The Striker's Chance (8 page)

“It also means more people are turning up to watch you play,” Holly countered. “Like it or not, some people buy tickets because they want to see someone they think is famous, not because they love the sport. The more people sitting in the stands, the more money Discovery has to spend on players, training and everything else that keeps the game alive. But you’ve been a professional athlete for long enough that you don’t need me to explain this to you, do you?”

Kepler stared fixedly at the floor, and she continued, “You don’t like the well-behaved yet sexy striker idea I’ve come up with, and you insist the picture painted by the British media of bad-boy Killer de Klerk is wrong as well. So tell me, who do you want to be?”

“I want to be myself,” he said with such quick defensiveness that she knew he hadn’t given his answer any real thought.

“And what is he like?” But she could feel him shutting down. These few, precious moments of honest interaction were coming to an end.

“Look, I’ll try to make more of an effort with this PR stuff, but I can’t make any promises. I suppose this breakfast is a washout, huh?”

Holly checked the clock. “If you throw on a suit, you could make the last half hour.”

Kepler’s eyes met hers, and it took every shred of her willpower not to close the distance between them and wrap comforting arms around his broad shoulders while she brushed reassuring kisses over his forehead. Every trace of arrogant swagger had been wiped from his face. He looked dejected, drained and lonely beyond belief.

But he was lost to her now, and she to him. She folded her hands in her lap and waited.

“Give me five minutes.” He hauled himself from the couch and disappeared into the bedroom.

Chapter Eight

“He’s falling apart,” Alan muttered. Discovery’s chairman turned his back on the action on the field with a shake of his head. “He’s going to kill himself if he keeps pushing like this.”

Holly peered nervously through the glass front of the corporate box. Rick was at her side, but she didn’t really need him anymore. She’d not only developed an increasingly complex understanding of the game, she had a burgeoning passion for it as well. She knew enough to understand that Discovery’s 2-1 lead over Cleveland Thunder had been hard to win and even harder to defend, and that with twenty-five minutes still to play Kepler was so exhausted that he was staggering more than running.

“Sven always keeps him on the pitch too long,” she snapped. “He’s got no support out there and he runs himself ragged.”

“But when he plays, he scores,” Rick countered. “He’s single-handedly tripled Discovery’s goals this season. At the end of the day, Sven wants to win.”

At that moment there was a collective gasp from the stadium crowd as Kepler took a hard tackle from an opponent. He lurched to one side as his knees bent enough for his fingertips to brush the turf but managed to stay upright. He regained his balance and charged after the Cleveland player with no less determination than he’d shown at the start of the match. But it was clear even from the distance of the box that he was favoring his right ankle.

Cleveland missed a pass and the ball went over the touch line. Play on the field paused as Discovery prepared to take a throw-in. Sven stepped forward on the sideline and motioned for Kepler to come in as one of the younger players sprang up from the substitutes’ bench.

Kepler flung up his hands in protest, but Sven shook his head and gestured again. The JumboTron announced the substitution as Kepler jogged off the pitch to warm applause from the crowd, and the younger player darted onto the field to take his place.

“I’d better go down there,” Holly said, mostly to herself.

Rick looked skeptical. “I don’t think now is really the time to—” But she was already on her way out the door, deaf to her friend’s warning.

She took the staircase normally only used by catering staff and security, which wound through the hulking stadium to the players’ dressing rooms and the tunnels to the pitch. She paused to flash her all-access pass once or twice, but otherwise was uninterrupted on the long walk from the corporate box.

Finally she reached the entrance to the tunnel, where she was met by a cadre of burly security guards. As she handed her pass over for inspection, a familiar voice drifted down the concrete passageway.

Kepler. And he was not happy.

As a security guard pivoted to let her walk into the tunnel, Holly was struck by the deafening roar of the crowd pouring in from the other end and the chaotic shouting from the sidelines audible even this far down. She couldn’t imagine what it must be like to be on the pitch itself, with thousands of people watching and making noise.

But she spotted a man who’d spent more than ten years doing just that. While one of the assistant coaches hung back at the tunnel’s exit onto the pitch—presumably to keep an eye on Discovery’s star player—Kepler paced up and down, gesticulating irritably as the medic stood calmly by with an Ace bandage in one hand. The two men were conversing in what she assumed was a mixture of Afrikaans and Dutch. While Hank’s tone was characteristically jovial, the foreign syllables of Kepler’s rant sounded harsh and guttural.

