Romance: Luther's Property (51 page)

Austin was definitely a longhorn. He had a longhorn. He also
had a pair of big balls. Monkey balls. The kind that got him through tough
situations, the kind of balls that helped him stay in the pocket on a third and
seven, two crazed looking 300 pound line defensive lineman, bearing down on his
ass, breathing down your neck, and just before they could get their claws on
him, he would juke left, then right, dip and dodge and slip out of the noose.
Then he’d scramble, looking for a receiver. Then he'd spot a teammate wide
open, all the way on the other side of the field. It was a dangerous throw, the
kind of throw that his coaches were always telling him not to make. But Austin
had never been one to listen to wise counsel, whether on the field or off it.
That’s who he'd always been. So of course, he made the risky throw. That’s how
he’d always lived his life.

While the ball sailed through the air, the entire stadium
held its breath. There was a loud gasp when the ball landed in the receiver’s
hands. And then one section of the stadium went wild, jumping up and down,
clapping their hands, and screaming, piercing the Heavens with their cries.

Touchdown!

Austin screamed and pumped his fists in the air. All of his
teammates mobbed him, slapped him on the ass, slammed their helmets into his
and grunted.

After that dramatic third-down touchdown, everything seemed
to come together for Austin and his Longhorn teammates. He made one great play
after another and before any of the so-called experts could wrap their heads
around what was happening, a 15 point underdog had won the National
Championship. David slayed Goliath.

From that day forward, Austin was a legend.

He couldn't help smiling every time he watched the replay of
that game that had changed his life forever. He’d finally cemented himself as
the best player in the country. Maybe one of the best college football
quarterbacks of all time.

Austin turned up the volume. The announcers were praising
him, laying it on real thick. He loved that. He could feel the adrenaline
coursing through his veins.

Austin hopped off the couch, clapping wildly, hooting and
howling in the darkened room. The viewing room.

“Hell yeah!” His deep masculine voice resounded off the
walls. It was the booming voice of a leader. An alpha. He could feel his mojo
coming back, the blood coursing through his veins.

He looked to his left and raised his arm in the air,
preparing to give a high-five.

That’s what he and his father used to do. But this time, he
stood there with his arm frozen in the air. What a horrendous feeling. He
wouldn’t have wished it on anyone.

The images of his father, Big Daddy Daniels, came flooding
back to him. Big Daddy was always trying to tell him which women to look out
for and which ones to trust. He never had a problem finding something
attractive about a woman. He had a very eclectic palate, which he ended up
passing on to his son who also had a very open mind when it came to the women
that he pursued.

After his father’s death, Austin had really lost his
way.
 
He’d always been a bit reckless, a
wild child, bad boy. He’d always been the type of guy who didn't give a damn
about whether or not he pushed the envelope. The envelope be damned! Rules
weren’t for him, especially the kind that tried to attach some sort of morality
to the way a man conducted himself in his private life, in particular when it
came to the ladies. Male journalists seemed to take a particular pleasure in
exposing the juicy details of his sex life.

Whenever he went out, even if just for a coffee at
Starbucks, it seemed like there was an army of paparazzi tailing him, some
hanging close to his bumper or pulling up alongside him, making it clear that
they were following him, even taunting him, trying to get a response, something
impulsive and irrational, something that would grab the headlines.

After he led Texas to victory in the national championship
game, he was America's darling. The tough, rugged bad boy who'd managed to win
in the end. There’d been so many people rooting against him, hoping that he
would fall flat on his arrogant face.

But there were many more people who wanted him to succeed
and stick it to all the uptight people in the media, those people that didn’t
know how to let their hair down and have fun, those, weak skinny, beta males
who seethed with jealousy when they saw the 6 foot five, green eyed
quarterback, who could make all the throws, especially the deep ones. Nobody went
deeper than Austin.

Nicole couldn’t believe that he’d screwed this us up. It was
supposed to be their anniversary night. They’d been planning on going out to
her favorite Chinese restaurant for weeks. She’d been calling and texting
Jeffrey for the past forty-five minutes but he still hadn’t responded. She was
starting to get worried that maybe something had happened to him. But that was
just too horrific for her to spend a lot of time thinking about. The thought
that something could have happened to him on their third anniversary was too
much for her to handle. It was the kind of horrible thing that you would hear
on the news. It was the kind of horrible thing that happened to other people.
The kind of thing that you thought you were immune to.

But as she paced around their apartment in her new black
dress and heels, her mind began to go in even darker directions. Pangs of
jealousy began to well up in her body. For a moment her head became dizzy and
she needed to lean up against the wall to keep from falling over. Several
months ago she’d seen Jeffrey’s phone lying on the couch. It was weird to see
his phone just sitting there like that. She’d only ever seen it in his hand. He
never left it out. And it wasn’t something that she paid that much attention
to. They were always together unless we were working.

