Total pages in book: 46
Estimated words: 43375 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 217(@200wpm)___ 174(@250wpm)___ 145(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 43375 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 217(@200wpm)___ 174(@250wpm)___ 145(@300wpm)
Except Rylin has strict dating no customers, no bosses…and definitely not a pro football player with a panty-melting smile.
She doesn’t have room for distractions while juggling double shifts, overdue bills, and a sister Rylin is desperate to protect. But Micah’s steady, quiet pursuit is impossible to ignore—and even harder to resist
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
1
MICAH
Idragged myself through the early August heat. Preseason or not, Coach had decided today’s practice should feel like fourth-quarter trench warfare—Oklahoma drills until somebody threw up, then red-zone install on dead legs. My body was built for collisions, but by the time we broke huddle and hit the showers, fatigue had snuck up behind my shoulder pads and started gnawing.
The ride from the practice facility out on Long Island blurred as I piloted the SUV on muscle memory more than anything else. By the time I reached Manhattan, I had one mission—food. Eating at The Tight Line would kill two birds since I liked to personally check in at least once a week at the delicatessen Raiden and I opened.
The moment I stepped through the glass doors, the fatigue eased, the way it always did when I walked into the place my best friend and I had built from scratch.
Stainless counters gleamed, fresh turf-green booth cushions waited beneath framed jerseys, and a huge chalkboard play diagram covered the back wall above the pass-through.
STACKED.
PRESSED.
ALWAYS IN FORMATION.
The scent of hot rye bread, roasted brisket, and a hint of garlic butter clung to the air. My stomach growled loud enough to punch through the rock music piping from the ceiling speakers. The perfect soundtrack for a linebacker who’d just spent three hours flattening rookies in the summer humidity.
The lunch rush had thinned, but plenty of tables remained filled. I meant to do the usual owner’s circuit—handshake the line cooks, eyeball ticket times, and sign whatever delivery slip got missed. My gaze made a lazy sweep, a habit from a lifetime of reading offenses, but everything in me braked hard when I spotted someone new.
She shot out of the kitchen doors, balancing three steaming plates on her forearm, a fourth in the other hand. Tall enough to catch my eye, maybe five-eight. Thin, but with subtle curves. She wore one of our cheap black aprons and a stubborn little smile. It was the kind that said the world might be heavy, but she could carry the weight.
When she turned my way to take another order, I noticed the fatigue that shadowed the skin under her hazel eyes. A sign of too many late nights and not enough sleep.
Strands of brown hair, kissed by the sun so they were the color of dark honey, had escaped a ponytail and kept sliding forward across her cheek. She blew at a wisp, laughed an apology to a customer when a french fry skidded, then tucked the strand behind her ear without breaking stride. Then she leaned to set a Reuben in front of a tourist dad who murmured something I couldn’t hear, making her laugh again. The sound floated over the room like a note from a song.
My first thought wasn’t poetic. It was primitive. Mine.
I was thirty years old, six-five, and two-sixty pounds of controlled violence. I was paid an obscene amount of money to diagnose plays in half a heartbeat, but one sunshine-sweet server almost dropped me to my knees. The reaction was so sudden, it hit like helmet-to-helmet contact, rattling my ribs and echoing between my ears. Immediate, visceral, and undeniable.
Whatever fired inside my chest while I watched her hustle across the floor didn’t feel temporary. It was a bone-deep certainty that this was the woman who would end the long stretch of nothing that had encompassed my love life. My heart didn’t race for just anybody. And every other part of my life—football, family, friendship, and business—was plenty full.
I wasn’t chasing random thrills. I wanted forever, same as my parents back in Alabama. Same as Raiden and Marissa, Prentice and Naomi. I wanted the Sunday-morning coffee, argue-over-paint-colors, hold-my-hand-when-we’re-ninety partner.
In the past few years, I’d figured maybe that wasn’t in the cards for me. Too picky, the guys said. I didn’t see it as picky. I was just refusing to settle.
They loved to bust my balls about it, calling the women I considered dating Mrs. Right Now, but I didn’t mind. Better than lying to a woman about interest I didn’t feel. It only took one conversation or the occasional dance at a club for me to bail because the spark just wasn’t there. No need for second chances when first impressions already answered the question.
I hadn’t even made it to a first date in years. Hell, I was starting to think my radar was busted. Then the new server rounded the corner with a tray balanced like a gymnast, and every circuit in my body lit up at once.
Yeah…my radar works just fine.
I took a slow breath, rolling sore shoulders and grounding myself in the floorboards so I didn’t move on instinct. Linebackers weren’t subtle, and we couldn’t exactly float across a room without notice, so a pair of tourists recognized me. A raised hand and a quick grin bought me privacy.