Infamous: A Bad Boy Sports Romance Novel (6 page)

A
fter hours
of taking refuge at the library, I finally resigned myself to going back to the real world. I stepped outside and turned my cell phone back on, rejoining the land of the living.

As I was making my way back into my neighborhood not even twenty minutes later, it rang.

“Where have you been all morning?” Lauren asked, the curiosity evident in her voice.

“Hiding at the library,” I easily admitted. It might not have been the best idea to tell my boss that I was purposely avoiding her client, but I refused to lie to her after everything that had gone down. “I’m assuming you’ve seen the picture.”

“You mean the one of you loading a rather plastered-looking Jared into a cab? Honey, I think
everyone
has seen that by now.”

I stopped walking and stepped to the side to get out of the way of the street traffic, leaning against a brick wall as I sighed. “I’m sorry, Lauren. I tried to get him out without being spotted.”

“He shouldn’t have been out of your apartment in the first place,” she fired back with a harsh edge that made me wince.

“I know. I’m sorry for that, too. I understand if you want to—”

“But Jared insists that what happened last night was entirely his fault and none of the blame should be placed on you. Just so you know— I disagree with him— but I’ll let this one slide. Consider it your one and only free pass.”

Bewildered, I asked, “Are you serious? You spoke to Jared?”

“Yes, he called to ask if I knew where you were. He promised not to leave the apartment, so if you’d like to let him sweat for a while, you’re free to do so,” she said with a chuckle, apparently enjoying the thought of an intern making Jared Moore wait around. But her amusement was short-lived and she darkly added, “Last chance, April. I’ll do as much damage control from here as I can, but I don’t want him even showing up on some random fan’s social media page until the results are out. Then we can decide how to proceed. Are we clear?”

“We’re clear. I won’t let you down again.”

Lauren snorted, her lack of faith in me ringing loud and clear.

“I guess we’ll see. But don’t make a promise you can’t keep.”

I clenched my jaw and nodded to myself. “I can keep it.”

“Good-bye, April.”

I opened my mouth to quickly thank her for giving me another chance, but the line went dead before I ever got the chance. I knew the only way to get back into her good graces was to finish the job without another incident, but the idea of going back and spending more time alone with Jared wasn’t sitting well with me.

Maybe it had something to do with the chills I got when he laid his head on my shoulder during the cab ride home the night before.

Maybe it was because of the way he leaned against me in the elevator, pinning me to the wall while he softly murmured that I was the most stunning woman he had ever seen.

Maybe it was because when I brought him to the bedroom, he had begged me to lie beside him and swore not to touch me. He just wanted me close. When I declined, he rolled off the bed and crawled after me. So I obliged him until he fell asleep— making sure to keep a foot of distance between us even though I ached to roll over and bury myself in his embrace.

He infuriated me to no end, but I wanted him.

Hell, if I was
really
being honest with myself... I kind of liked him.

Or at least I liked drunk-Jared.

Shaking off the thoughts, I headed back in the direction of my apartment, stopping at the coffee shop down the street to sit for another hour to try to convince myself that having a crush on Jared Moore was the stupidest thing I could possibly do.

But when I finally resigned myself to going back, my heart pitter-pattered with every step closer to my building and the man waiting inside.

* * *

J
ared sleeping
on my couch should have pissed me off.

After all,
he
was the one who rudely demanded that I give up my bed for him. He was a client and a guest and therefor deserved it more than me. So it was only logical that seeing him napping where he had made
me
sleep should have been irritating as hell.

But it wasn’t. He was curled on his side and at some point during his nap, he had tucked my pillow under his strong arm and rested his head on the blanket stack.

Watching Jared Moore cuddling with a pillow was
painfully
adorable. So much so that I was considering taking a picture, but thought better of it.

The last thing I needed was a reminder of this moment on my phone. My heart was already beating wildly enough and I was trying to silently steel my emotions to confront him. I carefully placed my bag down and closed the door, twisting the locks back into place as quietly as I could manage. I slipped my shoes off and tip-toed into the kitchen, putting the pizza I bought as a peace offering down before moving back into the living room to wake him up.

It was rather startling to find his eyes open and focused on me. I froze in place, staring blankly at him as he blinked a few times then sat up.