She would have preferred to spend these moments of freedom
traveling the country or maybe even the world. But when She had brought the
idea up to Jeffrey but he quickly shot it down. There was too much work to be
done at the firm. He couldn’t afford to take a week off for some meaningless
vacation. There would be plenty of time for travelling once they had really
established themselves in their careers.

It had really hurt her when he said that line about a
meaningless vacation. What could possibly be meaningless about it, if they were
spending time together? And that’s when she started to question the point of
being in a relationship if they couldn’t even spend time together. And
especially on the night that he knew was really important to her.

Sure, it wasn’t our their third wedding anniversary. They’d
been dating for three years but they still were not engaged. And they’d been
living in the same apartment for the last year. But marriage was one of the
subjects that Jeffrey refused to talk about. Every time she tried to bring it
up, he would frown and wave his hands in front of his face.

A few months ago she happened to see Jeffrey’s phone sitting
on the couch. She didn’t think much of it at first. But then it started
beeping, non-stop. Someone was clearly sending him lots of texts. She thought
that maybe it was a family member or something. His mother had recently spent a
couple weeks in the hospital. And the first thought she had was that something
might have happened to her. So when she went to pick up the phone she was not
snooping on him. But what she saw were definitely not texts from anyone in his
family.

There were texts from a Jessica, a Mandy, and a Chloe. Her
heart sank when she saw those names. She had to find out who those girls were
and why they were talking to him. The first few messages sent waves of jealousy
flooding through her body. There were some very suggestive texts sent back and
forth, but before she had time to scroll through all of the messages and really
get a feel for the nature of the relationship, she heard the front door
opening.

For a moment her body froze. Her mind went blank. She had no
idea what to do. She considered running. She considered throwing the phone
across the room. But all she did was stand there while the door opened and
Jeffrey burst back into the apartment. She dropped the phone on the couch in
the exact place where she had picked it up.

Jeffrey rushed into the apartment without saying anything to
her and nearly knocked her out of the way as he went straight for his phone. He
didn’t even look at the screen. He stuffed it straight in his pocket and turned
to head out again. She thought that was really weird. He never acted like that.
So she decided to call after him.

“Hey Jeffrey, is everything all right?”

He turned around slowly and glared at her. Then he sighed
and lowered his eyes. She walked towards him and put her arms around him and
once again asked him if everything was all right. He sighed again before
raising his eyes to meet hers. She grew really worried that something was
wrong. Maybe those texts, at least some of them, did have to do with his
mother.

“It’s Mom,” he said burying his head in her shoulder. “She
has to go back to the hospital for more tests. The bills just keep adding up.”

 
She ran my fingers
through his hair and tried to comfort him as best she could. Then she wiped
away a few tears that had begun to form in his beautiful, light green eyes.

 
For the next hour
they’d stayed on the couch, talking and crying. By the end of the day she had
completely forgotten about the female names she’d found on his phone and the
sexually suggestive texts that she’d seen.

But now all these months later, those memories were coming
back. And she felt as if all of her mind and body were being taken over by
thoughts of jealousy.

Austin woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of
his phone beeping. He felt certain that it was Tanya. About damn time, he said
to himself. When he picked up the phone, he grunted in disappointment. There
were several new email messages sent to him by Nicole the wedding planner. Each
one of them showed purchases that Tanya had requested that Nicole make for the
wedding.

Austin blinked several times as he stared at the
astronomical bills. She’d paid more than 40,000 for a floral arrangement. and
almost 65,000 for some kind of artisan silverware.

What the fuck! His mind was made up. There was no way that
he was going through with this wedding. He didn’t love Tanya. Never had. And it
was very unlikely that she loved him. The whole thing was such a farce.

He hopped out of bed and paced around his room. It was a
tough decision. But It was one that he had to make.

He called the wedding planner and let her know that the
whole charade was being called off. There was a long silence as Austin waited
for her to respond.

Even though the wedding was canceled, the bachelor party was
still held at a discrete Las Vegas strip club. Normally, Austin loved taking
those sorts of trips with his friends. It was a chance to bond away from the
field and the practice facility, a chance to just be regular guys.

But during this trip, he was clearly out of it.

“You're single again,” Brian, a big, burly offense lineman
said. “Just like I predicted.

He burst out laughing and so did the other three guys
sitting at the table. Lights swirled around them. Waitresses in skimpy ass
showing shorts, tight titty popping tops, sauntered around providing bottle
service. Leggy blondes with big boobs and tattoos worked their way up, then
slid down golden poles.

“Some of the guys thought that you would go through with
it,” Brian said. “Sometimes it's too easy to take people's money.”

