Off the Mark, page 3
“Are you…wait, you’re serious?” I managed to croak out through an ever-tightening throat.
Her lips pressed into a flat line. “Nothing’s in writing or set in stone, it’s just…call it a professional gut feeling. At the bare minimum, they can slap you with a hefty fine for breach of contract.”
The mental math I was calculating sent my heart into overdrive. Given my dad’s frantic call this weekend, I needed the money now more than ever. And fast. My stomach plummeted, sweeping away the levity I’d been using to avoid losing it. But that oh shit sensation, combined with my regret about last night, flooded my nervous system so dramatically I had to steady my breathing.
“I can’t lose that much money right now. I barely have any as it is and there’s…I’ve got…stuff. To take care of.”
Her eyes filled with concern behind her glasses. “Charlie, are you actually okay? I’ve known you and your dad for a long time, babe. If there’s something going on, you can always—”
“Nothing is going on,” I stammered. “But I’ll do anything to get back on their good side and prove that I can win. Reliably. Public apology? Charm some fans at a fancy event?”
She studied me closely before finally saying, “I’ll be advocating my ass off for you. Obviously. But other than that, there’s not much to do until I can get in a room with them and see the extent of the damage done. The emails and phone calls I’ve been getting have not been subtle. They’re pissed.”
I released a jagged breath. “I know you’ll do everything that you can. Because you’re amazing and I have no fucking clue why you still put up with me.”
Dempsey squeezed my shoulders. “I do it because you’re going to make me a ton of money someday.”
I laughed as I scraped a tired hand down my face. The race adrenaline was wearing off, the humidity clung to my skin, and the direness of my situation was now all too real. My attention landed in the center of the parking lot, to the people crowding around Riley Miller. Her girlfriend, Quinn, had come running over post-race, leaping into her arms for a movie-style kiss that had everyone swooning. She still had her helmet in one hand, goggles in the other, and they both started laughing as fans called for their autographs.
Quinn didn’t ride on the same team as Riley, but combined, they were motocross’s hottest It Couple.
Everyone was obsessed.
Next to me, Dempsey whistled softly. “They sure are cute together. All the agents have been talking about the volume of great press Riley and Quinn have been getting. Right now, from a PR perspective? These two can do no wrong.”
That had me sitting up straight. These two can do no wrong. The same news sites posting pictures of me doing shots were also posting pictures of Riley and Quinn, and each time it generated a feel-good response from the internet that was almost…precious.
Even I was low-key following along.
“For real?” I asked. “It’s influencing their press coverage?”
“Sports fans love a romance. They love anything that makes them feel like they’re getting a glimpse into their favorite rider’s personal lives.”
I swallowed hard. Glanced at the amiable crowd around Riley and Quinn, then back at Dempsey, who was watching them dreamily, probably wondering what it was like to have clients that were good with media. And who didn’t flip reporters double middle fingers when they asked rude questions. Which I’d only done one time.
Okay, three times.
“You know what’s so funny though? I’m dating someone too,” I blurted out, the words strange and heavy on my tongue. Rolling my shoulders back, I met Dempsey’s narrowed scrutiny with a giant smile. “And my boyfriend lives in Philly so I was hoping to show him off while we’re here. Woo some fans with his…his natural, um, charisma.”
She cocked her head. “You? Have a boyfriend?”
“Yep.”
“In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania? This city that we’re in currently?”
“The one and only. So random, right?”
Her lips pursed. “You never told me about him.”
“Well, it’s…it’s new. I didn’t want to jinx it, but things are getting serious.”
She took a step back, sizing me up. “Huh. That’s interesting. And how new is it?”
I curled my fingers around the edge of my truck and scrambled for an answer.
Red hair. Cocky smile. Broad shoulders.
I hadn’t allowed myself to think much about Rowan O’Callaghan since we’d gotten here. Given his reputation, the speed at which I’d thought of him for this spontaneous ruse should have been concerning. But I had more important things to fret about than Rowan’s forever-a-playboy attitude.
