Sweat-soaked and dotted with grass, Mia wore the most unflattering clothes. The sun highlighted her cheeks and long, toned limbs, but it was her black hair threaded through the back of a white baseball hat that did it for me. My dick ached to fill the gap in her thighs with those long legs wrapped around my hips.
The V-neck dip of her shirt teased a flash of skin all day. My mouth dried at the crease line between her breasts before she crushed shot after shot. The twist in her waist, tightening her curves and flexing her arm muscles, made more than her golf skills painfully obvious.
And that confident smirk. Damn, where had that been?
She deserved to smirk, since she kicked my ass on the scoresheet. What other skills was she hiding?
Mia felt like I was walking a tightrope. Not two feet off the ground with a safety net but suspended between two skyscrapers.
The question of whether those who attempted the walk had questionable sanity wasn't lost on me. The heights, the risk, the danger, or the thrill of conquering the impossible weren't for everyone.
I could've walked on the ground, many, many grounds, and yet, I was the fool gripping a giant pole and teetering one step at a time, toward life-defining, eternal glory on the other side.
Some days were too windy to attempt the walk. Fixing Mia's truck was a bird smacked in my face. Other days, I pushed a few cautious steps that wobbled the wire too much.
Today offered the most favorable conditions since I met Mia. She laughed, spoke with ease, and her smile was brighter than the mid-day sun hot enough to fry sidewalk eggs. Her soft, smooth skin was addictive to me, and I pushed my contact.
All her openness receded to wherever Mia went inside her head. Silence hung between us, as if I drove home alone. I waited on the side of the building until I knew if the weather conditions were right for another walk attempt.
Did something happen? Maybe she's tired.
I wanted to ask if she had dinner plans, but she slumped in her seat and hid her eyes under the brim of her hat.
Pursuit of a girl was a foreign concept, especially this snail's pace. Candace plopped on my lap and decided I was it. She was a quick fuck that never ended, but I fell for the small-towl girl with sass. Until I gave her reason to doubt our relationship, she was loyal to a fault.
Another man's hands on my ex, making her smile, and coming at me with some 'No hard feelings' bullshit, didn't bother me. Even when Eli cupped her ass in the parking lot, I was just irritated at a lack of general respect.
And I didn't need a knee in my nuts to drive home the realization of why I didn't care. I literally drove her home. One glance at the pensive scribbler in my passenger's seat verified why I didn't give a fuck what, or who, Candy did.
The star of my wet dreams shifted and picked up her water bottle. Mia's lips pursed and throat bobbing as she drank had me both parched and mesmerized. My cock twitched at a droplet in the corner of her smile before the pad of her finger swiped it away.
I wasn't the kind of guy who slept with his staff, but... this was more. I was falling for her.
Falling for a girl I barely know. Fuck, what's running through her head?
Mia was easier to talk to, but still not the easiest to open up. Her ex did a number on her. Beneath layers of sass, and more layers of pain, lived a bleeding heart.
"There's something you have to see."
Nervousness in her voice made me blink at the book. Was it her personal thoughts? For the brief moment she passed it into my hands, my breathing turned shallow, and my steady pulse increased.
Her frown dissolved those hopes and apprehension rolled her lip under her teeth. She dropped her hand to her side.
My eyes dropped with the movement. I mapped the bow shape of her upper lip and teeth denting the lower one. As if braced for a punch, I clenched my stomach. My fingers twitched to pull that pink flesh out, or better taste it. Any response my brain cooked up evaporated the longer I studied the warm tones in her eyes fighting whatever awareness weighed them down.
C'mon, Mia. Give me a sign.
One sign was all I needed. I begged her with my eyes as the words knocked on my heart.
Let me in.
Get me to the other side.
Under the temptation, I leaned closer. Mia before today stiffened and tensed into defensive mode, even when her body lit up with all the go-ahead signs. Goosebumps, wide eyes, lips parted, a pink flush in her cheeks - I wasn't wrong interpreting them.
She felt the same pull, she just needed to stop pushing against it.
Now, she relaxed and not from four hours of golf that coated her skin in a mix of perspiration and suntan lotion. Warmth pooled around her rounded pupils and her short breaths pitched her chest.
I took a giant leap onto that wire and bobbed precariously. The last thing I wanted was to make a move too soon and pushed her to retreat again.