Austin raised his head and stared directly at the big, bear
of a man.

“What?” He said, a look at confusing confusion etched on his
face.

What Brian told him nearly made his head explode. A few the
guys on the team had bet about whether or not he would be able to go to through
with the marriage to Tanya. Brian was the only one that had been able to see
the sham engagement. He ended up winning around $40,000.

“That's fucked up,” Austin said. “If you weren’t already so
ugly I would consider bashing your face in.”

Brian chuckled and put his arm around Austin's shoulder.

“It was just a friendly wager,” Bryant said. “No offense
meant.”

“Is that so?” Brian asked.

“Yes, it is. And to prove I’m going to give you a chance to
win some money from me.”

“How much?” Austin asked.

“Hold on a second. Let me tell you what I want you to do
first.”

While Austin listened, he closed his eyes and shook his
head. This was so ridiculous! Brian wanted him to travel across the country,
track down the cute wedding planner, somewhere in NYC and carry on a two-month
relationship with her.

“Are you serious?” Brian asked.

Brian smiled and nodded his head up and down.

“How much?”

“80,000.”

Austin looked out of the coffee shop window on to the busy
East Village Street. Everything was such a blur to him. He had only rolled into
town a few days ago and he knew that it would probably take him a while to get
acclimatized to this place. He had come from all the way across the country.
Sometimes long trips would help he refocus. He definitely needed that right
now. So many mixed emotions swirled in his head.

He’d spent part of his life in Colorado and the rest in
Texas. He had the wild western spirit. And that’s what people loved about him.
But it certainly wasn’t the only thing. And no matter what town he found
himself in or what town he was being run out of, either by the police or
jealous husbands and boyfriends, there was always a woman for Austin Daniels.
He had the kind of swagger that made women melt.

 
He was the bad boy
that so many women dream about. But this guy was the real thing and you could
tell by the cold gleam in his beautiful green eyes. He had a chiseled,
masculine jaw that always had a few days stubble on it.

But for all his tough guy looks and ways, Austin felt very
out of place in New York City. He loved the wide-open spaces. He loved the
desert roads. He embodied that true western frontier spirit. He was coming up
on his twenty-eighth birthday and he showing no signs of slowing down. He could
never imagine having to settle down and start a family. He couldn’t believe
that other men actually worked really hard just for the privilege of leading
such a boring life.

Yet, he’d been so close to tying the knot. Just a few weeks
away.

Nope. That sort of life would never be for Austin. He would
be on the open road for his entire life.

The waitress brought his plate to the table. “Here’s your
coffee. Milk with two sugars. And here is the bacon, home fries, and French
toast”, The middle-aged woman with brown eyes looked Austin up and down.

It had probably been a long time since she’d gotten with a
stud that young. And she seemed to be imagining all of the things that they
could do together. Austin knew that the woman was checking him out. But he had
grown plenty used to that over the years. Women, young and old, couldn’t help
but stare and continue to stare as their minds drifted off into fantasyland.
But no girl had been able to win his heart, to really make him want to settle
down.

The waitress eventually walked away from the table, but she
had a big grin on her face and a twinkle in her eye. Austin had been on his
bike all night and he hadn’t bothered to stop. Or rather he might have been
afraid that if he stopped he would end up turning back. This city was just so
damn big. He knew that he would never be comfortable in a place like this.
There were just too many people.

After Austin finished eating, he swigged the last bit of
coffee, and went outside for smoke. He felt a little better now as the city
moved all around him. Nobody seemed to make eye contact. They were either
staring straight ahead or looking at their phones and iPods. He wondered how
people got to meet each other in a place like this. But then two police cars
passed and he snapped back to the present moment.

After he smoked his cigarette, Austin got on his hog and
revved the engine. He didn’t look forward to riding through all that city
traffic. But he would deal with it one way or another. He had heard some crazy
stories about drivers in New York being really aggressive to bikers. That had
made him laugh at the time. He figured that if he could handle some of the
assholes driving on the highways of California, then he could handle aggressive
drivers anywhere.

He rode through the midtown traffic and made it back to the
hotel he was staying at. It was downtown and a five star hotel. And his grimy
biker appearance definitely raised some eyebrows. But he didn’t pay any
attention to that.

He’d heard that the East Village was the place to meet cool,
young people on the weekends. So he fired up the hog and headed down there. He
loved the looks of appreciation and desire that he got from the New York women.
Maybe this place ain’t so bad after all, he thought. He smiled and powered the
bike through traffic. He felt like a king on the bike and he looked like one as
well, the alpha male king. He threw his head back and screamed into the wind.
Several women stopped on the sidewalk, pointed towards him, and began giggling.