Page 27 of The Love Dare
“You might be one of the best in the league now, but you won’t be forever. And we both know of the four major sports in the US, professional hockey is the least popular by a sizable margin. Viewership is down. Youth participation is down. People are tuning out. If you want to keep making big money after your contracts dry up, you need an audience outside of the sport. And I can give that to you. I can give you the type of popularity, the type of fame, that opens doors. I’m talking host-of-a-morning-show type doors.”
God, that sounds awful.He shivered.
Fame was the one thing he hated most about his life. The absolute last thing he wanted to do was become a full-scale celebrity. The thought of being recognized every time he left the house was vomit-inducing. At least as an athlete, his fans were used to seeing him in full gear, with pads, a helmet, and a beard. In layman’s clothes with a ball cap on, he usually had a relatively good chance of moving about in public undetected.
Besides, he already knew exactly what he wanted to do after professional hockey became a thing of the past—the same thing Alexandru did. His mentor was recruited to the US after he got international attention for single-handedly carrying Romania to its first bronze medal match in the ’80s. When his professional career fizzled out, instead of moving back home where he would have been a king, he applied for citizenship and settled down in the same city he played for—Dallas. He openedhis own rink, coached his own youth team, and spent every single day in a pair of skates.
Hockey was Tyler’s whole life. He didn’t want to do anything else.
“Look,” he told the woman on the phone, trying his best to utilize the vast array of media training the league had been shoving down his throat since the moment he’d been drafted. “I’m not interested, okay? I’m not trying to be rude. But if you would like to feature the foundation in some way, I’d be more than happy to work something out on a smaller scale.”
“I see,” she murmured, trailing off into a heavy silence. Ice dripped down his chest, pooling into a frigid dread deep in his gut. “I didn’t want to have to do this, but I got a call from a friend atTZone. You know it?”
That absolute garbage dump of a gossip rag? Yes, he knew it. The foreboding freeze worked its way up his throat. He swallowed. “I do.”
“She told me about a little story she was working on. Apparently, she came across receipts you paid to some three different drug rehabilitation centers in the past five years. Now, we both know the league regularly drug tests its players, so I don’t think it’s you, per se. Maybe a girlfriend. A baby momma. A family member. Regardless, I don’t think one of the best professional hockey players in the country wants his name to be out there next to substance abuse allegations.”
“Are you threatening me?” Tyler gripped the phone, the frost turning to a fiery rage in an instant. “I will sue you for extortion so quickly?—”
“I’m not the one with the story,” Trish interrupted. “I have no control over if and when it publishes. But if you do me a favor, I can do you one back and put you in contact with my friend so your people can squash it. You wouldn’t be the first person to pay them a settlement to silence a story. Trust me.”
Trust her?
Not fucking likely. But he didn’t need to trust her to understand with absolute clarity what was at stake. Which was why, after ten more minutes on the phone, he caved to every one of her demands. Because hehadpaid three different rehab facilities in the past five years, and hewoulddo anything to stop it from coming out. But she was wrong about thewhy. Tyler didn’t give a shit about protecting himself. Sure, the hit to his image wouldn’t have been ideal, but he was clean. It wouldn’t have affected his contracts or his game, and he was sure he could have spun the PR to keep his endorsements intact. His publicist was a magician—she dealt with his grumpy ass all the time. But his mom was too fragile to handle it.
A fact that’s still true now.
His second alarm goes off, shortly followed by the vibration of an incoming call—the one he’s gotten at the same time every day for the past month from a sober living home in Orange County.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Tyler Baby.”
The greeting is warm, clear. Her voice isn’t slurred. It’s a version of her he wasn’t sure he would ever get back, the one he holds dear in his heart. Not the woman who he found passed out on the couch, the one who tried to hide empty needles under her pillows, the one who used concealer to cover the bruises. But the one who lay in bed with him for hours reading the school books his brain just couldn’t decipher, the one who sat with him at the kitchen table rattling off the instructions to his homework assignments so he could at least start off on the right foot, the one who tapped him under the jaw with a strictchin up, babywhen he came home upset because someone called him stupid. The older he grew, the less that woman existed. But he still remembers her, and he holds on to those memories witheverything he has. Because he refuses to let the drugs define her. Tyler is under no false hopes that she won’t relapse again. He knows it’s very likely. And if she does, he will try again and again and again for however long it takes to make sobriety stick. He’d rather go bankrupt than give up on her.
“I saw the show.”
He holds the phone out so she won’t hear and releases an audible groan.
“You looked very handsome,” she continues, unaware. “I tell you all the time to remove that monstrosity from your face.”
“Then you’ll be very happy to hear I’m contractually obligated to shave on night one.”
“Are you excited?”
“Sure,” he lies smoothly. Before they released her, the therapists at the rehab facility told him it would be better to shield her from any outside stressors she didn’t absolutely need to be made aware of, to keep her focused on her own healing. So the very last thing he’s going to do is burden her with the truth. “It’ll be fun. A break. An adventure.”
“And the women will all be gorgeous, not that you need any help in that department I’m sure.”
“Mom, please.” His face scrunches up. “Can you not?”
“What?” She laughs, and the pure thrill in it smooths the lines from his forehead. “You’re the one who’s about to give me an inside look at your dating life.”
“Believe it or not, that wasn’t at the top of my mind when I signed up for the show.”
“Hmph.”
“How are things with you?” He attempts a casual tone, but that’s never quite been in his wheelhouse.
