Off the Mark, page 8
“Let’s make sure they never find out then,” he said, pulling open the door with one hand and flashing a notebook and pen in the other. “I came prepared, Maddox.”
I slid past him into the dimly lit bar. My boots stuck to the floor, and there were baskets of peanuts on the counter I could already tell were stale. The clack of pool balls, the glasses drying on the counter, the low bass of rock music—all of it had memories of Jolene’s washing over me, made stronger by Rowan’s reappearance in my life.
“Seem familiar?” he asked, voice close to my ear.
“Very. I’ll have to be on the lookout for a smug pitcher, constantly looking to score.”
Rowan laughed, the sound as contagious as I remembered. I pressed my lips together and hopped onto a barstool, rapping my non-bandaged knuckles on the wood out of habit. Rowan slid onto the next one, left leg stretched long, his foot hooked around the lower rungs of my stool. “And I’ll be on the lookout for the smokin’ hot bartender who was way out of every customer’s league.”
I hummed under my breath. “Oh yes, even yours.”
“As you informed me within seconds of us meeting.”
“I wouldn’t have had to if you hadn’t hit on me instead of ordering,” I pointed out.
He dragged his thumb across his lower lip. “An honest-to-god rookie mistake. Only one I ever made.”
I tossed him a smirk. “Yeah, I haven’t missed this bravado.”
“Really? Because I’ve missed you.”
A smile burst across my face before I could suppress it. He tipped towards me, just a little. “Gotcha.”
“But we’re not playing the game,” I protested.
His eyes on mine were a distraction. “Aren’t we always playing some kind of game, Charlie?”
We were—thankfully—interrupted by the surly bartender, who poured two Yuenglings and slid them our way. I took a long, satisfying drink, feeling my shoulders relax. Then I peered over at Rowan. “How do you remember us playing that? It was years ago.”
He arched a single eyebrow. “How could I ever forget? Sometimes I’d think of the stupidest, most obvious jokes during the day, just to see if I could get you to break at night.”
“As if I ever broke,” I replied, chin high.
“Now that’s a bold statement for someone who just did.”
A strange glow settled in my chest. I lifted my gaze away from his and found the TV, which was set to ESPN, as any dimly-lit suburban bar TV should be. I couldn’t have pinpointed when Rowan and I had started it, playing the game where I attempted to maintain my slightly irritated disposition behind the bar while he lobbed cheesy, stupid jokes at me to get me to smile.
I would always fight it.
He’d only fight harder.
And if he failed in getting me to crack, I took a shot of whiskey purely out of spite. But if I lost? I’d give him one for free.
Sometimes we played during the last hour before closing. Sometimes whole weeks would go by—weeks where he was traveling for games or I was on the road, racing—and I’d catch myself missing his mischievous attention.
Other times, Rowan would be tossing out silly jokes to a pretty girl on the stool next to him while I poured drinks and tended bar, adding background noise to his casual seduction.
Because it was only ever that. A game to play with whoever was in his vicinity.
Rowan studied me over the top of his beer. “That wasn’t a joke earlier. I’ve missed you, Charlie.”
I nodded, fiddled nervously with my braid. “Yeah…yeah, I’ve missed you too.”
I turned on the stool, fully facing him now, and the reality of what I’d asked him to do—asked him to be—rippled through me. It was always easier to ignore the raw power of Rowan’s attractiveness with physical objects blocking the way.
But not even an hour in and his hands had gripped my waist, his breath had caressed the back of my hand, his muscular thighs blocked me in. When Rowan popped into my head as the right man to pretend with, his natural charisma and our long friendship had been the deciding factors.
I hadn’t anticipated the way my body was going to hum with constant awareness of his body.
He nudged my knee with his. “Talk to me about this miracle. Sounds like the bad girl of motocross needs a slight reputation adjustment?”
“Something like that,” I said, setting my beer down. “Before Bettencourt, when I was a privateer, I didn’t worry much about what the community thought about me because all I needed was to win. It didn’t matter if people believed I was like my dad because my reputation wasn’t directly tied to anyone else’s.”
