"It's no big deal," she said, wishing her mother wouldn't get so excited about her budding relationship with Ty. If things between them didn't work out, she didn't want to have to console her mother in addition to herself.
"Every mother wants to see her daughter fall in love with a strong, wonderful man. Not to mention filthy rich. I can't wait to see more of Ty!"
Her mother's giggle grated on Julie's sleep-deprived nerves, but before she could figure out a civil, nice-daughter response, her call waiting beeped.
"I've got a work call on the other line, Mother. I have to go." Julie clicked over.
"Good morning Miss Spencer," came Bobby's slow drawl."! hear you're taking special care of my number one boy."
Oh, God. "Ty's been doing great," she said in as crisp and professional a voice as she could manage, considering her client's "number one boy" was in her bed. Ty looked at her from beneath the arm over his eyes. "Who is it?" He sounded sleepy, lazy, and utterly unconcerned.
She shook her head, put her finger over her lips, and mouthed, "Bobby." Ty shifted onto his hip and the sheets slid from his torso, leaving a mouthwatering expanse of his skin and muscle.
"Who?"
She covered the mouth piece tighter. "Shh!" But it was too late.
"Now isn't this convenient? The two people I want to talk to are already gathered in one room."
"Bobby, I—" she began, but Ty had already bounded up out of the bed and grabbed the extension in her office next door.
"Hey, boss. You need something this fine morning?"
Ty's drawl was a match for Bobby's, even without the thick southern accent.
Julie felt like she was going to throw up. Or hyperventilate.
"You and your pretty lady just sit tight. I'll be right over." Julie's mouth opened. Then closed. Finally, she pushed a "Wonderful" out just before Bobby hung up on them both.
She flew out of the bed. "Fuck, f**k, f**k!"
Ty stood against the doorframe. "I never thought I'd hear you say that word once, let alone three times." He raked his gaze up, then down, her bare skin. "And it's a bonus that you're naked." Julie growled, then dashed into the bathroom. She threw her hair up into a bun and walked into a wall of cold water.
"Shit, shit, shit!"
Of course she'd figured people would be interested in finding out more about her, the woman who had captured Ty's heart. She'd planned on setting up a meeting with Bobby first thing Monday morning to present her revised plan for the final week of her contract. But she'd gotten so caught up in Ty's "I love you" that the part of her brain that had always put her business first had stopped functioning altogether. In typical Ty fashion, he waited until steam started to rise from the shower to get in. Julie dropped the soap and then her razor. She couldn't stop shaking.
"Everything's going to be fine," Ty said.
"What do you care?" she accused. "You're not going to be fired." He shrugged. "Isn't that why they hired you? To turn me into a good boy so they wouldn't have to fire my ass?"
She flipped off the tap and roughly dried herself off with a towel. Ty gently took it from her.
"Why don't you let me do that, before you scar that gorgeous skin of yours?" What was she going to say to Bobby about her relationship with Ty? How could she possibly spin things so it looked like she was still doing her job? Because quite frankly, Julie wasn't at all sure that she was anymore.
Having sex countless times a day with a hot pro football player definitely wasn't listed by the IRS as "gainful employment."
"Now look," Ty said in a voice meant to calm her. "We haven't done anything wrong. You've worked your fine ass off to reform me, and even from my perspective I can see that you've done a fine job." She wasn't in a smiling mood, but it was nice hearing that she'd been successful at taming a wild mustang, straight from the horse's mouth.
"I don't recall seeing any contract that said you and I couldn't date." She bit her lip. "True."
"Being with a successful, beautiful woman like you makes a guy like me look good. Bobby's not stupid, even if he pretends he is. He'll see that my being with a babe like you is an asset." Julie wasn't sure what was worse. The fact that the man she was relying on to pay a boatload of her bills was about to pound on her door, or that her boyfriend was a jerk who actually referred to her as "a babe like you."
She spun away and reached for the first thing in her closet. What the hell had she been thinking being with a guy like Ty? Then she realized he was chuckling.
"Can't you take anything seriously for one second?" she yelled.
"Admit it," he said, "you're not thinking about Bobby anymore, are you?" She shoved him on the bed. "So all that 'your fine ass' and 'babe, you're an asset' stuff was merely a ploy to take my mind off of this horrible situation? You didn't say it because you're stuck in the fifties and can't stop picturing me in the kitchen with an apron on?"
"Better I'm with you than a stripper, right?"
Julie dragged a comb through her hair. She hated that he was right, hated that she was exactly the kind of woman she would have set Ty up with.
She'd brushed mascara over her pale lashes just as the doorbell rang.
"I'll get it," Ty said, walking through her house as if he owned it. Julie let him go. If ever there was a morning for bright red lipstick, this was it. She emerged from her bedroom just as Ty opened the door.
"They've got great coffee on the corner, don't they?" Ty greeted his team's owner.
"I'll have to come back another time and find out."
"I'll brew a pot," Julie said, gesturing for Bobby to take the plush seat facing the park. Bobby waved away her offer. "A lovely offer, but unnecessary. Why don't you both sit down."
Julie was amazed by how quickly Bobby took control of everyone around him. She felt like an intruder in her own house, like she should see herself out when he was done reading her the riot act. She sat down on the hardest chair in her living room and primly crossed her legs, keeping her expression warm but closed. She wasn't stupid enough to frame herself for high crimes and misdemeanors. Ty, of course, flopped down on her sofa and kicked his legs up. Not a care in the world, that was always his game.
Bobby looked utterly at ease. "It's come to my attention," he said, "that you are no longer a man about town, Ty."
Ty grinned. "Julie's making an honest man out of me."