He spotted her as he changed direction, and his scowl deepened.

“Whatever it is you want from me, the answer is no. Not now.”

His tone was so hostile that Holly froze in place, as whatever half-baked excuse she’d had for coming down here vanished from her mind.

Kepler stared at her accusingly, his dark eyes bright with anger, his cheeks flushed with exertion. “What?” he roared. “Why are you here?”

She flinched and said the first thing that came into her mind: “I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

He gaped at her for a long moment and then fell back against the wall. Hank took advantage of this pause in his pacing to squat by Kepler’s feet and, with remarkable speed, pulled off his right cleat and began to palpate his ankle through the long sock that ran up over his shin guard to his knee.

“I’m fine,” Kepler insisted, and Holly wasn’t sure whether he addressed her or Hank. “There was no need to pull me out. Sometimes I think Sven must be half-blind.”

“You’re not fine, but you are stupid,” Hank said more sternly than she had ever heard him. “If you’d tried to keep playing on this ankle you could’ve done yourself some serious damage.”

“I’m telling you, I’m okay,” Kepler protested, but he winced as Hank rotated his foot.

“I’m going to strap this up quickly so you can get back out there and watch the match.” Hank began to wind the bandage around Kepler’s ankle. “Keep some ice on it and I’ll have a proper look after the game’s finished.”

“Whatever.” Kepler craned his neck to get a glimpse of the action happening beyond the end of the tunnel. He turned to her. “See? I’m fine. You can go now.”

She had absolutely no reason to be there, and he clearly wasn’t thrilled with her presence. Yet Holly found herself racking her brain for an excuse to stay.

His eyes narrowed, and she knew exactly what he was trying to say to her.
You made your choice.
You forfeited your right to personal moments like these.

She nodded slowly even as her heart plummeted.

“Great,” she said with forced brightness.

Hank tied off the bandage and sat back on his haunches, diplomatically failing to acknowledge Holly and Kepler’s exchange. “You’re set for now,” he said, rising. “We have ice packs ready out there.” He stuck his thumb toward the field.

Kepler slid his foot back into his South African flag-emblazoned cleat and hobbled to the pitch without so much as glancing in her direction.

Her progress back to the corporate box was deliberately slow. She didn’t want to be assaulted with questions about Kepler’s mental state by the various members of the board, and she couldn’t bear listening to them speculate on when, to whom and for how much he should be sold.

She wanted to be at Kepler’s side, supporting him in whatever way he needed.

Too bad he’d made it clear that the only thing he wanted from her was distance.

Holly took a brief detour past the press holding area to see who’d gathered for the routine post-match interview session. Normally she left this kind of thing up to Discovery’s full-time press officers, since the questions rarely strayed beyond bland general inquiries about the technicalities of the match. Kepler was an old hand at those exchanges, so she tended to leave him to it and use the time for more strategic interactions.

Since her efforts this week had gotten a couple of good mentions in the local papers, however, she thought it worth checking to see whether she recognized any of the journalists who’d provided the positive write-ups. She paused in the entrance to the small, white-walled room and nearly gasped in shock.

Evan Barstow stood in the center of the rows of chairs, typing something into his phone.

Holly ducked out of sight and hustled back down the hall, crossing her fingers that he hadn’t seen her. She hadn’t been face-to-face with him in years, and the sight made her heart pound. The trauma and strain of being unwittingly complicit in his firing years earlier came flooding back, and she had to take a deep breath and remind herself that she hadn’t done anything wrong. Not then, and not now.

Only about ten minutes left before the end of the match. She made it back to the tunnel in record time, barely managing to wave her pass at the security guards as she hastened toward the pitch.

The atmosphere hit her like a ton of bricks the minute she exited the tunnel. The stands towered over the grassy pitch, and the way they widened at the top made her feel like the rows of seats were multiplying as she watched. The stadium wasn’t completely full, yet the noise from the crowd was raucous and overwhelming. She could only imagine what it must be like when every seat was filled.

Sven stood a few hundred feet away, shouting into the din, and the players called to each other on the field as well. From this proximity she could see just how quickly they ran, how hard they kicked to send the ball hurtling through the air and—as a Cleveland player sent a Discovery midfielder toppling over—the unyielding force they threw into their tackles.

Holly found Kepler on the end of a row of seats bolted to a long bench, directly behind an identical structure where the substitutes sat in their uniforms. One leg was extended, and an ice pack balanced precariously on his ankle. She received a few inquisitive looks from the other staff members in the area as she approached him, but no one said a word.