I propped my chin in my hand. “I don’t mind the bad girl thing. Even a little bit of an edge helps me stand out in a sport getting crowded with big, branded personalities that attract huge fan bases. And, yeah, I’m not always the most pleasant to reporters. And I like to go out and have fun sometimes. Like, a handful of times a year. But every time I do, some rogue photographer catches me doing shots at a club, and it ends up all over the internet.” I indicated my bare, tattooed arms. “All the ink only makes it worse.”
Rowan’s eyes skated along my tattooed shoulders down to my tattooed wrists with a surprising affection. “Or all the ink only makes it better.”
My chest warmed again, so I swallowed another sip of cold beer. He did the same, gaze locked on mine while his throat worked.
“I saw a lot of this shit happen to guys on my team when I was playing baseball,” he said. “Once the media has this idea of who you are, they’ll sink their teeth into it and never let go.”
I nodded, twisting my glass back and forth. “Per Dempsey, I need to be on my best behavior at the next few events. With a boyfriend on my arm, preferably.”
At Rowan’s bemused look, I said, “She let it slip that I had one at a meeting, and I guess a romantic relationship is just ‘family-friendly’ enough to get me on their good side.”
That look of bemusement turned sly. “Wait. She told them you had a boyfriend before I showed up today?”
I realized my error a beat too late.
“It’s no biggie,” I said quickly, “but I might have implied that you and I were an item. Before I officially asked you. Then hadn’t had the chance after that day in your office to spin her some convenient story about why you’d suddenly vanished.”
His head tipped back on a laugh that had me dropping my face into my hands. “Oh, Maddox. That is brazen as hell.”
“I panicked, okay?” I pressed my cool fingers to my blushing cheeks.
His grin was a mile wide and much too charming. “What were you gonna do if I hadn’t shown up today? Drag along a cardboard cutout of my body?”
I blew the bangs off my forehead with a noisy breath. “Oh, I don’t know. Tell her you had to suddenly move to Canada?”
He nodded. “A classic. And I’m gonna give you shit about this forever. It’s only fair.”
“Fine,” I grumbled. “A cardboard cutout would be less annoying at least.”
He leaned in a few inches. “It’s always been adorable, watching you do that.”
“Do what?”
“Pretend that you don’t love having me around.”
I narrowed my eyes. He did the same. We held that pose, stony-faced, for a few seconds. Until the ends of his lips twitched. Just once, but it had me laughing into my fist, trying—unsuccessfully—to pass it off as a cough.
Rowan winked. “Gotcha. Again.”
“I’m stressed out. I just lost a race.” I held up my hand. “And I’m injured. I’m not at my best.”
He chuckled. Finished his beer, then raked a hand through his hair. “Cardboard cutout or not, we’ll get you back on their good side, Maddox. I said this the other day, but it’s still true. They’d be fools to cut you.”
I bit the end of my thumb, nervous about what came next. “I, uh…I was extremely lucky to score this sponsorship for a lot of reasons. It’s a ton of money. Money I need now, because my dad was served an eviction notice a couple weeks ago. If I can’t come up with the funds to pay what he owes, help him with the rest of the mortgage moving forward, he’ll be kicked out of that house. So that’s my miracle.”
His jaw clenched. “That’s criminal, Charlie. I’m so sorry.”
I lifted a shoulder. “I fucked up. Big time. The pictures from the bar. Blowing off the events. I can’t have my dad getting evicted because of my mistakes.”
“This isn’t all on you,” he said, brows knitted together. “Most of the fault lies with the awful system that doesn’t take care of athletes after they’ve retired. Especially ones with career-ending injuries, like your dad. How is he gonna pay his mortgage if he can’t race?”
I thought of the bridges my dad had burned after he quit, a result of his physical pain colliding with his new limitations. He refused appearances that paid. Was an asshole to his agent, who was only trying to do his best. And developed a reputation for being “difficult” that was impossible to shake.
