by K. A. Linde
“No trouble at all. Take your time. My apologies for intruding,” Jude said. “I should probably be entertaining with the Mrs. tonight anyway. She always complains that I work too much.”
Curt laughed, but Stacia saw the smile didn’t reach her dad’s eyes. “I’m sure she does. Good to be around family for the holidays.”
Stacia just glared and remembered Bryna telling her how Jude had flown her to St. Barts for Christmas one year instead of spending it with his wife. She had thought they were separated at the time, of course, but it just went to show that he was still a shitty spouse.
As soon as her father left the room, Jude’s eyes turned back to her. “Do you mind if I have a word, Stacia?”
Stacia. He’d said her name, not the one her father had introduced her as. Was he here to talk to me? Not to talk to my father? Well, she was damn curious now.
“Sure,” she said. She left her bourbon on the table and then followed Jude out of the living room and into the empty kitchen. She could feel Derek’s eyes on her back as she left.
“Hello, Stacia. Do you remember me?” Jude asked.
“You were Marshall’s agent,” she said crisply.
“Yes, I was. I’m glad that we’re on the same footing.”
“You think so?”
“Ah, yes,” he said with a sexy smile. “I remember we weren’t on the best of terms.”
“I wonder why that is.”
He considered it. “Well, see, I had questioned that at the time, but since you were the girlfriend of my client, I just blew it off. Then, you left and managed to snag another quarterback that I very much want to get on my client list.”
“Pace,” she whispered.
Jude gave her an appraising look. He seemed to be considering how much a coach’s daughter would know about the rules for sports agents about tampering. The truth was, she knew quite a lot. Like, this very conversation could get him in a world of trouble for contacting the player through anyone who could be considered a player’s representative. Though she was also aware that it would be hard to prove that he was doing this for the sole intent of tampering when he knew her father so well.
Rock meet Hard Place.
“So, this time, it made you interesting. I don’t want you to dislike me, Stacia.”
“Then, you should probably be a better person.”
“I’m assuming that this has something to do with Bri,” he guessed.
“Or everything.”
Jude casually leaned back and observed her. “That was a long time ago.”
“Three years.”
“And she and I broke up on good terms.”
“Liar.”
“We’ve both moved past what happened.”
“Stop talking!” Stacia said, throwing her hand up. “You know nothing about Bri, and talking about her so casually, as if you ever cared about her or respected her, is just insulting to me.”
“You’ve only heard her side of the story. But if it frustrates you to know that there is another side, then we’ll move on,” he said tightly.
For a shadow of a second, she saw something other than calculation move beneath him. She saw real emotion when he talked about Bryna. There was no way he could have actually cared about her. Not with the way Bryna talked about him.
“Did you love her?” she couldn’t help but ask, no matter how naive the question was.
Whether or not he had loved her…he had left her and damaged her almost beyond repair.
“Yes,” he said frankly.
“Well, I guess it’s too bad that she’s engaged now.”
He looked startled. “Engaged?”
Stacia laughed. “I think we’re off topic.”
Jude’s composure returned in a second. “You’re right. I want to shore up my investments.”
“Have you already been talking to Pace?” Stacia asked, nudging him toward admitting indiscretion.
“No, of course not,” he said with a smile, seeing through her deceit. “That would be illegal.”
“Then, I don’t see how I could help you.”
“I could make your life very comfortable, Stacia. Just think about it,” he said with a smile. She opened her mouth, but he held his hand up. “No need to say anything now. I’m sure I’ll see you next week.”
Then, he straightened and left just as her father appeared around the corner with the paperwork Jude had supposedly come for. But, as he exited the house, she knew, without a doubt, that he had shown up with the sole intention of speaking to her about Pace.
Her hands shook as she returned to the living room to grab her phone.
“What did you think of him?” her dad asked before she could leave.
“He’s a sleazeball.”
Her dad nodded thoughtfully. “He is. It’s unfortunate he’s so damn good at his job.”
Stacia laughed and remembered all the reasons she loved her father. She disappeared upstairs and debated who to call first, but she couldn’t help it when her fingers twitched to Bryna’s name.
“Hey, S!” Bryna cried. “How’s it going?”
“I just saw Jude.”
Bryna choked. “You what?”
“He came to my house, supposedly to get paperwork from my dad, but he just wanted to talk to me.”
“About what? Pace? That’s illegal!”
“Since when has he ever cared about being legal?” Stacia asked.
“Fair,” Bryna said softly. It was only ever anger or soft sentimentality that came out when Jude was brought up.
“He didn’t come out and say that he was there about Pace, but he basically did. He wanted me to be on his side…and he knew that you and I were friends.”
“Did he?” Bryna asked. “And what did he say?”
“He tried to feed me bullshit about you two, but in the end, I just told him to stop bullshitting me and that you were engaged.”
Bryna started coughing and sputtering. “You told him I was engaged?” she practically shouted.
“It was entertaining to see him silently freak out.”
“He freaked out?” she whispered.
