‘I really can’t say, Ronnie. It’s all in the hands of our lawyers right now, and I can’t risk anything more getting out into the media that could be twisted into something it’s not. The last thing we need is anything jeopardising Ryan’s position.’
‘And what is Ryan’s position, exactly?’
Max laughed, his hands digging deep in his pockets as he looked down at the ground for a beat or two. ‘Yeah, you’re good, Ron. You’re very good.’
‘Worth a try,’ Ronnie sighed.
‘Ronnie!’ Amber exclaimed.
‘What? Oh, come on, Amber. People are falling over themselves to get the truth about this story. And when all’s said and done I’m a sports reporter. We report on the big sports news, and this – this is big sports news.’
‘Can we just quit this subject now? I’m not saying anything, alright? If you want a statement, contact our lawyers. But I can tell you, all you’ll get is the stock “no comment.” Now, can I get back to what I came here to do?’
‘Which is?’ Amber wasn’t really in the mood for another battle with Max over lads’ mags and photo shoots that she didn’t think were wholly appropriate, so she was glad when the sound of the door opening again distracted her. And when she looked up and saw who’d just walked through it, she knew Max had lost any chance of any kind of conversation with her for the foreseeable future.
‘I went and got him from the crèche, was that okay?’ Ryan asked as he sauntered into the room, full of cocky arrogance and swagger, carrying his baby son in one arm.
Amber couldn’t help smiling. No matter what she did or didn’t feel for this man, he still looked as hot as hell with his messed-up dark hair, heavy stubble that was back to verging on the beard he’d used to sport, and those deep-blue eyes. ‘Of course it’s okay. What are you doing here? I’ve been trying to get hold of you for days now.’
‘Yeah. What are you doing here, Ryan?’ Max asked, not even trying to hide the fact that he didn’t appreciate Ryan turning up down here without letting him know.
‘I didn’t want to speak to you over the phone, Amber. I wanted to see you in person. And, seeing as I don’t have a whole lot to do at the moment, I thought I might as well come down here and see my beautiful boy.’ His eyes locked with Amber’s. ‘And his just-as-beautiful mum.’
‘Okay. Ryan, can I have a word?’ Max said, not missing the look Ronnie threw Ryan – a look Ryan didn’t see, but one he surely must have felt because if looks could kill then Ryan would most certainly be pretty much lifeless right now.
‘Jesus, Max, all I’ve done these past few days is have words with you. Can I talk to someone else now?’
Max sighed, throwing his head back, and Amber was almost certain she heard a small string of expletives just making themselves audible above the sound of that heavy sigh. ‘Just remember what I said, Ryan, okay?’
Amber looked at Max, frowning slightly.
‘Don’t look at me like that, Amber. You know the state of play here.’
She just raised her eyebrows, turning her attention back to Ryan, the smile reappearing back on her face as she watched their son pulling at the collar of his daddy’s black-leather jacket. ‘Hey, baby! Look who’s come to see you.’
‘You free for lunch?’ Ryan asked, his eyes now focused solely on Amber. Everyone else could just fuck off.
‘Yeah, of course I am.’
‘We need you back here at three, Amber,’ Ronnie said, his stance one of suspicion as he eyed Ryan warily. He knew Amber too well, and he could read those warning signs better than anyone. ‘We’re recording two episodes of Back of the Net, remember?’
‘Yes, I’m well aware of my schedule, Ronnie.’ She leaned over and kissed the top of Rico’s head, smiling at Ryan again. ‘I’ll just grab my coat and we’ll get out of here, okay?’
*
‘You’re looking well, considering.’ Amber watched Ryan from across the table as he fed Rico his bottle. And it didn’t escape her notice how many of the restaurant’s adoring female eyes were on him. He did look pretty sexy, though, even she had to admit that. And the addition of a gorgeous baby only served to make him ten times more attractive.
‘What? Considering I’ve currently got fuck all to do because some bastard’s spreading lies about me that could threaten my career? And did you never consider breast-feeding?’
‘I considered it, but it was never really gonna work.’
