“Yeah, you heard that right. The LA fucking Rangers.” Ger slapped his palm on the table, a self-satisfied smirk in place. “And…Arizona wants to have a chat too.”
“Arizona? I don’t get it.”
“There’s nothing to ‘get’…except a one-year contract worth big bucks.” He threw out a ridiculous number and made a mind-blown gesture. “Boggles the brain, right? If I shop thissome more, I can drum up interest elsewhere—Chicago, Miami, Boston, Hous?—”
“Okay, stop.”
“You’re shocked. I love this!”
I took a quick peek at the nearest table to be sure we couldn’t be overheard, but they were engrossed in conversation and were too far away to catch anything juicy. Ger knew that, the cunning SOB. If he’d been concerned about privacy, he’d have insisted on meeting at his office. He’d wanted to catch me unaware in a casual setting and spin an off-the-cuff “what if” potential multi-million-dollar deal…as one does.
“I just retired. Itjusthappened.”
“Un-retire. You’re not seventy, for fuck’s sake. You’re a healthy thirty-six-year-old dude with star power.”
“Star power?” I repeated incredulously. “I count on you to keep it real, Ger. Yes, I can probably sell some dishwashing detergent, and with some training, I could probably be an analyst, but?—”
“I know who you are. And I know I can get you that salary. At least for a year.”
He had to be high.
“Ger…”
“There’s an elephant in the room, Si. Do you need me to point it out?”
I flinched as realization dawned. “You’ve got to be kidding. Is this really about Alli’s boyfriend?”
Ger nodded slowly, a wicked grin firmly in place. “Let’s be honest, Alli’s involvement with Sutcliffe makes you appealing too.”
I slumped in the booth. “Oh, c’mon.”
“Especially in LA,” he continued. “The Devils couldn’t keep you because they spent all their money on new talent. They need new blood more than they need publicity, but the Rangers…they’re another story. They have money and could use your celebrity.”
“Celebrity? What are you fucking talking about?”
“Hollywood is here, baby. You’re in it. Don’t act like a hayseed. You know how this goes. You’ll get the commercial endorsements too, and those commercials will get played after the ads for the newTrilogy Alpha Teammovie.” Ger lowered his voice, his eyes blazing earnestly. “Look, I hate to go there, but I gotta spell this out for you. The longer Alli is with this guy, the more scrutiny she gets…and by association, you do too. There’s no such thing as anonymity in Liam’s world. They want to know every damn thing about him. And when he showed up with a new woman on his arm, who happened to have been married to a pro football player, they got curious about her…and you.”
“Yeah, thanks for the breakdown. I know this shit show,” I snapped. “I fucking live it.”
“I get that, and I’m giving you an opportunity to turn the tables,” he said softly. “Fuck the sad-sack bullshit. Take advantage. Jesus, Alli was at a party with her new beau and his good friend, Beyoncé, and you got tagged in the footnotes with a sorry-ass pic of you looking like a schlub in sweaty gym clothes last week. Fuck that! Use the spotlight, man.”
I scrubbed my hand over my jaw, suddenly feeling raw and exposed. My year from hell continued.
Alli’s relationship with a giant movie star had been news for months on end.Months.Alli and I joked about how ridiculous the headlines were, but the rabid media attention was getting to me. Even though our marriage had ended amicably, it was like having salt rubbed into a wound every day. So yeah…changing the narrative in my favor was tempting.
But I sort of liked the idea of going off the grid and escaping the constant noise too.
“I don’t know.” I sighed, poking at a chunk of tofu with a chip.
Ger gave a sympathetic nod. “I get it. I’m going to say two more things that may piss you off, but again…I want to be real with you.”
I glared but gestured for him to get on with it. “Go on.”
“One, you owe some of your recent endorsement opportunities to Sutcliffe. Power of associative selling at its finest.”
“What the fuck?”
“That’s a fact, man. And two…” He hooked a thumb toward the main portion of the restaurant on the other side of our high partition. “On your way out the door, I want you to walk slowly and read the room. You might say you don’t give a crap what anyone thinks and if so, good for you. Maybe you don’t mind that half the population wants to fix you and the other half feels sorry for you. And maybe they’re a tad jealous that you’re one degree of separation from theTrilogy Alpha Teamleader.”