My chest tightened as her teeth dented further into her lip. I wanted much more than guarded glimpses, dashed exits, and personal space. More than six inches between our mats.
And no space between our lips.
I wanted to know that it was me that skipped the pulse in her wrist where I rubbed my thumb. My cock pressed against my zipper wanted more, but my patience screamed she needed me to move slow.
No more birds in the face, Sam.
I cupped her pink cheek and rubbed her warm skin with my thumb. Wildfire urges to kiss away her doubts spread through me. The blood surging through every cell in my body screamed a call to action.
So I leapt. Blindly.
"Can I kiss you?"
My thumb passed over the path I wanted, from one corner of her mouth to the other, and released her lip. She froze, with uncertainty framed by her thick lashes.
I lowered my head and paused an inch from what I wanted. The only one who could stop me was her. It was her choice, one painful beat of my heart at a time.
Her lips parted and a hot breath passed over the pad of my thumb. Horror rounded her eyes and her soft words split open my heart.
"I can't, Sam."
I can't. Not we.
I didn't need to hear her list of reasons, because I couldn't find one that wasn't an excuse. My last working brain cell reminded me that she worked for me, I was getting out of a long-term relationship, and she wasn't over her ex.
All bullshit.
'I'm not ready,' was an answer I could accept and respect. But she stood silent and still, a statue whose teeth recaptured her lower lip and the biggest apology drowning in her eyes.
The clearest signs were written all over her face. From those apologetic eyes to her dry, parted lips, trembling spine, and fingernail flicks, she was terrified. She tolerated me, maybe accepted me, but she wasn't letting me in.
Whether she meant not yet or never, I wasn't sure, but I want those secrets that closed off her heart.
Teaching therapy was her heart screaming it wanted out. But I couldn't pull it out of her chest for her, any more than I could force her to have feelings for me.
Instead, I fell back on a masked smile, and lied through my teeth, "Sorry, I didn't-"
Mia's cheek pulled off my palm. I curled my fingers as she slipped out of my touch and hugged her elbows. "I'm doing you a favor, Sam."
Bullshit.
"No, you're not." My arms were around her before she spewed out more. "Come here, darling."
I didn't know why that word slipped out, as effortless as breathing, but it fit.
She needs someone to call her Darling.
Her back shuddered with a loud gasp, but I held her flush. I breathed in her mess of oily lotion and musky perspiration like an addict's fix. As I rubbed her soft, warm skin, her shoulders rounded, and she curled into my chest.
It wasn't the kiss I wanted, but I leaned over and aimed for her forehead. My chin knocked her hat back, which snagged on her ponytail and angled her chin up.
With bumped contact, my lips were on hers. Or hers mine. One press of soft warmth sucked the air out of my lungs. Warm. Soft. Only a breath. It was over without a taste or registered thought.
But its effect was instant.
My heart dropped in a roller coaster plunge, then shot off on overdrive. Our gasps competed for who sucked in more air between us. White surrounded her endless brown eyes.
"I'm sorry."
Fuck, I was only sorry that hadn't lasted longer. The prick swelling a salute between my legs agreed.
Her lips twitched, but before she answered, the door flung open with a bang.
"What the fuck is going on here!?"
Mia and I separated under Mike's bucket of ice water. "Michael, it's -"
He shoved his phone in my face. "Not... that. This."
My eyes skimmed a soundbite article under a picture of my arms around Mia. It was on hole ten, after she looked ready to smash Candy's face in a sand trap. "What the fuck am I looking at, Sam?"
I swallowed as his phone lowered. "Mike, it was just a hug."
"Not Mia," he snapped and flipped up another article. "Or, yes Mia. Midfield Accounting Whistleblower reveals corruption in the Sam Pearson Foundation."
What!?
Mike's words slammed a freight train into my chest. Shock straightened my spine stiff. The muscles in my legs locked into tree stumps and my feet took root.
Harsh and unforgiving, I didn't recognize my voice. "Say that again."
As he repeated the words, my entire face tightened in a frown. Mia shrunk back with a step. Her lower lip trembled as she hugged herself and rounded her shoulders.
She didn't... Did she?
I felt as if my stomach dropped, then turned itself inside out. Her name died on my tongue. "Mia?"
