Chapter Two

Karrie

I wait for the door to click before collapsing on it and letting out the breath I’ve been holding in. Jesus, I didn’t think the first time I’d meet Matthew Grant would be when I was running on a treadmill in the middle of a gym watching the Kardashians. I slowly slide down to the floor, thinking about how I got here.

I rushed into the building my father owned, running past security while I waved hello. I was a few minutes late and I knew my father was a stickler for that. ‘Karrie, the early bird gets the worm.’ It was stuck in my brain. He summoned me to his office early that morning, not giving me a chance to say no. As soon as I reached the floor to Cooney Communication, I walked to the corner office I’d been visiting since before I could walk. My great great-grandfather started this company. Over the years we’d branched out to entertainment. We owned the Cooney SportsCenter where our hockey and basketball teams played as well as all the sold-out concerts.

My mother and I would visit every single Thursday, our standing lunch date until she passed away from breast cancer at forty-two. Then it was only me. He would send the car for me and we continued on the tradition. I think this was why I came today. The calendar showed that it was Wednesday. Once I got to my father’s office, his assistant, who had also been there for longer than I could remember, smiled at me as she took her glasses off.

“Look at you.” Alice got up and came around the desk to hug me.

“Hey, Alice.” I hugged her back. “I was asked if I could come in. I thought it would be for lunch, but,” I said while I let her go, “I guess it’s not.”

“You look just like your mother.” She smiled at me while she took my face into her hands.

“She does, she really does.” I heard from behind me.

I turned and came face to face with my father. My father, I had to say was my hero. He stood at six foot four, blond hair, and blue eyes, eyes that still had the sadness from losing Mom, even though he tried to mask it. I walked up to my father and wrapped my arms around his waist.

“Dad.” I lay my head on his chest. He leaned down to kiss the top of my head.

“Did you eat?” He let me go as I entered his office. “Alice, can you please get us something to eat?”

I knew she’d already picked up the phone and ordered our favorite food. My father’s office hadn’t changed in forever. Family pictures were hung on the wall. Pictures of my mother were still on his desk. Their love was that of a love story.

Rich boy met a poor girl from the wrong side of the tracks. Fell in love against the odds. Not only had they run off and got married, they lasted longer than anyone thought they would. They did it with love, honor, and respect.

I threw my purse on the low coffee table in the center of the office and took a seat on the couch. My father came over and sat just across from me.

“So are you settling in well?” he asked since I moved into a Brooklyn brownstone he bought for me without my consent or knowledge.

“Dad, you bought me a brownstone,” I told him, “not a small apartment like you said. It’s a flipping brownstone.” I had never lacked for anything. I had about four trust funds set up for me, yet I still attended a public school and hung around with ‘normal’ people, as they put it.

“It was an investment.” He smiled at me. “Besides, I’m still not talking to you for paying your tuition all through school, so call it even.” Not only had I paid for it myself, I actually got a job. My father was so proud of me, even if it was just at the coffee shop. “Now, I asked you to come here for a reason.” His voice got very formal, which made my eyebrows pinch together. “I have a job offer for you.”

“Dad,” I huffed out, about to get off the couch. “We discussed this. I’m going to get my own job. I have a master’s in communication and public relations. Surely that will get me somewhere.” I had been a nerd in high school, so much so I graduated a year ahead of everyone my age and I was no different having completed my master’s degree in just under two years.

“Listen to me before you start, Karrie.” He got up, going to his desk where he took a folder in his hands. “We’ve just acquired Matthew Grant,” he started, and I looked at him, not sure if I should have known who this was or not.

He placed the file down in front of me, and I opened it up and came face to face with the most handsome man I had ever seen in my life. His hair looked like he’d just run his hands through it. His face had a well-trimmed beard, his eyes chestnut brown, the same color as his hair. But what got me was the dimple on one side of his face. His smirk had melted many hearts as well as panties for sure. He was dressed in a suit with his hands in his pockets.

“He had been drafted number one over all when he was seventeen.”

I started to go through the file he had given me, taking in all his stats.

“He’s got a bad rep.” My father started, but I put my hand up.

“Bad rep. He got sent down after a couple of years for partying too much. It says”—I looked back—“and I quote, that he slept through a whole game before he realized he missed it.” I threw the file on the table. “How could you have actually signed him? He has trouble stamped all over him in big bold letters.” I waited for his answer.

“His stepfather is Cooper Stone.”

My eyebrows shot up. You couldn’t be a hockey fan and not know Cooper Stone.

“Plus, the new coach wanted him”—he looked down and blew out a breath—“and I agreed, but only if he would have a chaperone.”

All the pieces started clicking into play. “You are not serious!” I asked, “You want me to babysit him?”

“No,” he replied, “I want you to make sure he doesn’t get into trouble, and all his publicity will be handled by you. I want you to feed stories to the press. I want to make sure by the end this guy looks like a reformed monk.”

“Dad”—I shook my head—“you can spin this however you want to spin it. You want me to make sure he doesn’t get in trouble. You want me to watch him and hold his hand. It’s a babysitter.”

“You are the perfect person for the job. Besides, it’s an entry-level position, so no one is giving you anything. You would also have to travel with him to every single game, as well as let him have a room in the brownstone.” His eyes moved to the floor while he said the last part.

I flew off the couch. “Are you insane? You want me to live with a menace to society? What if he’s a serial killer and we don’t know? What if he’s a cross dresser? What if he brings home hookers, or better yet drugs, and I’m stuck in the middle?” My voice rose. “You can’t honestly think this is a good idea.” My hands went to my waist while I waited for him to say something, anything, that he agreed this plan was insane, but instead of agreeing with me he leaned further into the couch and smiled at me.

