Imaginary Lines (New York Leopards 3)

“Oh, as opposed to mine?”

“Hey, you’re just on the defense today.” I pursed my lips. “Oh, and every day, actually.”

He grinned at me, but then picked up an old thread. “So is that what you think of me? That I’m some wealthy, aimless jock?”

Wasn’t that his role in life now? I thought he’d stepped into it proudly, but now, watching the tenseness in his shoulders, I wondered if I’d been wrong and he wanted more than that. I tried to cover up my assumption with levity. “What does it matter, what I think?”

“It matters very much.” He cleared his throat. “You’re part of my roots.”

“I’ve always dreamed of being compared to a root. Much more—poetic—than a flower.” Now I reddened slightly. I’d almost said romantic, but apparently I wasn’t at that point of flippancy.

God, it had been four years since we saw each other. How was that possible?

Maybe we were both thinking that, because we were both just staring at each other again. I’d forgotten how happy his eyes were, how much I liked looking at him. Which was silly. But it wasn’t really my fault he was so aesthetically pleasing.

I cleared my throat.. “So how do you like the big league?”

Apparently he failed to realize that my throat clearing was a distancing mechanism, because he reached out and slowly brushed a strand of my hair behind my ear. “I have a feeling it’s about to get a lot more interesting.”

The bolt of lightning that cut through me was unexpected, though it shouldn’t have been. Abraham had always been my type; he had invented my type. Still, it seemed relentlessly unfair that my body still went haywire for him when my mind and heart had written him off completely.

I leaned forward and plucked a fry from the table, holding it up like a teacher’s pointer. “How have you been for the past four years? You went from the boy-next-door, the small town hero, to a vaunted celebrity known to millions.”

Amusement flashed across his face. “You asking as the girl-next-door, or the sports reporter?”

“I haven’t even started yet.” I devoured the fry. “But if you’re offering an exclusive...”

He laughed. “I don’t do press.” He leaned forward and shot me an intimate, unshakeable smile. “Though maybe I could make an exception.”

That was it. No way was that in my head. He was flirting with me. “Abraham.”

He widened his eyes innocently. “Tamar.”

I shook my head. “Thanks for asking me to meet up.”

I grinned the entire subway ride home. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had so much fun. Abraham Krasner. It wasn’t like I’d forgotten how much I liked him, but I hadn’t viscerally recalled the warmth that filled me around him and how he made me laugh.

Actually, I hadn’t spent so much time thinking about Abraham Krasner since we cut our losses four years ago. Yet here we were, in the same city, and all of a sudden old daydreams were floating back up when I closed my eyes. Which was silly, because I’d made the mistake of headlong infatuation once, and I had no intention of going there again.

No, I wanted stability. I had a job, an apartment. I had straightened out my life. I knew where I’d be a year from now, and I certainly hadn’t been able to say that since graduation. I had my own health care, for God’s sake.

Well, I would when I signed up for it. I didn’t have to pick my enrollment for another week and a half.

But I was ready for a real, serious relationship. The kind where we fell in love and went away on weekends and eventually moved in together. And there was no way in hell I was going to let my heart get wrapped up in Abraham Krasner all over again, after all the time it had taken me to get over him. I wanted to like someone who actually wanted me back.

I entered my apartment and fell into my desk chair. Where was it? I found my airplane list of goals beneath a pile of edits. Yes, there was magic in this city.

I had one last item to add to the list—an item, I suspected, that precluded completing several of the other items. I wrote it in broad, bold strokes of blue.

9) Get over Abraham Krasner.

Chapter Five

On Monday, I headed to the Flatiron District in the low East 20s of Manhattan for my first day at Sports Today.

I didn’t expect to be so nervous, but I woke up filled with butterflies hatched overnight. My hands fumbled as I pulled on the outfit I’d assembled the night before. Now it seemed too daring, the royal blue of my dress too loud, the hem perhaps too high. I considered dumping all of it for all black, and then got a grip and went to work on my hair.

I loved my hair, but it was a pain in the ass; thick and wild and unruly. I used to mess it with tons of product to keep the curls in line, but now I’d given up on that. Instead, I usually wrung it with a cotton cloth and let it air-dry, which worked great in California, but the humidity here turned my hair into a baby-eating monster.