 by Fiona Davenport.jpg)
Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 25031 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 125(@200wpm)___ 100(@250wpm)___ 83(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25031 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 125(@200wpm)___ 100(@250wpm)___ 83(@300wpm)
Dempsey Tate was closing in on the end of his career as a professional football player. To make his lifelong dream come true, he needed to secure one final endorsement deal. Only the company wanted a family man, and he hadn’t dated in forever.
Then the perfect solution literally slammed into him—Skye Baird. She thought Dempsey was joking when he proposed after she spilled hot coffee on him. Little does she know their marriage of convenience will last forever.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
1
Dempsey
My phone vibrated on the top shelf of my locker, and I stopped undressing to grab it. “Hey,” I greeted my agent, Gil, when I answered. I’d been waiting for this call for a week.
“So I got a call from one of the Best Sports reps—a friend of mine.”
“Did they offer?”
Best Sports was a huge chain of sporting goods stores. They started out as one mom-and-pop shop and practically grew into a dynasty. But the company was still family run and owned, which was one of the reasons I loved the idea of being their spokesperson. I knew they wanted the face of the company to have a role model without scandal or anything that would be damaging to the spokesperson or the company.
I’d always been all about my job. I hadn’t even gone on a real date in more years than I could count, so nothing in my past would keep me out of the running. After meeting with the owners, I was confident that I had an excellent shot at being signed for this deal.
It was also a long-term gig, which was exactly what I was looking for. They wanted someone who would represent them long into their old age, who would become a member of the family.
This endorsement would get me what I needed to finish a project I’d had in the works for nearly a decade.
I came from a low-income area of New York City. My parents had me in high school and worked their asses off to make sure I had a good education and kept me out of trouble with community sports. Although the center had some state funding, the teams and equipment weren’t free, so my parents had scrimped for every penny. I’d been lucky to get one of the limited spots those first years. A lot of kids hadn’t been able to afford it, or simply missed applying until they were already full.
Not all of those kids had gone on to have a troubled youth, but more than there should have been. My best friend had joined a gang by the time he was twelve. When he was killed at fifteen during a retaliation shooting by a rival gang, I swore to do whatever I could to help as many kids as possible.
I wanted to build centers that offered more competitive sports options, classes that taught basic skills as well as nutrition, and even some job training. A few places provided similar classes and activities, though not all, but not only were they few and far between, they cost more than a lot of families could pay in those areas.
My goal was to open centers with an alternate funding source so that almost everything they offered was free. And I wanted a lot of them.
I’d been drafted at eighteen, and it hadn’t taken long for my skill to earn me a high salary. But even before I had money to put into the project, I started working on it. Even when I became one of the highest-paid receivers in the NFL, I knew I couldn’t make this happen on my own. Still, I’d kept working on it, buying up land, making deals, finding donors, anything I could do to pave my way toward my ultimate goal. I could have paid to build a few of the centers on my own, but I wouldn’t be able to sustain them long-term on my income, especially after I retired. And though I had a long list of donors, the centers needed a continuous stream of money.
I’d been smart with my money over the years, and I would be able to live out my retirement very, very comfortably. There were other long-term endorsement deals that I’d secured, but when I found out Best Sports was looking for a new face, I was willing to jump through any hoops they wanted. Every penny they paid me was going right into the coffers for the community centers. The signing bonus from the deal would be enough to build and furnish over a dozen, and the income would go a long way in keeping them funded.
Gil sighed, bringing me out of my thoughts. “The rep was doing me a favor and called to warn me. You’re the one they want. They think you’re the perfect fit, except for one thing. And it’s important enough that they might go another way.”