“You’re back.”

“Yeah. Sorry I took off like that.”

Jared shrugged. “It’s cool, I get it. Where were you?”

“At the library. I stopped on the way home to get that pizza I promised yesterday.”

He nodded and stood up, grimacing a little as he placed the pillow back on the couch. It was clear that he was embarrassed at being caught in a position that one might view as vulnerable, which led me to believe that he didn’t remember asking me to stay with him last night. As he staggered past me into the kitchen, I wondered just how much of last night he had forgotten.

We both sat down at the kitchen table to eat, his eyebrows raising with surprise when he flipped open the box and found it loaded with toppings.

“Went a little overboard, don’t you think?”

“I didn’t know what you liked so I figured you could just pick off whatever you don’t.”

He gave me a half-smile and lifted a slice, pausing midway to his mouth so he could ask, “Anchovies?”

“No.”

“Thank fuck.”

Then he bit into the slice, wolfing it down and going for another before I even made it halfway through my first.

The silence wasn’t entirely uncomfortable, but it was still too tense for my liking. Once I finished my food and washed it down with a glass of water, I watched him eat as I debated how to open the conversation we really needed to have.

“I know you called Lauren.”

His jaw stopped moving and his eyes darted up to meet mine. He tipped his head, motioning for me to continue as he finished chewing.

“You realize that you’re the only reason she isn’t here right now. Probably the only reason I still have a job.”

He reached for his own water and took a few gulps before he said, “I’m also the reason it was at risk in the first place.”

I studied him closely, realizing that he had absolutely no idea that his words were still true. Jared didn’t know about what happened to the interns and employees he slept with over the years. For a moment, I wondered what would happen if I told him. Would he care? Would he stop trying to push me if he knew the real reason?

Or would he overreact and fire Lauren? I couldn’t risk that possible chain of events, so I shoved the idea away.

“I just wanted to say thank you for owning up to it. Honestly, I went to the library just for the excuse to turn my phone off and avoid the call I knew was coming. I thought for sure she was going to fire me. The last thing I expected was to hear that you defended me.”

Jared suddenly looked uncomfortable and I could only guess that he wasn’t used to having sincere conversations with many women like this. Despite the fact that he was nothing more than a client – and I was doing my best to keep it that way – I realized I had let my thanking him become a little too personal.

So I straightened my spine and gave him a curt nod. “So... thanks. And she also said you promised to stay here for the remaining duration?”

Jared immediately sensed the shift in my demeanor and frowned, but nodded in response to my question. “Yeah, I’ll stay put. You don’t have to worry about that.”

“Wonderful. Then what do you say to a truce?” A cocked eyebrow was my only response and I rolled my eyes before I continued. “You and I both know we’re not going to last thirteen more days if we keep arguing like we have been. So let’s agree to stop bickering and act like adults. Deal?”

He hesitated and I wondered if maybe I was taking the professionalism act a little too far. He seemed pretty displeased with the way the conversation had gone, but if he didn’t want professional and he was uncomfortable with personal— what the hell did he expect from me?

“All right. Deal.”

He reached a hand out and I took it, swallowing hard when I felt a shiver go up my spine that was becoming entirely too familiar for my liking. I pulled my hand away and gave him a tight smile, one that fell off when he mimicked it.

I didn’t need him to outright say that he wasn’t happy with the idea of a truce— that much was written all over his face, much like it was probably written on mine. But I was determined to keep my word to Lauren and not screw up again.

Which meant that I needed to stomp my little crush right into the ground.

All I needed to do was keep reminding myself of why we were in this position in the first place. Jared was waiting for the DNA test to prove whether or not he was the father of a newborn infant. He’d apparently had unprotected sex with one of the cheerleaders of the Wolfpack and multiple others had come forward to support her.

Needless to say— it made Jared look exactly like the womanizer he was.

Disgusted by the entire situation, reality once again put a stop to my libido as efficiently as a cold shower.

A
pril had
to be the most exasperating woman I’d ever met.

She had been the one who so formally requested that we agree to a truce, but for the next two days, she was colder than she had been when we first met. She hadn’t outright picked any fights since we made peace, but the passive-aggressive comments about Brittany and my
‘playboy antics’
were beginning to wear on my already thin patience.

