Having secured a date with Payton, the week dragged as I sorted through business emails, attended meetings, and fielded phone calls from the press about when I would be naming my new GM. I gave them vague answers about the timeline, and hoped I’d have some worthy candidates to interview within the next few days.
I resisted the urge to call Payton again knowing if I was going to maneuver my way into a relationship with her, it was essential that I not appear to eager. I’d learned these rules from the girls I’d grown up with and while the rules seemed idiotic, I knew that in order to get what I wanted, I had to play the game. So, I maintained radio silence.
On Friday morning, I leaned back from my desk and stretched out. I’d been working for hours on identifying possible partners for the talent management firm and was stiff from hunching over the computer. I looked up at the clock and realized it was well past noon. I quickly calculated the time between now and when I was to pick up Payton for our date, and realized I had more than enough time to fit in a run along the lakeshore and get rid of some of the pre-date jitters I’d been feeling. I went into my bedroom, pulled on some shorts, and laced up my shoes before pulling a visor down low on my forehead.
In other cities, I’d always felt like I was under a microscope 24/7, and in L.A. it had led to some unpleasant encounters with fans and the paparazzi. Finn thrived on the whirring buzz of constant attention and the adulation that never ended, but I’d grown weary of it rather quickly and found myself irritated and annoyed whenever we’d have to be out in public. It didn’t help that when I felt trapped, my temper flared. One time, my anger had boiled over and I’d come close to punching a photographer who got a little too close for my liking. As usual, Finn ran interference, and by the time he was done smooth-talking the photographer, it was like nothing had happened.
In Chicago, people tended to mind their own business and leave others alone — even when they were well known. As a result, I felt comfortable slipping out of my penthouse and blending into the crowds that lined the running path along the lake. The feel of the wind on my face and the smell of the water soothed me as I settled into a smooth pace and headed south toward Foster Beach.
As I ran, I thought about Payton. I’d read everything my team had been able to gather together in short notice, and found out more about her than I’d anticipated. Her background showed that she’d been hard at work developing the skills that would serve her well in the position. I liked the idea that she was actually interested in sports because, for as much as I didn’t relish the job of running the Storm, I did love the competition, and dating someone who couldn’t share in that love would make the process incredibly tedious.
I shifted gears as my feet pounded the pavement, and thought about who the likely candidates would be for the next general manager. I knew Nick Wilcox, the Storm’s head coach, would want to have a say in picking the GM, but while I liked him as a coach, I felt like he was too emotional and didn’t think he had a very good sense of how to mana
ge a business from the top down, so I ignored his advice when it conflicted with my own intuition. He and I had had our disagreements, but he knew his place. There were a number of guys I wanted to talk with, but since the next draft was half a year away, I wasn’t in any rush.
I reached Foster Beach and stopped to stretch a bit on a berm that overlooked the lake. Payton seemed like a woman who knew what she wanted, and wasn’t afraid to tackle a challenge, and after the bathroom encounter at Black Jack, I knew she had plenty of her own fish to fry. I just hoped I could entice her to help me fry mine, too,
I lay there on the ground looking up at the sky, feeling the familiar tingling sensation I got when I was about to gamble big and win, and I smiled. I pushed myself up off of the ground, broke into a run, and headed back to the penthouse. I felt confident that tonight’s date would be the solution to many of my problems, and that getting Payton to fall for me would be easy so long as I played it cool and didn’t push too hard.
I repeated this to myself as I showered, shaved, and dressed to impress. I chose a casual look, pulling on a navy Gucci jacket over an Armani t-shirt and jeans that had been put together by a personal shopper whom I’d hired to keep me looking up-to-date, but not stuffy or overdone. Fashion did not interest me in the least, but I knew that as someone who was in the public eye on a regular basis, my look was sometimes the only message I gave.
I ran a hand through my dark curls and sighed as I realized there was no way to truly tame them, so it was best to just let them be. My stylist had been trying to convince me to get a buzz cut, but I rebuffed her on the grounds that I didn’t want to look like any of the players or coaches. She’d laughed and then rolled her eyes as she carefully trimmed the wild mop into something suitable for the owner of an NFL franchise.
There was less than an hour before I was due to pick Payton up, and I was surprised to find I was feeling a little nervous. Women like Payton always made me feel a little defensive. They were rich girls who’d grown up surrounded by luxury, had fathers who adored them, and people who catered to their every whim. I’d grown up comfortable, but far from rich, and the differences in upbringings was never more apparent than on a first date. I consoled myself with the fact that this wasn’t a typical date. Sure, she’d cornered me in the bathroom and definitely gotten a rise out of me when she’d run her hands over my bare skin, and the way her lips felt on mine had given me fuel for private fantasies in the shower, but I needed her to help me achieve a goal. I was keeping my eyes on the prize.
