His eyes kept scrolling. He lingered for a moment on a tall redhead, her curls bouncing around her as she swayed to the music. Something about her looked far too elegant for her to be in this club, but she seemed to be thoroughly enjoying herself, and her thin figure still had curves in all the right places.
The redhead moved slightly to one side, and Chase saw that she wasn't alone. There was another young woman dancing with her, so short that she'd been blocked from view.
Chase frowned, squinting in the dim light. Why did that shorter little woman look familiar to him-
The strobe lights flashed, and his brain suddenly made the connection.
The short woman dancing with her redheaded friend was none other than Katy, the newest staff member of the Hawks! What in the world was she doing here?
Already up and out of his seat, halfway to the bouncer standing implacably beside the entrance to the VIP booth, Chase paused for a moment. DeShaun had told him to leave this girl alone, he considered. Maybe he ought not to-
But this seemed like too perfect of an opportunity to get to know her a little better. That's all he wanted, he told himself. Just to talk with her, not to get her naked and riding his dick.
Although who could say how the night might end up?
"Hey, see those two?" he spoke up to the bouncer before he could change his mind. "The redhead and the short friend? Get them in here!"
He settled back on the couch, grinning as the big man strolled off across the club to fetch Katy and her friend.
Chapter six
"Okay, fine! This is kind of fun!" I shouted up to Miranda as I happily wiggled my ass back and forth. "Maybe coming out was a good idea!"
"What?" she called back to me, looking down at me.
I considered trying to project my voice up towards her, but decided not to bother after a minute. Instead, I focused on using my breath to keep myself from growing exhausted as I wiggled back and forth, loving how the heavy, thumping bass beat seemed to penetrate all the way into my bones.
At first, upon arriving out at the club, I hadn't felt much like drinking. But Miranda was insistent, and the two fizzy, deliciously sweet pink drinks that she brought to me were even more insistent. Pretty soon, she'd managed to lure me out onto the dance floor, into the press of people.
I went along, begrudgingly at first, but soon enjoying myself. The music was good, the drinks had settled into my stomach to give me a lovely, fuzzy warm feeling, and I deserved to cut loose a bit! If my very first day of my job was any indication, I'd need to take plenty of time to myself to shake off some of my stress!
Miranda smiled back at me as she danced. I paused for a moment, catching my breath as I watched her. Good lord, my friend even danced in clubs in a sophisticated manner! I couldn't pin my finger on what exactly about her movements made them seem so refined and elegant compared to everyone else, but she somehow managed to project pure class and noble confidence.
I tried to not compare my hip-wiggling dance to her movements. Remember, Katy, I'm here to have fun, I pointed out to myself. It's not as though I'm out here with anyone else who might judge me-
"Excuse me, ladies?"
I glanced up in surprise as a shadow fell over the two of us. At first, I thought that a mountain had somehow come to life and approached us. A minute later, my brain caught up with the fizzy pink drinks inside me, and the dark mountain resolved itself into a bouncer, looming over us, the lights glinting off his bald pate.
"Are we in trouble?" Miranda asked, turning and looking at the bouncer as I focused on getting my breath back.
The mountain of a man shook his head. "Actually, one of the VIPs spotted you," he replied. He jerked a sausage of a thumb over his shoulder. "He invited you to come join him in his booth, if you want."
I opened my mouth to protest that no, we were fine right here, but Miranda reached down and slapped her thin fingers over my mouth before I could speak. "That sounds wonderful," she replied quickly, as I tried to decide whether or not to bite at these fingers suddenly blocking my mouth. "Lead the way!"
"What are you doing!?" I hissed at her, as soon as she let go of my mouth.
"Oh, lighten up!" she replied, beaming back at me as she followed the bouncer. The huge man simply plodded forward, separating the crowd in front of him like a snowplow. By sticking close to him, Miranda and I were able to avoid being swept away.
