Page 56 of Tangled with the Tight End

“No. Definitely not.” I shake my head.

These meds seem to delete my filter. Not that I’m big on saying things in a roundabout way when I’m not under the influence of medication. I’m a straightforward person. I sort of take after my dad in that way.

“Chantal’s a woman my mom sent up here. You can bet my mom will call later to check on how it went.”

“She’s playing matchmaker?” Winona asks.

“Perpetually.”

She nods. Then she glances at me, holding my gaze. “I don’t want to overstep, but do you really need a matchmaker? It seems like women would be falling over themselves to be with you.”

I laugh softly. “So, you think I’m the kind of man women would fall over themselves for?”

“I think there are women who love football players and fame and who are attracted to men like you.”

“Men like me?”

“You know.” She waves her hand from across the room, running it from my head to my toes as if she’s a game show hostess and I’m the prize. “Men like you.”

I laugh. “Well, you’re not wrong.”

“Does it get old?” she asks.

“Women falling over themselves to get near me?”

“Yeah. I think it would be its own kind of exhausting.”

“Honestly, yes. It gets very old.”

Has anyone ever asked me about this? If they have, I can’t remember. Most people assume it’s a man’s highest aim in life to have swarms of strangers fawning over him.

I almost tell her how I liked it when I was younger. What guy doesn’t love women noticing him, telling him how handsome he is, treating him like he’s practically a god among men?

But after a while, it became more of the same—women wanting the idea of me. No one seemed interested in me—Declan—the guy who grew up in small town Tennessee, the man who secretly sings in the shower, the guy who can’t seem to figure out who he is when he’s not wearing number eighty-eight.

The pizza arrives. I buzz the delivery boy through the gates, one at a time.

“Grab my wallet from the dresser in the guest room,” I tell Winona.

“I’ll split it with you,” she offers.

I send her a look that says over my dead body. And she laughs, holding her hands up in a show of surrender.

She comes back with two pizza boxes, a plastic bucket of cookie dough and a bottle of root beer.

“I’m going to heat the oven. If I can figure out how it works,” she says.

“It’s simple,” I tell her. “Just push the knobs in before turning.”

She leaves the pizza and soda bottle on the coffee table and comes back without the dough, but carrying two glasses of ice.

We dig into our food, eating in silence for the first few bites. I try to hide my relief that she’s eating with me. I don’t understand what this is, and I’m not about to try to decipher my thoughts under the influence of pain meds with her right here in the room. Her watchful eyes meet mine occasionally and we just stare at one another. It should feel awkward, but it’s oddly comforting.

She’s moved to the chair where Chantal had been sitting, her legs tucked up under her and a paper plate with two slices of pizza on her lap.

“So, what’s it going to be?” she asks. “Action, romance, suspense?”

“You pick,” I tell her.