A grin fights its way through the sobriety of the moments before. “I’m decent, I guess. They haven’t fired me yet.”
“Modest,” she says. “I like it.”
“Not really. Just self-aware.”
We stop at a cream-colored Tesla Model X. She hits a button on her fob and the butterfly doors wing up.
“Holy shit.” I’m not immune to the sexy lines of a car most only dream of.
“My indulgence.” Pink dusts her high cheekbones, the only sign of self-consciousness in her otherwise sure movements while she loads her case into the car.
“You work hard,” I tell her, loading my cases in the back seat beside hers. “You deserve to treat yourself.”
“And I do. Believe me. I’m quite the diva.”
“I don’t buy that at all.”
“Ask my best friend.”
“Banner?”
“You know her?” she asks, then her brow clears. “Of course. She manages some of your guys.”
“Well, yeah, and you mentioned her in your story today.”
“Oh, right.” She pats the hood of the Tesla and turns a goodbye smile on me. “Well, I guess I’d better—”
“Would you like to grab coffee?” I blurt with the grace and subtlety of a rhinoceros.
She stares at me for a distended moment, wide green eyes clearly reflecting her surprise. Hell, she’s a fitness mogul. She probably drinks kale or something.
“Or a smoothie,” I offer. “There’s a place around the corner where we could—”
“Maybe some other time,” she says, a slight frown creasing her forehead. “I’m leaving on tour in a couple of days.”
In a couple of days. Not today. But still not interested.
“I have a new book dropping Tuesday,” she explains, which, even if it’s true, feels like a kind way to let the awkward guy down.
“Ah,” I murmur. It’s a useless sound that doesn’t tell her anything about how much I admire her strength. About how attracted I’ve been to her since the first time I saw her at the ESPYs a few years ago.
Yes, years. It’s taken me this long to get up the nerve to approach this woman, and I’m failing miserably. Give me a clipboard, shitty odds and thirty seconds on the clock, and I’m your guy. One woman a foot shorter than me, and I apparently lose all my nerve.
“What’s the name of your book?” My mush-for-brain manages to send a signal to my mouth to speak.
“Bionic Beauty,” she says, her smile reappearing. “It chronicles a year consulting with fashion designers to create prosthetic art. One of the most awkward parts of this whole leg thing is how people stare, especially the parents who tell their kids not to stare, which silently communicates there’s something wrong with us. Like we are something to be ashamed of and looked away from. I wanted to create something that makes it even harder to look away. Not because it’s awkward and you pity the girl who lost a leg, but you can’t look away because there’s something so arresting there.”
She doesn’t need a book or a tour or fashion designers to do that for her. The passion on her face, the fire in her eyes while she talks, has me completely captivated.
“Well, I better go,” she says.
For whatever reason, I press my hand to the small of her back when she turns to get in her car. Her body is lean and strong, but through the thin material of her dress, she feels soft, warm. I wish I could spread my fingers where her back curves in, caress the arch of it.
I’m creeping myself out, so I drop my hand. She doesn’t seem to have even noticed.
She climbs in, settling into the peanut-butter-colored leather seats.
“If you change your mind about the coffee.” I put my hand on the door before she can close it. “It’s my off-season, so I have plenty of free time.”
Lies.
I already canceled one meeting to see her today. In the off-season, I work nearly as much as I do when we’re playing. Preparation proves itself.
“Look, that’s sweet,” she says, leaning back into the decadent leather and caressing the intricate stitching on her steering wheel. “But I’m really busy, and I honestly don’t have time for . . . coffee. Coffee slows me down.”
“Interesting effect when it seems to accelerate for most.”
“Coffee isn’t necessary,” she goes on as if I haven’t spoken. “Thanks for the help, but I need to go to my next appointment.”
And in a flourish of outrageously expensive steel and electric car engineering, she’s gone.
Quinn
Men like him don’t . . .