"Lighten up? But why-"
"We're out here to have fun, to take your mind off of the stresses of managing crazy football players!" Miranda pointed out to me, as if I was a small child missing an obvious fact. "And that means we have to go with whatever the night hands to us! Besides, it will be fun! The VIP lounges here are great."
I bit my tongue, but my fingernails dug into my palms. I always hated whenever Miranda talked to me as though I was a kid. And how did she know what the VIP booths here were like? She probably got an invite into someone's VIP lounge every time she came here.
I, on the other hand, had never been invited into a VIP area anywhere.
Well, there's a first time for everything, a little voice in my head whispered to me. And this is the first time for going to a VIP lounge! Go along with it and enjoy it!
The little voice in my head seemed suspiciously pink, fruity, and fizzy, but I decided to go along with it. Besides, what else would I do - just stay out in the dance area by myself?
A minute later, the bouncer led us to one of the big lounges on the side of the club, reaching out to tug back the gauzy curtain across the entrance. "Here you are, ladies," he told us, letting us enter.
I stepped into the curtain enclosed area, following after Miranda - and then froze as my eyes settled on the faces of the two men sitting on the couch.
"No. No, no, no," I stated firmly, starting to turn around.
Miranda's hand shot out and caught at my wrist, keeping me from leaving. I stared back at her, amazed that she could latch onto me without even turning to look. How did she know that I was about to run away?
"Well, this is unexpected!" Miranda said warmly, smiling down at DeShaun Jackson, Hawks wide receiver, and Seth Chase, Hawks quarterback. "What a small world! It turns out that I'm here with your brand new social media manager!"
"Oh yes, I know," Seth Chase answered her smoothly, rising up to his feet. He looked past Miranda, down at me. "Fancy seeing you here, Katy."
Next to me, Miranda's mouth opened up into a perfect little O of surprise. For a split second, I felt a twinge of selfish satisfaction. Miranda was so used to always being the center of attention, and to the idea of me as the tagalong friend, that she seemed totally flummoxed by the role reversal.
No sooner had that thought flickered in my head, however, than I felt it pushed away as I looked back at Chase. "You invited me over here?" I asked stupidly.
"Well, I saw you out in the club, and figured that you might want to come enjoy some VIP perks," he replied, still wearing a smile that looked far too innocent on his face. "And maybe the two of us could get to know our newest team member a little better."
I switched my attention over to DeShaun Jackson, still sitting on the couch. Did he look intensely annoyed for some reason? The expression only flickered briefly across his face before he put on a smile and stood up, but I was pretty sure that he wasn't as thrilled as his quarterback to see me there.
This definitely felt like a bad idea. But we were inside the booth, now, and I strongly doubted that I'd be able to convince Miranda to leave, or Chase to let us go. I could always leave on my own, of course, but that would mean an abrupt end to an evening that, up until just a minute ago, I'd been quite enjoying.
"Yeah, sure," I decided instead, stepping over to take a seat on the couch in between Chase and Jackson. "So, what are you two up to? Plotting your next act of wild debauchery?"
"Oh, not yet - we aren't nearly drunk enough!" Chase replied happily, his eyes following me and still smiling at me. "And if we're not drunk enough, neither are you!"
> I opened my mouth to protest, but Chase already had a hand up, waving a cocktail waitress over to us. "Bring these ladies whatever they'd like," he told her, turning his attention to pouring himself a generous shot from a bottle full of amber liquid sitting in an ice bucket beside the lounge couch.
Great. It looked like Chase had invited me over here so that he could toy with me, like a cat with a mouse. I resolved to myself not to play his games, not to let him goad me into saying anything without thinking.
I realized a second that the waitress was still waiting to take my drink request. Feeling overwhelmed with conflicting thoughts and feelings, I ordered a vodka cranberry, my default drink. Miranda requested the same thing, a clear sign that she still felt off balance from Chase addressing me, instead of her.
My best friend recovered quickly, however, putting on a smile that grew more certain by the second. "So, you two are going to be working with my best friend!" she enthused, directing her smile back and forth between Jackson and Chase. "You two will both treat her with respect, won't you?"
