Page 18 of Filthy Player
“It’s just dinner, Paige, and helping me buy a truck. I bought Betsy for five hundred dollars from a neighbor because it could get me to school, and that’s all the shit I know about cars. Then as a thank you, I take you to dinner. We talk, hopefully I can get you to laugh, and I take you home. That’s all that I’m looking for tonight.”
“Really?” She tilted her head to the side and a chunk of her bangs that had fallen out of her clip dropped over one eye.
I smoothed it back, lingering at her ear before running it down her jaw. “Yeah. You want to give me more, that’s your call, but I’m not playing you, and I wouldn’t. I’m honest. Always.”
“Okay, then. I should hurry to get ready.”
“Dress casual. Not going anywhere fancy while I’m in this.” I wiped my hands down my jeans and dress shirt. I’d thrown it all on after practice, hoping for her yes to dinner, but something told me Paige wouldn’t be impressed with five-star restaurants and suits and ties. Which suited me just fine. I’d always prefer a good burger and beer to foie gras and champagne.
“All right, and thanks again for my dad. That was really cool.”
“Be even cooler when you’re in the box with him, wearing my number thirteen on a jersey and cheering for me.”
Her cheeks burned and I told her I’d see her soon. I walked away before I pulled her in closer and kissed her like I wanted to.
Then I walked up to her dad, took the handles of his wheelchair and pushed him toward the garage.
Loud enough for Paige to hear, I asked, “So Sam, you got any embarrassing photos of your daughter lying around?”
CHAPTER SEVEN
PAIGE
I’d been nervous at home getting ready, debating what to wear and how to do my hair after I rushed through a shower. It wasn’t that I was excited or nervous about going on a date with Beaux Hale, quarterback of the Rough Riders, Super Bowl Champions, necessarily. It was that I had a date at all.
It’d been over six months since I’d been out with anyone, and I hadn’t had sex since Spencer broke up with me. I didn’t have time with the other guys I’d gone out on a date with. They’d claimed I didn’t have enough time to give them and walked away before we could ever make it that far.
Which not only still stung, but made me uninterested in dating anyone. If they couldn’t understand the time my dad required, they weren’t worth mine.
I still doubted Beaux would be any different when I arrived back at the garage.
Then my nerves spiked to DefCon freak out levels. And that was Beaux’s fault.
He looked too damn good sitting in the office with my dad, feet kicked up on the desk, beer in his hand and saying something while my dad threw his head back and laughed.
He looked at ease in our rundown garage’s waiting room slash office. He looked like he was just a guy. Not a sports superstar, not plastered on the covers of magazines or headlining interviews on Sportscenter.
Seeing him appear to be just a normal guy, dressed to excite a woman’s libido in well-worn jeans and a pale blue, striped dress shirt, well that did things to me.
As we climbed into the truck and started talking, I was beginning to think he was showing me exactly who he was—just a simple, laid-back guy from Iowa who threw a ball for a living. And I really liked everything he was showing me.
“Do you know what kind of truck you want?” I asked as we drove down the Interstate headed out toward Durham.
“Ford and black,” Beaux replied. “That’s all I really care about.”
“Why a Ford?”
“Because Chevy’s are shit,” Beaux said simply.
“Nice.” I laughed. It sounded exactly like something my dad would say and I turned to the window and watched the trees go by, the clouds roll in.
It felt like it stormed in Raleigh all the time during the summer. Huge gully-gushes that barreled over embankments and flooded roads.
We were supposed to get rain again tonight, and hopefully, it wouldn’t be a bad one. I hated storms and the unpredictability in them.
He pulled in to the Cornerstone Ford and Jeep dealership halfway between Raleigh and Durham. He barely had time to help me out of the truck, when an excited salesman was strolling toward us.
“Hello there, good evening and welcome to Cornerstone, I’m Kyle Ballsman, how can I help you today?”
