Interference (Prescott Family Book 1)

by Mignon Mykel

  I made a mental note to talk to Mark the first chance I got. He really needed to stop directing people to me. Wasn’t that his job? To figure out what appearances and gigs were best for his athletes when they weren’t doing what they were being paid to do? Fuck, Mark knew I didn’t like to sign up for the extra things that came with being a pro-athlete. Events with the team, sure. Gigs at the rink, absolutely. But beyond that, it was a hard no.

  “We are putting together a reality television series, and you are one of the names we were interested in having involved with the show,” she stated in a rehearsed manner.

  I didn’t think sleep was going be coming back to me anytime soon, so I rolled over onto my back before throwing my legs over the side of the bed. As I stood, I shook my head. “Yeah, sorry. No reality TV.”

  “If you’d just let me pitch it to you—“

  “That’s all you’re going to be doing, Miss Meadows. Do you really want to waste your breath? I’m not doing television.”

  “That’s fine,” she rushed to say. As she began talking about multiple women and just as many dates, I strode naked to my dresser to pull out a pair of old, worn sweatpants. I pulled them on while listening with one ear. She continued to talk, so I continued to move, walking out of my room and down the hall that was home to both mine and Jonny’s rooms, a spare room, and a bathroom, before walking barefooted down the stairs. Whenever she’d pause for an answer, I was sure to give a barely verbal ‘mmhm’ just so she would continue her rant and be closer to done.

  I had sisters. I knew how to work a phone call with the long-winded female species.

  “So great,” she said finally, with a smile evident in her voice, so unlike the unsure tone at the beginning of our conversation, one-sided as it mostly was. “I will meet you tonight after your game. Thank you so much, Caleb. I promise you, you won’t be disappointed.”

  Standing in front of the fridge now, I frowned when I heard the telltale sign of her ending the call. I pulled the phone from my ear only to stare down at the ‘call ended’ screen, the frown not going anywhere.

  Well shit…

  What did I just agree to?

  Sydney

  After calling David and talking him into extending my deadline—because let’s be honest, twenty-four hours was not doable, not to talk a guy into a show he was apparently against—I packed an overnight bag and headed to Grand Junction Regional, a good hour and a half away. The only flight leaving for San Diego was at five in the evening, with a quick layover in Phoenix. After all was said and done, I arrived in San Diego at almost eight thirty. According to my calculations, that still gave me about an hour to head from the airport to the arena. Not knowing traffic, yet assuming the worst, I really hoped that was enough time.

  I left my terminal and headed towards the rental car area. Seeing the line snaking back and forth, I had to fight back a groan. I moved to the back of the line and propped my wheeled bag up before digging in the front pocket to find my leather folio. In it, I had my printed confirmation codes, maps, a description of the show, random notes on the man, and any and every selling point I could possibly give Noah Caleb Prescott, award winning forward of the San Diego Enforcers. I had to convince him to sign on.

  After what little I found, I wasn’t entirely convinced I would be able to pull this off.

  The second child of Noah and Ryleigh Prescott, he was the first to be professionally drafted in the family. Not for lack of trying on his oldest sister’s part, though. She was one of the largest supporters of a professional women’s hockey team in the Midwest, and I almost found more information on her than I did Caleb.

  Caleb was a six foot five power forward, a player known for his speed and quick moves. He wasn’t one to get into many scuffles, but he wasn’t afraid to pull a punch if it was necessary. Most of the journalists and forum posters had nothing but good things to say about him.

  To be honest, I couldn’t find a single negative remark on the man.

  That was on the ice.

  Off the ice wasn’t much different.

  He gave back to his community at home. He participated in most of the teams’ appearances at local hospitals. He was endorsed by a few brands, but from what little I could find, his name was simply attached to the companies. There weren’t print or video ads, and the few interviews I found weren’t extremely lengthy.