Kepler inched forward on his seat as he watched the action on the field, clearly itching to join in despite the bandage encasing his ankle. She wondered how many tackles he’d taken in twelve years on the pitch, how many times he’d played in stadiums packed to the brim with people chanting his name and tens of thousands more watching on TV, how many white balls he’d sent sailing into the net in matches of international significance.

She would never really understand what he’d been through, but there on the sidelines with the roar of the crowd, the sound of impact as two players’ bodies collided, the anxious postures of the substitutes eager to play, she suddenly realized just how much he’d lost on that frigid January night back in England.

Kepler shouted encouragement to one of the Discovery players who’d taken possession of the ball, not noticing as the ice pack slid from its perch. When she leaned down and plopped it back in place, he started as he registered her presence.

“What are you doing out here?” he demanded, although his tone held more surprise than annoyance.

“Evan Barstow is in the pressroom,” she said with hushed urgency. “Remember the name? He’s the reporter who writes all those negative articles in the
Recorder.
”

Kepler nodded in recognition. “Right, the one who hides behind the anonymous byline. So much of what he writes is so absurd that I can’t believe the paper bothers to print it. Last week he said my goal came too late in the match, even though it scored the winning point.” He shook his head.

“He seems to have friends in high places. Anyway, I’ll go with you when you speak to the press.”

He looked at her with sudden sharpness. “I don’t need supervision. I’ve done everything you asked me to this week.”

“I know,” she said, taken aback by his change in tone. “I appreciate it. We’ll get some great coverage. I’m just worried Evan will try to pull something on you, and I might be able to help if that happens.”

“I’m sure I can handle him,” Kepler muttered, but at the same time he gestured to the seat next to his, indicating his acquiescence.

Holly stepped carefully over his extended leg to drop into the hard plastic seat. She checked the clock. Barely three minutes left and Discovery had managed to hold on to their lead.

“It’s such a different experience sitting down here. You don’t get a real sense of the action from in the box. It’s kind of sterile and cut off.”

“I haven’t seen a match from the stands since I was eighteen years old,” he mused, his attention straying back to the pitch. “I barely remember what it was like.”

“Once the season starts, we should get you to a Panthers game,” she suggested. “You could see how they do things in American football.”

If Kepler heard her, he gave no sign. He was focused on the end of the match. His eyes flickered as they followed the ball. What could he see in the passes, tackles and formations that ordinary people couldn’t?

Finally the ref blew the whistle, and the victorious Discovery players exchanged high fives and applauded the opposing team. After the usual period of milling around before the players exited the pitch, it was time to face the press.

“How’s your ankle?” She asked as he rose gingerly from his seat.

“All sorted.” But he was visibly limping as they made their way through the tunnel to the pressroom.

The procedure they used was for a select group of players, plus Sven, to take turns standing in front of a partition decorated with the logos of the sponsors. Each journalist got four questions, and then the next one in line got their chance. The order was determined by the press officer in charge. Tonight it was a recent college graduate named Jeff, and his expression quickly shifted from surprise to alarm when he saw that Holly had accompanied Kepler for his turn in front of the reporters.

“Is everything okay?” he whispered. Holly gave a slight shake of her head as Kepler positioned himself in front of the partition.

“See that guy in the glasses, over there? That’s Evan Barstow. He’s behind all that gossip in the
Recorder.
”

Jeff’s eyes widened, and he stepped back to let Holly take his place beside the first reporter, standing out of frame but able to give Kepler cues.

After a few quick questions from a sports channel correspondent, Kepler spoke to reporters from the two newspapers that had covered the events she had arranged over the previous few weeks. Then it was Evan’s turn.

“Mr. de Klerk, great to meet you. I’m Evan Barstow, freelancing at the moment.” Evan stuck out his hand, which Kepler pointedly ignored.

“We’ve met before.”

“You have four questions,” Holly added, eager to get this over with.

Evan glanced between the two of them, his eyes beady and calculating behind his wire-rimmed glasses. He nodded to the cameraman to begin filming and switched on a handheld voice recorder.

“First question, then. Kepler, you’ll turn thirty-one in a few months—are you too old to still be playing professional soccer?”

She bit her lip, but Kepler shook off the question with an easy smile.

“I’ve scored the winning goal in the last five consecutive matches. If anything, I seem to be getting better with age,” he said with the charming thousand-watt grin he’d perfected over a decade of dealing with prying journalists.