“Super new.” I lifted my chin. “We’ve been together a little over two months. Real honeymoon-period stuff.”
A few slow, excruciating seconds ticked by. “Weird. I would have said you were fucking with me but you’re blushing. Really blushing. I’ve never seen you do that before.”
“I’m what?” My hands flew to my cheeks, which were warm to the touch.
She crossed her arms. “Not wanting to jinx it is the only reason you didn’t tell me?”
“Can’t a girl have a secret? And it wasn’t like you were asking.”
“You’re not the blushing-over-a-boyfriend type. I kind of assumed you, I don’t know, devoured men for sport.”
I hid a smile. “Hey, hey. Don’t buy into all that Bad Girl of MX hype. I have a heart, you know.”
“Oh, I know you do,” she murmured. Then she looked over her shoulder at Riley and Quinn again. “This new information is intriguing. Especially since the fans seemed primed for romance right now. I have no idea if this will soften the weekend’s bad press, but if you want to show him off at some events…” She shrugged. “Can’t hurt as long as he’s well-behaved.”
“He’s fucking nice,” I protested.
She grinned. “I’ll believe it when I see it. You’ve got a race coming up and the press event right after that. Do you think this nice boyfriend of yours is willing to come and get his picture taken with you four days from now?”
I forced down a surge of nerves at make this happen in four days. “Totally. This dude is obsessed with me. I couldn’t keep him away if I tried.”
She looked impressed. “Good for you. Don’t get your hopes up too high, but I’ll see what magic I can work. We still have a lot to do to fix this, nice boyfriend or not.”
Dempsey was one of only two people I regularly gave hugs to, and I didn’t hold back now, flinging my arms around her neck. She had grown up worshiping my dad’s racing style, had even trained with him before he got hurt. When she became an agent, letting her represent me was the easiest decision I’d ever made.
She’d had a front-row seat to Maddox family drama for years…and still stuck around.
“Thank you,” I said. “For believing in me even when I mess up. I really am sorry, Dempsey.”
“I know you are.” She pulled back. “We’ll figure it out, one way or another.”
Then she grabbed her things and reached for her car keys. “Whoever this guy is, he must be different. The Charlie Maddox I know doesn’t suffer fools lightly.”
I fixed another fake smile on my face. “You’ll love him when you meet him. Everyone does.”
It was the most honest part of this bizarre, deceitful conversation. Everyone did love Rowan. He was an insufferable flirt who—back when I was still tending bar at Jolene’s—I watched take home a different woman more nights than not.
The fact that I’d been blushing earlier while talking about him wasn’t an issue. That was an ordinary, physical response to the memory of what Rowan looked like.
Which was…very hot.
Almost annoyingly hot.
Blushing was simply inconvenient. The problem was that my old friend Rowan O’Callaghan didn’t know that he was my boyfriend.
My only option was to go tell him.
4
ROWAN
It turns out that the learning curve when stepping in as interim executive director is really fucking steep.
Two days after I’d shrugged off Luciana’s concern, I was sitting behind Elaine’s desk, dreaming of the days when I was only responsible for one part of the complex machine that was the South Philly Rec Center.
Elaine was—thank god—getting better every day, though when I spoke with Mattie, she reiterated what Luciana had said: her prognosis was great. Didn’t mean that returning here was an option though.
I kicked my feet up onto the desk, balancing them on a stack of grant reports I’d just discovered were due this week. I was still on the phone, pleading with the same plumber half the block used, because the sink in our kitchen was leaking again and we were this close to a flood.
“I told you. I’m slammed, brother,” Joey grumbled. “That rain last night flooded everyone’s basement on Federal, and I ain’t got enough extra hands to send over to you.”
