To tears.
We cried a lot of you during the making of this book, both for personal and professional struggles and triumph.
If not for your salty hydration, we probably would have died a slow and painful death. And then we'd have to be real ghost writers.
So thank you.
In the future, though, we'd really appreciate if you made a bigger effort to taste like wine-or vodka.
I'm Wes Lancaster.
The third "Billionaire Bad Boy," as it were.
I own the New York Mavericks, BAD Restaurant, am a silent investor in several start-up companies across the United States, and yeah, I'm worth three or four billion dollars.
Sounds like the same old story, right?
I'll admit, even to me-who'd rather not lump himself into the Billionaire Bad Boy heap with the likes of Thatcher Kelly-the basics are startlingly similar. But the difference between Thatch, Kline, and me is that they keep avid track of each dollar-granted, their reasons vary greatly from one another-and I've never been one to focus on the numbers. I know a ballpark figure, and I know what that ballpark figure means.
It means freedom.
Freedom to live my life as I please, spend money tastefully but often, and enjoy all the things I appreciate with abandon. Women, cars, travel, and time-each and every one can be mine on my terms.
I like the control. I like the escapism. I like being in charge of my own life.
Money may not buy happiness, but it definitely buys opportunity. For me, that opportunity comes in many forms, the most notable being my ability to live the dream of owning a National Football League team. My staff knows by the level of my involvement-something they like to whisper creative epithets about-that the desire to do so has absolutely nothing to do with the money and position and everything to do with being a part of the experience. I've overheard the very technical description of "annoyingly present" more than once-and god-fucking-dammit, he's here again; this is horseshit even more than that.
But now my interest has grown deeper, more complexly woven into the staff-specifically Winnie Winslow, the new team physician-and not only do I not stay away; I can't.
She's everything I don't want.
Strong-willed. Demanding. A mother to a young child.
But as it turns out, maybe the joke is on me. My brain says she'll ruin everything, but my heart says she's everything I can't live without.
Normally my brain rules the day, making the important decisions and keeping me from the certain agony a romantic entanglement would bring to my life. But apparently, now, there's a new, beating, four-chambered fuck-of-a-guy in charge.
He says this is the last time this book is about me because now, thanks to Winnie and Lexi Winslow, I'm a very big we.
This is us.
The halls were busy, staffers running from the cafeteria to meetings and players making their way from the locker room to the weight room or the field, and each person I passed acknowledged me with a nod.
I appreciated the effort, but I actually hated the attention. It meant I had to watch myself, my expressions, my reactions-be whom they expected, which sometimes wasn't who I was.
But just as I'd built the machine that was the current operations of this team, I'd constructed my reputation all on my own. Stoic. Unemotional. Unswayable, unflappable, hard-to-rile Wes Lancaster.
It scared me how often my insides were the exact opposite-rolling turmoil that kept the contents of my stomach only seconds away from making an appearance.
My relationship with God was tenuous and largely lacking in effort on my part, but I'd still lost count of how many times I'd thanked him for the power of perception and strong esophageal control.
Overhead, the lights flickered and hissed as one of the bulbs strained to avoid the end of its life. I made a mental note to notify maintenance as soon as I finished my rounds.
Much like every other team in the league, we operated on a schedule, with certain players, be it special teams, skill positions, defensive linemen, etcetera going different places at different times. When the cafeteria closed down the breakfast service in an hour, everyone on the team would be somewhere-a meeting, a final practice, at weight lifting, or getting medical advisement or attention. Wednesdays on travel weeks needed to run even more smoothly than any other day, as the whole team would need to be out and ready in a timely fashion so that they could prepare for travel tomorrow.
And this week, we were headed to Miami. Hot, sunny, skimpy-clothes-inducing Miami. Please, fuck, let there be some sort of bikini-wearing opportunity for Winnie Winslow, my dick chimed in with a wink and an overly enthusiastic nod before my brain could stop it.
Goddammit.
I'd hired her as the team physician, but she'd just as quickly become my obsession, my weakness, and my distraction. Witty, thrilling exchanges laced with an edge of anger I couldn't stop picturing in the bedroom took up way too much space in my mind for the amount of interaction we'd had. Thrown together in mostly professional circumstances, we hadn't so much as touched for the first few weeks of our erotic dance of torturous teasing. Even now, we were still in the infancy of intimacy, a fledgling friendship that hovered on the edge of acquaintances.
In fact, the most contact we'd had was the soft slip of her hand in mine during Thatch and Cassie's shotgun nuptials a few weeks ago. But innocent or not, ever since, I'd become irrationally fixated on the drive to once again feel her skin on mine. It was unnatural at best, but troubling was more likely as I'd involuntarily begun to completely avoid the company of other women.
I'd actually tried to force it for the first week after our return, but as that time bled into this, and the days at work got longer and longer, my body stopped being cooperative.
That's right. Without the incentive of Winnie's touch, my dick has stopped responding. And yes, my little problem did make itself known in the most embarrassing way possible, at the very worst time. The only thing I have to be thankful for is that the particular woman had made my acquaintance before and knew it was an entirely new problem. Of course, I went home to my hand and a most explicitly detailed fantasy of Winnie Winslow, and the fucker reacted to that just fine.
"Trust me," I heard Winnie say as I rounded the corner into the hall that led directly to our training room. Open call for players with injuries or medical needs opened up at six a.m., which was nearly an hour ago. An hour's worth of restraint felt like it took Herculean effort, but the camel's back had finally buckled-I'd run out of control … and metaphors.
I had to see her. That rough but sweet voice. The fervor in her every comment. I wanted the feeling it gave me when she directed all of it at me.
Luckily, touching base in any and all meetings and locations was normal for me, the "helicopter boss," so the only one who would know what a fool I was would be me.
Despite the internal embarrassment of losing the battle with myself to stay away, my step got decidedly peppier. If Thatch had paid witness, comments would have been made, and I would have communicated both verbally and otherwise that he should fuck right off. But he wasn't, and all that separated me from looking Winnie dead in her heated eyes was the rest of this stupid hallway.
"I know more about you than I've ever wanted to know, Martinez," Winnie went on, her commanding voice carrying easily down the empty hall. "Google is altogether way too informative."
"I think she's saying she's seen your dick, Teen. And by the sound of it, I'm thinking your nickname isn't the only thing that's teeny," a jovial, young male voice said.
Commotion rang out, hoots and hollers and overall mayhem echoing out the door and down the hall to my ears.
"Whoa," Winnie said loudly through a laugh. "Pick up your pants, Teen. I didn't see your penis, I don't want to see your penis, goddammit, put away your penis."
The room sounded rowdy with all the answering chuckles, and I found myself quickening my already brisk steps in order to make it to the end of the hall a little faster.
"Penis, Doc?" I heard one of the other guys ask. "That's very clinical."
I paused just outside the door as she responded. "That's right. Clinical. The only reason I'll be looking at your penis is if you break it during a game. A penis is only a dick or a cock if I'm seeing it socially."
"The way you say that makes my penis feel very sociable, Dr. Winslow," Mitchell teased, and the other guys muttered and mumbled their agreement.
"Sorry, Cam," Winnie clucked with a stern take on playful. "My calendar's all booked up."
Despite all reason, I smiled as I stepped into the room and discovered about half a dozen more players than I was expecting. Evidently, half of them knew better than to sexually goad their physician just because she was a woman. With some internal coaxing, I forced my expression to something gloomier.