"Sure, if that's what you like."
"Okay," Brad said. "So?"
"Well, she's looking for some fun, but she's bored by all her daddy's brute guys who have no brains. Nothing to talk about but football."
"Why would we need to talk?" Brad asked, his grin cocky. "I can make sure she ain't bored without ever saying a thing."
"But, you see, that's just it, Brad." Kyle leaned his forearms on the edge of the lectern, the way he always did when he was driving home a particularly important point. "She can have her pick of a roomful of men who've had lots of practice pleasing a woman. She's got so much money she can't be swayed in that direction. She wants…conversation. Somebody who can talk about something besides football."
Brad plopped his big body down into the chair. His bulky frame barely fit between the chair and the regulation college-classroom desk.
' 'You sure about this girl, Professor?'' he asked. He didn't seem at all convinced, but he was studying Kyle.
"I'm sure that sometime in your life, whether it be at the doctor's office, the bargaining table or when you're out with a beautiful woman, you're going to need to be able to think. To reason. To know something besides football."
"And you ain't gonna pass me, are you?"
HER SECRET, HIS CHILD
"Sure." Kyle put his glasses back on. "If you do passing work."
"An' how'm I gonna do that?" The linebacker was getting angry again.
Kyle couldn't lie to the kid. "I don't know for sure if there's time, Brad, but I'm willing to tutor you—no charge—and see where that gets us."
"Tutor me."
Kyle grinned. The idea seemed so foreign to someone who needed the service so desperately. "Yeah. Like private coaching to help you learn the right plays."
"When you gonna tutor me?"
Reaching for his planner, Kyle gave the kid a pained look. "Hey, don't make it sound like I just shot your grandma."
With a sheepish smile, Brad said, "She'd shoot you dead 'fore you even had a chance to pull your gun, Professor."
Kyle might have continued that conversation if he hadn't suddenly discovered that he had the wrong planner. He'd opened the book to the day's date to find only three words scribbled there. Dinner with Jamie. He'd been in such a hurry to get to class he'd grabbed his personal planner. Not the one he used for school.
Damn.
"How about Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays right after class?" he ad-libbed, hoping he was free then. After having gotten this far with his most recalcitrant and neediest student, he wasn't about to
TARA TAYLOR QUINN
lose credibility by admitting he couldn't even bring the right calendar to class.
"I got gym time then."
"Can you make gym time an hour later?"
"Maybe." Brad's face was blank. "I'm not sure."
Kyle grabbed up his folder, the planner and the text he'd brought to class, and slid them all back inside the leather satchel that went everywhere with him. "It's your choice, Brad. Either you make passing this class a priority or you don't."
"I'll be here," Brad grumbled as he followed Kyle out of the classroom. "Thanks a lot."
Kyle ignored the sarcasm.
Karen glanced around critically, although she already knew what she'd find. The house was spotless. There were fresh flowers in the foyer and on the kitchen table. Kayla and Ashley were upstairs in the playroom doing puzzles and listening to Disney songs. The girls had had an early bath and dinner and were ready for bed. And the best news was, in return for Karen's keeping Ashley that night while Jamie met with a client, Jamie was going to keep both girls the following day and night so Karen and Dennis could have some time alone.