I glued my eyes to the ceiling but kept my voice cheerful. “Yo, I get it. I was up early this morning bailing out my grandmother’s basement, and Alice wasn’t happy about it. She missed her morning coffee with Midge and Maria and some hot gossip about a cousin’s baby shower.”
He coughed out a laugh. “You know Alice can call the experts.”
“We’re trying, but you’re tellin’ me you’re too busy,” I pointed out.
“Yeah, okay, you don’t gotta bust my balls about it. I know it’s bad, and you don’t want sink water all over the ground when you’ve got kids running through. Can’t Dean fix it?”
“He’s not our handyman guy anymore. He’s my program coordinator guy and he’s busy.”
An alarm on Elaine’s computer buzzed, indicating my next meeting was in twenty minutes. How the hell did she get anything done during the day?
“Joey, I have to run. If you get any openings, take pity on us?”
“Put some towels down, and we’ll do our best, okay?”
We hung up just as Dean ambled into the office with my favorite Philly Underdogs mug. He placed it—steaming, full of fresh coffee—on the only spot on the desk not covered in paperwork.
I grabbed it with grateful hands. “People don’t call you a hero enough. But that’s what you are to me.”
He sank into the chair by the desk, shrugging one shoulder. “What if I also told you I already called an old boxing buddy about our plumbing emergency? He’s got a spot on the other side of Snyder and he said he’ll be here in an hour.”
“You’re joking.”
Dean grinned. “It helps that the last time I stepped in the ring with him, he knocked me the fuck out. Think he still feels bad.”
I raised my mug in his direction. “This gives new meaning to taking one for the team, dude. Thank you. When I got here this morning and saw the water spraying across the floor, I almost put my fist through the wall. But I was too tired from crying over Elaine’s inbox. I’m not lying”—I turned the screen towards Dean— “she has like nine hundred unanswered messages.”
“Things are that bad?”
I cocked my head towards the stacks of files and boxes. “Do you remember our senior year when I got hit in the leg with a baseball? I found myself yearning for that time when I saw the kitchen.”
He laughed, shaking his head. “Your whole leg swelled up like a balloon. Mom and Midge had to hold Alice back in the stands so she didn’t take the batter’s head off with that pointy umbrella she used to carry all the damn time.”
“She used to threaten a lot of umpires with that thing. She for sure got some calls turned in my favor through intimidation.”
Dean nodded over at the mess. “You’re doing an admirable thing, taking over for Elaine like this while she’s out. What can I do to help?”
“Absolutely nothin’,” I said easily. “You’re doing your super important job and that’s the best thing you can do. I’m only being dramatic because money’s tight and the board has me nervous.”
His jaw ticked. “Tight as in…I might not have a job anymore?”
I swallowed my coffee too fast, and it scalded on the way down. “Finances are a little uncertain right now, but you and I have been through worse.”
For a second, it didn’t look like he was buying it. So I swung my legs to the floor, rose from the chair, and gave him an affectionate clap on the shoulder as I walked to the other side of the office.
“I’m serious,” I said, hauling over a box of files to the small table by the desk. “I’m handling it.”
He looked slightly more convinced, then began his favorite new hobby: fiddling with the gold wedding band on his left ring finger. Though fiddling wasn’t quite right. More like he was gazing at it like he couldn’t believe his own good luck.
Dean was a little taller than me, white with dark hair, a crooked nose and an ex-fighter’s build—complete with the scowl that had earned him the nickname Dean the Machine during his boxing days.
But he smiled a lot more now.
Two months ago, he’d married Tabitha Tyler, a woman he’d been secretly in love with since we’d all gone to school together. Dean and I had grown up on the same block—the corner of 10th and Emily streets—and he’d been quiet and serious even as a kid.
Something changed in him though when Tabitha came home two summers ago. Watching him fall stupid-in-love with Tabitha was all the evidence I needed that whatever that was, I’d never felt it.
