“Oh.” Setting the pencil down, Simon studied him for a moment. “You’re intent on this one, are you?”
“If you’re asking if I’m in love, yes.” God, that felt good to say out loud. “So what happens to her still affects me. If you were hoping to give up caring what happened to her, don’t. She needs help too.”
“Yes, she does.” Simon sighed. “Look, Michael, I won’t lie, her past will come back to bite her on this one. She’s set herself up for a rocky go of it. Not impossible but not ideal either.”
Rocky wasn’t worrying to him. He’d conquered adversity before, he’d do it again for her. A hundred times. Thousand.
“I’ll tell you the biggest play will be to stand beside her. Unlike last time—”
“What do you know about last time?”
Simon gave him a look that asked, were you dropped on your head as a baby? “When one of our starters begins hanging around publicly with a notorious person, I start researching. It’s my job, if you recall. Anyway, unlike last time, where the other person involved in the video immediately bolted from her and made it sound like he was a victim of a con artist, you’re standing beside her, saying you believe she had nothing to do with it.”
“Because she didn’t.”
“Great. You can say it with conviction.”
“Because it’s true.” Michael’s gauze-wrapped hand clenched, and he hissed at the reminder of the pain. “Drop the PR speak, Simon. She didn’t do it. That’s the end of that.”
“Most likely, you’re right. So we’ll go with that angle.”
Simon was just doing his job, but Michael began to wonder if he could still perform his duties without his head attached to his body.
“We won’t wait for someone to find out. We’ll cut it off at the pass. Post an informal video of you and her together, speaking directly to the fans about it. That it was a violation of your privacy, that it was an unfortunate situation to be caught up in, that you hope others can use this as a lesson about what uploading videos of people you don’t know can do to another person’s life… play it from the mentoring angle. Make it seem as if it’s aimed more toward high school and college kids since that’s the best odds of who uploaded the video to begin with, and who struggle with proper social media behavior.”
Make it a mentoring thing. That, Michael could get behind. Simon was good, Michael had to admit. Hitting him right where it counted. “Right. So, when do we do this?”
“I’ll have Kat flown in this afternoon. We can do the video tonight, have it uploaded pretty soon afterward. I don’t want it to seem glossy and edited. I want it fresh, real. You kick some ass on the gridiron tomorrow afternoon, and the odds are it’s forgotten from your life before next week.”
“And Kat’s life?”
“Don’t push. She’s got a different situation and a different past. I’ll help, but she’s not part of my job. You’d do best to find someone freelance to work with you on that side of things. I’ll give you names.”
It was the best he could hope for. Michael shook Simon’s hand and started calling Kat even as he left the small conference room in order to find the assistant with their schedules for the weekend.
“Hello?”
“Kat,” he breathed, feeling whole again just hearing her voice. “Where are you? Are you at home?”
“No. I packed up and—”
“Don’t leave,” he barked out, then realized he’d scared a lobby full of people. The desk clerks froze, a mother pushed her small child behind her legs for protection. With a grimace, he ducked into an alcove and lowered his voice. “We’ll fix this, Kat. Please, don’t leave.”
“I’m not leaving. I was about to say I packed up and came to Gary’s place in case. The lawyer suggested I duck out of the apartment for the time being.”
The vise crushing his chest instantly let up, giving him much needed relief. “Thank God.”
“Michael… what’s going on?”
“You’re going to get another call from Simon, our PR guy. He’s putting you on a plane out here. Don’t argue. It’s for the best.”
“That’s too much.”
“I need you here, Kat.” He knew, if it were for him, she’d view it differently.
There was a brief pause. “Oh. Okay.”
With satisfaction, he smiled. “God, I love you.”
Silence.
That was a little deflating, but he pushed on. “He’s got a plan for a video addressing the situation. You and me, together. We’ll use my social media, then push it to yours after it’s finished. No official press conferences. Don’t want to make too much of a big deal about it. We act like it’s a nonstarter. There’s more, but we’ll talk about it when you get here.”
“You sound confident.”
“I am. Just… will you trust me?”
“I do trust you.”
“Good. I’ll see you tonight.”
Chapter 26