Real(6)

“Can’t,” Pete says from behind the wheel as Riley digs into the fries. “These are the best damned fries,” he mutters.

“Yeah, thanks, Miss Dumas,” Pete adds, his expression genuinely nice as he looks at me in amusement.

“Brooke. Please.” I glance at my friends as they sit in the car with the hazard lights on and their faces turned in this direction, and I sigh. “So do you always follow his instructions to the letter?”

“To the T.” Pete gets out of the car, walks over to Kyle’s Altima, and opens the back door for me. The inside of the car falls silent until I’m safely tucked inside and we’re finally heading home.

“I think it’s hot that he wants you home safe.”

“Melanie, right now you think McDonald’s is hot, and you barfed when you saw Supersize Me and have banned it ever since. Your breath smells like vodka and Quarter Pounder.”

“Well, Brooke, if you had a drink with me, you wouldn’t be able to smell me. No more excuses. No more, ‘I have competition tomorrow.’ You should get drunk and go give Remington all the babies he wants.”

“He wants twins but I already said I want to wait until the Vegas wedding.” I hand her a little vitamin B and C complex chewing tablet. “Here, suck on this. I know it’s not what you want, but it’ll get that alcohol out of your system sooner.”

“Thanks, doctor. I’m going to miss you. But it’s high time not only little Nora got all the fun. It sucks that your little sister has a better sex life than you when you’re so much prettier, Brookey. Please, pleeeeze promise to text me every day.”

Smiling, I bring her close and wish she wasn’t drunk so I could actually talk to her. I have no idea what I’ve done, but I’m excited. All I know for sure is I’m not backing out of this agreement. My mom and dad will be ecstatic to see I’m giving my life some momentum in a new direction, and I’ll be only too glad that when I talk to them next Sunday morning, the answer to their greeting, which is always “Any job offers?” will finally be yes.



All right, so it’s only for three months, but it will do wonders for my career. Plus, it feels good to be wanted in a professional sense, after all the preparation. “I will, Mel. Every day,” I tell her, as I listen to her busily sucking on the tablet.

“When he kisses you, you need to text me that very second.” “Mel, he hired me as a specialist. There will be no kissing, it’s all professional here.”

“Fuck professional!” she protests.

“Stay professional, Brooke,” Kyle says warningly. “Otherwise I’m stopping over and having words with him.”

“I’m glad you said ‘words,’ Kyle, because that’s all a man like you can actually get away with when facing Remington Tate,” Pandora tells him before she bursts out laughing.



I smile, because the image of Kyle standing up to Remy really is funny. An image of the latter flashes in my mind, and I see him as I just saw him, looking at me unapologetically, as sexy as sex itself, and I wonder how it’s going to feel when I have to put my hands on him.

My job is extremely tactile. There’s no way of helping my clients without having some sort of contact. I’ve rehabbed my students in middle school, nursing injuries like I nursed my knee, but I’ve never touched a man that I actually want like this one. Whenever he trains, he’ll need stretching after, and that is right up my alley. Now, my sole purpose will be making sure Remington Tate keeps fighting like a champion. Suddenly, I can’t wait to be back on a team, even if I’m on a different side of it.





To Atlanta





The private jet is enormous, and Pete signals for me to board before he does. He picked me up at my place less than an hour ago, and he looks sharp in a Men in Black suit. I head up the stairs and realize you can actually fit standing inside the plane, like in a large airliner. However, no commercial jet I’ve ever been in has had a fraction of the luxury inside this one. Suede, leather, mahogany woods, gold trimmings, and state-of-the-art screens adorn the interior. It’s all a collection of extravagance in this big, amazing, rich man’s toy. The seats are arranged in sections that resemble small living rooms, and in this first section there are four plush ivory leather seats, bigger than a first-class seat. They contain a smiling Riley, who stands to greet me, as well as the other two members of Remington’s staff—his personal trainer, Lupe, a fortyish, bald man who looks like Daddy Warbucks from the movie Annie, and his chef and nutritionist, Diane, who I recognize as the woman who delivered the tickets to me.