Jackson opened his mouth to reply, but Chase beat him to the punch. "Oh, I'm sure that we'll try," he replied smoothly, "but she's got quite the challenge in front of her! As I understand it, she's basically the fun police."
I immediately forgot about my previous promise to myself to not rise to his bait. "I'm not here to stop you from having fun!" I burst out, glaring hotly back at Chase. "I'm just trying to make sure that you keep your damn pants on in publi?"
"But why, when we can have so much more fun with them off?" he asked sweetly, taking a sip of his drink as I sputtered in an ineffectual attempt at a response.
The waitress returned with our own drinks, and I tried taking a sip to calm myself, but the alcohol didn't seem to have much effect. I tried taking another sip, sending it down to check on the first one.
On the other side of me, DeShaun Jackson leaned forward. "Listen, Chase is just being an ass," he spoke up, glaring past me at the quarterback. "He's a good quarterback, yeah, but man, it would be nice to go a week without seeing a picture of his naked ass in the papers or online somewhere."
"You get to see the real thing in the showers," Chase retorted to Jackson, making Miranda nearly choke on her drink. "And you can't deny that it's glorious."
Chase turned his attention to Miranda. "You can back me up here, can't you?"
"Not quite - I haven't seen it in person, after all," she said, making Chase laugh and my teeth grind together.
"The night is young!" he told her. "There's still plenty of time for that fact to change."
I had to step in at this point, I realized. "Not happening," I spoke up, leaning forward to physically block Chase and Miranda's view of each other. "I didn't say anything about stopping you two, or any of the other players, from going out at night to have fun. But you're to keep your clothes on, and if that means that I have to be your damn chaperone, so be it!"
"I'm all right with that," Jackson nodded on the heels of my pronouncement.
For just a moment, I thought I saw Chase narrow his eyes at me. But his expression opened up a second later, and he shrugged.
"Sure, whatever," he gave in. "Maybe we'll keep a lid on things tonight - and I can get to know a little more about the fun police."
I felt a growl rumble in the back of my throat at the new and thoroughly unwanted nickname, but hey, I'd happily talk more about myself if it meant that Chase would keep his damn pants on. "Fine," I retorted.
"Fine," Chase fired back, locking eyes with me.
For a moment, the VIP booth sat silent. I glared back into Chase's brilliant blues, determined not to blink first.
"So!" Miranda finally piped up brightly. "Are either of you looking for a financial advisor to handle investing your salary?"
Chapter seven
As he sipped at his drink, Chase found himself contemplating a totally unexpected thought, one he'd never imagined that he would think.
Katy Tenner, he considered to himself, actually wasn't so bad.
He'd invited her over to the VIP booth mainly out of spiteful fun, as a chance to poke at her for her surely upcoming attempts to control him, to try and lock him in his hotel room whenever he wasn't at games or practice so that he couldn't have any fun. And indeed, he'd been having fun at first, referring to her as the fun police and cracking jokes about how she'd look better in a policeman's uniform.
But as the night went on, Chase found himself tiring of the jokes, and instead started listening.
And to his amazement, he realized several minutes later, he was actually enjoying the conversation!
After she'd downed her first vodka cranberry, the woman loosened up a bit, happily talking with him about how she hadn't known the slightest thing about football up until a couple months ago, when she heard about this opportunity to work for the Hawks. "And you won't believe how many nights I stayed up, lying on the couch and trying to stay awake as I watched recordings of old games."
"Really?" he asked, surprised in spite of himself. "You actually watched all of our old games?"
She nodded, waving her drink. If there'd been more than a few sips remaining in the glass, she would have spilled liquid everywhere. "Yeah. You guys might be shit shows when you go out drinking and partying, but you're also a hell of a good team."
"Thanks," he replied, still surprised. He waved to the waitress, who nodded and hurried off to fetch Katy another drink.
