"Wait, don't leave yet."

Brett's hand hovered over the silver doorknob. One twist and he could be out of the room and heading for the elevators and freedom. Away from Ms. Cassandra Fielder, with her soulful brown eyes and her intoxicating, musky perfume. Not to mention the judgmental tone she’d used with him. He'd had enough of that from his agent Dan, his coach, Ron, and his parents. Everyone in his life constantly told him they were disappointed in him.

God, he was more disappointed in himself than anyone else was.

"You don't want me to leave because you're worried about your job. I know Frank and Dan are friends. For once, it’ll be nice to know I won't be the one failing someone important."

Even he could hear the cynical tone in his voice.

"Look, I'm sorry, Brett. I shouldn't have been so rude. I let my anger get the better of me. I would say it won't happen again, but I can't guarantee that." Her smile pierced him straight in the gut, causing him to think of other ways he could make her smile at him like that more often.

No.

He didn't need to let himself get distracted, even though spending time with Cassandra Fielder wouldn't be a hardship. His focus had to be on what he needed to do to get through the next couple of weeks. It wouldn’t be that hard. All he needed to do was keep his nose clean. If he did that, his sponsors would be happy and they’d stop threatening to pull their support. Or so Dan said. But if it was that easy, then why the hell had Powerz terminated their contract, so now he stood in front of a woman who looked at him as if he was a piece of crap?

Shit, he wished he'd done better at the Games. No, he knew he could've done better, he just hadn't wanted to, and that was something that he had to live with and something he regretted every day since. To know he not only let Naomi down, but also the most important people in his life. The sad thing was, she would never know how he'd let her down. Would never remember how he'd told her he'd win gold for her. So what if he’d won one in a relay event? He didn't win an individual gold. And that was what he'd promised her he’d do.

Thinking about Naomi and all she’d suffered at his hands was the reminder he needed. As much as it galled him to have to appease sponsors with this whole rebranding issue, he would do it. He owed it to her and to his support team, as well.

"Fine, I'll stay." Brett walked back over to the table and sat. "Why don't you tell me what you have in mind for me? What’s your grand plan to improve my image?"

For the first time since Cassandra walked into the room, she appeared nervous, tapping her pen against a notepad. A suspiciously blank notepad. Where were all the notes outlining what hoops he needed to jump through?

"I don't have anything planned at the moment.”

“That’s convenient, isn’t it?”

She laid her hand flat on the pad in front of her and he could tell by the way she took a few deep breaths she was holding back her annoyance. “The only reason I have nothing prepared is because this meeting was sprung on me fifteen minutes before I walked into this room."

"Right, so why am I here then?"

Frustration grew inside of him. He’d missed a training session this morning because Dan told him to get his ass over to Star Image's office. He fully expected Dan to be waiting for him when he arrived, but instead he’d been ushered into the conference room where he was told someone would be with him shortly. When twenty minutes passed, he got tired of waiting and had taken a short walk around the office. It was either that or walk out and he knew Dan wouldn’t appreciate him taking the latter option.

“You’re here so I can get some basic information from you to enable me to work on a suitable plan of action. I need to know your likes and dislikes. What you feel comfortable doing and what you don’t feel comfortable doing.”

“Oh God, please don’t tell me you think me doing one of those dancing or singing shows is the best way to build up my image. I promise you right now I can’t dance and I really can’t sing.”

She looked as though she were seriously considering that as a suggestion. “Most of the singing competitions prefer to have unknown people on them, unless you mentor someone, and as for the dancing shows, they do teach you how to dance, so it doesn’t matter if you’re bad when you start.”

Brett couldn’t think of anything worse than being put in a situation where millions of people could watch him screw up, only to get voted off first round.

No, thank you very much.

Sure, swimming in the Olympics put him in front of millions of people but that was what he did. It was why he got up at 6 a.m. every day—rain, hail or shine—and why he traveled so much and competed against the best swimmers in an effort to improve himself.

