Page 127 of Kiss Me Tonight

When I lift my brows, encouraging him to move on or get out, his fingers reflexively squeeze the bottle’s glass neck. “As a recruiter for the Steelers. Clearly, you have a passion for coaching.” He glances around at the pub, taking in the sparse décor and the candles seated at every table. “But staying here in Maine is a waste of your talents.”

I make a dramatic show of sitting up straighter. “You really think so?”

“Do I?” Clarke echoes, a hint of emotion finally coating his tone. “You’ve won two Super Bowl rings. You’re the Heisman trophy winner from college. The MVP winner from half of your seasons, at least, while you played for the Bucs. Do Ithinkso?”

Once upon a time, someone listing off my accolades would have inspired a sense of excitement and fulfillment within me. After all, when you have no sense of self-worth, it always feels real nice to be the recipient of good, old-fashioned praise.

Eighteen-year-old me would have been a puddle of goo right now.

Thirty-five-year-old me only takes another sip of my beer, purposely dragging out my response to make the man sweat. “I’m not looking to play matchmaker.”

Clarke sits forward in the booth. “I’m not saying anything about matchmaking with the players, DaSilva. I’m talking about you leaving this Podunk, small-ass town and doing something with your life.”

I like this Podunk, small-ass town.

And crazy as it may seem, I feel like working with the Wildcats blends all of my interests. Football, working with kids and making a difference in their lives,Levi.

“Coordinator, then.” Some of the lackluster enthusiasm in Clarke’s face dilutes. That tick in his jaw comes roaring back, and this time his nostrils flare too. “All right, special teams. How does that sound? I can’t promise you a top coaching position, but something smaller to start out? That I can do easily.”

I put my beer down. Plant my hands flat on the table and jut my chin forward. “Cut the goddamn bullshit, Clarke. You’re not offering this job out of the goodness of your heart. So why don’t you tell me the real reason you came all the way to this small-ass,Podunktown?”

I’m no idiot. I know why he’s here, but I want to hear him say it.

I want him to show, once again, that he’s a controlling bastard who thinks he can play God with a snap of his fingers and a promise to give a man whathethinks we all want. I didn’t want his offer of pussy and money and fame seven years ago, and I certainly don’t want anything he’s offering now.

Dark eyes level on my face, unwavering. “Levi—”

“Is not yours.”

With the front door to the Golden Fleece propped open and all the blinds drawn back, there’s no hiding the rage that twists Clarke’s features. “I don’t know what you think is going to transpire between you and Levi, but I can promise this: you’ll get sick of her soon enough.” His knuckles whiten around the bottle’s glass neck. “The woman you see now? That ismydoing. Her long blond hair? Me. She looked like a dyke when I met her. Her big tits and the meat on her bones?Me. Fucking her for the first five years of our marriage was like screwing a man.” His mouth twists angrily. “Anytime she stepped out of line, I put her in her place. So, when you’re fucking her and thinking she’s the woman of your dreams, just remember I had her first. Everything you like about her, I created. I took her out of this goddamn town and made her who she is.Idid that.”

Put her in her place.

The last time I punched someone, the producers onPut A Ring On Itasked me to get physical with another one of the contestants. The altercation was mapped out in advance. Me defending my so-called honor against a sniveling prick out of Kansas. I refused. The investment broker didn’t. When you see a fist swinging in your direction, though, it’s only human nature to strike back. And, I did—hard—with one upper right hook to the chin.

Down he blows.

Staring at Rick Clarke now, my knuckles are already tingling with the want for retribution. But this isn’t a bare knuckle fight on low-grade reality TV. It’s real life. And until this moment, I never realized the scope of misery that Levi suffered being married to this jackass.

The mental abuse she no doubt suffered.

The manipulative tactics and the destruction of her psyche.

Without even asking her, I know why she stayed. I know why she put up with it all, even as her ex-husband changed everything about her.

Topher.

My own mother walked out on me when I was five-years-old and never looked back.

Levi survived fourteen fucking years with this fool because her son needed her.

I’ve never met another person like her. No one else in the world is as good as she is, as pure and driven and loving and kind. And I’m one lucky asshole that she looks at me and sees someone worthy of standing by her side.

My ass comes off the seat. Tension like I haven’t felt in years, since that long-ago day in my childhood that put me on a path straight to hell, turns my blood cold. “Say it again.”

Suffocating in his own ego, Clarke doesn’t even have the wits about him to realize I’m walking a very tight rope that ends with my fist battering his face. He follows suit, straightening from the booth and getting in my face. “I fucked her, DaSilva. I fucked with her mind and I fucked with her body, and once Topher agrees to move back to Pittsburgh with me, I’ll fuck with her heart too, you—”

Crack!

---