  I did find a few paparazzi shots of him with models and actresses, but never with the same one more than once. And never so many pictures with different women in a span of time that would paint him as a typical athletic player. The one event he seemed to go to annually was the NHL Awards in Vegas, which I can’t say I was aware was a thing. He went right before his rookie season and again last June. Like most of the attendees, he was freaking gorgeous in whatever big named suit he’d wear. Most of those pictures though, he was either by himself or with a blond male that the captions labeled as his brother, Jonny.

  So what I knew was the man didn’t like to be in the public eye, yet the public still loved him.

  And I was supposed to convince him to say yes to a very public reality show?

  I needed all the luck in the world with that one.

  I triple checked my car rental paperwork before placing the folio on top of my bag. I tugged down on my brown dress pants before smoothing my hands down my thighs. My hands went to the small of my back to check the tuck of the light green, long-sleeved blouse I chose for the meeting, making sure it was tucked and tight, not billowing. I guessed I kind of resembled a tree, the brown and green thing going on, but the light green worked well with my complexion and hair.

  I leaned to the side a little to try and catch a glimpse of the people ahead of me. When it looked like there would be no moving for a moment yet, I toed off one of my three-inch heeled sandals to flex and rotate my foot. Oh, that felt divine…

  At five-two, every inch counted. If my body was able to handle the pain of five-plus inch heels for long periods of time, I’d wear those in a heartbeat. As it was, my baby three-inch ones killed.

  I slipped the heel back on when I saw the line start to shuffle forward. Grabbing the handle of my bag, I moved with the masses, stopping yet again a few feet later. As a fan of the messy top-knot, I had tried really hard to keep my hair down for this meeting but that was so not happening anymore. The temperature difference between Utah and California was pretty significant, even at this later hour.

  I leaned down to unzip the front of my bag again to find a hair tie. I opted against my go-to style for a clean, if slightly loose, ponytail in the middle of my head, part over my left eye still intact. I brushed my long side-swept bangs into place before glancing at my watch.

  I was such a fidgeter. Patience was something I’d never had a whole lot of.

  It was nearing nine. A full thirty minutes had passed already? That was no good.

  I was that person who would have everything done yesterday if I could. I hated being late; I liked being punctual, on time, and therefore no less than fifteen minutes early.

  According to the map I looked at earlier, it was ten minutes from the airport to the arena, but that was on a good day.

  Again, I bent forward to the front zipper to rift around, pulling out my iPhone this time. I opened up a web browser and plugged in NHL.com to figure out where I stood in regards to the timing of the game. From what I pulled up earlier, it appeared most games ended at about nine-thirty or so. I figured that to get to the arena on time based off those numbers and the traveling times, I’d have to leave the airport in fifteen minutes to get there on time, Sydney style, or within thirty minutes at the absolute latest.

  Honestly, though, the thought of getting there right on time almost gave me hives.

  iPhone in hand, I crossed my arms and tapped my toes. Could this line move any slower?

  As if my thoughts willed it to happen, the line moved. Two more lanes opened and two others cleared, allowing the line to move a bit more quickly.

  Positive thou
ghts, Sydney…Positive thoughts.

  I was late.

  This did not sit well with me. Those hives I was thinking about before? I certainly felt a twitch behind my eye and was fighting back the urge to scratch at my arms. Granted, it sounded like the game was still going, if the cheers and loud music were any indication.

  This late thing didn’t sit well with me, but what was I going to do, especially with the game apparently still going? Go down to the ice and talk to him?

  Ok, deep breath; maybe I really wasn’t all that late.

  Thanks to David, I had been able to drive the rental right up to the side of the arena, where security would watch it. No parking tickets here, no siree.

  I stumbled briefly in my jog-walk from the front doors of the arena to a set of doors separating the lobby and the actual seating and bowl.

  Running in heels wasn’t really my forte. I left my bag in the car, but carried my leather folio with me. When I was stopped for not having a ticket, all I had to do, according to David, was give my name. Upon doing so, the ticket usher spoke into his walkie-talkie and I was given clearance. An usher walked me around the side to a private elevator, making me feel all sorts of special.

