“Good morning!” the flight attendant chirps, two weeks later, as Olivia and I get settled into our early-morning flight to Key West. “Can I get you two anything before we take off?”

“Some coffee would be great,” Olivia says with a polite, distracted smile, hard at work wiping the already-spotless lenses of her sunglasses with a little microfiber cloth. “Thanks a lot.”

I nod gratefully. “I’d love a Bloody Mary, thanks.”

“Seriously?” Olivia asks, disapproval flickering over her face. She fixes me with a frown. “It’s not even six a.m.”

I ignore her and grin widely at the flight attendant, a pleasant—and pleasantly stacked—brunette who is fluttering her eyelashes at me. “Actually,” I announce, “better make it a double.”

I down the whole drink in two long gulps, hoping a little buzz will be enough to take the edge off. I’m not exactly sure how I wound up agreeing to play Doting Boyfriend to the Ice Queen of the Upper East Side. This little quid pro quo made a weird kind of sense inside the plush confines of Olivia’s fancy offices, but now that it’s time to take off I’m having some serious second thoughts.

Am I really signing up to spend the week with this woman?

The deal seemed like a life-saver at the time. Sure, Olivia acts like she’s got a stick up her ass, but she’s sophisticated and charming—exactly the kind of woman a man wants on his arm walking into a room of stuck-up investors. I know how to turn on the charm, and I’m pretty much a hero in the sports world, but I found out fast that all of that means jack shit when there’s real money on the table.

Hundreds of millions of dollars of real money.

Energy drinks and sneaker deals are one thing, but I’ve got my eye on a new prize. A buddy developed a great idea for a line of health food kiosks, places to grab and go a healthy—and tasty—meal. They could be the next big food chain—if I can secure investment from the people who know their shit. But this is the big leagues, the next level. Guys who care more about profit and loss projections than whether I was voted MVP.

Two years running.

Because I may have the sports scene on lock, but the truth is, I know I’m out of my league when it comes to this new world. Way, way out of my league. I didn’t go to a fancy college or get an MBA. And sure, I may be wealthy by ex-player standards, but these guys buy and sell billion-dollar companies. It’s just a whole other ballgame—one I’m still learning how to play.

Which is why I need someone on my arm who knows the rule—and can stop me from putting my size elevens in my mouth and saying the wrong thing. Olivia promised me she’d find the perfect fit, and her references swear she’s got the magic touch . . .

But I never expected it to be her in the seat beside me, heading for the biggest week of my life. I’d have figured a beautiful woman like her would have guys lined up to squire her to this wedding, but maybe they all spent five minutes with her and figured it was safer to keep their distance.

Oh well. Too late to back out now. I catch the flight attendant’s eye and signal wildly for another drink.

“So we’ll get settled at my dad’s house in Key West today,” Olivia says once we’re airborne, pulling a printed schedule out of a folder and handing me a copy, “then head to Miami tomorrow for your investor retreat, then back to the Keys for the wedding.” She lets out a sigh of resignation. “It’s not the most efficient itinerary I’ve ever come up with, that’s for sure.”

“I’ll bet,” I say, unable to hide a smirk. I’d be willing to bet that even one nanosecond of wasted time drives her insane. Olivia’s the most organized, tightly-laced woman I’ve ever met, all carefully laid plans and detailed checklists. She’s basically a walking, talking spreadsheet. She even dresses like a librarian, or maybe one of those sexy Hitchcock blondes who could stab a guy in the back as soon as look at him. She met me outside the terminal this morning in a navy-blue suit so closely tailored I’m surprised she can even sit down in it, her long blonde hair scraped into a tight, painful-looking bun.

And sure, there’s a part of me that wouldn’t be opposed to peeling that suit off her, garment by understated, expensive garment . . .

But something makes me think she probably has another, identical suit on underneath it.

This woman is never off the clock.

Maybe I’m too obvious checking her out because Olivia raises her eyebrows. “I think we should talk about boundaries,” she announces, folding her hands in her lap.

“That so?” I sit back in my seat, amused. “Have at it, princess.”

“I just think it’s important to keep things professional,” she says. “This is an . . . unorthodox situation at the best of times, but now that I’m personally involved . . .”

“Oh yeah?” I can’t resist teasing. “You don’t jump into the hot seat for all your clients?”

“Of course not,” Olivia snaps, looking slightly offended. “But I don’t want you to go thinking this is some kind of free-for-all just because—because—” She breaks off, blushing faintly. “Look, we both have a lot at stake here, all right?”

Sticking it to her dad’s new fiancée hardly seems as serious as trying to land a hundred million dollars in investment capital, but who am I to argue? “I will do my very best to control myself,” I promise solemnly. Olivia purses her lips.

“You’re making fun of me.”

“Maybe just a little,” I wink, and she lets out a sigh.

“Just promise me you’ll at least try to be mature about this. You already signed the paperwork, and it lays out exactly the terms of The Agency’s services.”