It was hard enough for me to try to put a lid on the flirting and her rattling my cage was only making me want to bend her over my knee and turn her ass red.

I tipped my head to the side and eyed her carefully, noting her rigid posture and the way she purposely stayed as far to the other end of the couch as humanly possible. Fuck, I was kind of surprised she was even sitting with me at all. The day before, she had practically
ordered
me to watch television alone so she could sit at her desk and get some work done.

Which turned out to be code for sitting by herself and reading while avoiding me, as I found out when I snuck in and surprised her shortly after.

The girl certainly was in touch with her inner rage.

But now as my mind drifted back to the perverted places it typically stayed, all I could think about was what I’d do if given the chance. April was tense as hell and I would bet a year’s salary that one good fuck would loosen her up exponentially.

If only she would agree to it.

With a low grunt, I turned my head back to whatever movie she had picked and tried to re-immerse myself in the plot. I’d missed too much of the beginning to know the full details, but it irritated me to no end that she had chosen a chick-flick— a genre she hated as much as I did.

Why’d she choose it? Well, the fact that the story seemed to be about accidental pregnancy seemed to be a major tip-off. I clenched my jaw and turned my entire head toward her, smirking when I saw her cheeks turn red almost immediately.

“This movie sucks,” I said dryly, waiting for her to finally woman-up and meet my eyes. When she did, I continued. “Why don’t you pick something you actually
want
to watch.”

“Who says I don’t want to watch this?”

“You aren’t fooling anyone, April. We both know why you picked it. And for the last fucking time—I am
not
the father.”

April shrugged, returning her eyes to the screen even though I knew I had her full attention. “So you say. The cheerleaders seem to disagree.”

I scoffed. “The girls who jumped into this are just pissy that I never called them back.”

Her eyes turned to me and the fire behind them burned bright.

“If there wasn’t any truth to their claims, no one would have believed them. But you’re infamous for being a player, Jared.”

I wouldn’t have gone so far as to call myself
infamous
—at least not for my relationships (or lack thereof) with women. My frown deepened as I considered her words.

When all was said and done, I wanted to go down in the books as one of the best damn quarterbacks my generation had ever produced. Sure, I took advantage of my fame and got with women because of it, but the way April made it sound...

Would that be all anyone remembered? The number of tally marks I had carved into my bedpost? Was there really a chance that the gossip and rumors would outshine the fact that I was an extraordinary athlete?

I couldn’t answer any of those questions and it was leaving me with a sour feeling in the pit of my stomach. I stood up from the couch and muttered, “I’m going to lie down,” before I stalked away, not bothering to glance back and see whatever look might have been on her face.

I didn’t bother to shut the door after I entered April’s bedroom—just plopped right down on the bed face-first and groaned into the pillow. After I got out the noise of frustration, I rolled onto my back and stared up at the ceiling for a little while. Eventually, I closed my eyes and tried to ignore the sound of the movie still playing in the living room and focus only on the faint noise of the traffic outside the apartment.

I didn’t know how long I was lying there when the floorboard outside the bedroom creaked, but I could still hear the movie playing. I didn’t even open my eyes to look at her, I simply pulled an arm from underneath my head and patted the spot next to me on the bed. After a brief moment of hesitation, her footsteps began to approach.

“I’m sorry for being such a bitch,” she said with a sigh. “I offered you a truce, but I really haven’t been honoring it.”

The bed dipped beside me and I cracked an eye open, surprised that she took my invitation. But she was perched right on the edge—ready to flee at any moment.

“I’m not lying, you know,” I told her, shocking myself a little as the words just slipped out. “I’m really not the father.”

She shifted around uncomfortably and judging by the way her jaw flexed, I imagined she was biting down whatever scathing remark came naturally to her. When she turned to meet my eyes, it was clear that she didn’t believe me.

“How can you be so sure?”

I could count on one hand the amount of people who knew the truth about what happened with Brittany. The whole affair was a complicated mess and I had only confided in people I knew I could trust— people whose opinions mattered to me.

For a reason I couldn’t even begin to comprehend, I felt compelled to add April to that list.

“Because I never slept with Brittany.”