Page 5 of The Only Shot that Mattered

He got up and walked out of her game room, which was really just the second bedroom in her townhome. Down the hall was the master bedroom and attached to that was her bathroom and her closet, which was filled with nothing but comfortable clothes to wear at home.

Kenna knew exactly what was about to happen in the next few minutes. Cam wouldn’t find anything suitable for her to wear to the game tomorrow. He would try convincing her to go to the mall with him, and now, she needed to think of an excuse quickly. She already agreed to go to the game with him. There was no way Kenna would be subjected to go to the mall tonight too.

It wasn’tthat long ago that retirement felt really far off for Damien. The fact that the time was near blew his mind this entire season. They were already halfway through the season before playoffs, and the Ellwood Infernos would most definitely win the championship this year if he had anything to do with it, which he would.

Despite being confident in all this, Damien didn’t really enjoy explaining this to the media repeatedly. Unfortunately, that was a part of his job. He was considered an OG in the game, touching stats that rivaled LeBron, Shaq, and Kobe, God rest his soul.

“How confident are you in going to the playoffs, Damien?” the reporter asked as she sat poised with her pen at the ready.

He smirked, his full lips splitting his face into a lopsided grin. He knew the question was coming. The media had become an entity he’d learned like the back of his hand over the past several years. The reporters blurred together at this point, asking the same shit on different days.

Holding his grin, he looked the pale faced blonde woman directly into her hazel eyes and said, “I’m confident we’ll be getting a ring this year.”

She smiled, and the blush that had rested on her face since they shook hands thirty minutes ago flamed brighter. Damien chuckled. The deep bass of his voice vibrated the space between them. He loved watching women squirm in his presence. It was fun for him, but he rarely acted on it. In his twenties, he probably would have busted the white girl down, but now that he was thirty seven, he didn’t have time for all that. He learned long ago to be more selective with the company he kept because groupies were a real thing, and they could be crazy as hell. He had a reputation to uphold, and being attached to a throng of crazy women wasn’t it.

“That confidence will get you everywhere, Mr. Blaze.”

Slowly, he leaned back on the loveseat he sat on, making it look more like a comfortable chair because of his size. His arms spread out across the cream colored leather back of the sofa, and he gapped his legs while looking around. “It seems it already has.”

The reporter, whose name he had already forgotten, looked around the lavish sitting room and blushed an even deeper red. “It seems so. I think that’s all I need for today, Mr. Blaze. I hope you have a good game later. One step closer to getting that ring, huh?”

She stood and smoothed down her black skirt that fit her tightly. It was too bad she didn’t have a nice ass to look at it. He nodded coolly at her, the smirk still on his face. “That’s right.” Finally, he stood, dwarfing her with his size. “Let me show you to the door.”

They walked through his mansion, and he got a kick out of her eyes travelling all over his home. Rarely did he conduct interviews anywhere but at his home anymore, unless it wasdirectly after a game or a press conference. He hated doing them, so it was a luxury to him to be a big enough deal to do them from home when he had to.

Only a few more months of this.The end of his NBA career was bittersweet to him. He couldn’t wait to spend more time with his family, his daughter in particular, but he was sad to say goodbye to the career he worked so hard for.

Damien had given the NBA the last fifteen years of his life, and it was officially time to lay the ball to rest. His career prevented him from settling down and experiencing regular things. Sure, he got to travel and experience extraordinary things in his lifetime, like buying houses for his family or people in need, traveling to exotic places, and fucking on the baddest women in the country, but he’d missed out on so much. His daughter’s birth, birthdays, holidays… the normal simple moments he could never get back.

“Thank you for meeting with me today, Mr. Blaze. I’ll send over the final draft of the article to your team for review before publishing it.”

Damien nodded at her and opened the front door, but before he could respond, he was face to face with his baby mama, Jendaya.

Her brown eyes moved between Damien and the reporter before a smile broke out on her face. “You ready to get going, baby daddy?”

The reporter looked flustered, as if they had been caught doing something they weren’t supposed to do. Damien chuckled. Most people didn’t know what to do with his and Jendaya’s relationship, which was another huge reason he had yet to settle down. Women were too jealous of his baby mama, even though she was happily married and didn’t want Damien in the slightest.

“Come in first. I just have to grab my bag.” He turned to the reporter and flashed her another smile. “Thanks again.”

She nodded and then scurried out the door, carefully bypassing Jendaya, who rose a brow at Damien. He chuckled and closed the door after she stepped in.

“What was her issue?” she asked, tossing her long brown wavy hair over her shoulder. Jendaya was a redbone who ironically looked a lot like Zendaya. She hated the comparison, but it was true. She was slender with high cheekbones and the prettiest smile. Damien loved her with his whole heart, but only as a friend.

In high school, they had been the best of friends. It wasn’t until he was two years into his contract with the NBA that he saw how lonely his new lifestyle could be. Yeah, he could have a new woman in his bed every day of the week, but he was a lover boy at heart, so the one-night stands didn’t sustain him. He didn’t trust the women he chose to have in his bed as far as he could throw them because they were all looking for a come up.

That was when he and Jendaya decided to try for a relationship. The underlying attraction was always there, and in their early twenties, they had been a bit curious about how a relationship might look between them. It only took them a year to figure out it could never work. They loved each other fiercely, but it was never romantically. They realized they could confidently say that now, and there was no love lost between them. Only a month after they broke up, Jendaya found out she was pregnant. Neither of them was upset about it, though, because they knew their child would have the dopest parents on the planet, and their co-parenting proved to be out of this world. There was absolutely nothing like having a child with his best friend, and Damien never regretted it for one second.

When Jendaya got married, there was no need for a maid of honor because Damien stepped in as the best man while theirdaughter was the flower girl. Her husband, Grayson, checked all the boxes and was as cool as they came. He and Damien became fast friends, and their daughter, Skylar, had another adult in her life to spoil her.

Damien shrugged as he walked toward the stairs. He had placed his game bag right at the foot of the steps so he could grab it and go when it was time to leave. Over his shoulder, he called, “You know how that shit goes.”

“Don’t tell me she got caught up in the Blaze effect.”

“It’s hard not to, don’t you think?” All his teeth showed as he cheesed down at her with his bag in his hand.

“Boy, please. It ain’t that hard, believe me. I wish you would find someone to give your time to though. I already know you’re going to drive our baby insane if you don’t find something to do with yourself before you retire.”

They walked toward the door as Damien responded. “I don’t know what to tell baby girl, because I’m most def about to be all in her business when that time comes. She gon’ love it too.”

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