Aiden waited by his car until Lily came out of the club an hour later. He was beat and only wanted to go home, but he’d offended the hell out of this poor woman. He could see that now, and that hadn’t been his intention at all. He couldn’t leave without telling her he was sorry. Shoot. Now he was one of those guys. The creepy guys who hung out and tried to push themselves on the girls at the club after hours.
He’d half expected one of the bouncers to come and try to chase him off, but no one had. They did walk her to the door and he saw her speak to them, shaking her head before heading his way. And, the large man stayed in the doorway, eyeing her as she approached. Well, hell, he couldn’t blame them. He’d do the same thing if he were in their position.
Aiden stood and held his hands out, trying to appease her. “I’m really sorry, Lily. That came out all wrong back there. I wasn’t trying to offer money in exchange for anything.”
She looked back over her shoulder at the bouncer, as if to assure herself that she was still being guarded, and he winced. He really screwed this up if she was that worried.
“It’s all right,” she said, but he could see it wasn’t.
“It’s just, I see you in there every night, and it’s clear you don’t belong there. That’s not you in there.”
She raised her chin and he could see the pride shining in her eyes. “I’ve worked really hard to get where I am, Mr. Kyle. I’m a registered dietician, and I’m damned good at what I do. It just turns out, I’m not very good at running numbers and creating business plans. But, I’ve had a business coach look at my figures now, and if I can keep my head above water for six months, and add two new clients per month for each of those six months, I can make it. I can make it.”
He eyed her realizing she was a whole heck of a lot more than she appeared, just as he’d suspected. And, she was damned determined. He liked that about her.
“So,” he said, a plan forming in his head, “you just need twelve more regular clients to be able to quit? If you had twelve more, you’d be all right?” He didn’t know why he thought of it like that. Like he needed for her to be all right before he could walk away and forget he ever saw her, but that’s what he was feeling.
“Yes, if I get twelve over the course of the next six months and keep them,” she said, slowly, nodding her head.
“Done,” he said and held out his hand. “Give me your business card. I’ll have twelve new clients for you tomorrow.”
Twelve at the same time instead of over six months should not only get her what she needed, it should put her over the top with the big influx of income at once. His teammates wouldn’t be thrilled, but he’d make them see it his way. Dang. If he had to, he'd blame it on the curse so they’d go along with it. Because he could tell this woman was too much temptation for him. His best strategy—his only strategy—for resisting the curse, was to stay away from women. And he couldn’t seem to stay away from this one, at least not while she was working here and her job might just depend on him. He’d watched her drop more drinks in three nights than he would have thought possible. And, every time, her boss’s head had turned right toward Aiden.
She laughed at him. Laughed. At him. He narrowed his eyes.
“What’s so funny?”
“You! Why would you do this for me? What is it that you want?”
Now it was his turn to laugh. “What do you know about baseball?” he asked.
“Nothing. Well, that’s not exactly true. I know all about the nutritional and dietary requirements of an athlete’s body and how to balance those needs individually for each specific sport and for the individual player. But, the game? Nothing.” She shrugged a shoulder.
“We have a forty man roster. Each of those forty men treats their bodies as a temple, carefully monitoring what goes into it. But, we’re also busy and most of us are lazy as hell when it comes to things like cooking or grocery shopping. I’ll be doing my teammates a favor by getting them your info. I can get you at least twelve players tomorrow as regular clients. Maybe more. Oh, and I’m also friends with half the Brawler football franchise. I can get you more clients when their season starts.”
Her eyes widened and she seemed frozen, unsure of whether to believe him or not.
“I don’t want anything in exchange, Lily. I just don’t want you to have to work here when you’re so clearly out of your element. Besides,” he said, running a hand through his hair, “I can’t keep coming here every night to make sure Donny keeps his word about not firing you.”
He didn’t tell her why he couldn’t keep coming here. He wouldn’t let her know she was temptation on legs for him, and he couldn’t keep subjecting himself to that when he needed to focus on his game.
“So,” he said, sticking his hand out again, “give me your card and I’ll get your clients. Then, you quit.” He looked over her shoulder once more to the club’s entrance where the bouncer stood, glaring at them.
With a very distrustful glint to her eye and a great deal of skepticism she didn’t seem to be trying to hide, she handed over her business card. He nodded and got into his car, then watched until she got to her car and was inside with the engine running before he pulled away.
He had a lot of favors to call in.