AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I don’t care about outcomes.”
“Come now, Miss Jameson, everybody wants something.”
Patient very, very unmotivated. In danger of consuming large amounts of chocolate and ice cream.
“Think of something you want. Something small. Picture it in your mind. Can you see it?”
“Uh-huh.”
“What is it, Miss Jameson?”
“Alex Winters being hit by a piano falling from several stories up?”
Patient may be actively hostile. Or borderline psychotic. Prospects for intervention poor.
Oh good, now her subconscious was giving up on her. What did that say about the situation?
That she really, really wanted Alex Winters’s head on a platter. Or maybe her father’s. She still couldn’t believe he’d sold the Saints. Without even once mentioning his plans to her in advance. Which could only mean that he felt guilty about it. Had Winters pressured him? She wouldn’t put it past the man. He was a very highly motivated individual. All about the win. And the money. She knew men like him like the back of her hand, having grown up around professional athletes. Even though her father had tried to keep that culture out of the Saints as far as possible, there was only so much you could do to hold back the tide.
What she didn’t know was when he’d stopped trying. They’d had all these plans. She was going to come back from Chicago and start helping him out. They’d talked about it forever. So what had changed?
How had Alex Winters convinced him to sell?
She didn’t understand any of it.
So maybe that was the first step. Talk to her father.
Alex strode into his new office at Saints headquarters on Wednesday morning and paused just inside the door to take in the sight. His at last. No sign of Tom Jameson’s old battered desk and wall of photos. Instead there was everything Alex needed to get to work. The desk was just like the one back in his New York office. His laptop. A bank of three phones. The only things hanging on the wall were the number he’d cut out of his jersey after the bombing and framed and the bank of flat-panel TVs tuned to every possible sports and business station under the sun.
Right at home. Ready to make the Saints the team they could be or, at least, stop them from sliding into oblivion.
So why did he feel guilty?
Goddamn Maggie Jameson, that was why. She’d looked at him with those big angry brown eyes last night, and told him to go to the devil before she’d passed out in the taxi home.
She’d looked lost. Something he’d never seen before.
Maggie Jameson was a chip off the old block. Never far from her father’s side as long as Alex had been a Saints fan. Which was forever. He could picture Maggie’s childhood and teen years as well as his own, thanks to the never-ending photos of her in the press and in the team newsletter and on the Web site. She’d been cute as a kid, big brown eyes and straight dark hair and bangs, tucked under her dad’s arm or whacking at balls tossed by the pitchers at kid-friendly speeds. She’d had a pretty good swing, he remembered.
He rubbed the side of his face idly. He’d bet she had a pretty good swing now too and he’d probably been lucky that she hadn’t slugged him one last night. He wouldn’t have held it against her.
Tom’s Little Saint, the press had dubbed her, which had morphed into Saint Maggie as she’d grown older and become a seemingly perfect teenager, bringing home straight-A report cards, helping out with the Saints’ community programs, and avoiding any hint of teen drama. Or, at least, avoiding anything that Tom hadn’t been able to keep out of the papers.
She’d grown up to be more than cute—he’d had time to appreciate the sleek curves under her suit yesterday before she’d realized what the meeting was about and her expression had turned to ice and fury. But those sleek curves and the way her face was an intriguing mix of angles and softness were things he was determined to ignore.
He needed Maggie on his side, not in his bed. She knew more about the Saints than anyone apart from her father. In many respects she was the team’s mascot, even more than the actual fuzzy blue, white, and gold angel that cavorted on the sidelines at the games.
Trouble was, after last night, he had no idea how to win her over. And if he couldn’t win her over, he was going to have to fire her. Lucas and Mal were going to laugh their asses off. Lucas had suggested that informing Maggie about the deal sooner might have been a good idea, but Alex hadn’t wanted the complication, worried that guilt over his daughter’s feelings might stop Tom Jameson from doing what needed to be done to save the team.
There was no place for messy emotions in business. They didn’t get the job done. He wasn’t a monster, he tried to make sure people were treated well and taken care of, but someone had to make the hard decisions.
And that someone was usually him.
Which was just the way he liked it.
So why was Maggie Jameson tugging at his conscience like goddamn Jiminy Cricket in a bad mood?
Maybe he was just tired from the pressure of closing the deal, though, as one of his old bosses had said, “if you’re tired of the deal, you’re tired of life.” Alex wasn’t ready to be tired of life. He had a team to save. And he’d call the plays the way he saw them. Even if he had to drag the rest of the world kicking and screaming along with him.
