4

Cleo

Plum Purple Bottle Of Lube

I had dreams and those head intern dreams depended on not getting caught up with a football player. I practically shoved Miles and his enormous pile of flowers off to one of the couches, hidden by a divider. As quick as I could, I stumbled back to the front desk, about as red as the dahlias.

"Cleo!" Coach Lawson boomed, surrounded by his crowd of assistants and analysts we traveled with.

I attempted a smile, breathless. "Coach!"

"What're you doing up?"

What a great question.

The front desk employee shot me a knowing look, but I shook my head.

Please. With all the love and sisterhood and girl power in the world, I begged her with my eyes. Don't mention the boy, hidden away in the lobby .

She hummed loudly and resumed typing at her desk.

"I—uh—I'm buying an iced coffee," I blurted out. "For tomorrow—tomorrow's practice."

"We're drinking at the pool. You're welcome to join us!" Coach Lawson thumped his Romans hat against the counter and gestured back to the lines of coolers behind the front desk employee. "How much beer do you have? How much can we buy? Can we buy all of it?"

The employee threw me a knowing smile. "It's before two in the morning. You're fine."

"There we go!"

The front desk employee started stacking cans on the counter and Coach Lawson's lackeys loaded them into their arms. But even after he paid, Coach Lawson loitered long enough to offer me a crinkled smile. "You sure you don't want to join us?"

"Oh, I'm fine, coach."

"You work too hard. Reminds me of myself. Ha! You'll get older. Know you don't have to do all this stuff, kid."

"I'm sure I—" My attention was diverted for a moment by the front desk employee, leaning as far as she could at her desk. She was staring at something beyond us, off towards the lobby, and I had a sinking feeling in my stomach that I knew who it was that took her attention. I swallowed. "I'm—I'm sure I will. But not—not today."

Quickly, the front desk employee slid away from her post, but none of Coach Lawson's team seemed to notice. Coach Lawson especially. He patted his stomach. "You know, you've been doing great work, Bennight."

"Thank—thank you, sir." It was so hard to focus when half of my attention was on the front desk employee, walking back to her post with a black credit card in hand. "It's appreciated, it—it really is."

"I thought you handled yourself very well today. Didn't she, boys?" They all nodded, not really paying attention. "Reminds me of your mother. I worked with her back in the old days. When she left my team, wow, we missed her. I know she's doing good work at the charity—the New York one—what one is it now? But damn! That Bennight glue is something else!"

"The…oh." My eyes followed the front desk employee while she swiped the credit card and scooped up a package of chocolate-covered strawberries from the cooler. "That wasn't just me today. Um…Miles Locke helped me."

"Locke?" He frowned. "They've passed that boy around more often than a cat at a senior home."

It took me a moment for his words to sink in because the front desk employee hurried back to the desk to pull a bottle of wine from a locked cabinet.

No, no, no . I bit my lip.

My team couldn't see him, because there would be fifty questions, and who could say Miles would keep his mouth shut?

"What I wouldn't give to have him on the Romans," coach said wistfully.

I cleared my throat. "Miles seems very happy at KYU."

Coach Lawson burst into laughter, and I was about to ask him what was so funny when I saw the plum-purple bottle of lube that the front desk employee pulled out from another locked cabinet.

Coach kept laughing while the front desk employee hurried across the tile. " Somebody's having a good night!"

"You know what, coach?!" I yelled, and he and his team swiveled to look at me. "I can't tell you how much I love being part of the Marrs family. Every day—I'm just—thank you."

He offered me another smile and tapped the counter. "That Bennight glue. We'll see you in the morning, kid."

"Of course, sir. Thank you."

I waited as long as I could before the distant sounds of a door allowed me to move . Then, I flew across the tile. "What the hell was that?!"

"Hm?"

The man had the audacity to sit comfortably on the couch, surrounded by chocolate strawberries, wine, and a plum purple bottle of lube. Like he didn't have a care in the world! My hands flew to my hips.

"You could've gotten me in so much trouble."

"I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking."

"You weren't thinking?! "

He raised an eyebrow. "You've got that effect on people, vixen. Don't pretend like you don't know that."

I stared without a response. Miles wouldn't wiggle himself out of my irritation. But as hard as I tried to hold on to it, it slipped out of my fingers like water. I wasn't irritated. No - I still had that horrible, awful, career-threatening fascination with him that wouldn't end with the chocolate strawberries clearly meant for me.

"Don't do it again," I finally said.

"Won't happen again."

"Good." I turned and shook my head, needing to get away from the way his eyes smoldered in the soft lamplight and the way his t-shirt hugged his muscles.

"What're you doing tomorrow night?" he called.

The damn audacity .

How could he even have the balls to ask that?

"Miles, I'm part of the scouting team," I reminded him.

"I don't care about Marrs."

The craziest thing was that he actually meant it. Marrs University was one of the few schools where student-athletes made royalties off their names, and we were one of the top football programs in the country. People begged in my inbox daily for a consideration. And Miles couldn't care less.

"You're seriously not gunning for Marrs?"

An amused smirk played on his lips. "Nope."

"You're happy with KYU?"

"I don't give a damn about KYU either."

Did he play every conversation like he wanted to shock me? If that was the aim, he succeeded. I stood there, unable to piece the little bits of information he popped up with. And a hundred percent unsure of how to proceed.

"So, about tomorrow night…" Miles pressed.

"We have the coaches' dinner," I answered automatically.

"Day after?"

"You're kidding, right? Are you kidding?"

"Thursday night. We don't have practice Friday morning."

"Yes, because the selected few are talking with Marrs's team captain." With a sigh, I stopped myself. And, slowly, I looked over at the gorgeous man, waiting for my answer.

I hesitated. "Thursday night?"

"What would you say to a campus tour?"

Miles's eyes never left mine, and the calm confidence of his questions hooked me again and again. I had to have everything in order at all times. All of my square cubes had to go in the square openings. Anything else didn't work with my system. But he was just so…Miles didn't go with the flow - he switched it up to work with him .

Taking a moment, I thought hard about two absolute facts.

Miles didn't give a shit about Marrs. Check.

I wanted to become head intern, and Miles, the same man who didn't care about Marrs, couldn't jeopardize that because he didn't want to go to Marrs. Check.

So…where was the inappropriateness?

And I worked hard for my university—damn hard. Didn't I deserve a little break, including a delicious man buying me wine, chocolate-covered strawberries, and overpriced lube?

We'd have our fun and part ways. Easy-peasy.

Right?

He cocked his head to the side. "Seven o'clock? I'll pick you up."

The amusement was back, but there was something else too. A dare. We both knew if I agreed to an evening campus tour, it wasn't because I was squealing with joy at getting to see political science halls in the rich moonlight. We were meeting as adults.

And adults do fun things with plum-purple bottles of lube.

"Seven sounds fine," I replied, trying not to let the pleased note touch my voice.

"You're right. Seven sounds perfect."