Page 24 of Love Game

Unable to resist, Kate asked, “How did he look at me?”

“Like he thought you’d be tastier than the Danish.”

“Bull.” Kate sighed. “Besides, you just told me I couldn’t sleep with him.”

“Yet.” Millie held one finger up to make her point. “It would be awkward. And probably against some rule.” She added the last as an afterthought, then promptly brushed it away. “But you might want to hold off on doing anything with Davenport too. I have a deal brewing with one of the local affiliates for you and Coach McYummy, and it might involve our old pal Jim.”

“Are you telling me I’m about to get cockblocked by the evening news?”

“God, I love it when you talk dirty.”

“Sleep with him, don’t sleep with him,” Kate muttered, her sights on the Italian restaurant that anchored the food court.

“To be or not to be,” Millie intoned gravely.

“You are the queen of mixed signals.”

Millie chuckled. “Sweets, you have no idea. Now tell me what shoes you’re wearing to the banquet tonight.”

* * *

If Millie Jensen’s intention was to win the award for most awkward seating arrangement, Danny would have to give the woman her due. By the time he’d arrived at the round table closest to the stage, there’d been only one empty seat. The one next to Kate Snyder and her flame-red dress.

Danny caught the glare she shot at the PR director’s back as she sashayed away and took no offense at Kate’s cool greeting. He wasn’t particularly fond of being set up either. But Mike Samlin sat on Kate’s left, and the rest of the table’s occupants—as well as nosy nellies at neighboring tables—were watching his every move. If there was one thing he excelled at, it was playing under pressure.

Danny took the time to shake Mike’s hand and plant a kiss on his wife Diane’s cheek. “You don’t look a day over twenty,” he said, meaning every word. The streaks in her hair obviously hadn’t come from the sun, and a fine webbing of wrinkles fanned from her eyes, but her all-American smile was still the same. If they could get her back into her old cheerleading uniform, he and Mike could pretend their gilt-edged futures still lay ahead of them.

“You always were such a smooth liar, Danny,” she chided.

“Truth, Di. I speak only the truth these days,” he insisted as he moved to take Ty Ransom’s outstretched hand.

The men’s basketball coach looked dapper in a blue suit so vivid it would have looked ridiculous on any man under six five. Ty introduced his wife, Mari, a diminutive platinum blond who, by all appearances, took her role as an athlete’s wife to heart. A good bit younger than her husband, Mari flashed a practiced smile and pointed a stunning set of fake tits straight at him as they exchanged greetings. Her barely-bigger-than-a-napkin dress matched her husband’s suit to perfection. Unfortunately, the orange cast of her spray tan clashed with Ty’s mellow mocha complexion.

Danny moved on with both relief and trepidation. Richard Donner, Wolcott’s biggest booster, and his wife, Jacinda, rounded out their party. As he took his seat between the trophy wife and the trophy magnet, Danny couldn’t help but note that Kate was the only woman at the table who hadn’t somehow altered her God-given good looks. Her dark hair tumbled thick and lustrous over her shoulders, untamed by stiff sprays. The color in her cheeks came from good health, not a cosmetics counter.

She looked absolutely delicious. And he was going to do his damnedest to ignore her and the fact that the neckline of her siren-red dress did everything a dress should do to accentuate the positive without pushing…things…over the top.

He made small talk with the table at large as he studiously ignored the come-hither glances Mrs. Donner shot him from under a thick fringe of fake eyelashes. Oblivious to his wife’s flirty looks, Richard launched into an enthusiastic accounting of all the lucrative opportunities that would come to the university once they brought the football program up to snuff. Hoping to refocus the conversation on the athletic program in general, Danny smiled at Diane and dropped a broad wink.

“The twins need braces, huh? Don’t worry. I’ve come to save the day.”

Diane rolled her eyes in response. “Yes, Uncle Danny, and we’re all counting on you.”

But humor, self-deprecating or otherwise, wasn’t Dick Donner’s strong suit. “We’ve been leaving millions of television dollars on the table by allowing our program to languish.”

Kate snorted and muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, “Perish the thought.”

“Once we prove that we can play with the big boys”—Richard clapped his hands then rubbed them together—“there’s no reason we can’t get just as big a slice of the pie as the other guys.”

Danny shook his napkin and leaned closer to Kate as he settled it on his lap. “No reason other than they have multimillion-dollar facilities and an excess of kinesiology majors, and I have future doctors, economists, and engineers running drills in a cow pasture.”

Kate smiled as she reached for her water goblet. “Horse, I think,” she murmured. Perfect pink lips pressed against the rim of her glass, and a sharp stab of envy pierced his gut. “Or maybe there were goats. I can’t remember.”

“We get the money, we get the facilities,” Richard stated with an impatient wave. “We need a team first.”

“Tell me, Coach,” Jacinda Donner interrupted, placing a bold hand high on Danny’s thigh. “Do you really think we can go all the way?”

He was saved from answering—and the awkward business of removing the woman’s hand—by a student server who chose that blessed moment to serve their salads. He beamed up at the young girl as she plunked the plate of field greens onto the table in front of him.

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