I could’ve donewithout this. I was fried, my body ached, and my legs felt like they were in bits. All I wanted was food, a shower, and straight to bed. Chris had run me into the ground at training. Called it asharpening session, which was code forthrash your arse because you’ve finally made a Wimbledon quarter-final.
Still, I felt good. Better than I had in months, really. After a year of physio, cortisone shots, and watching other blokes take my spot, the knee was finally letting me play without fear. My rhythm was back.
Quarters was uncharted territory for me here. I’d come close before, had people whisper maybe this was my ceiling. Maybe the injury had done me in for good. But not this year. This year, if I kept my head screwed on, I had a real shot.
I spotted Gwen across the room and gave her a nod.
Except she wasn’t alone.
At the bar stood a woman I’d never seen before, blonde hair tucked behind one ear, a crisp, white dress cinched at the waist, the kind that made her look like she’d stepped out of a pin-up poster. Couldn’t have been more than five-three, but the way she carried herself made her look taller. She leaned in to order, rising onto her toes, making the hemof her dress lift just enough to make me mutter a curse under my breath.
Jesus Christ.
It wasn’t just her body, though. It was the way she held herself. Her presence. No preening, no scanning the room to see who was watching. Just a calm, quiet confidence surrounded her. She looked like she belonged entirely to herself. Out of place here but in the best possible way.
Something about her intrigued me. For a moment I thought my lungsandbrain cells stopped working.
Her laugh cut through the low hum of the room, unpolished and warm. Her posture was relaxed, but her eyes were sharp and knowing. Like she didn’t just look at people, she read them like a book.
That hair,fuck. Long, blonde and wild, it looked like someone had just run their hands through it. Except I wantedmyhands in it. And those eyes—blue enough to wreck a man. Even from across the room.
My body might’ve been cooked from training, but the second I saw her, I suddenly didn’t feel tired anymore.
“Hey, Jordan. All set for tomorrow?” Gwen slid into the seat opposite, snapping me back into reality.
She dropped a schedule on the table and started running through it. “Centre Court, two o’clock. Press at four-thirty. Dinner with that sponsor at seven. I told them you might cancel depending on your mood.”
“Might?” I smirked. “I will.”
She raised a brow. “Any questions?”
I tried, I really did. But my eyes had already drifted back to her. She was still at the bar, waiting on her drink, one hand tucked casually into the pocket of her dress like she had all the time in the world. And somehow, she was the only person in the crowded room I could see.
She looked like trouble. My kind of trouble. The kind you’d let ruin your whole week, and then thank her for it. And God, I’d let her. Beg her to.
“Actually, yeah.” I tilted my head toward the blonde. “Who’s that?”
Gwen followed my gaze and groaned. “That, my friend, is Kate.My brilliant, very beautiful best friend. And I’m telling you now, don’t be a dick.”
I held up a hand, mock-offended. “I wouldn’t dare.”
But something in me had already shifted. That wasn’t ashe’s hotmoment. That was aholy shit, who is she?moment. And those didn’t happen often.
“I’m giving you ten minutes,” Gwen warned, standing with a smirk.
I nodded, eyes still locked on Kate.
Only ten? Might be the fastest I’d ever fall flat on my face.
Chapter Three
Kate
Yup.As predicted, Gwen’s “ten minutes” had stretched into twenty. She’d barely glanced back after disappearing with the player who’d already hijacked my attention the second he walked in.
I’d noticed him straight away. There was something about the cut of his shoulders, the way he carried himself with self-assurance. That and the fact he wasn’t exactly hard to look at. I’d tried to shake it off, turning my focus back to my drink, to the chatter and the buzz of the room. But he stuck like an itch in the corner of my mind I couldn’t ignore.
Then I felt it, that flicker of awareness. A shift in the air behind me. He hadn’t said a word, hadn’t touched me, but somehow, I knew he was there. Just…a presence, not leering or obvious. Just…there. And God did he smellgood.