"Oh, I really shouldn't," she said, as she accepted the new drink and handed the waitress her old glass. "But maybe one more drink won't hurt."
"That's what I always tell myself," Chase joked, to general laughter from DeShaun and the others. "And each drink seems fine - they just all gang up on me later in the evening and convince me that it's a good idea to show the reporters how I've freshly shaved my balls!"
He saw Miranda perk up at those words, but decided not to focus on her for the moment. He could always circle back and hit on her later. Right now, he was having fun (fun? Was that really happening?) with Katy.
"So what did you think when you walked into our locker room this morning?" he asked, leaning in a little closer to hear her words.
"Oh god, I was terrified!" Katy answered with a laugh. "Let me just point this out - when you're my height, everyone else around you is already taller than you. Going in to meet a bunch of massive football players? It's terrifying!"
She jumped up from the couch, waving her hand at Chase. "Here, let me show you. Get up, and then get on your knees."
"Stealing my lines," Chase joked, but he did as requested, sinking onto his knees on the floor of the club next to the couch.
Katy eyeballed him for a moment, and then stepped up onto the couch next to him, giving herself a good foot and a half advantage in height over him. "See? Look up at me," she told him. "Isn't this terrifying, imagining that everyone else is always this much taller than you?"
Chase shuffled a little closer, looking up at her - although his view of her face was partially blocked by the swell of her breasts, sticking out from her chest. "I dunno," he shrugged. "Maybe it's my natural charisma, but I'm kind of liking the view from down here."
After a moment, Katy gasped as she caught onto his meaning, and Chase grinned up at her - and then the grin shifted to shock as she pulled an ice cube from her drink and dropped it neatly down the back of his shirt.
"Cold! Aah, that's really fucking cold!" he exclaimed, hopping up to his feet and hopping in an effort to dislodge the ice cube from where it had stopped, right at the small of his back.
"Serves you right," Katy told him, but she wore a smile on her face even as she denounced him. "But no, imagine walking into a room and everyone's that much taller than you, and staring at you and judging you! It's tough!"
"I suppose it might be," Chase admitted. "But I'll point out that, one time, I hooked up with half of the Brazilian beach volleyball team. Whole bunch of tall gals, and none of them seemed to have a problem with me. In fact,"
he added, dropping his voice into a conspiratorial whisper that carried easily across the booth, "they were quite happy with my height, if you know what I'm talking about."
"Trust me, Chase, even people who have never heard of football know what you're talking about, thanks to how often you flash all the paparazzi," Katy immediately fired back. "You could really stand to keep your underwear on every now and then."
"That's assuming that I'm wearing any," Chase told her, giving her a wink that, out of the corner of his eye, he saw made Miranda nearly spit out her most recent mouthful of alcohol.
Katy, however, remained unimpressed. "Look, I know that your flirting act works on all the other girls, Chase," she said, "but it's not going to work on me. I'm in charge of guarding your image, not rubbing down your dick, and I don't want to mess this job up. So flirt all you want, but I'm not falling for it."
She seemed serious. Chase thought for a second of pushing that boundary, but then decided against it. What would be the point? It wasn't like he was starving for pussy.
And besides, he suddenly thought to himself, he could actually use a friend.
Chase paused for a moment, frowning to himself. Where in the world had that thought come from? He had plenty of friends - he had DeShaun, he had...
Curious. He seemed to be drawing a blank. Maybe the alcohol was hitting him harder than he'd expected. But he certainly had lots of friends - how else could he be so popular and famous?
But none of those friends, he was willing to admit to himself, were female. He'd met a dyke at a strip club in Denver a couple months ago and had hit it off with her, but then it had turned out that she wanted to experiment with her sexuality by sleeping with him, so he cut that off.
After bedding her, of course. What was he if not generous?
"Okay, fine," he said, realizing that he had been silent for nearly a minute now, and conversation in the VIP booth had died down. "You let me have fun, and I'll ease off on the flirting. How's that sound?"
SACK: A Football Bad Boy Romance Page 4
