybe this cleanse wasn’t so smart after all. It was like going to the supermarket when you hadn’t eaten in days. And since I had a penchant for athletes, this supermarket trip was filled with all of my favorite foods.
I need to get my shit together.

The cameraman in front of me raised his lighting up into position to film, dragging my attention from Brody’s titanesque shoulders to the face that had been splashed across so many Monday morning newspapers. His jaw was rugged and chiseled, with just a hint of a five o’clock shadow on his sun-kissed skin. I followed the carved line of his cheekbones up, passing sinfully full lips and an imperious Roman nose before rising to the most incredible eyes I’d ever seen.
Jesus. He’s even sexier in person.

Pale green, almond-shaped eyes sparkled beneath luscious thick, dark lashes. His eyes were captivating in a way that startled me. I shook my head in an attempt to disconnect from the magnetic vision in front of me. Luckily, Nick forced my attention back to reality.

“Easton’s been vocal about thinking women shouldn’t be allowed in the locker room. Don’t count on him being as cordial to you as he is to the good ol’ boys.” Nick had been filming the team for more than ten years; his warning was from experience rather than rumor.

I also knew about the feud between Brody Easton and Susan Metzinger, a reporter from a rival station. She’d publicly slammed him for using foul language in the locker room, and the incident had turned into a month-long tabloid war. He suggested she didn’t belong in the locker room anyway and that none of the
male
reporters seemed to mind. She did a full-page write-up dedicated to Easton quotes in which he used language she found degrading to women. The quotes were pretty much all taken out of context, but the article was accompanied by a half-dozen video stills that caught his eyes looking in the direction of a woman’s ass or cleavage. Things only escalated from there. It had happened more than a year ago, but I mentally prepared myself for attitude from the famed quarterback.

“You ready?” Nick slung his bag over his shoulder and lifted his camera. The reporter in front of us wrapped up his interview and shook hands with Easton.

As I’ll ever be.
“Sure.”

I stepped forward and extended my hand. “I’m Delilah Maddox with WMBC Sports News.”

A slow grin spread across Easton’s face. He surprised me by leaning in and kissing me on the cheek. “Pleasure to meet you.”

I wasn’t sure if he was baiting me into an argument—expecting me to lash out at him for kissing me when he’d just shaken the last
male
reporter’s hand—or if he was trying to use his blatant sexuality to throw me off. Either way, I wasn’t playing his game. I cleared my throat and stood straighter, even though my knees felt a little wobbly.

“Do you mind if I ask you some questions?”

“Why else would you be in here?”

I ignored his sarcasm. He was still smiling at me. Actually, it was more like a smirk, and it made me feel like a toy he was about to play with. “You ready, Nick?” My cameraman finished setting up the lighting, then lifted the camera into position and gave me a hand signal.

“Congratulations on the win today, Brody. How is your knee feeling after your first game back?” I lifted my microphone high, knowing Nick was filming in close.

“I feel . . . ” He nonchalantly reached to the towel wrapped around his waist and tugged at the corner. The towel fell to the ground. “Great. I feel great. And how about you? It’s your first trip into the locker room, isn’t it? Do you like what you see so far?” His lips curled up into a full-blown wicked smile.

Before I could catch myself, my eyes dropped to his naked lower half.
Shit.
He was dangling in the wind. I totally got distracted by just
how low
the thing dangled.
Subway.
The nickname was damn well suited. It was probably a full minute before I responded to his question
. A full minute of dead air time.
Great.
“Yes. Umm . . . the locker room is . . . ummm . . . nice.”

I sounded like a total ditz.
On air.

The jackass continued interviewing me. “Is it as big as you thought it would be?”

“
Ummm . . . it’s much bigger than I imagined.”

His smile grew even wider.

Ugh.

I needed to get back on track or my first locker room interview would become a laughingstock blooper. Viewers had no idea he was naked from the waist down. “Do you think you were at one hundred percent today?”

His eyebrows jumped. “If you’re referring to today’s game, definitely. I had one hundred percent out there on the field. There’re some other areas where I have a lot of
growth potential
, but my knee felt one hundred percent today.”

