Page 1 of Tight End
1
RAIDEN
The lights in the damn media room were too bright. They glared off every surface, turning the whole place into a sweatbox of tension and flashbulbs, like we were under interrogation instead of celebrating a Super Bowl win. I sat off to the side of the elevated dais, legs spread, forearms braced on my thighs, watching the shit show unfold with my usual silence.
Reporters lined the rows like vultures, cameras flashing and voices overlapping, all of them salivating for a headline. I kept my face unreadable as Saxon took the heat up front. He didn’t need backup, but a few of us had shown up for him anyway.
Lennox leaned against the wall near the door. He was the owner of the New York Nighthawks, the football team I played tight end for.
Micah, my best friend and one of our linebackers, was farther back. Brady, Rhodes, and Nixon sat with me.
I kept my focus on Saxon, my jaw locked tight, already feeling the start of a headache crawl across the base of my skull. My muscles were coiled with restless energy that had everything to do with this circus.
I hated this shit—the lights, the fakeness, and the need to explain what shouldn’t need explaining.
But Saxon was holding the line like he always did—calm, stone-faced, his voice low and steady. PR had called this presser to kill the rumors about him and the new hire. She stood up front in a sleek dress, eight months pregnant and glowing, with a diamond ring the size of a marble on her finger.
That should’ve been enough to shut it all down. No fuel left for the fire. But the media couldn’t help themselves.
I was tuning it all out when the door opened again and something shifted in the room. A woman entered in a rush, breathless, juggling a laptop, recorder, and what looked like a press pass she was clipping on mid-run. She whispered something to a PR assistant, her blue eyes wide with apology, then made her way down the side aisle to an empty chair in the third row—one of the seats reserved for reporters from Empire Sports Network. Someone must have been sick or flaked because I’d never seen her before.
She kept her head down, slipping into the seat quietly, trying to disappear.
It didn’t work.
I saw her, and everything slowed down.
Blond hair tied back in a messy bun like she hadn’t had time to do it right. Soft tan skin, lean muscle under tight black jeans, and a black sweater that hugged her curves. Her movements were smooth, balanced, controlled, and athletic. Her posture gave her away. Shoulders back and head high, with the kind of confidence you couldn't fake. I was willing to bet my next paycheck that she was an athlete or used to be one.
Her eyes scanned the room, alert and focused, not flustered by the noise or the pressure. She wasn’t some rookie. Even late, she didn’t look thrown. She was there to do a job, and she meant business.
She crossed her legs, the shift of her hips making me notice the exact way her jeans fit. My gut tightened and my cock swelled at how damn perfect they looked.
My blood went hot the moment she walked in, and now I felt it settling low and coiling with the kind of heat I hadn’t felt in a long fucking time. I couldn't remember when a woman last sparked my interest, let alone made me feel this damn turned on. I was shocked to find myself as hard as a fucking rock just from looking at her.
I wondered who she was and why she was here when this wasn’t her regular beat. I knew all the reporters who covered the Nighthawks, especially in smaller pressers like this one.
But I didn’t give a fuck why she was here. There was just something about her that fascinated me. I had a very strong feeling that she wasn’t just attractive. She was interesting. Rare.
My gaze stayed locked on her. I didn’t even try to hide it because I was kind of curious to see what she’d do.
At first, she didn’t flinch or squirm, but she definitely felt me watching. Her chin tipped slightly, and she turned her head, not directly toward me, but enough that our eyes caught for the briefest second. The moment she caught me staring, her breath hitched. Just a tiny flicker. Her throat moved as she swallowed hard. She tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear, kept her eyes forward, and adjusted her recorder like she wasn’t melting under the weight of my attention.
She tried to pretend she hadn’t noticed, but I saw the flush climbing her neck and the twitch in her fingers as she fidgeted with her pen. She was good at the mask. It was necessary in her line of work.
But I was better at spotting cracks, and I’d seen the hunger in her expression before she smoothed it over. Satisfaction surged through me. Slow and dark. She felt it too.
Then someone asked if the woman in the photo was Saxon’s type, drawing my attention back to my teammate as a deep frown shaped my lips. I fucking hated it when reporters felt they had the right to pry into our personal lives. I was about to jump in and tell them to back the fuck off, but Saxon beat me to it.
He answered flatly, “No.”
There was an audible pause, as if everyone was holding their breath waiting for him to elaborate. He didn’t. Like me, Saxon was a private guy. So I was shocked when another voice chimed in, pressing harder, and he didn’t even blink as he answered, “My fiancée, Ivy Fisher. She’s my type.”
Then he got up to walk out, just like that.
The room erupted, a dozen voices rising all at once. With a smirk, I shook my head and leaned back in my chair as I let the chaos roll right past me. That was the most Saxon thing he could’ve done—blunt and definitive. No room for questions.
My lips glided up into a grin when my eyes strayed back to the reporter I was having very dirty thoughts about.
