Page 2 of Playing for Love

After an exasperated sigh, she said, “Mia Lane. Don’t forget again. I’ll text you with her number. She’s moving in tomorrow. Bye, honey.”

I’d been kidding, meant to be funny, but she hung up before I had a chance to say so, or to tell her I loved her too. Our usual ritual. It was unlike her, but I shrugged it off. If she didn’t mind, I certainly didn’t. I was more of a believer in saving the amore, the words of love, for special occasions, to keep them special. I was more like my Dad, the anti-Italian, as my mother joked. Though she and her strong cultural roots had Italianized Dad pretty well. I smiled as I jumped into the shower.

About the only non-Italian thing about me was my last name. And my guarded approach to amore.

Right now, the love of my life was football.

Denise was right about that. Football was the biggest problem in our relationship. I don’t know if she started out hating football, but it was clear that she hated it now. I let the cool water sluice over me, remembering that football had to be my focus, letting my tension run off with the water.

Toweling off, I shoved the problem of Denise from my mind.

My phone lay on my bed and it didn’t ring, but I saw it light up. The number was one I didn’t recognize, wasn’t in my contacts. But mine was a highly protected number only given out to people I knew, people I wouldn’t mind talking to. No reporters, no media, no agents except my own.

Picking it up, I figured what the hell and punched it on.

“Gabe Wyatt speaking. To what do I owe the pleasure of your call, whoever you are?”

A feminine trill of a laugh tickled my nerve endings from the other end of cyberspace.

“This is Mia, I’m sorry. You’re funny. I should have expected it.”

“Mia . . . oh, Mia.” I searched my blank memory for her last name and then skipped it. “Denise’s friend from college.”

“That’s me. She told you I moved to Boston?”

“Yes. Gave me my marching orders to show you around.”

“Is that what she told you? My marching orders were to keep an eye on you.” She laughed again. I laughed too, but she was hitting more than my funny bone with that titillating laugh of hers, reminding me of something too far away to grasp. What was it with me and women’s laughter anyway? I’d always been drawn by the way a woman laughs, the sound, the authenticity, the way it made me feel, light as it were a helium balloon for my soul. Whenever I met a woman, I relentlessly tried to make them laugh, to test them out, see what they had to offer.

Mia had a lot of promise. Her laugh didn’t have the edge of Denise’s, it was more open, the sensuality less guarded, less sharp. Being a connoisseur, I ought to know. Pulling myself up short, I woke up to where my mind had been running. Mia was out of bounds, promising laughter or not.

“Well, either way,” she said, “I wanted to call and say hello. I just moved in yesterday.”

“Good. We’ll have to set up a time to have dinner.”

“That would be great. I have this long, gaping, empty weekend in front of me with nothing to do and no one to do it with. I was hoping—”

“Sure, of course. Sorry. I forgot it was the weekend. We’re on two-a-days, and I pretty much work seven days a week. But I have to eat dinner sometime, so we’ll have dinner. I know a great Italian place in my neighborhood.”

“That sounds wonderful. What time?”

“Tonight?”

She’d misunderstood and I was surprised by her eagerness. My mind raced, running through the options. It must be almost eight. I’d planned a quick bite, reviewing clips of new lay drills, then early to bed. Our last preseason game was Sunday, two days away. Coach said I’d be sitting it out, but that didn’t stop me from preparing as if it were another Super Bowl. The other teams would be gunning for us this year, hard. The last thing I wanted to do was come into the season soft. I’d planned an early night and I’d have to stick to that. To bed by ten.

“Oh—I’m sorry,” she said at my hesitation. “You probably already have plans. Whenever you have time. I should have expected you’d be busy.”

“Tonight is fine. Where are you? I’ll pick you up.” I could handle it. I didn’t want to disappoint her. I’d make sure dinner was quick, no more time—or not much more—than I’d have taken to eat on my own.

Glad to have my cool back, we made arrangements for me to meet her out front of her apartment building in Beacon Hill, a ritzy old-world part of Boston. The place I’d pick to live if I weren’t a die-hard Italian boy living in East Boston.

I pulled up in my new Audi R8 convertible, experiencing a puzzling case of nervous energy. Mia had thrown me off-guard and I hadn’t even met her yet. She was Denise’s friend, my watchdog, my own hanky-panky police.

No wonder I felt off. I didn’t need a guard or a watchdog or whatever else Denise had in mind. I went along with it because I always went along with Denise, but it bugged me. I had some rules in life that I followed ruthlessly, and one of them was never to cheat. Not in cards, not on my friends and, most importantly, not on my woman.

I’d tell Mia right away—after I told Denise—that I wasn’t comfortable with a watch dog. I’d fix Mia up with someone this weekend and get rid of her. How hard could it be? Trying to picture Mia, I couldn’t place her. I’d met too many of Denise’s so-called best friends and I had no idea who Mia’s boyfriend Paul was. Damn, I was bad. I needed to do something about that name-remembering thing.

As soon as I’d parked at the curb, a graceful willowy woman emerged from the door. Chestnut-brown hair, thick and wavy, bounced around above her shoulders and framed her flawless face, a face that looked smooth as ice cream, good enough to lick—