“Yeah, he did. But, Bri, I think he’s even worse than ever. He left his wife to come talk to me on Thanksgiving. He’s breaking the law for sports agents, so he can try to get to Pace. He thinks he’s invincible.”
Bryna was silent for a moment. “He should have had some consequences for his actions. Instead his wife took him back just like that. I should have turned him in to the police or something.”
“I’m not saying that. I’m saying…he’s a jackass.”
Bryna cracked up. “That, he is. I know you’re saying I should forget about what happened…and I have. I have Eric. But, still, when someone brings him up, sometimes, it just stops me cold all over again.”
“Yeah…I know.”
“So, have you told Pace?”
“I wanted to call you first,” Stacia admitted.
“Well, don’t worry about me.”
“Bri…”
“Yeah?”
“He said that he loved you at the time.”
“I see. Aren’t his lies getting more elaborate?” Bryna said, dropping into that soft voice once more. “Go on. Talk to Pace. I’m fine.”
They ended their call, and Stacia immediately dialed Pace’s number. She had chosen Pace second because she was furious at the thought that Pace might have been talking to Jude already, that Pace would still sign with the scumbag after what Jude had done to Bryna.
“Have you been talking to Jude Rose?” Stacia demanded as soon as Pace picked up the phone.
“Excuse me?”
“Are you in talks with Jude motherfucking Rose?”
“Where did you hear that?” he asked.
“From Jude motherfucking Rose!” she said, her voice rising.
“Stacia, calm down. It’s all under control.”
“Oh my God,” she breathed. “You’re talking to him, aren’t you?”
“Official
ly, I’m not talking to anyone. I’m not allowed to talk to agents before the end of the game on Saturday.”
“Yet you are,” she accused.
“On the record, no. Off the record, kind of. How did you talk to Jude?”
“He showed up at my dad’s house under the pretense of picking up paperwork from my father, and then he cornered me and said he wanted to shore up his investments. What do you think that means, Pace? That he’ll go through me to make sure that you sign with him!”
“See? He’s sneaky. They’re all sneaky like that. I haven’t made any decisions. No investments shored up,” Pace insisted.
“Are you actually considering him after what he did to Bri?” Stacia asked in disbelief.
“I can’t rule out the best agent in the business because he fucked my sister,” Pace said harshly. “I’d have to rule out a lot of people if that were the requirement.”
“Dick.”
“Guilty as charged.”
Stacia ground her teeth. She was physically shaking with anger. This couldn’t happen. “It was bad enough that Marshall used Jude. I can’t sit through another draft with his smug face. And, this time, he knows that I know what happened with Bri.”
“Stacia, calm down. Seriously. No decisions will be made until after the regular season is over. Then, I have to make the best decision for my career.”
“Jude is not the best decision,” she insisted.
“I’ll have you there with me when I decide, okay?”
Stacia sighed in relief. “Okay.”
He hadn’t confirmed that he wouldn’t work with Jude, but at least he was going to let her be included. That was more than Marshall had allowed.
She just couldn’t shake the feeling that Jude was bad news. She didn’t care if he was the best in the industry. If he treated his wife and kid that poorly—not to mention, Bryna, a woman he had claimed to love—then he would certainly treat his clients just as shitty if things didn’t go his way.
“Just try to enjoy the rest of your Thanksgiving, okay? Are you having fun with your dad and Derek?”
“Yeah,” she admitted, settling down. “Derek came out to Dad today.”
“Wow. How did that go?”
“Dad was surprisingly cool with it. I think they talked about whether or not to come out to the team, but ultimately, he left it up to Derek. I think it’s good for him—to have it off his chest. Plus, Jordan got to meet Dad.”
“That’s good. I’m happy for them.”
“Me, too. Other than that, just good food and bourbon. I’m hoping to finish the first draft of my paper tomorrow, so I can drive home to watch you play your last game at home.”
“Fuck, that sounds crazy.”
“It really does,” she admitted.
“How’s the paper going anyway?” he asked.
“Pretty good. I think all of that studying is finally paying off. I feel like I get it now, but I can’t wait to start the sports broadcast seminar next semester. I just wish I were taking it during football season, so I could cover all the games.”
“Fuck, that would be hot as shit.”
Stacia laughed. “You’re ridiculous.”
“My sexy woman with brains, on the sidelines. It’s like a wet dream.”
“Oh my God, stop!”
“And I know your wet dream is me out on the field,” he said, poking at her.
“I do enjoy seeing you in uniform, but I don’t mind you out of it so much anymore.”
“You’ve never minded me out of it,” he reminded her.
“True. But I mean…I just like when we’re together, and football isn’t between us,” she said quietly. “I felt like, for a long time, I was with you because of football, and you were with me because of cheer, so football ruled our lives. It’s nice now that we’re together, and the defining trait of our relationship isn’t just football.”
“You know, I worried, when you first left Marshall, that you’d start jersey-chasing again.”
“What? Like, I picked you because you were the quarterback?” she asked.
