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CHAPTER 12: JOLENE
I feel like I’m going to throw up.
I’ve done exclusive interviews before. I interviewed Coach Thompson dozens of times, and I’ve interviewed players and other coaches, too.
But that’s when I was a sports beat reporter. This is my first interview as correspondent.
And on top of that, I have this sinking feeling that the new head coach is Lincoln Nash, and the fear of seeing him again after nearly twenty years is knotting my stomach.
When fear takes over, I jump into fight mode. Not fight-or-flight…no no, right to fight. I’m not just terrified of seeing him again.
I’m terrified I’ll fuck up this brand-new job because of him. Of all the people in the world to be hired the same time I get my dream job, it had to be him.
And my hunch it’s him has only been confirmed by the fact that his house in Los Angeles just sold in under twenty-four hours a few days ago.
I’m pacing the small conference room where we’re holding this interview while Dave, my camera operator, gets set up. I review my questions—the same list of questions I’ll ask no matter who it is, and I draw in a deep breath.
“What’s going on with you?” Dave asks, breaking into my thoughts.
I like Dave. We’ve worked together lots of times, and the station assigned him to work with me this season—a promotion for both of us, but he won’t be traveling with the team or making besties with the new coach like I will.
Dave is in his late twenties and single, and he loves to regale me with all his tales from the clubs. I live vicariously through him since that’s not really my scene so much anymore—not with a seven-year-old at home, though I do take advantage of the occasional night out with Sam when the boys are at their dads’ houses and she’s not pulling a late shift.
“Nothing’s going on with me. Why do you ask?” I halt in my pacing at his question.
“You’re walking back and forth like you’re caged in here. It’s like you’re nervous, and I have never seen you nervous to do an exclusive. Ever. And it’s making me nervous.”
“I’m not nervous,” I snap at him.
He raises his brows as if to tell me I’m proving his point, which I probably am. I take a drink of water. I look out the window. I force myself to recenter, to focus on the task at hand. Maybe it’s not Lincoln and I have nothing to worry about.
And then the door opens.
Jack Dalton is standing there, a force to be reckoned with…and he’s blocking my view of the new coach. I force a smile.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Dalton,” I say, and he nods politely with a smile.
“I’m pleased to introduce you to our new head coach,” he says, and he moves into the room so the new coach can stand in the doorway next. “Mr. Lincoln Nash.”
My heart drops into my stomach when I see him in person for the first time in nearly twenty years.
Time stands still as we face off across the small room.
Memories plow into me.
It wasn’t just his dad hurting my dad and taking him out of the game forever. It wasn’t just the friendships between our families torn apart from one event. It wasn’t just the hatred and animosity my father spewed at the Nashes.
It was the fact that in the midst of all that uncertainty, the person I loved more than anyone or anything in the entire world shattered my heart.
And now he’s standing in front of me again, a smug smirk on the handsome face that time has been very, very kind to, and I have to interview him. According to my boss, I have to become his best friend. I have to act professional when I can’t stop staring at him.
When I can’t stop feeling the feelings that rushed over me every time he walked in any room back when we were together.
He’s twenty years older now than the last time I saw him in person, and my God is he attractive.
A scruff lines his jaw that wasn’t there in his younger years, and his dark eyes seem to pin me to my place as they land on me. His dark hair looks freshly cut, a longish, spiky crew cut with a tapered fade, and he wears a suit ahead of the press conference.
Lincoln Nash in a suit is a fucking sight to behold.