‘Why? Because those incredible tits of yours are reserved for one man only? And I wish that man was me because, Jesus, I know exactly what I’m missing.’
‘You know, just when I begin to think you really have grown up, you come out with something like that.’
Ryan looked at her. ‘So, how is everything with the not-exactly-new husband?’
‘Do you want me to get up and leave?’
He looked back down at Rico. ‘No. We don’t want your mum to leave, do we, kiddo?’
‘Then stop making him look like the adult.’
Ryan said nothing for a second or two as he put Rico’s bottle down and laid his son over his shoulder, gently rubbing his back. ‘He’s settled back in at Endleigh United, then?’
‘Like he’s never been away. Why are you here, Ryan?’
‘I wanted to spend some time with my son, seeing as I appear to have quite a bit of it on my hands at the minute. And I wanted to see you, I told you that. I want to explain things, in person.’
‘Max doesn’t seem to think you should be telling me anything.’
‘That’s because he’s thinking of you as Amber Sullivan, sports reporter, rather than the mother of my baby. The woman I used to sleep with.’
Her eyes stared straight into his. ‘I would never betray your trust, Ryan.’
‘I know.’ He held her gaze maybe a little longer than he should have done because she eventually broke the stare and looked down, her eyes focusing on her wedding ring.
‘Is any of it true?’ she asked, twisting the wedding band round and round.
Ryan waited a second before answering. ‘I don’t know why I got involved,’ he began, his hand still gently rubbing Rico’s back. ‘I mean, it wasn’t as if I needed the money. I guess I just got off on the idea of having even more. It was at the height of my – of my problems, Amber, you need to remember that.’
‘Height of your stupidity, you mean.’
Ryan laughed as Rico let out a tiny burp. ‘Hey! There you go, little fella. Do you want your mum now?’
Amber couldn’t help smiling. ‘I think he’s quite happy with you.’
Ryan nestled Rico in the crook of his arm, his eyes once more locking with Amber’s. ‘I met this guy – a pretty prominent businessman, does a lot of his work out of south-east Asia, where most of these betting rings are…’
‘I know all about these betting rings, Ryan. I want to know what your involvement with this particular one was.’
Ryan sighed, breaking the stare briefly to look down at his now-sleeping son. ‘It was some charity function the club I was playing for at the time was throwing. I met this guy, this businessman, there. We got talking, and he obviously knew a lot about me, about the fact I liked to take risks, the fact I wasn’t scared of breaking the rules or…’ He broke off for a second, his eyes now back on Amber. ‘He told me they were looking for players, top-flight players, to help fix some of the bigger matches. He made it sound so easy, Amber. I told him I didn’t need the money, but I was gambling quite heavily at the time and what this guy was offering me – the kick it could give me was just too much to turn down.’
‘Jesus, Ryan, I don’t believe you…’
‘All I had to do was fix things like yellow cards, bookings – if they wanted someone sent off in, say, the second half of a match then all I had to do was make sure I got in the way, so to speak, of an opposing player; make sure they tackled me badly enough to get that necessary red card. They’d bet on the most ridiculous things, the smallest of things, it was crazy! Two yellow cards i
n the first fifteen minutes of a match? It was easy money, Amber. And don’t think some of the referees weren’t involved either, believe me, it’s…’
‘Did you do any of it, Ryan? Did you actually have anything to do with fixing any matches?’
His eyes locked with hers again, and this time he was determined no one was going to break that stare. ‘No. And that’s God’s honest truth, Amber. I thought about it, I listened to them, I even watched videos of some of the matches where players had been involved, and they really made that shit look easy. It was nigh-on impossible to tell what the hell was going on, so I thought about it, of course I did. We’re talking hundreds of thousands of pounds here, Amber. They were willing to pay me hundreds of thousands of pounds because that was nothing to them. It was frigging peanuts compared to the amount they’d be winning when those matches were played. But I couldn’t do it. When it came down to it, I just couldn’t go through with it.’
‘How far down the line did you go?’ she asked, her eyes never leaving his.