  He sent me down to the lower level, where I was met by a security guard. This one was female, but she looked a bit scary to me, so I just smiled and let her take me to where I had to go.

  The woman stopped with me in a long hall as echoes from the announcer ricocheted the halls, expressing the organization’s thanks for coming out and that the kids in attendance were welcome to stick around for a post skate.

  Well… I guess the game was done now.

  A few feet ahead of me was a lit opening to the right, the tunnel maybe, and directly across from that was a set of closed, double doors. As we neared the tunnel and doors, I could hear talking and music from beyond said doors. Extremely loud music.

  I let out a quick breath through pursed lips before smiling over at the security lady. “Thank you.”

  She nodded and turned to stand a bit further down the hall, near the elevator but still watching me.

  Don’t worry, I wanted to say, I won’t barge into the locker room.

  While I had grown up with three older brothers, barging into a locker room full of men of all ages wasn’t really my thing.

  Not knowing what else to do, I stood next to the wall across from the closed doors and crossed my arms over my chest. I supposed I would wait; it wasn’t like I had any other choice, right?

  Patience, Sydney. Patience, I repeated, over and over in my head, trying hard to refrain from tapping my foot. Granted, I wasn’t too sure I could stay upright if I attempted to tap my heeled toe, so instead I shifted my weight to the other leg, wincing slightly as the pressure was released from the previous.

  No sooner than the wince left my face, the double doors opened wide and men in work-out clothing, team sweats, and a few in business attire, started to pile out. Ok, maybe ‘pile out’ wasn’t entirely accurate, but they weren’t exactly coming out single-file, either.

  Two terrifyingly tall men walked out, wearing identical brown wind-pant bottoms. One wore a white tee with the Enforcers’ logo taking up the entire front of the shirt. The logo was either printed vintage-style, or the shirt had seen many trips to the laundry.

  The other wore a light brown long-sleeved tee with Enforcers written over the right chest area. Both had wet hair and brought with them a fresh male scent; however, the smell that wafted after them was pungent, smelling of stale sweat and old gym clothes.

  I tried really hard to not turn my nose up.

  The man in the long-sleeved shirt quickly glanced in my direction, causing me to straighten to my full, even if short, height. He nodded upwards once at his teammate before saying in a deep voice, “See you on the ice.” The other said something in return in a heavy European accent, perhaps in agreement. Man-in-long-sleeved-shirt walked over toward me; the nearer he came, the larger his tower of height became.

  Taking a breath, I reminded myself that at five-two, most men towered over me. Then again, most men didn’t come at me with the additional inches skates gave.

  “Can I help you?” he asked.

  “Um, yeah. I mean, yes, please,” I stuttered, nervously glancing down to my leather folio. One of the things I needed to work on was my presence, and stuttering and using half-words like ‘yeah’ was not acceptable. I opened my folio and pretended to sift through papers when honestly, I had no clue exactly why I was here. What if Caleb didn’t agree to meet with me? What if he was only agreeing over the phone to get me to hang up?

  I couldn’t look this man in the eye. He was…scary looking, with a yellowing black eye and a missing front tooth.

  He pulled up the sleeves of his shirt as he waited for an answer.

  “I’m looking for Caleb Prescott?” I asked, finally gathering the courage to look up at the man, painting a look of confidence on my face. “I’m Sydney Meadows; he’s expecting me.”

  “Oh, yeah. He mentioned something about something,” he said with a nod. His hard face softened just slightly, no longer as intimidating without the stare in his eyes. “I’m Winski. Trevor.” He threw a thumb over his shoulder. “I’ll get him for you. He’s debriefing.”

  “Ok, thank you.”

  I watched as Trevor turned away and went back toward the double doors, but rather than going through them, he simply put a hand on the door jam and leaned in. “Yo, Prescott! You got a visitor.” He turned back around and crossed the pathway to enter the tunnel, grinning and nodding once toward me.