Michael's eyes slanted into narrow slits and his hand shook his phone in her face. "Mia. What the fuck did you do!?"
"I'm sorry," she whispered as a tear trailed over each cheek.
The sight squeezed my heart. I reached for her arm, but she bolted inside the house.
"Mia!" Mike's call was answered with a slammed door.
The urge to chase her tore me in half. Stay? Go? My brain couldn't budge past a blank sheet of paper.
With a frustrated sigh, Mike pulled his phone to his ear. "Ashley, put out whatever fires spring up. No response until we know more."
More? We don't know anything!
Ignoring his subsequent rants about irresponsibility, I thumbed through Mia's notebook. What the fuck was going on?
Past stick figures who met untimely deaths were jargons of numbers. The stickmen twitched a smile on my lips. One poor soul was run over by a tank, another got a spear in its groin, and one walked a pirate plank over circling sharks.
All had giant heads, small dicks, and 'Sam' connected with an arrow. I wasn't sure whether to laugh or be flattered.
My eyebrows furrowed at the messy abbreviations and scribbled numbers. With the pad of my thumb, I counted five pages. What were these numbers? Tot exp? Dnr cons? Hieroglyphics to me, but she circled a percentage at the bottom of each page.
One percent. Four percent. One-half a percent. Three percent. Two percent.
I sucked in a sharp breath on the last page's note.
Rip-off.
The notebook was orange, not her blue one for class. As I turned it over in my hand for clues, a ray of sunlight cast across it.
She held it up at Midfield.
When I thought she wanted my fucking autograph.
What was she trying to tell me? My thumb jumped past the numbers to a note scented and damp with sunscreen. Regret jumped out of every word.
Sam,
I'm so sorry. Please forgive me. I wanted to tell you. The numbers balance, but recipients are paid nothing compared to the expenses. I don't know why or how it's happening, but it's really, really shitty.
I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner.
Mia
I read her words until they blurred, with the same stunned reaction. This wasn't at all what I expected.
She tried to warn me.
That comfort was brief, swallowed up by not knowing what she warned me of. Was it genuine concern, or because a press leak was coming?
"I'm not a numbers guy," I mumbled to Mike. "But, fuck, if my donors are being ripped off..."
I swallowed the rest of that sentence. Sickness rolled in my stomach, and I swayed on my feet. My hand palmed the wall behind me, but my resolve hardened.
If true, then I have to make it right.
My hand was on my phone faster than the time I needed to read her note again. I handed Mike the notebook and called Simone.
She answered in a dry voice, "Please tell me you weren't arrested."
"No," I snapped. "I need you to dig into something. Under the radar."
Static from her huff crackled in my ear. "I don't do background or paternity tests."
"Not that!" I rubbed the pressure mounting in my forehead. "I... suspect someone is bleeding my charity donations."
"Fuck, really? I assumed Ash's messages were false allegations." Rustled paper sounds followed her sigh. "Which ones?"
Good question. Excellent question. No fucking clue.
Mike and I frowned at Mia's percentages. His lips twitched over the abbreviations, which furrowed his eyebrows, but he showed no signs of surprise. "All of them?"
"All!?" she squeaked. "Sam, that's five charities. I'll need tax specialists-"
"Bring in whoever the fuck you need," I cut in as my voice heightened. My blood rushed so fast, the sides of my neck pulsed. This couldn't be happening. "Keep it quiet until you confirm what I'm worried about."
"Never a dull moment with you, Sam." Another sigh crackled in my ear. "Give me a couple days. If there's shit, then we'll dig it up."
Her words didn't instill me with confidence. Instead, my stomach rolled with nausea. "This was why she was fired," I said and pointed to her notebook. "Wasn't it, Mike?"
"Makes sense," he mumbled.
Two months of silence pricked my frustration, "Did you know? How!? Didn't you ask her? She's your sister!"
"No, but if you haven't noticed." He pointed at the shut door. "Not the easiest person to open up."
How could she think I'd be mad for telling me?
As my eyes shifted to the door, Michael stepped in front of it. "Give her space while we figure this shit out."
The more Michael and I deciphered Mia's notes, my chest pulled tighter. By the time he sent pictures of every page to Simone, my eyes bulged from memorizing those number without a fucking clue what they meant.
