CHAPTER 1
CAMDEN
Everything they sayabout Florida is true.
The heat, the bugs, the guy with the beer belly in a cutoff shirt smoking a cigar while wrangling an alligator in the middle of the road…
It’s all true.
“Do we really have to do this?” Malcolm, my babysitter for all intents and purposes, groans in disgust.
“Weare not doing anything, and I have no idea why you’re still here.”
“Because you’re about to make yet another bad decision.”
I gesture to the guy trapping the gator as I tell Malcolm, “If you’re not going to leave me the fuck alone, why don’t you make yourself helpful?”
“That’s not in my contract.”
“Neither is fucking up my life.”
“I’mkeepingyou from fucking up your life.” He clicks his tongue and adjusts the collar of his shirt, looking like a real-life Carlton Banks. Minus the dance moves. I might like him more if he did dance. At least then he’d be entertaining, while simultaneously ruining all my fun.
After…everything, Malcolm showed up on my doorstep one day and has yet to leave. Apparently, my PR team thinks I’m incapable of keeping myself out of trouble. He calls himself my assistant.
I call him a pain in my ass.
“So, let’s just pack it in,” he suggests. “I’ll buy you breakfast tomorrow. Or today, since the sun will be coming up in a few hours.”
“Oh boy!” I clap a few times. “Can I get an ice cream too, Daddy?”
He wrenches back, hand on his chest. “Please don’t call me daddy. Only Jenson can do that.”
I roll my eyes. “So why don’t you go home to him. Leave me be.”
“Not happening.”
I blow out a breath toward the night sky. It’s nearly two in the morning on a barren stretch of road outside of Fort Lauderdale. I shouldn’t be here, I know that, but lately, none of theshoulds have stopped me from doing anything.
Not the partying in Miami when I shouldn’t be drinking so much in the off-season.
Not the two blondes in Key West when I’ve got a girlfriend.
And not that pesky arrest for illegal drag racing.
Malcolm’s been at my side for the last two months, hissing in my ear about what I shouldn’t be doing and reporting back to Debra Rosenstein, half of Rosenstein & Hill, the public relations firm for the most high-profile athletes in Philadelphia. I’d been hauled into her office after the incident with that motherfucker and his camera, and she chewed my ass out, demanding I clean up my act before it’s too late.
But in my defense, it was raining and the sidewalk was slippery. I couldn’t help it if I tripped and fell on top of him. He was lucky it was only his camera that broke and not his fucking mouth from running it so much.
Over the past few years, I have earned a bit of a reputation and I’m used to being called names, but living and playing inPhiladelphia is brutal. The “fans” are savage, climbing poles and rioting overwins. And they’re even worse over losses. Lately, I haven’t been able to go anywhere without somebody chirping in my ear or throwing something at me, making my life in Philly hell, probably hoping I’ll be traded or quit.
Which is why I got the hell out of dodge, with a pit stop to pick up my car before hightailing it south.
Slim saunters over to me and skims his hand over my 1978 Camaro. “Sweet little ride you got here.”
I nod in agreement. I had it customized with a turbo kit that whistles like a banshee and headers that announce my arrival three blocks away. That’s what I love most about it, the sound. It quiets the roaring in my head as I’m racing down the drag.
“Yeah, am I finally gonna be able to actually stretch her legs or what?”