There was only one woman who’d ever made me feel…something…but that was years ago. She’d promised me a hundred times over that she’d rather pour hot sauce into a paper cut than go on a date with me.
It didn’t matter now anyway. I tried not to think about her too much, was probably only doing so because I’d seen on ESPN this morning that the Women’s Motocross Championships were being held in Philly. The riders were all staying uptown at the convention center.
I hadn’t trusted myself to check and see if she was here.
The computer dinged with a new email alert, which also reminded me that I needed to get to that next meeting in a hot minute. I strolled over to the desk but not before nudging Dean on the shoulder again.
“You just hanging out, thinking about your wife?”
“No. Yes. Maybe. Shut up.”
I cracked a smile. “I’m not judging, big guy. Did I mention that I walked past the two of you on your stoop last week, and you didn’t even notice me? I did a whole funny faces-weird walk bit too.”
His cheeks reddened. “Tabitha is very…charismatic.”
“That she is,” I said slowly, clicking open my chaotic inbox. Tabitha was more than just charismatic, though growing up she was bright and cheerful and friends with everyone. She also understood Dean in a way most people didn’t. “I bet you she’s staring at her wedding ring too.”
“You’re probably right.”
“Because you’re pretty damn charismatic too.”
He rose from the chair with a smirk. “Nice try, but that’s a lot of bullshit this early in the morning.”
I was mid-laugh when I clicked open the message at the very top. From Luciana. Subject line: The Arnold Foundation update.
The first line of the email read: “We were able to confirm that the rec center won’t be receiving the operations grant. With no other immediate options, we need to discuss plans to cut the senior food program and the staff positions required of it.”
“Fuck me,” I whispered.
Dean turned around. “What’s that?”
“Nothing, we’re all good,” I lied. I scooped up my phone and notebook and hoped the expression on my face wasn’t something like oh shit, we’re fucked. “I’ve got a meeting anyway—”
A loud pounding on the office window had both of us jumping.
It was Eddie, banging away and pointing at the tree in the front of our building. Dean cursed under his breath, then pulled the window open. Eddie grew up across the street from us—he was in his seventies, Italian-American like so many folks in this neighborhood, and basically my and Dean’s shared adoptive uncle.
I’d hired him as a consultant to help Dean with the food program—the same one that was going to get cut thanks to the email sitting like a bomb in my inbox.
“Jesus, Eddie,” Dean said, “how many times we gotta tell you to use the front door when you want to get our attention?”
Eddie shrugged, drawing on his cigarette. “Not my fault I was walking in and spotted a kitten in the tree.”
“A…a what?” I strode over to the window and peered out, only to see a tiny bundle of orange, fluffy fur, shaking and crying. “Well, you don’t see that every day. Looks like we’ve got a kitten trapped in a tree, fellas.”
“Yeah, you wanna save it or what?” Eddie asked.
“I don’t know, is Pam in need of a sibling?”
I was mostly joking, but Eddie’s smile was too sincere. Two years ago, he’d started feeding a feral cat he’d named Pam, building her an elaborate housing contraption on his sidewalk. But she finally moved inside, and the times I’d been over there she was never not in his lap.
“She does need a sibling,” he said, stubbing his cigarette out beneath his foot. “How’d ya know?”
I shot a look over at Dean, who was trying not to smile.
“You heard the man,” he said. “Are we saving Pam’s sibling or not?”
The day was already veering off course. Might as well give in and accept it.
I clapped my hands together. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last forty-eight hours, it’s that an interim executive director’s job is never done. Let’s go rescue a kitten from the only tree on this block.”
5
CHARLIE
I parked my truck and shut off the engine, gazing through the front window at the narrow street. According to my phone, I was two blocks from where Rowan had mentioned he was working the last time we’d exchanged casual text messages. I’d just won my first X Games and he’d sent a goofy picture of himself raising a drink: I just saw you kick major ass on ESPN. Congrats—I knew you could do it, Maddox.