Adrenaline spiked in my veins as I paced. Dryness coated my tongue as air wheezed out my pursed lips. My nails scratched a hole in my beard.
How could this happen? Two months ago, Midfield kissed my ass. How could people I hired and trusted work behind my back?
I wanted to wrap one of my clubs around someone's neck or turn them into street meat under my truck. But I didn't have a fucking clue who was responsible.
"Mia." Her name stopped my steps. "She knows who did it."
Mike's footsteps trailed mine through a home I should've been more familiar with. It mirrored him - modest, decluttered, and low-maintenance. Through a galley kitchen, I passed wedding pictures wedged and a framed, triangular American flag hung in the living room.
Outside a closed hallway door, Michael's palm rested on my shoulder. "Sam, I should -"
"Make sure she doesn't get blamed." At the muffled sobs behind the door, I nudged it open. "That's what you should do."
Mia's room was an empty shell with no personality, which faded under my tunnel vision to where she curled up on the tiniest bed. Her elbows crossed her chest and fingers pinched her shoulders. Beneath her shirt, the bumps in her spine and ribs rounded and contracted with her raspy breaths.
The bed, smaller than mine as a kid, groaned as I sat with my knees wedged in my chest. My hand met her shaking shoulder. "Mia."
I leaned over her, dipping the bed down with my hand braced near her head. She rolled back and two red, swollen eyes blinked up at me from under clumped lashes. Random strands of her hair sprawled in a black halo around her head.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I should've told you, but I didn't-"
"I know." I slipped my hands behind her shoulders and lifted her up. The bed dipped under my ass and my left cheek hung off, but I pulled her to my side.
She sagged into me with a shuddered exhale. "What about your PR?" her voice muffled warmth into my chest.
"Under control, thanks to you telling me." My palm around her cheek, I held her ear to my heart to silence her protest and heaved a sigh. "I'm exactly where I need to be."
When her lips parted and a challenge burned in her eyes, my voice shifted to a firmer, "Not the first time my team's sorted out a misunderstanding. But I promise I'm going to take all possible actions."
While my words pointed at retribution against greedy assholes bleeding money out of my charities, they hid a double meaning. Mia was on my team, but I wanted her to feel safe, protected from the inevitable media shitstorm behind strangers' screens, fucking sound bite vultures who would scour her trash, and -
Oh, fuck.
I've hit Labrador mode.
Ashley teased my inner protective switch like that. Who wouldn't stand up for their friends though? My parents lived four hours away, so my team was my found family. Jer was the annoying, inappropriate uncle.
Mia's pink, swollen, damp cheeks made my thumbs twitch to wipe them.
I might be past Labrador mode with this one.
Fuck knows I don't hug Jer during a meltdown.
My heart mutinied escaping my chest as I thumbed her damp cheek. "I trust you... But I need the truth, Mia."
"We all do," Mike said. "Both of you. Downstairs. Now."
I frowned at his interruption, but he opened Mia's door and waved us out. In the living room sat a tall, thin guy with slicked, curly black hair and a trimmed beard. He wiped his hands on his jeans.
Mia's nose crinkled and her head tipped. "Amir?"
"Yeah..." His eyes shifted between us. "Uhh, good to see you again. Heard your shoulder's back-"
"It's good." Once his sweaty palm met my extended hand, my memory placed him.
Midfield fan... When I flicked my business card at Mia.
Michael's expression was stone serious. His mouth pressed into a white line and not a hair in his eyebrows lifted. Before the question of why Amir was here finished forming in my brain, he said, "I called him here."
Our heads turned, of which only Mia and I had wide eyes and open mouths. She broke our silence first, "You knew."
I crossed my arms over my chest at her accusation at Michael. He only stared down Amir. Skinny as a string bean, he looked harmless, wiping the back of his hand over the bullets sweating out his forehead.
"I suspected," Michael answered in a stance mirroring mine. "Amir has quite the confession here."
"Yeah..." Amir's thin lips parted with a flick of his tongue. Dark brown eyes darted between me, Mia, and Michael. "I reported the charity issues to the press. Please don't -"
"Why the fuck shouldn't I!?" I squeezed my fists and stepped closer to this traitor. Hopefully, he enjoyed his arms and legs attached to his torso because the urge to remove them rushed me closer.
