Down by Contact (The Barons 2)

I tensed. Beside me, Adrián snapped to awareness with a sharp cut of his gaze in her direction.

“Simeon, I know you in particular experienced a lot of turmoil during Hurricane Katri—”

“Can you not?”

Stacey’s mouth snapped shut.

Adrián crossed his arms over his chest and glared down at her.

“Let’s stick to the Center and not do the tragedy voyeurism thing, all right?” He rolled his eyes and turned to the camera. “Look, we’re here because we want to do right by Grand Street Center. If you want to help pick up the slack due to their recent loss of funding, you can go to their website and donate. I’ll match dollar for dollar until they get back everything they lost.”

“Wow,” Stacey said. “That’s amazing of you! It really shows that this has gone beyond a mandated assignment by the NFL.”

“Yep.” Adrián looked from her to the cameraman to the rest of the reporters. “We got everything?”

They didn’t, but things moved on a lot faster with him ice grilling everyone in the vicinity. Stacey was stalwart, though. She was going to do her damn job whether some beautiful linebacker had an attitude problem or not. And she never once rerouted to the Katrina questions.

We ended the interview with another plea for people to donate to the Center, and then everyone started wrapping up. There were some gossip reporters practically oozing with the desire to ask inappropriate questions, but we hauled ass back into the safety of the Center while the NYPD cleared everyone out.

Inside, the Center was darker now that the sun had started to go down. Sheila and Yaritza had slipped out the back, trusting us to finish boxing up and putting away the athletic equipment as promised and shut down for the night. That kind of faith was humbling in a way I hadn’t felt in a while.

“You can take off if you want,” Adrián said. “Go out the back and head home. I’m just down the block.”

“I know, but I’m staying.”

“Your choice.”

There was a lot I wanted to say to him. About him interrupting the questions, about him pimping the Center unprompted and matching donations. And about him mean mugging the world as a direct result of our conversation about Judd. Judd who’d tried to kiss me and had smiled and apologized after I’d politely asked him to back off. In another life, I’d probably get a kick out of dating him and hanging with his son, but this life guaranteed I couldn’t bring myself to trust another fan.

We worked in silence, and after a while, the noise from the camera crews lessened. I glanced out the window just in time to spot the news vans driving off. A couple of determined paps were still lingering across the street with cups of coffee and heavy cameras around their necks.

“Everything’s off the floor,” Adrián said, dusting off his hands. “And they finished the windows while we were outside doing that bullshit.”

“Come on, Adrián,” I chided. “It’s part of the job.”

“Heh. Whatever.” Adrián grabbed his fitted Marlins cap and put it on backwards. “I hope everything at your house is good. I know you live by the water.”

“Up on a hill, though. Should be okay.”

We stared at each other, him still tense and guarded and me indecisive about where to take this. Whether I should take it anywhere. I had a very specific plan in mind for this boy, and none of it had to do with the confusing mix of desire and fondness that had welled up in the couple of minutes spent watching him get no-nonsense on a reporter.

“Thank you,” I said finally. “I don’t like talking about Katrina.”

“I figured. It can’t be easy. Definitely not worth going into for some bullshit interview.”

“It’s not. I lost several people. Extended family, friends . . . And the ones who survived lost everything. My mama had just bought our first house, then it was gone.” I ran a hand over my hair. “Not something I want to think about if I don’t have to. So I appreciate you cutting in. I never would have.”

“Because you’re too nice.” Adrián laughed dryly. “To people who don’t even deserve it.”

I wonder if he knew he was one of them, or if he thought him cleaning up his act now erased everything that had happened before. Starting with the Fox News bit and ending with his willingness to fuck me while refusing to treat me with any kind of . . . affection or respect. It was that that hardened my insides.

“I’ll see you after the storm, Bravo.”

I went for my backpack. After a moment, he followed.

“Simeon.”

“What?”

Adrián came up behind me, well within my personal space, and turned me to face him. With a large hand curling around the back of my neck, he pulled me in so fast that I only caught a glimpse of inky eyelashes and the tip of his nose before his mouth slanted in a kiss.