Most Valuable Playboy

“Hi, Ford. Why is Cooper the man? Are you going to tell him?” she asks, practically bouncing on those skyscraper heels.

My agent raises his right arm toward the ceiling, like a warrior issuing a battle cry. “Four years. Four beautiful, amazing, incredible, make-it-rain years.”

My jaw comes unhinged. It falls to the motherfucking floor when he says the dollar amount. It’s mind-boggling. It’s staggering. I slide my hand through my hair. “Holy shit.”

“Holy fucking multimillion-dollar-face-of-the-team-starting-quarterback-for-the-next-four-years shit.”

Ford punches the air several times, and Violet throws her arms around me. “I am so proud of you. This is amazing. This is incredible. You deserve everything,” she says, her voice bubbling over with excitement. She sounds like champagne. Like diamonds. Like all the stars in the sky.

I’m floating. I’m in shock. “Thank you,” I say, surprised I can even get those words out because I’m too stunned. Too overwhelmed. Ford already banked me life-changing money when he negotiated my rookie contract. This is many-lives-changing money.

I walk to the couch and sink down because I’m not sure I can stand anymore as I process this news.

“Don’t sit. We need to go out and celebrate. We have points to review. We have things to discuss. Get up, brother,” Ford says.

Violet sets a hand on his arm. “I think he needs a little time to process this.”

Ford turns to Violet, pressing his hands together. “Speaking of time, how can I thank you? You were amazing. You were incredible. Thank you for everything you did. And guess what?”

“What?”

Ford waves his arms as if he’s flying. “You’re free now. You don’t have to pretend to like this guy anymore.”

She narrows her eyes. “What do you mean?”

He shoots her a look. “He told me you were never into him in the first place, and that’s why it’s all the more amazing that you pulled this off. You were so believable. Kind of ironic, though, that in the end, our man went all Boy Scout and told the truth that you guys were never a real thing.”

Violet snaps her gaze to me, her voice wary. “Cooper, what is he talking about?”

My brain is sluggish, still processing the shock and thrill of this news. “I told the coach the truth before the game.”

“What did you tell him?” she asks tentatively.

“That it was all smoke and mirrors,” Ford says, waving his hands like a magician.

“Smoke and mirrors?”

“Fake. False. Made-up. Whatever you want to call it,” Ford adds, like he thinks Violet doesn’t understand words.

“I know what smoke and mirrors means,” she says to Ford, then turns to me. “I just don’t understand why you’d say that.”

“I didn’t want the coach to think I was a liar,” I say, the words coming out slow since my head is a swirl of numbers and deals and life-changing news. But even in this daze, I try to explain what went down as best I can. “I didn’t want to earn the job under false pretenses. I wanted him to know the whole truth.”

“What is the whole truth?”

I part my lips to speak—to tell her nothing is false with her—when an alarm sounds from inside her purse. She grabs her phone and mutes the noise. Her shoulders tense, and she mutters something about her appointment as she heads for the door.

“Vi,” I say, standing and walking to her. “But I also realized—”

She turns around. Her eyes brim with sadness, but her voice is resolute. “I can’t be late, Cooper. This is a new client, and I can’t take a chance.”

I nod. Of all people, I understand how sometimes—even most of the time—business has to come first. “We’ll talk later?”

She offers a smile, but it feels forced. Or maybe confused is the better term. Because fuck, I am, too. This offer should be the greatest moment on the business side of my career. The chance to step into my own. To have security and a bright, bold future. But as I look at Violet, suddenly the contract isn’t the most important thing. I want the girl, too. I want a future with her. She’s the thing I can’t live without.

I grab her hand. “I’ll call you later. I promise.”

She swallows and nods tightly. But she says nothing, almost as if she doesn’t want to chance speaking. She turns on her heel, walks down my steps, and leaves. I don’t look away, not yet. Finally, when she’s in her car, I turn around to see the smiling face of my agent. I want to ask him how I can negotiate my way back into her heart.

But he’s not the guy who knows those answers.

Instead, we spend the next few hours reviewing the deal over a fantastic steak dinner, and he offers to take me to the team hotel, but I have sixty minutes before I’m due there, so I ask him to drop me off at Trent’s bar instead.



Trent nods at me from his spot behind the bar. “Well, well, well. If it isn’t the king of San Francisco.”

I wave him off, like the adulation is all too much. “Please. I insist on a parade now everyplace I go.”

He tosses a dish towel in my direction. It lands on the wooden counter. “You came to the wrong place. In fact, you might have to pay for drinks now.”

I feign a look of shock. “Money for food and drinks? Never heard of such a thing. By the way, what are you doing behind the bar?”

“I like to help out now and then. What the hell are you doing here?” He looks at an imaginary watch. “Don’t you have to go to your nun cloisters and put on blinders like a horse before the Kentucky Derby, so no one can see you?”

“Something like that. I have thirty minutes before I have to be at the hotel. If I’m not there, it’ll be lights out,” I say, slicing a finger across my neck.

“Really?”

“No. But yes, I need to follow the rules.” I slap my palms on the counter as if it’s a drum. “But also, the team offered,” I say, then tell him the amount, and he blinks about five million times.

“That’s insane.”

“I know. It’s ridiculous. It hardly feels real.”

He grabs a glass and pours from the tap. “So you came here for a celebratory drink before your last game of the season?”

I shake my head and draw a deep breath. “I don’t drink before games. I came here for something else.”

He sets the glass down. “My potato skins recipe is under lock and key.”

“Dude, you told me years ago the secret was how long you bake the cheese.”

“Dammit.”

I glance behind me. His bar is full of too many ears. “Can we go to a table in the corner?”

“Ooh baby, I thought you’d never ask.”

I roll my eyes. Trent waves over another bartender to cover for him, and we head to a quiet table. Funny, the last time I was here he told me the notion of me being with his sister was absurd on account of my supposedly straying eyes.