"Hang on." Mike's hands palmed my chest, laughable given our height difference. "We can use this, Sam. If Amir's willing to help..."
Amir's head dipped down, his eyes darkening. As I wondered how easily his insides were rearranged, he nodded. "Yeah."
"Good." Michael nodded to the sofa and pulled out his phone. "Now talk."
A pair of gray eyebrows lifted at me. "And you had absolutely no idea?"
Bitterness tightened my vocal cords and coated my tongue dry. "None, Stephan."
My new best friend sat next to me. Beneath his gray dress pants, Amir's knee bounced in an earthquake. I assumed his armpits sweated as mine did, beneath our white dress shirts.
Overhead lights gleamed Stephen Colston's bald head, the sports reporter who salivated most at Mike's offer. He stroked the tip of his gray goatee with feigned sympathy.
"That's shocking," Stephan's gaping expression was Oscar-worthy. Wide eyed and slack-jawed, he looked genuinely surprised. "Absolutely shocking."
"It is." I nodded with a grimace. "I was shocked."
He leaned forward, false shock soaking his voice. "And how did you feel when you found out?"
Ashley's 'single word prompts' recommendation flashed in my mind.
"Shocked. Horrified." I crossed one ankle over my knee and clutched it with my hand. "Betrayed. Disgusted. Not for myself but the charity donors and recipients."
"Your charity donors." Stephan shuffled his blank notecards. All his words were prompted in between the cameras. "What would you say to them, Sam?"
"I'd personally apologize." Tightness compressed my chest, and my tie almost strangled me. "What happened is unacceptable. It needs to be stopped."
"How do you think those donors feel?"
I rubbed at the edge of my jaw. "If they're like me, then they feel cheated and deceived in the name of good faith and charity. I don't know if I have the words to describe how bad that feels."
Total lie. I had the words. Ashley censored them.
Stephan paused for another card shuffle. "You've been open about your personal donations before. Dollar for dollar, you match."
I gave a stiff nod. "Dollar for dollar."
"So... you're a victim." He slumped back into his seat with the exact revelation Ashley hoped he displayed. "A true victim. The biggest victim of all."
I wanted to admit that I was an idiot who trusted the wrong people, but my PR queen argued that came off as me accusing other donors of also being idiots. Instead, I followed her prompts, "The real victims are recipients who the charities haven't been able to help. That changes, starting today."
Without a blink, I leaned forward. With my elbows pressed on my thighs hard enough to leave dents, I stared into the camera. "I want to assure every donor that their contributions weren't a waste. My legal team will identify every dollar of fraud. And I will personally replace every dollar that can't be recovered."
Stephan and Amir's eyebrows raised in tandem. The behind-camera gasps were a nice addition.
"Sam, that could be -"
"Millions." I squeezed my hands with the same insistence tearing through my chest.
"All five charities are close to my heart. Childhood leukemia took my uncle. A Houston Food bank partner for at-risk children and seniors, Paws for Cause's animal shelter for my mom, a free after school sports clinic for low-income families, and... veterans' support for my grandfather."
"All admirable." Stephan's dismissive tone made me squeeze my ankle tighter. "What can they expect?"
"Action." My stomach clenched and I squeezed my hands hard enough to burst open my knuckles. "I'm still struggling to believe this happened, Stephan. It's a wrong that needs to be made right. Money isn't enough, we need to take action to restore the charitable contributions to who need it."
Stephan turned to Amir for his portion of the interview, which went deeper than Mia's initial impressions. My foundation wasn't the only one scammed. Midfield's greed soaked into the millions.
Per Ashley's coaching, he admitted, "Sam had no idea."
Clueless idiot was the lesser accusation, which I accepted because the alternative was suspected money launderer.
Today's interview started a painful two-week process, where my life revolved around PR damage control in one identical public idiocy confession after another. To recoup the wasted money, Ashley sold my story. I gave national-level interviews, local interviews, put out social media explanations, and podcasts.
Her 'Sam is for sale campaign brought in triple the amount of lost donations. The press ate up what Amir and I said and fought like pigs for scraps.
Admitting my stupidity burned my chest. Once I was acknowledged as a victim and charges were slapped against the Benning brothers for corruption, support poured in, but the media circus paled in comparison to the behind the screen shit.