“All three hundred pages,” I joke. “Look, relax, I can read,” I add, teasing. “I’ll keep my hands to myself . . . If you can do the same. Just because I agreed to play your arm candy, doesn’t mean you can get a taste of the goods. I’m not an open snack bar, if you know what I mean.”

Olivia’s mouth drops open, and she flushes. “I’m not . . . !” She splutters. “I wouldn’t . . .”

“Sure you won’t.” I’m loving the flustered look on her face, but Olivia has super-human self-control. She reins in her reaction and pulls out her laptop.

“Enjoy the flight,” she says, ice-cold, and goes back to work.

OK then.

We keep to ourselves after that, the sun rising outside the window as the plane cruises south down the eastern seaboard. Olivia pecks away at her laptop—allegedly she’s working, although when I glance over at the screen I see she’s scanning the Wikipedia page for Dungeons and Dragons, so it’s anybody’s guess what’s actually going on at that agency of hers.

I’m just emerging from the tiny bathroom when the cute flight attendant lays a hand on my arm. “I’m not supposed to do this,” she says quietly, “but I have to ask. You’re Ryan Callahan, aren’t you?”

I grin. Some guys hate being recognized off the field, but it never really bothered me—even less now, since the truth is I don’t know how much longer it’s going to happen. I was a big name, sure, but it’s been three years since I retired. Pretty soon I’ll be a question at your local dive bar’s trivia night. I figure I should enjoy it while it lasts. “Guilty,” I tell her, flashing a grin. “What’s your name?”

“I’m Chelsea,” she says, returning the smile. She’s got curly dark hair and an ass you could bounce a quarter off, her mouth like a pink cupid’s bow. “I’m a huge fan. That pass you caught off Hunter Beech in the Super Bowl? I think about it in bed at night.” Her hand moves from my arm up my shoulder and down my chest, squeezing gently. “If there’s anything I can do to make your flight any . . . friendlier, let me know, OK?”

“Oh,” I say, as her gaze cuts toward the tiny bathroom and I realize what she’s getting at. “Oh.”

I don’t actually see how the hell the two of us would fit in there at once, but I’m guessing this one has some limber ideas. I pause, glancing back up the aisle to check if Olivia is about to come read me the riot act. She’s put the laptop away and is looking at her schedule again, gnawing her thumbnail anxiously. I’m surprised at the gesture—I didn’t think a person like her got nervous, like possibly it wasn’t programmed into her algorithm back at the robot factory.

Something about the sight of it makes me feel a little bit softer toward her.

Oh, hell.

“You’re sweet,” I tell Chelsea apologetically. “But I‘m good for now.”

Chelsea winks in reply, apparently unbothered. “Suit yourself,” she says easily. “I’ll bring you extra pretzels anyway.”

I head back to my seat, Olivia looking at me quizzically. “What was that all about?” she asks, visibly stiffening as I accidentally brush her arm with mine.

Jesus Christ. “Flight attendant wanted me for my body,” I report with a shrug. “But I told her you’ve got first dibs.”

Olivia frowns. “You’re not planning on spending the weekend flirting with every pair of legs you see, are you?” she asks. “We’re supposed to be selling the idea that we’re a couple.”

Which is why I just turned down a no-strings bathroom fuck, princess, I think. “In that case, how about you try not flinching when I touch you?” I say instead.

“What are you talking about?”

“This,” I say, reaching out and laying a hand on top of hers. Sure enough, she stiffens.

I exhale. Way to stroke the ego. Does she really find me that repulsive?

“Or, we can just say we’ve found religion,” I suggest, only part-kidding. “Keeping things pure for the wedding night.”

Olivia gives a hollow laugh. “I bet Vanessa would just love that.” She swallows hard and slowly relaxes beneath my touch. “Sorry,” she says, tipping her head back against the seat. “I’m sure this will come as a shock to you, but I can be . . . wound a little tight sometimes.”

That makes me smile. “You?” I tease softly. “Never would have guessed.”

I let go of her hand, careful, and we pass the rest of the flight in silence. Olivia digs a thick, serious-looking paperback out of her shoulder bag while I go over my PowerBar pitch in my head. I’ve practiced the thing so many times I could probably deliver it in my sleep at this point, which doesn’t actually do anything to dampen the nerves in my chest when I think about trying to sell Mason Dubeck and his team of potential investors. It would be one thing if it was only the presentation I needed to nail, but I’ve got the whole week in front of me—full of plenty of opportunities for these douchey finance bros to decide I’m some ignorant meathead jock.

Ironic, huh: put me in a stadium in front of fifty thousand people, and I’m great, but set me up in a room with just ten of them, and I think I want to blow chunks.

Dude. Pull it together.

I won three Super Bowls, didn’t I? There’s no reason I can’t make this happen, too.

I rattle the ice in my empty plastic cup and glance over at Olivia. She’s still deeply absorbed in her novel, idly twisting a strand of hair that’s escaped her savage bun as she reads. It’s actually kind of weirdly reassuring, how focused she is. She’s probably never failed at anything in her entire life.

