“I talked with Jeffrey Porter last night,” he put in, knowing it was a way to further emphasis his undesirability as a match for Jenny. Cole was well aware of Jeffrey’s many indiscretions.

Cole lifted his beer bottle in a mock toast. “Is he serving as your cautionary tale?”

“His girlfriend caught him cheating. You know,” Mitch mused aloud, “I honestly think Jeffrey said ‘no’ to the first hundred propositions. Then maybe one night he was alone. Maybe we’d lost the game. Maybe he got hurt on the field. Maybe the coach had reamed him out for something, and maybe he’d had a fight over the phone with Celeste. And there she was, a fresh, pretty, willing little sweet thing that would make all his problems go away. At least for a while. And so, he stumbled. And once he’d done it the first time, well…”

Mitch had watched the same scenario play out with dozens of players. His teammates tried to make relationships work, yet, inevitably, they were spectacular failures.

“You don’t have to sell me on the general sleaziness of professional athletes,” said Cole.

“I’m trying to sell you on the general sleaziness of me. I’m going back to that world, Cole. And I’m no different than any other guy on the team.”

“Then you had no business sleeping with Jenny.”

Mitch grunted out a cold laugh.

He ought to be drawn and quartered for what he’d done to Jenny. Guys like him had no business sniffing around caring, wholesome, defenseless girls like her.

Jenny was keeping a sinful secret. It had to do with her updated wardrobe. Though she’d worn her usual Friday outfit of gray linen slacks, matching blazer and her favorite aqua silk blouse to the office this morning, underneath it all, she wore skimpy purple lace panties and a matching push-up bra.

She and Emily had spent every evening this week shopping for new clothes. They’d started Tuesday at Harper’s Boutique. Then, they’d moved on to every high-fashion store within a fifty-mile radius.