Page 53 of Heartless As Puck

JANE

“He’ll break your heart, too. They all do.”

Rebecca Jansen’s words echoed in my head as I was preparing Austin’s usual pregame breakfast of oatmeal and eggs.

It hadn’t seemed like she was trying to be malicious. I got the feeling she was genuinely trying to warn me away in some misguided attempt to save me from Austin.

I didn’t know what to make of it.

My phone pinged with the distinctive sound I used to signal Google alerts for Austin’s name. I finished turning over the eggs and reached for my phone, swiped the screen to unlock it, and tapped on the notification to open it.

My heart sank. The headline read: Chicago Chaos Changes Are All Talk.

I scanned the article quickly. “Speak of the devil.”

Rebecca Jansen was claiming that the team’s less than stellar performance against Detroit showed that fans couldn’t expect the kind of turnaround that the Chaos’s new management was insisting was just around the corner.

In addition to referencing the game, she cited obvious tension between members of the Chaos, particularly Drew McKinley and Matt Matthews, as well as a “heated argument” between the team’s captain, Austin Harris, and members of the Milwaukee Mountain Lions at the fundraiser the previous night.

My gut churned. Whatever my complicated emotions regarding Rebecca might be, Austin would be furious. Either that or devastated. It was hard to know for sure.

Coach Dunn and Stephen Robertson wouldn’t be pleased either. Not to mention Joseph Trent, who’d spoken at the fundraiser and certainly wouldn’t be glad to hear that his players had done anything worthy of negative attention during the time when they were supposed to be having positive exposure.

I drew in a deep breath and let it out in a gust.

Rebecca Jansen could hold a grudge, that was for damn sure.

I did feel for her. After all, she’d found out in the worst possible way that her boyfriend—Connor Taggert—was cheating on her. Photos of him with another woman had surfaced on one of her competitor’s websites.

I understood her hurt and her anger. It was true that most of his teammates had known what was happening and hadn’t told her. That was a betrayal, in a sense.

But righteous anger or not, Taggert was gone now. The rest of the team didn’t deserve to suffer because of his misdeeds. Especially not when they’d kept quiet out of fear rather than loyalty. Punishing them for that went beyond petty.

The eggs sizzled, and I turned off the heat, then stirred the oatmeal, which was almost ready too. I needed to tell Austin about the article. I doubted he’d seen it yet. He liked to stay focused on game mornings, which meant he didn’t visit social media and screened all calls other than those from his coach, agent, the team manager, and me.

Despite knowing I had to tell him, I was tempted to keep it to myself until later because I knew it would upset him, and I hated to do that. Unfortunately, even if I kept my mouth shut, I had no doubt he’d find out as soon as we reached the stadium. It would be best if he had time to prepare his game face. If he was blindsided, that wouldn’t help anyone.

“Morning, Jane,” he said, wandering into the kitchen with headphones around his neck and a team jersey on. It looked soft and cozy, and my fingers itched to reach for him. “Is breakfast ready?”

“Yeah.” Forcing myself to turn away, I switched off the stovetop and served his eggs onto a plate, then poured the oatmeal into a bowl. “Do you want a coffee?”

He nodded. “Yes, please.”

He took his breakfast to the breakfast bar, as was becoming a habit now. I fixed his coffee and made one for myself too, adding a spoonful of sugar and a little creamer. I took the coffee to him and left mine at the stool beside his while I quickly put together my own breakfast of Greek yogurt and fruit.

“I, uh, have some bad news,” I said, stirring my blueberries and strawberries into the yogurt and scooping up a spoonful.

He looked up, his mouth full of egg, and made a sound in the back of his throat, encouraging me to go on. Something warm unfurled within me. He shouldn’t be adorable like that, and yet I wanted to bundle him up and protect him from the truth.

After a brief hesitation, I opened my phone to show him the article. “Rebecca Jansen is at it again.”

He read it, his frown growing deeper with each passing second. I resisted the urge to run my thumb over the furrow and smooth it.

“Damn.” He wiped his expression clean, hiding his frustration. “How are we supposed to make progress in cleaning up our image when she’s so determined to stand in the way?”

“I guess all you can do is keep trying and hope that if there is less for her to latch onto, then there’s less damage she can do.” It might not be what he wanted to hear, but I couldn’t think of a better option. If she were just some random reporter, perhaps she could be paid off, but she was a woman with a vendetta, and I had a feeling that if anyone tried to bribe her, it would be on the front page of the paper the next day.

Austin’s phone, on the counter between us, rang loudly. I picked it up, hoping I’d be able to deal with whomever it was so that it wouldn’t distract Austin from his upcoming game.