Ryan took a deep breath, exhaling slowly, looking down at the table only briefly before raising his head to meet her gaze. ‘I was in the tunnel. I was about to go out and make sure I was booked as close to the tenth minute of the game as I could make it, and that would have earned me more money than I made in a week, believe it or not. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t. I love this game too much to sell it down the river and for once my head ruled my pathetic, materialistic heart and it said no. I couldn’t do it.’
‘So, you didn’t actually do anything that could constitute fixing a game in any way?’
He shook his head. ‘I swear, Amber, I couldn’t do it. Oh, they weren’t happy, believe me. And there were threats and recriminations and for a time I really thought it was all gonna come out there and then. But Max, he… he stepped in. Oh, he dragged me over the fucking coals first, for being a bloody idiot, but he stepped in. He took it out of my hands and, somehow, he managed to get them to back down. I don’t know how he did it, or who he used to make sure that outcome was reached; I didn’t ask. Because I didn’t really want to know, I was already too involved. But he made sure my name was left out of it. He made sure my involvement was wiped clean, erased. Even when that particular betting ring was exposed, my name was never mentioned.’
‘Is that why you moved back up north?’
‘It was one of the reasons. You know the others. It was time to get away, to try and get my head straight because I’d just let those problems build up and I – I needed the space. I needed the distance.’
‘And that’s everything now, is it? No more skeletons waiting to fall out of the closet?’
‘That’s all.’
‘So why is your name suddenly coming out now? If they’d promised to keep your involvement out of it?’
Ryan wasn’t going to tell her what it was he was really thinking. What good would that do? To sit there and tell her he thought her husband was behind all this would only push her away, and that was the last thing he wanted. ‘I don’t know. Max has got people trying to find out just what’s going on, but…’
‘But, what? Do you think you know who might be behind this?’
‘No. No, I’ve got no idea. But this could ruin me, Amber. And I’m scared.’
‘But if they can prove you didn’t do anything… have the police spoken to you?’
He nodded, leaning over to kiss Rico’s forehead. ‘I told them exactly what I’ve told you.’
‘And?’
He looked at her. ‘And, that’s it, for now.’
‘For now?’
‘They’re speaking to more people. Going back over the case from a couple of years ago. So I had to tell them the truth because they’re going to be speaking to people I was involved with. But the fact my involvement was covered up…’
‘Why didn’t you just tell the truth back then, Ryan?’
‘All I could think about was coming home. I’d been in London since I was fourteen years old, Amber, but all of a sudden I felt like a stranger. Newcastle seemed like a safe place to run to, back to my northern roots. Back to where I belonged.’
‘I still don’t understand why you couldn’t just tell the truth.’
‘Because it wasn’t that simple. There was all the other shit going down with my addiction, the depression, the drinking… I couldn’t handle it all, I couldn’t handle any of it, if truth be told, and even though it was wrong, I know that now, I just wanted it all to go away. I wanted to get out of London and come back home and forget that any of it had happened. But I couldn’t leave it alone, could I? And the only way I seemed able to forget was to immerse myself in the crap that had caused all my problems in the first place. And the rest, as you know, is history. But now…’ He looked down at Rico again. ‘Now I know I should have just faced up to everything. I should have dealt with it all and not let it follow me to Newcastle. I was weak and I ignored everything Max and you and Gary… I ignored it all. But if I’d listened…’
‘Hey, come on. Look, it’s pointless going over old ground now, it’s happened.’
‘I wanted the fame and the women and this ridiculous life of excess that just isn’t fucking real, Amber. It’s all a smokescreen for people who can’t face up to the things they really need to deal with, but it isn’t real.’ He bent his head to kiss Rico again, stroking his tiny cheek with his finger. ‘This little guy – he’s real. You…’ his eyes were back on Amber’s, and there wasn’t a thing Amber could do to break that stare, even if she’d wanted to. ‘What I felt for you – what I still feel for you, that’s real. That is so fucking real.’
‘Ryan…’
‘I love you, Amber, and I don’t care that you don’t want to hear that, I don’t fucking care because I need to say it. I need to say it and know that you heard me, okay? I need that, right now, more than at any other time.’
