Page 17 of Puck Prince

“Come on, you must get up close and personal with the men.” He wags his brows the way every sleazy, chauvinistic asshole does when they find out I, and I quote, “spend my days feeling up men.” If they knew what the locker room smelled like after a game, they wouldn’t find it quite so titillating.

“Part of my job involves discretion.” Something he clearly knows nothing about. “I can’t walk around handing out private medical information.”

Mostly because I don’t have any. I expected to be in the college circuit for a few more years, at least. I barely even know the team lineup, let alone the hot dish this guy wants.

“I’ll keep you anonymous, sweetheart.” He actually winks at me.

I open my mouth to tell him I’ll make that wink permanent and jab his eye out of the socket if he doesn’t step his over-greased hair out of my way, but before I can, I hear a voice from behind me.

“Leave the lady alone.”

A deep voice.

A gravelly, gritty voice that felt like silk whispering those dirty little lies in my ear.

The reporter jolts past me to his real target—to Owen.

And it all starts to click together.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

This is so much worse than a run-in in the elevator.

My one-night stand turned married lifelong regret is not only standing next to me—he’s the star player for the team I now work for. Is it too late for the incognito mustache?

As the tall, broad, lying shape of him comes into view, I glance just to be sure, and yeah, it’s him. Fuck.

“Goddammit, how many times do I have to tell you press boys to lay the fuck off? Stop harassing…” He gestures at me, and then he looks at me. Actuallylooksat me. The recognition settles in and he says the words I am internally screaming.

“Oh. Shit.”

7

OWEN

“Well, ladies and gentlemen—if it isn’t Owen Sharpe, star center for the Houston Scythes!” The dumbass reporter with his over-whitened teeth and shitty toupee is grinning like the cat that caught the damn canary. But my words have trailed into a dribble as I realize who it is he was harassing.

“Wh…what are you doing here?” she asks.

I stare at her.

She stares at me.

I stare at her some more.

She stares at me some more.

Then my brain catches up, and I upscale that internaloh, shitto anoh, fuck.

Before I can express that eloquent sentiment out loud, Weatherman Fuckface inserts himself back into the dynamic by thrusting his mic in my piehole. “Owen, the question on every fan’s mind is whether or not you’ll be able to play with thatgruesome back injury of yours. I take it that’s where Ms. Callie Coleman here comes in? A little ‘hands-on’ treatment? What can we expect this season?”

“What you can expect is a fist to your meant-for-radio face if you don’t back up and get that microphone away from me,” I growl.

The team’s PR team is gonna get their panties in one hell of a twist whenever this airs, but I don’t give a shit if the camera is rolling or if millions are watching. This toolbag needs to get one thing straight: I don’t like the media up in my face, and I especially don’t like when they use women against me.

Especially this woman. Fuck only knows the kind of headlines she could generate for the press that won’t stop hounding me.

But right before my verbal assault gets a little more “hands-on,” to steal a phrase, something he said snags my attention.

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