I won’t finish that thought. That’s how she used to think. That girl who wallowed in her own pain and depression, who assumed her life was over anyway, so why not just end it? I don’t usually talk about my suicide attempts unless someone asks, but today I did. Did I do it subconsciously because I was so aware of Ean Jagger looming at the back of the room? Was I trying to scare him off? Or draw him in? Was it a test? If it was, I don’t know if he passed or failed, but I know he kept on coming.
At first, I thought I imagined his stare—the fixed intensity of it that warmed me even in the air-conditioning. But as my talk went on, I was more aware of him than every other person in the room, even though he didn’t say much. He’s a hard man to ignore, though I don’t think he realizes it. Obviously, there’s his height. I’m five seven in bare feet. In my heels today I stood about five ten, and he still towered nearly a foot over me. I’d put him at around six seven. With that height, those black-rimmed glasses, and shoulders so wide they blocked the sun when he stood with me in the parking lot, he reminds me of Clark Kent. The obvious leashed power of that huge body and the austere beauty of his face make me want to see the S on his chest beneath that shirt. He’s arresting, but not flashy like so many of the guys I meet in LA.
Over the years, it’s become harder to discern men’s motives when it comes to romance. When I was using a wheelchair and then a walker as I started the long process of re-learning mobility and regaining confidence, they weren’t exactly knocking down my door. But I became America’s Titanium Sweetheart and realized life wasn’t about the leg I lost, but about the woman I found inside of me. She is resilient and tough and ambitious and generous.
She became really rich really fast.
And all of a sudden, boom. The men were back. I never know if it’s my renewed confidence and the way I take care of this body that’s been through so much, or if it’s my fatter purse that’s drawing them, so I take very few up on their offers.
Coffee.
That’s what Ean offered today, but I couldn’t bring myself to accept. I read so much more in his eyes than coffee. He searched my face, fixed on me like there wasn’t anything else he wanted to see. Another man looked at me that way not long ago. Ted fooled me with those eyes that seemed to offer as much as they asked for, but he was a fraud. Ean Jagger seems like the real deal, but I don’t have time for the hurt if he’s not. I got shit to do.
That would be a great T-shirt in my QuinnPossible fitness line.
“I got shit to do,” I say, pausing packing to voice record on my phone. “New T-shirt for QP.”
I envisioned QP while out hiking. Banner had a proposal and possible investors lined up within the week. That girl is a badass, but then, so am I. We make a formidable team. There are always so many ideas passing through my head at any given time, I’d lose half of them if not captured immediately. And ideas are money.
My phone is still up to my mouth from voice recording when it starts ringing. I glance at the name on the screen and smile.
“What’s up, Willa?” I ask.
“A helluva lot,” my assistant answers, the coarse response at odds with the Marilyn Monroe breathiness of her voice. “How are you this morning?”
“Good.” I fold my favorite silk pajamas and lay them in the suitcase. “Packing for this road trip.”
“Great. Exactly why I was calling. Did you get your itinerary?”
“Yup
. Car will be here at ten tomorrow morning? That right?”
“Yes, ma’am. And the deets for Atlanta and New York are in the email, too.”
“I saw.”
“And you end this leg of the trip in San Diego.”
“Then a few days off the road before jumping back on. Got it.”
“Smart of you to insist on that,” she says.
“I know myself and I know my body.” I run a hand over silky underwear no one other than me has seen in a long time. “I need just a few days in my house and in my life before I go back out there.”
“The book is already getting great press.”
“Yay,” I auto-reply, mentally reviewing my checklist to make sure I’m not forgetting anything.
“Make sure you find time to actually do some fun stuff while you’re on the road.”
“You’ve seen my schedule. Exactly when will I find time for anything fun?”
“It can be simple. There’s a famous ice cream shop called The Bent Spoon right across from the theater on Princeton’s campus.”
“Dairy.” I shudder.
“You’re not lactose intolerant. I know all your allergies. You’re allergic to stupidity and meanness. That’s about it.”