His pale green eyes darkened, and I watched his long lashes lower. I followed his line of sight, and suddenly I was staring at his naked package.
Again.
Damn it.
My eyes darted back up, but I felt my cheeks heating. I had to end this, or I was going to be beet red on air.

“Well, welcome back. And congratulations on today’s win.”

I waited until Nick lowered his camera and turned off the light. Then I looked right at Brody Easton’s smug face. “You’re an asshole, you know that?”

His eyes sparkled. “I do.”

I heard the chuckles and high fives at my back as I stormed out of the locker room.

Brody

“Good morning, Mr. Easton.”

“Morning, Shannon. How is she this week?”

“She’s been a little down and her sleeping has been a bit off. But your Tuesday visits always seem to cheer her up. She’s up and ready for you. I think she’s in the day room.”

Grouper stopped sweeping the hall as I approached. “Grandson is going to be disappointed.”

“And that shit has nothing to do with him not getting a game ball this week. Damn kid’s named after a fish.”

Grouper chuckled and extended his hand. “You looked like shit out there yesterday.”

“You can’t sweep for crap,” I said, smiling. “I should talk to the administrator about firing your old ass. Place looks like a blind man cleans it. And I threw for two hundred twenty-eight yards . . . that’s not looking like shit. That’s me being fuck-ass spectacular.”

“Marlene’ll wash that mouth out with soap, she hears you using that language.”

He wasn’t kidding. She might be eighty years old, but the little lady still scared the shit out of me. When Willow and I first started dating, I knew it was Marlene who would chop my balls off if I hurt her granddaughter, and not her large husband.

I spent another minute exchanging insults with Grouper before heading into the day room to look for Marlene. I didn’t have to look very far. There were only a few people in the room, and the crazy old bat was the only one wearing an evening gown.

“Hot date tonight, Marlene?” She was sitting in her wheelchair; I leaned down and kissed her forehead. It took her a minute, but then her eyes smiled, and I knew today’s visit would be better than last week’s.

“Well, don’t you look handsome?”

“I always look handsome.” I wheeled her to a corner of the room and positioned her chair across from me before taking a seat on the couch.

“Shouldn’t you be wearing a tuxedo?”

Well, that explains the evening gown.
As usual, I went with it. “I had practice this morning. I’m going to change in a little while.”

She nodded. “Tell my granddaughter to wear a blue dress. It will bring out her eyes.”

Willow’s eyes were a cross between sky blue and spring-grass green. If she wore blue, her eyes changed to aquamarine. If she wore green, her eyes shifted to peridot. I had always preferred it when she didn’t wear either—I could stare at those eyes all day debating which color I loved more. Unless the color she was wearing was flesh, then it wasn’t her eyes that I was as focused on.

“I’ll make sure she wears blue.”

Marlene got quiet for a few minutes, and I watched her expression, knowing she was going somewhere else. I just never knew where we’d land.

“I think someone stole my teeth.”

My eyebrows shot up. “Your teeth are in your mouth, Marlene.”

Slowly, her shaky hand reached up and found her pearly white dentures. “Damn it. I’ve been looking all over for them for nothing.”

My visit went like that for at least another hour, back and forth between topics—some thirty years old, some current. I had to be at the stadium at two to watch the game playback. Not wanting a two-thousand-dollar fine for being late to a mandatory offensive-line meeting, I stood to say my goodbyes.

“Do you want me to bring you someplace before I head out?”

“Heidelman’s on Thirty-Fourth and Amsterdam. I can go for a Reuben.”

“I’ll bring you one when I come back next week.” I leaned down and kissed her forehead, skipping telling her Heidelman’s had closed fifteen years ago.

“And don’t let old man Heidelman make the sandwich. That old man is a few Bradys short of a bunch.”

I chuckled. “Got it. No old man Heidelman.”

“Give Willow a kiss for me.”

“Will do. And you make sure to tell Grouper your room needs a better cleaning, okay?”

“Does it? Okay.”

Marlene wanted to stay in the day room, but I popped into her empty room on my way out to check things out. As usual, it was pristine. Hell, you could eat off the floor with how Grouper kept the place. But I liked to get Marlene in on the action of busting his balls anyway.

On my way out, the old bastard was washing the glass front doors. I splayed my five fingers wide to intentionally leave a handprint on the spotless door. “You missed a spot.”