“He didn’t always…he didn’t always make the best choices. Guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, huh?”
Rowan’s expression darkened. “Charlie, I don’t really think that’s fair—”
“So what’s your miracle then?” I asked, interrupting him.
He hesitated, jaw still flexing. For a moment, I thought he might press the issue, but then he let out a long sigh. “I told you that the rec center is in the middle of a financial crisis. A major one. We lost an operations grant this summer, one we had gotten for years, and it covered a lot of our salaries. Including this new program I started for seniors in the neighborhood.”
He rubbed the back of his neck a few times. “Since I’m the person temporarily in charge right now, I gotta find a lot of money in three fucking weeks or I have to eliminate that program. The first of many.” He tipped his glass my way. “All those events you want a boyfriend for, well…I checked ’em out online. A lot of rich people and rich businesses will be in those rooms with you. If I can get some face-to-face time and a warm intro from the Bad Girl of Moto herself…”
Rowan’s mouth hitched up, eyes hopeful. And I was already nodding in agreement. “I do know some of them. And if I don’t, I’ll make it happen. Consider it done.”
His smile turned sheepish. “Thank you. Do you…do you think it’s a totally stupid idea?”
“Of course not. It’s a totally strategic idea.”
“Okay then,” he said firmly. “That’s what I need from this…this arrangement. Connections to money so my favorite place in the world doesn’t go under. It’s the only way I can justify helping you right now, given how chaotic it is at work.”
I finished my beer and hoped my cheeks weren’t red. My stomach had lurched sideways at the way Rowan had said he needed to justify helping me. And I had no idea why. He was my friend. It didn’t make him less of one for needing an excuse to participate in my bizarre proposition.
At least he wasn’t still hung up on thinking he owed me for an act of kindness I never expected to be repaid.
“It’s smart of you,” I added. “Smart to leverage this fake dating thing to your benefit if you can. We should be thinking of it as a business transaction. Nothing personal. Just a way for us to both get paid.”
Understanding dawned on his face. He leaned forward slightly. “What I said about justifying this wasn’t the right choice of words. I didn’t mean it to sound so impersonal. Like you’re a burden to me. Because you’re not, Charlie. You’ve never been.”
My face was undeniably beet-red now. “Oh, I know, it’s okay. Friendship aside, this should be transactional. It’s best to be candid up front so no one gets hurt. Right?”
He stared at me for a beat too long. I fought to maintain eye contact.
“Right,” he finally said. “And how long is this business transaction?”
“The championship race is at the end of August. So three weeks from now.”
His smile was wan. “And I’ve got three weeks to save these programs. Do you remember my buddy Dean? The boxer?”
I nodded, vague memories of briefly meeting him once or twice at Jolene’s—though Rowan often spoke warmly about this man who was more brother than friend. A quiet, serious fighter who’d seen Rowan at some of his lowest points, according to him.
“I sort of convinced him to turn down a super high-paying announcer gig to take an underpaid, overworked nonprofit job at the center with me instead. Running the senior food program.”
“You mean the one you’ll have to cut?”
He rubbed his jaw. Nodded. “I can’t fire him two years later. The guy just got married, for fuck’s sake.”
The brief flash of vulnerability on his face had my stomach twisting again, this time in sympathy. But then he reschooled his features, all charm and easy humor. “But I wasn’t gifted with these movie-star looks for them to go to waste. Unleash me on a room of unsuspecting rich people and I’ll walk out with a check. I guarantee it.”
I chewed on my bottom lip. “Rowan. Firing your best friend would be horrible. I’m sorry this is happening to you.”
His attention darted up to the TV behind me. “It ain’t gonna happen. Not on my watch. Not if we pull this off, yeah?”
Growing up in Sweetwater, the common understanding was that cities were cold, unfeeling places where a person wouldn’t stop and help you if you were lying half dead in the street. But to hear Rowan tell it, his neighborhood was the reason he and his grandmother survived. Why they’d held on through the worst.
To hear Rowan tell it, South Philly was the reason he’d made it to the majors at all.