“Don’t forget douchery.” I laugh and sit on the edge of my bed. “I’m highly allergic to that shit.”
“A scoop of ice cream won’t tie you up in knots. It’s more the experience than anything else. Simple pleasures, Q.”
Simple pleasures.
Like a man’s big, warm hand at your back, leaving you feeling desired and cherished with something as simple as a touch.
But feelings like those are rarely simple.
Ean
“Do I need to talk to Granger?” I ask Mack Decker, San Diego Waves’ president of basketball operations. “We need this crap settled before the season starts. We can’t afford another suspension.”
“Maybe.” He shrugs wide shoulders in his polo shirt. “He’s one of Banner’s guys, so she’ll probably have the situation resolved before we have to intervene. She won’t want the league involved either. Everyone knows she keeps her players in line.”
She does, for sure. The only thing Banner might be more well-known for is her famous Titanium Sweetheart.
“What do you, um, know about Quinn Barrow?” I lean back in my seat at our favorite taco shop and take a sip of my beer.
Deck glances at me over a bite of his veggie-laden taco. They’re one of his few cheats. I’ve never met anyone more disciplined with what goes into his body than Deck. It’s a legacy from when he was a player himself, and part of why he’s a future first round Hall of Famer.
“Quinn?” He wipes his mouth with a napkin and narrows his eyes at me. “You asking for you?”
I clench my teeth and sit up straight. I’ve never been one of those guys who talked about “conquests” with other men, or who asked for advice when it came to a woman I wanted. Even when I was a baller myself, I didn’t take full advantage of the sexual perks that came with the sport. I’m more of a relationship guy, but I haven’t had as many of those as most men my age. I don’t like drama. I abhor messiness. And people are often both.
“Just asking,” I grit out. “What can you tell me?”
Decker’s wicked smile grates on my damn nerves.
“Jag likes a girl,” he sing-songs.
“Fuck you, Deck.” I tip my beer back for a quick swallow. “Never mind.”
“Sorry, sorry.” He holds his hands up and widens his grin. “This is a brand-new experience. I’ve known you since college, dude, and I can’t remember you ever asking about a woman.”
“Well, when I want to know something, I find out for myself, but Quinn . . . well, she’s different.”
“Because she’s an amputee?” Deck frowns.
“What?” I glare at him. “Hell, no. Not because of that. If anything, because maybe she’s out of my league.”
Deck chokes on a chuckle and Dos Equis. “Out of your league? Dude, women love you.”
I roll my eyes and grimace. “Whatever.”
“You’re just buried so deep in your Xs and Os, you don’t notice.”
Don’t care is more like it. I have needs. Of course I do. And I satisfy them, like most guys, but I’m forty, not fourteen. Getting ass for the sake of it gets old.
Maybe it gets lonely and pointless after a while, too.
“They’re into that moody, broody vibe you got going on,” Decker elaborates unnecessarily. “Tall, dark, handsome. The glasses make ’em think you’re smart. Hot nerd is a thing.”
I snort. “I’m not a nerd.”
“I beg to differ. Nobody generates the kind of data and stats and strategies that you do without having a significant amount of nerd in him.”
“That’s my job. I take it seriously.”
“That’s why we snapped you up as soon as possible.” Deck takes another bite. “You’re doing a damn good job leading the team, by the way.”
“How’s Coach Kemp?” I ask with a frown.
Deck puts his taco down and steeples his fingers, elbows resting on the table. He answers only with a grave shake of his head.
“Shit.” I set my beer down, too. “He looked pretty bad when I went to see him a few weeks ago, but I’d hoped . . .”
“There’s hope till there isn’t,” Deck says, twisting his lips and picking his taco back up. “But it only reiterates that life is too short not to go for something when you think it could be special.” He angles a knowing look across the table. “When you think she could be special.”
“How’d you know Avery was special?”