By the time I was on my way down to the car, I had convinced myself that Finn had been absolutely right. Landing Payton Halas Lasky as my next girlfriend would be the first step in solving my problems.
Chapter Ten
Payton
It had been several days since Dax had called and asked me out, and I’d spent the week searching through all of my contacts as I looked for people who might be able to help me land a job. There was no way I was going to be able to meet my mother’s unreasonable deadline, nor did I want to, so the only other option was to find a job and get started working my way up with an organization.
I’d thought about Dax on several levels all week. The first being the hot, but unfinished encounter in the bathroom at Black Jack. Having gotten a small taste of what he had to offer, now, more than ever, I wanted to run my fingers through his dark, curly hair and feel his hands sliding over my naked skin. Over the past two days, I’d found myself daydreaming more than I had since I was 15, but this wasn’t some silly, schoolgirl crush. No, this was pure lust.
By Friday afternoon, I could feel my body vibrating with anticipation as I moved through my daily routine. After downing my fifth cup of coffee, I knew I had to work off the combination of nerves and caffeine, so I grabbed my gym bag and headed down to the gym to see if Chad was available for an impromptu workout. He was surprised to see me, but had space in his schedule to spend an hour guiding me through a kickboxing workout before having to haul heavy weights from one end of the gym to the other. It felt good to lose myself in the physical challenge of a workout that strengthened all of my muscles and made me sweat until the heavy circles of iron were slick and slippery in my hands.
As I held the weights waist high and began the third set of lunges, my leg muscles burned and I forced myself to find a place in my mind where the pain became bearable. I conjured the memory of Dax in the ladies’ room smiling down at me just before I pulled him in for a kiss. The memory of his lips pressed against mine made me go wobbly in the knees.
“Hey, Lasky! What’s with the legs?” Chad yelled from the other end of the gym. “Pay attention to what you’re doing or else you’re gonna blow a knee!”
“Sorry! Sorry!” I yelled half-heartedly as I tried to pull my mind back to something less distracting. I thought of my mother and her ultimatum, but that made the rage well up inside of me again, and I quickly pushed the memory out of my mind. I settled on running through my closet and trying to decide what to wear for my date with Dax as Chad yelled at me to pick up the pace.
“You okay, Lasky?” Chad asked as I stored the last of the weights back where they belonged. “You seem kind of distracted.”
“I’ve got a lot going on right now,” I admitted. I liked Chad, but we weren’t close friends by any stretch of the imagination, and I didn’t find spilling my guts to my trainer a practice that made any sense whatsoever. “I’ll be more focused next time.”
“Glad to hear it,” he nodded as he wiped down a weight bench in preparation for his next client. “Keep your head in the game or you’re going to get hurt.”
“Gotcha,” I said, waving goodbye and heading for the locker room. I pulled on my sweats and then jogged the two blocks back to my apartment, feeling both tired and amped up. I dropped my bag at the door and headed for the bathroom where I opened the taps and began filling the large tub with hot water. I grabbed a glass bottle from the windowsill and added scented oil to the bath. I looked around the room, trying to stash all of the memories of it deep within the recesses of my brain.
If my mother’s ultimatum held, I’d lose this luxury, and the thought of that made my spirits sag. I scanned the calming, sage-green walls and dug my toes into the fluffy rug that covered the heated tiles as I thought about how many times this bathroom had been my refuge in the storm. I ran my hand over the smooth edge of the beautiful, Victorian-style tub that I’d sink into when the noise of the world got to be too loud and I needed to think. I shook my head impatiently as I reminded myself that all of this was just stuff and that the most important thing was that I chose the path that was right for me. But as I sunk into the hot, scented water, I knew that making a break would be difficult.
“Why did you have to do this, Mother?” I wondered as I submerged my body and tried to clear my mind of negative thoughts. With only a slight bit of difficulty, I turned my thoughts to Dax Connor and our date, and began to squirm a little.
I thought about how close I’d been to him and how strong his body felt pressed against mine. I closed my eyes and leaned back in the tub as I envisioned where all of this might lead tonight. I could see his dark eyes flashing as he wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me against him before bending down so that his lips were an inch away from mine. I shifted in the tub as I imagined that moment of pure desire before he pressed his lips to mine.
“Oh, who am I kidding,” I muttered as I let myself conjure the image of what I had really wanted the night before. In my mind’s eye, I grabbed the front of Dax’s shirt and pulled him to me, kissing him hard and deep. The feeling of his well-muscled chest under my fingertips intensified my desire as I imagined him gripping my wrists tightly as he pushed me up against the counter. I could feel my pulse pounding as I struggled to free my hands as we buried our tongues in each other’s mouths. In the tub, I slid my hand under the water and down between my legs as I imagined the way that Dax and I would have struggled to assert control over one another.