Amber shook her head, but still her eyes wouldn’t leave his.
‘I’m scared,’ he whispered, and Amber felt a little piece of her heart break for this man in front of her. Because he really was so different to the person she’d first encountered just a couple of years ago. ‘Football is my life. It’s all I’ve ever known, and if that’s taken away from me I don’t know what the hell I’m gonna do. I don’t know who I’ll be any more.’
‘It won’t come to that, Ryan.’ She reached across the table, taking his hand, her fingers curling tightly around his. ‘Max won’t let it, I know he won’t. He loves you like a son; you know that. He’ll have the best people working on this, and it won’t come to that. You aren’t going to lose anything.’
‘I lost you.’
She slowly let go of his hand, her eyes back down on her wedding ring. ‘I’d better get back. I don’t want to be late.’
‘Amber…’
‘Rico needs to go back to the crèche.’
Ryan stood up, his baby son still asleep in his arms. ‘I can take him, can’t I? Amber, please, hang on…’
‘I need to get back, Ryan.’ She slipped on her jacket, walking over to him, leaning in to kiss her little boy. ‘And so does he. Make sure you get him back to the crèche soon. They’ll be expecting him.’
‘Amber…’ He reached out and gently grabbed her hand, stopping her from walking away. ‘Everything I said, I mean it.’
‘Yeah.’ She looked into his eyes once more. And then wished she hadn’t. ‘I know.’
Chapter Eighteen
‘Is he going to be down here long?’ Jim asked, leaning back against the nursery doorpost as he watched Amber settle Rico down in his cot.
‘I don’t know. They’ve suspended him indefinitely so it’s not like he’s got anything to stay up north for at the minute. And, like he said, while he’s got the time he might as well spend some of it with Rico.’ She walked over to Jim, flicking off the light switch so the room was bathed with the soft glow of Rico’s night light. ‘And that will actually take a bit of weight off our shoulders, for a little while, won’t it?
’
‘He’s taking him every day?’
‘Most days, yes. Have you got a problem with that?’ She pushed past him and made her way downstairs.
‘Of course I haven’t got a problem with that… Amber.’ He followed her into the living room. ‘Is everything okay? You’ve been a bit on edge ever since you got home.’
‘It’s been a busy day, Jim, that’s all,’ Amber sighed, pouring herself a small measure of whiskey. ‘And I’m tired.’
He walked over to her, taking the glass out of her hand and pulling her into his arms. ‘Do you want an early night?’
‘Early? It’s half past ten.’ She pulled free of him, sitting down on the couch and switching on the TV. ‘I just need to chill out for a bit.’
Jim looked at her. Something was wrong, and it didn’t take a genius to work out what. ‘He’s not our problem, Amber.’
‘Yeah, you see, you keep saying that, Jim, but, to be honest, he still is our problem.’ Jim sat down beside her, and she turned her head to look at him. ‘Because he’s been down here for all of half a day, and look at me. I want it to be just you and me and Rico, but it’s never really going to be like that, is it?’
He reached out to touch her face, gently cupping her cheek in his hand, his mouth brushing lightly over hers. ‘It’s like that now,’ he whispered, his hand moving lower, sliding inside her shirt and cupping her breast, his thumb flicking over her nipple. ‘It’s like that right now.’
‘I hate it when you do this,’ she groaned, but she was already slipping out of the denim shorts she was wearing, lying back against the cushions as he unfastened her shirt before undoing his own, pulling it off and throwing it down on the floor. ‘I really, really hate it.’
He smiled, and she felt the past few hours just wash away, pushed aside as he took over everything. Her strong and beautiful American man. Ryan Fisher could try, and she’d never be able to stop him from trying, but he would never, ever come between her and Jim again. She wouldn’t let him, because she loved this man too much. She ached for him, constantly, with a need bordering on obsession. And all it had taken here was the touch of his hand against her skin and she was lost in him. And lost was exactly where she needed to be.
Final Score Page 21