As we’re starting to descend into Key West, the plane suddenly hits a pocket of turbulence and the plane jerks. It’s nothing too bad, but Olivia gasps and grabs my hand as her book slips to the floor with a thunk.

“You OK?” I ask, looking over at her in surprise.

“Fine,” she says faintly, but her pretty face has gone ghost-white. She forces a deep breath, visibly trying to keep her composure. “I just don’t love flying, that’s all.”

“It’s actually the safest way to travel,” I promise, reaching down with my free hand and tucking her book back into her lap. “You’re way more likely to get creamed by a cab on the streets of New York.”

“Thanks,” she says with a grimace, and I chuckle.

“Just trying to be reassuring.”

“Try harder,” she mutters, but she doesn’t let go of my hand.

“See, now we’re getting somewhere,” I tease. “When you need to act like you’re crazy about me, just imagine we’re going to die.”

Finally, Olivia cracks a smile. Her grip on my hand relaxes slightly. “What is it the British say: lay back and think of England?”

“I dated an English girl once,” I muse. “But she wasn’t laying back, that’s for sure.”

“TMI.” Olivia yanks her hand away. “Maybe you could try not to be a total man-whore this week?”

“Only if you try not to be a total pain in the ass,” I reply pleasantly.

Olivia scowls.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I smile. Call me crazy, but she looks kind of hot getting all riled up.

And something tells me she’s going to stay this way.

It’s nearly an hour from the airport to her dad’s house so we rent a car at the airport, a sweet little red McAdams sports car. I’m expecting Olivia to tell me we have to ride with the top up for fear of wrinkling her outfit, but to my surprise she takes off her suit jacket before hopping into the passenger seat. She’s got skin the color of milk, a faint spray of freckles covering her yoga-toned upper arms.

“When in Florida,” she says, slipping her sunglasses on. “Besides, I could use a little color.”

It’s not a bad drive, all palm trees and the smell of the ocean and Kendrick Lamar crooning about needing a woman who’ll give him a run for his money. I feel more relaxed than I have in weeks. There are worse things than being in a nice car with a beautiful woman, the warm sun beating down on the back of my neck.

“So tell me about this new stepmom,” I say, raising my voice over the sound of the highway. “What am I walking into, here?”

“Oh, she’s a terror,” Olivia replies, “but odds are she won’t last.” She tells me a bit about her dad and his parade of wives, each slightly younger—and significantly more ridiculous—than the next. “My mom died when I was sixteen, so I think once I moved out to go to college he just started looking for somebody to take care of him,” she explains.

I frown at that, glancing over at her for a moment. “That must have been hard,” I say. It’s the first time I’ve ever stopped to consider what Olivia was like as a teenager. Until now I’d kind of figured she conjured herself into existence at age thirty, wearing a plain dress and holding a briefcase, but suddenly a different picture of her springs into my mind—younger and more vulnerable, a kid who lost too much too soon. “Your mom, I mean.”

Olivia shakes her head. “It was a long time ago,” she says, and just like that her past—and however she feels about it—is behind a tightly locked door. We ride the rest of the way without talking, just the low hum of the radio and the faint crash of waves in the distance.

“Right up here,” she says about twenty minutes after we pull off the highway, pointing down a wide, quiet cul-de-sac lined with bright tropical flowers. The houses here are huge and sprawling and a little ramshackle, like a Jimmy Buffett video come to life. “That blue one with the crooked porch is my dad’s.”

I pull into the driveway outside a big, sea-worn house right on the ocean. It’s quiet out here, like we’re a hundred miles from civilization—which I guess we are, down in the Keys. The front walkway is flanked by half a dozen enormous plants, a tiny lizard scuttles across the concrete, and I can see the water down past the house, a brilliant shade of turquoise blue.

I’m beginning to see why so many country songs are about packing it in and moving to the beach life, to drink beer and chill.

I lift Olivia’s suitcases out of the trunk—the woman packed like she was going on safari for six months, not jetting down to Florida—before following her up onto the wide, sagging porch. She rings the bell, and we wait there for a long, quiet moment, but nobody answers.

Olivia sighs and rings it again. “Is this definitely the right house?” I ask, glancing down the street. The midday heat is oppressive, and I could use a cold beer right about now.

Make that two.

Olivia makes a face. “Of course it’s the right house,” she says, reaching out and turning the doorknob. It swings open easily and she steps into the darkened foyer, glancing smugly over her shoulder at me like, see? “He’s my father, I obviously know what house— Oh my God!”

Olivia whirls around and shoves past me with a horrified look on her face, launching herself off the porch with surprising agility given her three-inch heels.

“What the fuck?” I turn back and peer inside the house, bracing myself for a grisly murder scene or a ten-foot alligator strolling across the tile. It takes my eyes a moment to adjust, but when they do the first thing I see is a man’s bare, wrinkly ass, blindingly white in the sudden sunlight pouring in through the open doorway.

The second thing I see is the naked woman with his dick in her mouth.