The satisfied grin that usually overtakes his face when someone mentions his wife is on full display. “Well, that’s quite the story. The first time we met, she was trying to interview me in the locker room, and I dropped my towel.”
“Damn.” I chuckle, shaking my head. “Knowing Avery, I’m surprised she left your balls attached.”
“Barely. She was spitting like a little cat, but there was also this buzz between us. Like a vibe I’d never felt with anyone before or since. Not even my ex-wife, I’m ashamed to say.”
“Wait a minute. You were a player when you guys first met? But you’ve only been together a few years.”
“Right.” A shadow passes over his face. “We wasted ten years. I married my ex, and we had my daughter, who I wouldn’t trade for anything. Avery got engaged to someone else. That we finally made it back to each other is a small miracle.”
The look he aims at me is frank and knowing. “I don’t advise leaving it to a miracle, if you don’t have to,” he says. “When I saw an opening with Avery, I did the full-court press, man.”
“One-on-one defense,” I say, nodding. “No letting up.”
“You got it. So figure out your own strategy, but don’t just sit around with your thumb up your ass. You know once the season kicks in, you won’t have time to explore this properly. If you think Quinn might be someone special, and there might be a connection, don’t waste time asking me about her. Learn about her for yourself. And even more importantly, let her learn you.”
I pull my phone from my pocket. The screen defaults to the website I’ve been checking compulsively since I met Quinn yesterday. Titaniumsweetheart.com shows a pic of Quinn, her hair slightly longer than it was yesterday, and wearing a T-shirt that reads “QuinnPossible.” I click on the upcoming appearances tab, and a long list of cities and venues pops up.
Wow. I thought my life was busy. Deck’s right. Once the season kicks in, I won’t have time to pursue her in earnest. If I want to see if there’s something worth pursuing with Quinn, I’ll have to chase her. She may not be a world-class runner anymore, but looking at the appearances posted on her site for the next few months, she still moves fast. If I want to catch her, I’ll have to go on the offensive. If this were a game, I’d tell my team to move the ball up the court and get into scoring position as quickly as possible.
“I
think I have my strategy,” I tell Decker, grinning and sipping the last of my beer.
“Oh yeah?” he asks. “What is it?”
“A fast break.”
Quinn
“I know most people look at me and see what I’ve lost.” I tap my left leg, tonight brushed metal carbon studded with rhinestones down the side. “And I get it. That’s how I felt at first, too. But now, I see what I’ve gained.”
I pause and look over the packed audience at Princeton’s McCarter Theatre Center. “It wasn’t the circumstances that changed my life so radically for good,” I say. “It’s what I chose to do with them. How I chose to see them. As a runner, maybe I would have qualified for the Olympics. Ended up on a box of Wheaties, sure. And done some great stuff, but losing my leg, and going through the hell of accepting my new reality, of learning to walk and run again. Learning to live again and even better than before—that transformed my trajectory.”
I gesture to all of them. “I wouldn’t be here with you tonight. Without adversity, I wouldn’t have written books on overcoming it. There wouldn’t be a gym called Titanium because there would be no Titanium Sweetheart.”
I smile when the audience laughs.
“The leg I’m wearing tonight and so many like it might not exist because I wouldn’t have been passionate about elevating disability through art and fashion,” I say, holding up my book Bionic Beauty. “I gave folks something beautiful to look at when they stare. Without this, maybe I would be living a good life, but I wouldn’t be living this life. And I love this one. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Thank you.”
The applause is most gratifying because it signals the event is almost over. I love what I do, but after flight delays and the preparation for tonight, I’m ready to be done.
“Ms. Barrow has graciously agreed to answer some of our questions,” the moderator, one of the students who coordinated bringing me here, says. “We’ll take just a few, and we have mics set up in the aisles.”
I’ve been standing almost a solid hour and after a long flight, my neck and shoulders feel tight. The muscles in my legs ache. I sit gratefully on the high stool and take a sip of water.
Team Player 2: A Sports Anthology Page 33
