He jerks his thumb in the direction of the parking garage. “I had to take the long way. Some puck bunnies were waiting at the door.”
I grimace. When I was a rookie, I admit to enjoying the attention of all the women. But that got old quickly, and I soon realized none of them liked me for me. They just wanted to be with a professional athlete.
“Oh my God! Declan Wild!” A blond woman, passing by us in the hallway, screeches to a halt and just…stares at me.
“Hi,” I say politely.
She waves her hand in front of her face. “You’re even hotter in real life!”
Jared cracks up next to me. “He’s like a king, isn’t he? A Wild King.”
The woman doesn’t even look at him as she answers, “You are, Mr. Wild.”
I give her the fake smile I’ve mastered over the years. I appreciate my fans, but I’ve never been comfortable with all the attention off the ice. “Thank you for the compliment, but I can assure you I’m no king.”
“He’s just shy,” Jared, the fucker, says to her. “Would you like me to take a pic of you two?”
The woman hands him her phone immediately and rushes to my side.
After we’ve smiled for the camera, Jared hands her phone back to her. She scans the picture and then looks up at me. “You’re the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen.”
I flash another distant but friendly smile, the kind no one can see the real me through. “Thank you. I hope you enjoy the game.”
As soon as we’re out of sight of her, I punch Jared in the arm. “A king?!” I say to him. “Are you serious?”
He grins. “Hey, I think I’m popular with the ladies, and then I get around you and remember you’re about a thousand times more so. You keep me grounded, man. Women literally faint in front of you. In all seriousness, I can see why you don’t date much.”
Yeah. Dating. The thing most people do before they ask someone to marry them.
“It just got to be more of a hassle than it was worth,” I mutter as we reach the locker room and head inside.
“I get it.” He opens his locker. “Don’t sweat it, Wild. You’ve got time to find the right woman if you want to settle down someday.”
Time is something I definitely don’t have. But I don’t tell Jared that. Instead, I reach into my locker and start to get dressed for the game.
Chapter Two
Mia
“Your ranch is perfectly set up for corporate retreats,” I say to the Butlers as I stand at the front of my family’s company boardroom.
“Tell us more, please,” Bud Butler, the son whose opinion will make or break this deal, asks me with just a hint of boredom in his voice.
I take his clear challenge the way I always do with potential clients. I nod at him and turn back to the video screen.Time to win this account.
I use the pointer to highlight the slide on the screen. “With all these unused cabins on this section of your property, you have a beautiful area to convert into guest bunkhouses.” I flip through the different designs I had our company architect draw up. “You can keep the remodeling minimal. You can have eco-toilets installed as well.”
Dressed in my lucky fitted black jacket with matching skirt that hits me just above the knee, I feel the adrenaline coursing through my veins. My assistant, Dean, has the camera trained on me so that if we get what we hope to get out of this meeting, we’ll have the training materials to do it again.
“Wonderful,” Alice Butler says from the video screen where she and her husband, Jack, called into the meeting. “I love the concept, Mia. Our family definitely needs the additional income.”
“That’s what Circle PR is here for, ma’am,” I tell her. A single strand of my jet-black hair falls into my face, and I tuck it back behind my ear. “Our motto is ‘Preserving Montana’s Ranches,’ and we do our best to satisfy each and every customer.”
“I like this idea, too, Mia,” Jack says from his spot next to Alice. “What do you think, Bud?”
His son, Bud, who runs the ranch in conjunction with his parents and who’s sitting directly to my right, frowns. “I’m still not sold. What about guests traipsing in and out of our family kitchen for meals? It sounds awfully distracting. I’m not interested in eating with a bunch of strangers.”
I’ve spent weeks working with the Butlers and getting to know their likes and dislikes. I had anticipated Bud would feel this way. And I’ve prepared a solution.