Her heart sank that he could feel that way. Of course, she had given him every reason to believe that would be the case. After three years of her QB search, he had every right to be afraid of that.
“Yeah.”
“Well, I worried a bit that you only picked me because you felt like I was your prize for getting the starting position.”
He chuckled. “We both feared the same thing, yet here we are, and neither of those things is true.”
“I like that.”
“Me, too.”
“I wish we hadn’t been so stupid in the past,” she admitted. “That we’d gotten to this place a long time ago.”
“Maybe we had to go through this to get to where we are. If it means that I have you right here, right now, then I wouldn’t change a thing.”
She sighed at his words.
“But if I could change the mistakes I made and still end up with you as my girlfriend, then I’d take all of that pain and all that mistrust away. You didn’t deserve to feel like that, and I wish I’d never hurt you.”
THE LAST GAME OF THE SEASON.
It was a cold and breezy day and unseasonably overcast. Stacia had forgone a cute dress for black skinny jeans and her cheer jacket to ward off the crisp breeze.
But the weather and her clothing weren’t the only strange things about the day. Everywhere she went with the girls, it seemed like people were whispering behind hands and laughing when they passed. But it didn’t make sense. She didn’t know what they were laughing about. A couple of the football players would stare at her, and then when she saw them looking, they would immediately look away from her.
Stacia thought she was imagining it or going crazy until Trihn asked, “What the hell is everyone’s problem today?”
“Yeah. Am I missing something?” Bryna asked. “Do I have something in my hair?”
“No, you look great,” Stacia told her. “But I don’t know why people are acting so weird.”
“Well, I’m going to go find out,” Bryna said.
Then, she stomped right over to a football player and put the fear of God in him. He started stammering to her and nodding profusely. She came back a minute later and shrugged.
“He said that the cheerleaders are spreading some kind of rumor that we’re going to fuck the whole team if we win tonight,” Bryna responded dryly.
“How mature,” Trihn grumbled.
“For fuck’s sake,” Maya said, flipping off the cheer squad, who burst into laughter at the gesture.
“Fucking bitches,” Stacia muttered. “Lindsay just needs to let it go.”
“She needs some serious dick to move on,” Bryna said.
“I swear, the girl has the largest stick up her ass,” Maya said. “She came up with something so petty, yet it still spreads like wildfire.”
“Well, any of those football players would die to fuck us,” Stacia said. Then, she nodded her head toward the cheer squad. “Unlike them.”
All four girls died laughing. It was their turn to get glares from the cheer squad, as it was obvious that whatever Lindsay had tried to do had backfired.
Stacia decided to just ignore all the strange behavior around her. This was the last football game Pace would ever play in this stadium. She wanted to revel in it. He’d come a long way since transferring in the middle of his senior year of high school to start at LV State. And he had proven himself to be competent in the starting position. She was just happy to be a part of this season.
Last season had been such hell that she hadn’t really gotten to enjoy it. But, now, it was just her and her quarterback.
Everyone cheered through the touchdowns and yelled and cried through the failures. She jumped up and down with the best of them at the incredible runs Boomer and Drayton had. She marveled at Pace’s lightning-sharp throws and quick feet. It was a beautiful game to watch, and by the end, it was bittersweet, knowing that they would have to say
good-bye.
Sure, they had bowl games, playoffs, and hopefully the national championship game ahead of them, but nothing could compare to the feeling of winning this one and watching the close of a great season.
“What a game,” Bryna sighed. She wiped at the corner of her eye. “I can’t believe that’s my last home game as a college student.”
Trihn threw her arm over Bryna’s shoulders. “You and me both.”
“Well, I have another year,” Stacia said.
“It won’t be the same,” Bryna said.
“You’re right. It won’t be.”
“Come here,” Trihn said, opening her other arm.
Then, the three best friends hugged as their season came to a close. It was a toast to friendship that had always revolved around a football team and the good times they had shared together.
They came away laughing, and then a football player Stacia had only met briefly approached them.
“Hey. Sorry. Excuse me. Uh…Pace wants to see you,” the guy said.
Stacia’s eyes rounded as she saw Pace standing with Coach Galloway, talking to a few reporters, who were huddled around the team, asking about their stellar season. Pace caught her eye and waved her over.
“I’ll be back,” she told her friends.
Butterflies were fluttering in her stomach, and she was nervous. She didn’t know what was going to happen or why Pace would have asked her to come out onto the field. He couldn’t be doing what she thought he could be doing, could he?
Of course…football players all over the country would propose to their girlfriend after a big game. But she was just being ridiculous, thinking that was what was happening.
Plus…would I even say yes?
Her stomach flipped again at the thought. She didn’t know. No, this couldn’t be it. He just wanted to talk to her. He just wanted to celebrate with her.
She plastered a smile on her face as she took the first step out toward him. Her mind was just doing crazy things. She wasn’t ready for that. He wasn’t ready for that. It definitely was not what their big conversations had been about. She bit her lip as anticipation zipped through her.
“Stacia!” someone called behind her. Then, a hand grabbed her arm.