“Honey, you are over-exaggerating. I would never put you in any danger. You know this. And besides”—he hugged the back of the couch—“we do random drug screening.”

I stood as I looked at him, my mouth open, no words coming out.

“Where is the little girl who wanted to save the world? Just think about it. You could make this into the best turnaround story out there.”

I glared at him and crossed my arms over my chest. I knew what he was doing. He was baiting me. I’d never turned down a challenge, another thing I got from my father. He got me to stick to my eight thirty bedtime till I was fifteen on a dare. A fucking dare.

“I want a contract,” I informed him. “And an out clause.” I pointed my finger at him. “If at any time I say ‘I’m out,’ then I’m out.”

He nodded at me.

“No objections to that.” He smiled at me. He knew full well he had won. “We can even include a signing bonus.” He leaned forward as he placed his hands on his knees and smiled.

I rolled my eyes at him, and as I was about to tell him to hush his mouth, the knock on the door stopped me. Alice walked in followed by Robert, the general manager of the team.

“Karrie.” He approached me as he put his hand out and shook mine. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”

Alice placed a brown deli bag down on the table, along with a couple cans of soda.

“I asked her to come over to discuss Grant. Robert, meet his new chaperone.” My father pointed to me.

“Are you serious?” Robert looked shocked, to say the very least. “I thought more of a man who is eighty and has wrinkles.” He placed his hands into his pockets.

My father shook his head. “No one’s better than Karrie. Set up the meeting for tomorrow and let's get this show on the road. I have to head down to California in two days. I want everything worked out by then. I want him on the ice on Saturday when we face Pittsburgh,” my father ordered.

It wasn’t an option at this point, so Robert just nodded.

So now here I am as I get ready for tomorrow. I’ve been staying at the W for the last two days while they paint the brownstone and turn his room into what they are calling a ‘man cave.’ As I’ve been told. I get up from the floor and make my way over to the shower, opening it on cold. I need to cool down. Jesus, if he was hot in pictures, it is nothing compared to what is in the flesh.

His body is definitely bigger, his chest wide, and when he took off his soaked shirt, I almost face-planted on the treadmill. His arms are muscled up and his skin smooth. The only thing he has on his body is a scripture writing on his ribs under his arm. Let’s not even start with the abs. His six-pack is so defined that if you poured water down his chest, you’d have six separate pools. I close my eyes, trying to make my heart settle down. “Get out of your head, Karrie. This is a job. You have to ignore the pang of your vagina and focus on the goal.”

I pick up my phone, texting my best friend Vivienne.

I MET HIM!!!

Three seconds later, I see the bubble appear on the bottom with the three dots in it. I know she is answering me.

Vivienne and I have been best friends since the last year of high school. She was an exchange student from Paris and we clicked right away. We bonded over trust funds, fashion, and all things Gossip Girl. The bubble disappears and instead a picture of her face lights up on my phone. I press the green button and collapse on the bed.

“Go for it, Ho Bag,” I greet her and hear her laugh in the background.

“Very funny.” She is almost whispering.

“Where are you?” I ask her while looking out my minuscule window. I’ve got a great view of the brick wall from the next building. Nothing says New York like your window facing a brick wall.

“I’m in court, so I can’t talk too loud. Where did you meet him?”

“Why are you in court?” I ask her, confused.

“I followed a guy I met in Starbucks here. I swear he winked at me.”

I’m the one who starts laughing immediately now. Vi has always been a hopeless romantic, thinking that love will happen at first sight. I’m always there to catch her when she falls, with wine and ice cream.

“You know he may be in court because he’s a criminal, right?” I turn on my side.

“I don’t think so. He’s wearing a suit. A nice suit,” she says, and I hear a case number being called in the back. “Oh, shit.” I hear her muttering while she says excuse me a couple of times. “Jesus, why why why do I do that to myself?”

I’m not sure she’s asking me the question or answering it herself.

“Hello?” I ask, sitting up.

“He was in court being charged with robbery,” she huffs. “I swear we had a moment.” She continues huffing as she walks faster. “Okay, now back to you, you met him?”

“I did, in the gym. I was on the treadmill watching the Kardashians and he came in.”

“How many times did I tell you not to watch that show in public? You never listen to me. Merde,” she curses in French.

“I missed the last three weeks and it was about Kim’s robbery. You know I’m going to watch just to see her cry,” I tell her, trying to find a good reason for watching that. “Plus, who goes to a hotel gym?”

“Obviously people who want to work out?” She points out.

“Whatever,” I huff out. “He was in there with sweat all over him, huffing and puffing while he ran.” I roll my eyes. It was actually gross. Okay, maybe not, but still.

“Did you talk to him?”

“No, although he did bump into me walking to the elevator, and I thought he stabbed me in the back, except it wasn’t a dagger!” I giggle.

“He stuck his cock in your back? Like in your pucker hole?”

“Are you insane? I haven’t even had sex the whole way yet. Well, like full-blown sex.”

“Two pumps is not sex!” she yells out somewhere on the streets of New York. “Then he got soft and collapsed. He should have his penis taken away. Permanently.”

“You know I saw him last month making out with a guy. Maybe my vagina broke his penis.”

“Your vagina did no such thing. So when is this meeting?”

“Tomorrow. I’m arriving at eleven to go over the clauses in his contract. He gets there at noon.”

“Okay, I want you to text me right after, and don’t forget to dress sexy. If he got a boner with you in shorts, imagine you in tight stuff. He might be tenting all meeting long.”

“Au revoir,” I tell her, hanging up, going into the shower, and turning the water back up to hot. “It’s going to be fine. It’ll be good. I got this,” I tell my reflection in the mirror, right before I close my eyes and picture him naked.