“It seems like we have to be, given what’s at stake. So no pressure or anything.” I arched an eyebrow. “All we have to do is make our fake relationship appear realistic enough to save my contract, help my dad not get evicted, get the rec center a bunch of money, and protect Dean’s job.”
Rowan grinned but it seemed forced. He clinked his glass against mine. “Cheers.”
“Cheers.” I drummed my fingers on the bar. “And we can’t tell a soul about this. About us. It has to be our secret.”
He leaned back on the stool, shaking his head. “Yeah, I can’t do that to Dean. And by extension, Tabitha. I’ll have to tell him.”
I frowned. “Have you told him his job’s on the line at the center?”
“Nope. It’s not the same though.”
“Care to enlighten me on the difference?”
“The cuts the board wants me to make aren’t gonna happen. Telling him will only worry him for no reason. This”—he waved a hand between us— “is something he’ll sniff out immediately.”
I pursed my lips. “That doesn’t give me a ton of confidence in our ability to pull this off if you’re saying Dean will figure us out minute one.”
“He’s known me since I was four. He’s not some rando reporter or a fan on Instagram. And we had Dempsey fooled today with zero prep ahead of time. Dean knows my romantic history too well to believe we’re dating.”
“And what’s your romantic history?” I asked.
He leveled me with a cheeky grin. “Absolutely fucking zero. That’s why he’ll know I’m lying. Don’t you have a friend you want to tell? Who’s the person who immediately sees through your bullshit?”
I don’t have a person like that, I almost said. Almost. But I didn’t have the heart to admit I didn’t have much in the way of friends. More like friendly acquaintances I could go to a bar with after a race.
Not someone like Dean, that’s for sure.
Things might have been different if I hadn’t spent so much of my school-age years busy with starting my racing career—or busy trying to cover all of our bills. It made talking to my school friends about trivial social drama or homework questions nearly impossible.
“Can Dean and Tabitha keep a secret like this?” I asked, dodging his question.
“Hell yeah, they can. Not only can they keep it, they’ll know how to play it cool around the nosy busybodies on 10th Street, which includes my grandmother. The nosiest busybody of all. Dean and I have been each other’s alibis since we were kids. We know how to play this game. And if we can sell our pretend love story to all the old gossips in South Philly, it’ll spread like wildfire without us even trying.”
I was quiet for a moment, avoiding his gaze and watching the day’s sports highlights on the screen across the bar. I’d chosen Rowan because he was my friend and I trusted him. To an extent. How did you rely on people not to screw you over?
How did you willingly hand over the tools they needed to do you dirty?
“Charlie. It’s not negotiable,” he said, catching my eye and keeping it. “I believe we can pull this off, but I’ve got to be honest with the people I’m closest to.”
Don’t you have a friend you want to tell?
“Sure. Right. I get it,” I finally said, forcing a smile. “We’re agreeing to lie, on purpose, to a lot of people. It’s a little nerve-racking, to say the least.”
His expression grew teasing. “Is Charlie Maddox having a crisis of conscience?”
I snorted. “No fucking way. We both know athletes who have done a lot worse than use a romance for some favorable publicity. It’s a harmless crime. No one gets hurt. And in the end, we both get what we want.”
Rowan regarded me with a flirtatious look I knew well. “And is there anything else you want out of this arrangement, Maddox? Because if this is some complicated ploy to get me into your bed, you only have to ask.”
I wrinkled my nose as he laughed. “I’ll remind you that I don’t need ploys, Rowan. Definitely wouldn’t need a ploy to seduce you. Your desperation is glaringly obvious. Has been for years.”
He laughed even louder. “Damn, I forgot how fun it was to mess around with you.”
“Sure, yeah, mess around,” I murmured, not sounding disappointed. He was opening his notebook and clicking open his pen. “Are you serious with that thing?”
“Aren’t you? We need to figure out how to convince people we’re in love.” He nodded down at the blank page. “I’m here for all that sweet, sweet research, babe.”
