Page 27 of Recruited By the Billionaire

“Now that sounds more like the Frankie I know and love. You’ll be okay.”

But Frankie still couldn’t get Robert off her brain that easily. He was renting out space and she couldn’t stop him. And she knew Taymar had the tea on everybody in that organization. HR might as well had been called Gossip Central. “He was married before, wasn’t he?” Frankie asked.

Taymar nodded. “Yup. But they divorced. She died two years ago.”

“It was a drug overdose, right?”

Taymar nodded again. “Yep. But by all accounts he really loved her. He used to try to get her clean in every way he knew how. He didn’t give up on her until she gave up on herself. He used to beg her to get it together. But when he was done with her, he was done with her. But yeah, he used to beg her to get herself clean.”

Frankie didn’t respond to that and all talking ceased as they drove to the stadium. And as Frankie leaned back and listened to Gladys Knight and watched the city turn into suburbs turn into the outskirts of town where the stadium was located, she still couldn’t get Robert off her brain. Which infuriated her! But she couldn’t just forget him.

“She tears you down, darling.

Says you’re nothing at all.

But I’ll pick you up, darling,

when she lets you fall.

You’re like a diamond.

But she treats you like glass.

Yet you beg her to love you.

But me? You don’t ask.

If I were your woman.

(If I were your woman).

If I were your woman.

(If I were your woman).

If I were your woman,

here’s what I’d do-oo-oo-oo:

I’d never, no, no, stop loving you!”

And that was the problem in a nutshell, Frankie thought as they drove. She was so accustomed to being mistreated by men, so used to that kind of dynamic and energy in a relationship, that she was actually considering letting it happen again. She was actually wondering if it was a mistake that she didn’t open her door to Robert when he came knocking. And she knew better than anybody could tell her that that was bad. That to even consider such a thing was messed up.

Shewas messed up.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

But by the time she got to the stadium, and those stares were following her from the lobby all the way up to the executive floor, as if word had spread like wildfire, her tune changed. There was no way she was going to be that girl, even though people thought she already was.

It was also odd to her how word of her indiscretion spread so fast, but word of Robert’s generosity to the Bevis Dent and Aaron Thomas’s families didn’t spread at all. Everybody knew about his bad behavior. Nobody knew anything about the good he was doing. But that was his problem, and she knew she had to stop trying to act as if his generosity could excuse how he treated her after he got what he wanted from her. She got to work and did all she could to forget Robert Marris.

It got easier as the week went on. Robert, she’d heard Laine tell one of the recruiters, was back in Chicago handling his other corporation that was separate and apart from his team ownership business, and wasn’t expected back for another week. Two weeks without having to see him or hear much about him did help. And the gossip and stares quickly faded away.

Until he came back to town and decided to reopen that painful wound.

Frankie and Laine were working in the middle of the wide-open recruiting office. The draft was fast approaching and they still weren’t certain who would go first. Especially since the guy they were eyeing didn’t want to play in Pensacola.

It was during that time, when Laine was suggesting the recruiters might just throw a curveball in the mix, that one of Robert’s assistants, this one a young man, came up to the conference table where she and Laine were seated.

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