My team earned their Christmas bonuses.
Michael secured my interests with Houston's management. Simone presented her case as if they were a courtroom, not a boardroom. Heat pumped out my armpits and ringed the dress shirt choking my neck at the conference table filled with suits. Their frowns dissolved when she assured them first that neither I nor the team were at legal risk.
By the time Michael finished his, "This'll all wash away once Sam steps on the field," pitch, judgmental eyes looked warily in my direction. The timing couldn't have been worse for my contract, but the most important person at the table stood up.
"I believe him." Gary Sparks offered a tight nod. "Sam might be a clueless idiot, but he's not a criminal."
My heart pounded so hard in my ears, I almost missed the murmured agreement.
All of my sponsors were outraged, but all press was good press for their bottom lines. All threw their unconditional support behind my 'victimization.'
Three times a week, we organized a feature for each charity. My eyes leaked during visits to the leukemia wing at Houston General. I donated six luxury vehicles now in my possession and served hundreds of meals for the homeless. Eight hundred pounds of dog food and five hundred pounds of kitty litter were delivered to Paws for Cause. Hearts for Heroes, the veteran support charity, allowed me the humility of attending one of their group settings.
The support hour turned into a rant of limited resources, but I was all ears. Complaints about poor meeting conditions, limited post-service housing availability, and lack of mental and physical health resources fed my drive past retribution.
Their testimonies, similar to ones from Mia's therapy class, planted the seeds for my craziest idea to date.
"Good news." Michael scrolled through his phone. By the swollen bags around his eyes, the past three weeks aged him thirty years. "Simone's almost done with the Bennings case prep."
"That is good," I muttered, slipped on my sunglasses, and exited the community center.
Legally, Simone couldn't sue the manager – some Amos Benning I'd never met – for drawing a seven-figure salary from my foundation. By no coincidence, his brother Marcus was the manager who fired Mia, then Amir for digging into questionable financial reporting. Both Bennings were lucky to never be in my presence.
Midfield's slimy president wasn't innocent in my mind, but I left the witch hunt to Simone. Settling for bad PR instead of me knocking out teeth left a bitter taste in my mouth, but her team worked with the feds to shred Midfield's bankrolls and put a few bodies behind bars.
In an anticlimactic email format, I fired Midfield for breach of privacy. Their lawyers whined until two whistleblower statements about unethical employment practices shut them up.
"Fuck, this has been a tiring three weeks." Michael's eyes outlined my shoulder, which rubbed grease into my shirt. "Jer says you're close."
"No." My head shook at the wall of heat we walked through in the lot. "I'm there. No bullshit."
His smugness hit my ear. "Because of yoga?"
Heat simmered off the hood of my car, blurring the air. I pushed an exhale out my nose. "Because of Mia. You were right, Mike. She's... what I need."
Because of the media horde, I stayed away from the studio. Amir happily thrust himself into the limelight, even offered a book deal.
Somehow, he thought Charitable Contributions was a catchy title. As long as he didn't call it Sam's Stupid.
PR touring meant I was home a lot less. When I was, the house was empty, and my meals were a silent solitude. I missed that fishbowl-sized studio.
Moreso, I missed her. She deserved more credit than I did for my shoulder recovery.
My lips were haunted by the slight touch of hers that was over before it started. It only furthered my itch for a deeper taste. When I did sleep, my dreams extended that kiss to a whole lot more.
"She's fine," Michael assured me. "Quiet, but answers the press for you if asked."
"Good." A quiet Mia was unfamiliar to me, but her on my side pulled up the corners of my mouth. Simone sent me evidence that Mia hadn't leaked anything, but I didn't need it.
"I told Ashley to stop the interviews." His eyebrows drew together. "Press is moving on now that the feds are handling Midfield. You pass that shoulder test and I'll get your contract. You're done. All future comments are you're moving forward to start the season."
Start the season.
I should have been more excited about that.
As an alternative to putting my fists through walls, preferably one of Midfield's, I hadn't stopped practicing in my basement. My movements were clunky, and my breath was out of sync. Meditation led my brain straight to her.
With one more week until my shoulder test, I didn't want to wait until.
I didn't need shoulder rehab with Mia anymore, but I sure as fuck needed her.
A/N. Sorry for the teaser. 😇