  Well then. If yelling was all it took…

  I took a deep breath to compose myself before running my hands down my shirt to straighten it again, as well as triple check the tuck. I was about to pull my hair tie out before thinking better of it; it would likely be a crazy mess with an annoying crease where the hair band had been. To still my shaking hands, I crossed my arms over the folio and pulled it to my chest.

  The next man to walk out of the double doors was a tall blond, his hair too long and too curly for most guys – but managed to work on him. The nearly white curls were extremely tight for blond hair, and they fell past his ears and were nearing his shoulders. Unlike the previous two men, he still wore his hockey pants and socks but walked out shoeless. He also was without a team tee, and instead wore a Reebok form-fitting shirt. When he walked closer, seeming intent on coming to me, I was afraid that maybe I had looked up the wrong guy on the internet.

  No.

  No, no. This was Jonny Prescott.

  “You wanted me…?” he asked, a crooked grin on his youthful face, no doubt due to the double meaning he threw out. He looked like a baby still, maybe newly-early twenties.

  I was grateful that he wasn’t in skates; I didn’t have to look up too much further to speak to him.

  “I was looking for Caleb? He was expecting me. I’m Sydney Meadows.”

  “Oh,” he said, drawing the single syllable out with a slow nod. “I’m Jonny. Wrong Prescott at your service.” He extended his hand for me to shake.

  I looked at his proffered hand before sliding my much smaller one into it. “Sydney.”

  “You said.”

  With a quick nod, I drew my lips into a tight smile before taking my hand back.

  “Jonny Prescott…” he said, with a slight lift to one of his blond brows.

  I simply nodded. I wasn’t sure what he wanted me to say.

  When I didn’t respond, he looked me over so quickly I thought I imagined it. Then, with a grin he no doubted practiced on women of all ages, he said, “You’re that sexy voice from this morning.”

  I felt my face blanch before going hot. I brought one of my hands to the back of my neck and squeezed gently in embarrassment. “Yes, I did call this morning. I’m sorry for the timing.”

  “Ah, don’t worry about it. Look,” he said, stepping back with one foot, “I’ll just tell Cael to hurry his ass up. There’s a post-skate tonight so he should
be out of Coach’s office soon, anyway.”

  I couldn’t find words to say through my embarrassment so I just nodded and watched as he walked back toward the locker room. Unlike Trevor before him, he didn’t yell for Caleb. I wasn’t exactly sure how Jonny summoned him, but it was obviously a different tactic than the first time.

  It wasn’t too much longer before Jonny came back out, having ditched his hockey bottoms for the same wind pants his teammates before him had worn, as well as a clean tee. Walking beside him in a nearly identical get-up, the only difference being the type of skates, was Caleb.

  He looked even better in person.

  Jonny and Caleb may have been opposites in looks, but oddly enough I could tell they were brothers. Where Jonny had curly blond hair, Caleb’s was brown and straight; maybe, if he grew it out longer than the half or so inch it was, it would have a slight wave to it if the quick flip by his ears was any indication. They had different jaw lines, too, and Caleb appeared to be slightly taller, but beyond that…

  Shee-oot.

  Fuck a duck. Peace out, girl scout, this wasn’t going to be as easy as I’d hoped. The longer I looked at Caleb in person, the more intimidated I became by him. The elder Prescott brother was hands-down gorgeous. Paired with the sleep-thickened voice I heard this morning, I could feel my lady bits tighten and my heart rate accelerate from something other than business nerves.

  Caleb grinned crookedly and shook his head at a crack Jonny made before putting a hand to the side of his younger brother’s face, pushing him away. Jonny held up his hands, laughing lightly, then nodded to him as they separated–Jonny for the ice and Caleb for…

  Me.

  With a quick breath out, I straightened as best I could, throwing my shoulders back and putting a grin on my face. I offered my hand yet again tonight. “Caleb? I’m Sydney.”

  Caleb