He might get into trouble outside the pool, but at least he had some sort of control over the situation in the pool. Handing that power over to a stranger on a dancing reality show—not happening.

“Don’t worry, you’re safe from me pushing you into doing something like that. I don’t think those types of shows are good for image building, anyway. But there are other shows that could work.”

“No, I don’t want to do TV.”

“You may not have a choice. If I find something that I think could help you, then I’m going to look at it carefully and suggest you do it.”

Brett crossed his arms and leaned back in the chair. No way was he going to get pushed around by an image consultant. “If I recall, I’m the client. Your job may be to improve my image, but at the end of the day, if I don’t want to do something, I won’t do it.”

“We’ll see,” she murmured as she scribbled something on her notepad. It looked like some sort of flowchart. Words written in circles and squares with lines darting left and right, up and down. It made no sense to him, but he guessed it made sense to Cassandra.

“Tell me…” she looked up from her paper. “Do you like working with kids? Or doing some sort of construction?”

“Yeah, sure, I don’t mind working with kids.” In fact he’d done a couple of hospital visits in the past. He’d enjoyed talking to them and spending time getting to know them. Even though it was heartbreaking to see them when they were so ill, their determination to get well was fierce, stronger than some Olympic athletes he knew. “As for construction, I know some basics. It’s not something I do often because I don’t want to strain a muscle while I’m in the middle of training for something big.”

“Okay, good to know. What’s your schedule like now? Do you have any competitions coming up soon?”

“No. Apart from my normal training schedule, I don’t have anything pressing, but sometimes I like to scope out local events. I watch the competitors and, when asked, I give pointers to the kids on how to improve their technique.”

“Oh. Oh.” Her face brightened and it made her even more beautiful than before. Her brown eyes sparkled and she smiled that smile, a combination of sweet and sexy, again. “That’s good to know. I can work with that.”

Brett didn’t know what to make of the comment. Had he dug himself deep into a hole he couldn’t get out of? Well, whatever Cassandra came up with, he hoped it didn’t involve him standing in front of a camera.

"Are we done here now?" he asked.

"Yes, I think I’ve got some good ideas. Do we have your contact information?"

"Not sure, although everything you want to do will need to go through my agent first. He'll want to know all the details and then he'll contact me."

Cassandra shook her head, a cascade of caramel curls floating around her before settling softly against her shoulders. "No, that's not going to work at all. I can't always go through a third party. I need to be able to contact you directly to discuss when I need to see you and what I need to do."

"Powerz always worked that way. They would contact Dan and Dan would contact me."

"Well you're not at Powerz anymore, and that's not the way I work on campaigns."

Since when had he become a campaign and not a person? Ultimately, he was the one who would decide if he wanted to follow Cassandra and Star Image's ideas. No matter what Dan said, it was his life and he employed Dan, not the other way around. Although, at the moment, if he and Dan parted ways, he didn't think another agent would be too happy to take him on board.

Fuck, maybe he didn't have a choice.

The unbidden thought floated through his mind. If he wanted to maintain his sponsors, not to mention being able to keep getting Naomi the treatment she required, he had to toe the line this time. He had to do the right thing. And if he wanted a career after swimming then, as much as it frustrated the hell out of him, he needed Cassandra and Star Image Consultants.

"Fine, I'll talk to Dan."

"Good, and if you have any problems, call me and I'll talk to Frank. He owes me a favor now." She pulled out a business card and wrote something on the back, before sliding it across the table to him. "Here are my contact details. Let me know when you've spoken to Dan. After that, we can get moving on presenting Brett Hunter 2.0 to the world."

Cassandra stood. Brett immediately stood as well. He walked until he met her at the head of the table. She stuck out her hand to him again. “Thank you for not walking out,” she said with a wry smile.

He gripped her hand. Like before, a jolt of electricity zinged up his arm. “It’s been an interesting meeting, Ms. Fielder.”

Her sexy half smile honed in on him like a guided missile. “Trust me, it’s only going to get more interesting as time goes by.”

Oh, great. This was going to be a helluva lot of fun.