Betting On The Rookie. Stephanie Doyle

was. He was built to be a knight.

      But she’d told him when he agreed to do this, it was necessary to stick to the script.

      “Yes, as many of you may know, Scout Baker was working for the Rebel organization as a scout when she found me coaching a high school baseball team. She invited me to a tryout camp, and, well, my life really hasn’t been the same since.”

      Sam nodded. That sounded sincere. Real. Most likely because it was.

      “Anyway I owe the Baker family a tremendous debt, and I’m confident that Samantha will do right by me.”

      There. It made perfect sense. A man could overlook scandal out of loyalty to the family. Sam hated that she had to set the narrative that way, that he had taken pity on her, but at least he would be perceived as squeaky clean despite her past.

      “Are you at all worried about her questionable character and her collusion with her client to cover up an assault?”

      Sam gritted her teeth. She had hoped for no follow-up, but this part was still scripted just in case. All he had to say was: I’m not here to talk about my agent’s past. I’m here to talk about my future in baseball.

      A perfect line that would pivot everyone back to the game and him and away from her.

      “She didn’t collude with her client on anything. She was lied to by a man she trusted to tell her the truth. And what really cranks my gear is that somehow it’s like she’s to blame for what that asshole did. This guy is a violent scumbag who hit his fiancée, tried to cover it up and then lied about it. Why is my agent to blame for that? I’m perfectly happy with Samantha Baker as my agent, and, no, I have no concerns about her character at all. Now, if we’re done here?”

      Evan stood so quickly he almost toppled over his chair. A few reporters were still firing questions at him, obviously wanting to feed on the sound bite he had given them.

      Sam closed her eyes and sighed. He was going to make the ESPN highlights tonight by calling Richard Stanson a violent scumbag asshole.

      At least it hadn’t been douche bag. He’d at least taken her advice and avoided that one.

      The door to the office where she was waiting flew open and then slammed shut behind her. Evan was already loosening his tie as he mumbled under his breath about more assholes.

      “I’m not here to talk about my agent’s past. I’m here to talk about my future in baseball,” Sam said. “It’s a great line. You know how I know? I wrote it for you.”

      He glared as if he were about to snap at her, too, then she could see he just released his anger in a woosh of breath. As if simply by looking at him, she had soothed the savage beast. She had originally thought he was a white-knight hero, but he wasn’t without a little temper, either.

      “It’s not right. Calling out your character like that. And sorry, but I’m not going to stand for it. You’ve got to deal with that. Okay? You’re my agent now. I get to say what I want about you when I want to. Got it?”

      At his intensity, Sam felt a swirl of something in her chest. Like she was being looked after and cared for and protected. It wasn’t an uncommon feeling.

      Of course she’d always had Duff.

      Then there had been Bob, her mother’s husband and Sam’s biological father. Something Bob hadn’t known for eighteen years of Sam’s life because he’d been stupid by dumping Sam’s mother when he thought he was doing the right thing by her. Bob had wanted to fight her battles, too, like any other father would, but Sam was an adult when she met him. She’d been able to take care of herself, even at eighteen.

      Yes, Duff and Bob were two men with flaws. But they were also two men who’d had her back.

      Now Evan stood in front of her, and with him, she had that same feeling. Like no matter what, he would guard over her, snarling at anyone who dared to take a swipe at her, no matter how many times she told him she could save herself. Hadn’t he called her terrifying?

      Terrifying people took care of themselves.

      She opened her mouth to tell him one more time he didn’t have to save her. That she wasn’t that kind of woman who needed rescuing.

      Instead she nodded. “Got it.”

      He was looking at her warily, like he was waiting for more of a fight, but the truth was there was no point in arguing. She wasn’t going to change his mind, and she wasn’t going lie to herself and say there hadn’t been some satisfaction in watching someone else defend her. Someone else besides her say she wasn’t a liar.

      “I’m going to be on Sports Center tonight, aren’t I?”

      “Yes,” Sam agreed. “Maybe that’s not such a bad thing. A little buzz never hurt anyone. And since you don’t have a Twitter account, you’re not going to know what all the horrible Richard Stanson fans are going to Tweet about you for calling out their boy.”

      “The fact that he still has fans... I mean, seriously, how do people reconcile that? How can you root for someone who you know has no respect for women?”

      Sam frowned. “Because he wins. Don’t get me wrong—we’ll call him out for it, we’ll talk about him for a couple of weeks, we’ll even discuss domestic abuse and ways to help end it. But at the end of the day, people don’t really care about their sports heroes’ lives. They care about their own lives, and when their team wins, they feel good. That’s all that counts.”

      “Doesn’t make it right.”

      Sam walked over to him and brushed a little lint off his shoulder. “I told you before. Welcome to the Bigs, my friend.”

      They looked at each other, and Sam could feel a shift in the dynamic. She was standing too close. She had made an excuse to touch him. Had there been any lint really, or had she just wanted to get closer to him? So she could be near the man who wanted to rush to her defense.

      The man who had made her pout.

      He was looking at her now not as his agent but as a woman, and she could feel the answer to that look all the way to her toes.

      Yes.

      No.

      She tried to be casual about how she removed her hand from his shoulder, but before she could fully escape, he’d circled his fingers around her wrist, trapping her.

      “Are we going to talk about this?” he asked, his voice low and slightly gruff.

      “Talk about what?”

      Sam almost wanted to smile at how well she had pulled off that line. She was cool, casual and sounded completely unaware of anything he might be talking about.

      “I want you.”

      Sam’s jaw dropped. Who did that? Who just said the thing they were thinking despite the consequences?

      “I get it. I know it’s messed up. You’re my agent and I want it to stay that way, but maybe it would be better, easier, if we talked about the elephant. Because I’m pretty sure this goes both ways.”

      Sam managed a weak huff. “That’s awfully arrogant of you.”

      Evan shook his head slowly. “Not really. You’re trembling, and where my thumb is hitting your pulse point I can feel your heart racing.”

      Sam jerked her hand away, and Evan let her go.

      “We need a plan. A way we’re going to deal with it.”

      “I had a plan,” Sam said. “I was going to ignore it. You were supposed to do the same. It’s how adults deal with things they don’t want to deal with.”

      “That seems silly, doesn’t it?”

      He was smiling, which made him look incredibly endearing. She wanted to slap his face. Maybe that would cure him of his desire. “Look, Evan, what did you think I was