Page 52 of Lawless in Leather

She flicked her browser open and did a quick Google search.

There were many, many, many hits. The top ones all coming from news or baseball or sports sites. She was fairly sure there was going to be a lot of flak on the baseball sites so she ignored those and clicked on the top newspaper result. Which was the Staten Island paper. Wow. Had everyone on Staten Island clicked on the story?

The link brought up the front page of the paper, which was half filled with a full color shot of Marly in all her blond Valkyrie glory, white wings gleaming behind her and a shit-eating grin pasted across her face.

SAINTS SEEK DIVINE INTERVENTION, the headline screamed, and Raina rolled her eyes. Still, she’d expected the Angels’ name to give the headline writers of the world an excuse to roll out their punning mojo. It wasn’t the worst it could have been. She scanned the story. It was a mix of praise for the girls and the journalist speculating why the heck the new owners of the Saints thought they needed cheerleaders. On the whole it seemed to be slightly in favor of the idea. So that was good. The article had about four hundred comments.

She never read the comments. Nothing good came of newspaper article comments. She’d learned that on Broadway. You couldn’t please everyone and there was little point trying. She closed the tab resolutely.

Back to the search results. She waded through a few more news links, which all seemed to be the same sort of story. Hot girls. Good dancers. Why did we need cheerleaders in baseball but well done Alex Winters for finding a way to generate some interest in the team.

Not as bad as expected. She sipped coffee, finished her toast and apricot jam, and stared at the list of sporting site links in the search results. Should she or shouldn’t she?

While she was trying to decide, her phone started to ring.

Brady. She pressed the speakerphone button.

“Hey, you,” she said.

“Oh good, you’re up,” Brady said cheerfully. “I thought you might still be in bed. Wait, why aren’t you still in bed? Didn’t you take that lovely man home with you last night?”

“We had a nightcap,” she said.

“Is that what you’re calling it these days? Seriously, Rai, if you didn’t do that man there is something very, very wrong with you.”

“No comment,” she said.

“No comment means guilty as charged,” Brady crowed. “Well done. Luis and I are very proud. It’s been too long.”

“Did you call just to dissect what goes on in my bedroom or was there another reason?” she asked hastily before he could go into chapter and verse on exactly how long it had been. Because the answer was a little sad. It was over a year since Patrick had done his vanishing act. A year was too long. Her body, which was aching in a pleasant way in some of those unused places, agreed with her. It was keen to get back into fighting shape in that department. She needed daily workouts.

Damn Malachi and his stupid baseball team.

She sighed.

Brady laughed. “Damn, that must have been good sex. Which again forces me to ask why you’re not still in bed?”

“Because baseball is stupid,” she muttered.

“Ah. Away game, is it?”

“The next three or four games are away,” she said. “What kind of stupid sport is that?”

“I take it he’s traveling with the team then? My sympathies.”

“I’ll survive,” Raina said.

“Let’s hope so. But hey, I have something that will cheer you up.”

“What?”

“Are you at your computer?”

“Yes.”

“Take a look at the club’s Facebook page.”

She opened the page. For a moment, she couldn’t see what was different; then the number next to the LIKES button registered. “Three thousand likes? We got two thousand likes overnight?” Holy crap. Brady had been good at working social media for them but burlesque was kind of a niche market and they’d thought they’d been doing well to build to a thousand.

---