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“Back to Maggie,” Lucas said, apparently not interested in money talk. “What exactly did she agree to do for us?”
“We’re working out the final details of that today. But essentially she’s going to be our one-woman cheer squad and team whisperer. I’ll get her to introduce me to everyone, play nice with the press, and do whatever else we need to get the Saints on board. And the fans.”
He paused for a moment, contemplating what would happen if the Saints fans decided they hated the new owners of the team. The fact that the Saints got pretty good gate takings at Deacon—considering the state of the stadium and the fact it was too small—and that their fans were rabid enough to buy truckloads of merchandise and whatever else the Saints might offer them was pretty much the only reason the team had stayed afloat over the last year. If the fans changed their minds and stayed home, then the corporate sponsors would ditch the team as well and they’d either fall into the minors or the footnotes of history.
Or be relocated and renamed, as he’d warned Maggie. None of those options appealed. So winning the fans over was one of his top priorities. Which meant displaying a happy and cooperative Maggie Jameson at every opportunity between now and the start of spring training. Then the players and the team’s form could start taking some of the load as well.
And then there were the other teams’ owners …
But time enough to worry about them later. Maggie was due to arrive in about thirty minutes. Which meant Mal’s fun tour of the bowels of Deacon Field needed to speed up. “Okay, Coulter, let’s get this thing done. Lead down, Macbeth. Or something.” He wondered how many more levels there were. They’d started near the top of the oval tower block that rose for six stories above the highest point of the stadium’s north side, backing the home plate like a giant silver toilet roll. The slanted roof with its trademark silver glass marking a circle in the surface was supposed to evoke a halo. Personally, Alex thought it was ugly as sin but he wasn’t dumb enough to start messing with beloved landmarks at this point.
Not to mention that unless the repairs to the tower actually required an exterior remodel, he wasn’t going to waste money on cosmetic changes that could be better spent pumping up the team talent and making sure the whole damned field didn’t burn down around their ears.
I should go inside. Maggie stared at her hands gripping the steering wheel of her car. She should let go of the steering wheel, get out of the car, walk to the elevator, and go up and meet with Alex Winters like she’d agreed.
The theory was fine. The execution, she was having trouble with.
She’d argued with herself last night, trying to convince herself that working with Alex would be fine and that she could do it and everything would be just dandy.
But this morning, after the trek out to her dad’s place to get her car—she’d been determined not to take Alex up on his offer of a driver and had had to take the subway, a ferry, and a cab—her nerves were starting to get the better of her. The fact that her dad hadn’t been home to talk to hadn’t helped. How could she work with Alex? He’d stolen her life. Every time she started to think she might see something good in him, that was the fact that kept getting in the way.
Driving into the parking garage, which should have felt as comfortable and familiar as slipping on her favorite pair of yoga pants, she felt weirdly out of place again. And now that she’d parked her Mini, she seemed to have frozen in place, stuck to the seat.
If she got out of the car and went inside, then she would be throwing her lot in with the devil. Was it selling out or was it the right thing? Could she work with him?
Could she work with him and not do something really dumb like notice that more than just his arms were appealing?
She tried to squelch the thought. It insisted on popping back up and circling around her brain like a hamster on speed.
Damn it. The man was the devil. That was the only explanation for the fact that she could be so angry at him and yet still be far too aware of his eyes and mouth and hands.
She lowered her head to the steering wheel, feeling the tension turning her back and shoulders to steel bars.
“So what do we do when faced with a difficult choice, Ms. Jameson?”
Patient displays reluctance to commit in the face of obstacles. Patient overwhelmed.
“Eat chocolate?”
Patient would benefit from better coping mechanism. Patient is going to end up with diabetes.
“Perhaps you could try some visualization? What do you want out of the situation? Can you see it?”
Patient reluctant to learn the lessons we have been teaching her. Still, she pays the bills.
What did Maggie want out of the situation? That was easy. She wanted to walk upstairs and find her father in his office, Shonda manning the desk outside as always, telling her she needed to eat some more, and then go a few doors down to her own little office and get to work, with nothing having changed.
“There is no point in visualizing what cannot be. Let’s try again. What do you want, Ms. Jameson?”
Alex’s face flashed into her head, green eyes laughing at something Hana had said last night, beer in one hand, leaning back in his chair, collar loosened, sleeves rolled up, muscled forearms flexing.
Her stomach lurched.
No.
She didn’t want that.
That would be masochistic, idiotic, and several other things that her imaginary therapist wouldn’t appreciate her saying out loud.
