Michelle Betham - Striker

‘Have you always been this prehistoric in your views on women reporters and I’ve just had blinkers on for the past heaven knows how many years?’ Amber couldn’t help throwing a glance over towards the corner of the room, where Ryan was still sitting in her chair, his feet still on her desk as he concentrated on his mobile phone. She was almost shocked at her own reaction; the way her heart missed that stupid and clichéd beat, her stomach flipping over, and that was just from looking at the back of his head. She had a real fear of her knees giving way the second he turned around. Was this really happening to her? Thirty-seven-years-old and acting like a teenager. Two days ago she would have thought this behaviour hilarious, and something she would never have indulged in. But then, two days ago, Ryan Fisher hadn’t been on the scene. ‘What’s he want to see me for, anyway?’ Amber asked, trying not to sound bothered.

Kevin shrugged, looking at his watch. ‘No idea.’ He looked straight at her, smiling a wide smile and throwing her a wink. ‘Just be nice to him. Alright?’

Amber sighed as she tried not to smile back at her pain-in-the-arse producer. ‘Like I’d be anything else.’

‘You’re a true professional, Amber. Right, I’m off to meet Ronnie for a drink, seeing as you hijacked him last night.’

‘Jealous?’ Amber smirked, now itching to get away and see what Ryan wanted.

Kevin just pulled a face and walked off in the direction of the lift.

Amber waited a few seconds, just so she could compose herself, really. Something else she wasn’t used to doing – composing herself. Amber Sullivan was usually ready for anything. But not this.

Taking a deep breath, she quickly ran a hand through her long, dark red hair and strode over to her desk by the window, kicking the seat of her swivel chair so it spun round to face her, knocking his feet off her desk in the process.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asked, that hard exterior making a comeback, belying everything she was really feeling inside. Because, inside, she was feeling all mushy and mixed-up like some star-struck wannabe WAG, but she didn’t want him to see that. She wanted him to be on the receiving end of the full-on, couldn’t-care-less attitude.

Ryan grinned at her. Yeah, he was right. Last night she might have been that sexy sports reporter that wet dreams were made of, but today she was right back to her uptight self. ‘Where’d you get off to last night, then?’ he asked, still leaning back in her chair like he owned the place. And he could probably afford to.

‘Not altogether sure that’s any of your business,’ Amber replied, his arrogant attitude still one she couldn’t quite get her head around. But, oh God, he looked so hot sitting there with that sexy, messed-up hair, his tattooed arms hard and toned in a white t-shirt that showed off his tanned skin to perfection. Shit! Her heart was going ten-to-the-dozen here, what the hell was wrong with her? She fancied him; that‘s what was wrong with her. Ronnie was right – the bastard! She wished he wasn’t, and she’d spent the past day or so trying to deny it and pretend he was so far from the truth it was laughable, but she’d only been kidding herself. There was something about Ryan Fisher that was gradually knocking down all her well-built defences, and there was nothing she could do about it. But he really didn’t need to know that. Despite everything she’d told herself, she was finding his arrogance and bare-faced cheek one hell of a turn-on. ‘I’ll ask you again – what are you doing here?’ But she still had to keep up the cold-bitch act. For now.

‘I came to see you ,’ Ryan said, fixing her with a stare that may just have ever-so-slightly dented her steely exterior. ‘You busy tonight?’

Amber sat down on the edge of her desk, looking briefly out of the window at the view of the city centre, the traffic down below streaming past the building, letting her know that rush-hour was almost upon them. ‘I’ve got work to do,’ Amber lied. She had absolutely nothing to do; she was finished for the day but, once again, he didn’t need to know that.

He sat forward, clasping his hands between his open knees, his eyes still boring into hers. ‘Can we cut the crap, Amber?’

She stared back at him, those deep-blue eyes of his making her feel quite dizzy. ‘I… What do you mean?’

‘You know what I mean. Don’t you?’

She swallowed hard, a tingling in her thighs that she should not be feeling at 4:15 in the afternoon sending warning signals to her brain that she really shouldn’t be thinking about doing what she was doubtless going to end up doing, but what the hell. Ronnie was right on another score – maybe she did need to let her hair down more often. So, yeah, she knew what he meant. And even though it went against everything she’d ever stood for, broke every self-enforced rule she’d ever set herself, she wanted to see what was going to happen next. If she let it. Because she could still stop it, if she wanted to. But she didn’t want to. That was the problem.

Ryan smiled, a smile that sent a shiver right through Amber’s body, that tingle in her thighs only increasing with every second his eyes were on hers. ‘I’m giving you the chance to welcome me back to the North East in a way nobody else could ever do.’

‘You’re giving me the chance ?’ Amber asked, half laughing at his never-ending arrogance. ‘You’ll be telling me it’s a one-time-only offer next.’

Ryan sat back, shrugging, and Amber laughed again, throwing her head back, yet knowing full well that she was going to grab this chance with both hands in an act of total recklessness that was so beyond anything she’d ever done before – well, maybe not in a long time, anyway.

‘There are two reasons why I shouldn’t go anywhere near you,’ she said, sliding down from the desk, leaning over to write something down on a post-it note. As she wrote, she deliberately stuck out her bum, arching her back downwards, completely aware that she was flirting outrageously now, but not because Kevin had told her to. It was because she wanted to. Probably just to see if she still could.

Standing up straight, she smiled at Ryan, quite flattered by the flustered look he sported, even though it was obvious he was trying to look cool. Okay. So she could still do it. ‘Reason number one – you’re a lot younger than me, and two – you’re a footballer.’ She handed him the piece of paper, his fingers quickly brushing against hers as he took it from her, an action which sent a wave of something almost electric shooting right through her. ‘Anytime after seven-thirty. Now get out of my chair. I’ve got work to do.’

Ryan felt like he’d just scored the winning goal in a cup final. Sticking the yellow post-it note to the dashboard of his black Jaguar XK coupé, he entered the postcode into his satnav, waiting a few seconds until it finally plotted the route to what he hoped was going to be a very successful night. He knew he should really be taking it easy; he should be leaving the fun until after Saturday’s match, that would be the sensible thing to do. But Amber Sullivan was something else. She was also the kind of woman that was almost guaranteed to change her mind if you left her hanging on for too long, so he wasn’t going to play games. She wasn’t one of those ten-a-penny pretty girls; she was different, a distraction he hadn’t banked on, but one he couldn’t ignore.

Switching the radio to a rock station, he turned up the volume and headed out onto the motorway, barely able to keep the smile off his face. Was he going to be the one that made this ice-cold sports reporter break her own rules? That in itself was enough to turn him on, but the thought of what lay beneath the surface of a woman who was quite fascinating, to say the least, made everything just that little bit more exciting. And the one thing Ryan Fisher couldn’t live without was excitement. It was something that had got him into a lot of trouble in the past, and maybe he should be listening to the warning shots that were ringing out now, telling him to back off and lay low, play it cool, settle down. But he couldn’t do it. He just couldn’t do it. That would be like rolling over and admitting defeat, and anyway, who’s to say that what had happened in London would happen here? He knew the pitfalls now. He’d promised Max he’d left all that behind, and he had. But that didn’t mean to say he had to stop having fun altogether. Jesus, he was only human.