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‘So you’re using this system of yours with other teams as well?’ he asked.
‘No—this is the only team I’m working with, and I only do one research project at a time. My last one was preventative medicine,’ she explained. ‘Basically I worked with patients who had high blood pressure. The aim was to help them to lose weight and maintain lean muscle mass, and that reduced both their blood pressure and their risk of cardiovascular incidents.’ She couldn’t resist adding, ‘And by that I mean heart attacks and strokes.’
‘Right.’ Jared stared at Bailey. Archie had called her a ‘bonny lass’, but she was so much more than that. She was truly beautiful, with a heart-shaped face and huge brown eyes—emphasised by her elfin crop. She looked more like some glamorous Mediterranean princess than a doctor.
But, in Jared’s experience, beautiful women spelled trouble and heartache. His ex, Sasha, had used her stunning looks to get her own way—and Jared had fallen for it hard enough to get very badly burned. Nowadays he was pretty much impervious to huge eyes and winsome smiles. But he’d already seen how Archie was following Bailey round like a lapdog; he had a nasty feeling that Bailey Randall had used her looks to get her own way with her ridiculous bit of computerised kit, the way Sasha always used her looks.
Still, at least this system of hers wasn’t something that would actually hurt the players. It wouldn’t be of much real use—like the pricey fitness wristbands he’d referred to earlier, it wouldn’t give enough information about what was actually wrong or how to fix it—but it wouldn’t do any real harm, either.
Jared spent the session on the side of the pitch, ready in case any of the players had an injury that needed treating. But there were no strains, sprains or anything more serious; and, at the other end of the scale, there wasn’t even a bruise or a contusion.
Half a lifetime ago, he’d been one of them, he thought wryly. A young hopeful, planning a career in the sport and dreaming of playing for his country. He’d actually made it and played for the England under-nineteen squad, scoring several goals in international matches. But Bailey Randall’s bit of kit wouldn’t have done anything to save him from the knee injury in his final game—the tackle that had stopped his football career in its tracks. Jared had ended up pursuing his original plans instead, studying for his A-levels and following in the family tradition by taking a degree in medicine.
The lure of football had drawn Jared to work with a club as their team doctor, rather than working in a hospital or his parents’ general practice. And he still enjoyed the highs and lows of the game, the camaraderie among the players and hearing the supporters roar their approval when a goal was scored.
At the end of the training session, Archie turned to Bailey. ‘Over to you.’
Jared watched in sheer disbelief as Bailey proceeded to take the youth team through a series of yoga stretches and then breathing exercises.
What place did yoga have on a football pitch? In his experience, the players would do far better working on sport-specific training. As well as ball control, they needed to focus on muscular endurance and lower-body strength, and also work on explosive acceleration and short bursts of speed. If Archie wanted him to do it, Jared could design a training programme easily enough—either a warm-up routine that would work for the whole team, or some player-specific programmes to help deal with each player’s weak spots—and it would do a lot more for the players’ overall neuromuscular co-ordination than yoga would.
But having a go at Bailey Randall in front of the team wouldn’t be professional, so Jared kept his mouth shut until the lads had gone for a shower and she was doing things on her laptop. Then he walked over to her and said, ‘Can we have a quick word?’
She looked up from her laptop with an expression of surprise, but nodded. ‘Sure.’
‘What exactly does your box of tricks tell us?’ he asked.
‘It analyses each player’s performance. For each player, I can show you a graph of his average performance over the last ten matches or training sessions, and how today’s performance compares against that average.’
So far, so good. ‘Which tells us what?’
‘The system will pick up if a player is underperforming,’ she said. ‘Maybe he’s coming down with a cold but isn’t showing any symptoms yet—and if he’s sick he’s more at risk of sustaining injury and shouldn’t be playing.’
He gave her a sceptical look. ‘So you’re telling me you can predict if a player’s going to get a cough or a cold?’
‘No, but I can predict the likelihood of the player sustaining an injury in his next match, based on his performance today and measured against an average of his last ten sessions.’
‘Right.’ Jared still wasn’t totally convinced. And then he tackled the subject that bothered him most about today’s antics. ‘And the yoga?’
‘As a football team doctor—someone who’s clearly specialised in sports medicine—you’d already know that dynamic stretches are more useful than static stretches.’ She held his gaze. ‘But if you want me to spell it out to prove that I know what I’m talking about, dynamic stretches means continuous movement. That promotes blood flow, strength and stability. It also means you can work on more than one muscle group at a time—so it’s more functional, because it mimics what happens with everyday movements. And you only hold the stretch for a short period of time, so the muscle releases more effectively and you get a better range of movement with each repetition.’ She raised her eyebrows, as if challenging him to call her on it. ‘Happy?’
He nodded. She did at least know her stuff, then. Even if she was a bit misguided about the computer programme. ‘So you’re a qualified yoga teacher?’
‘No. But a qualified teacher—the one who’s taught me for the last five years—helped me put the routine together.’
‘Right. And the breathing?’
She put her hands on her hips and gave him a hard stare. ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake! Are you going to quiz me on every aspect of this? Look, the project’s already been approved by Mr Fincham.’ The chairman of the club’s board of directors. ‘If you have a problem with it, then maybe you need to speak to him about it.’
‘I just don’t see what use yoga is going to be to a bunch of lads who need sport-specific training,’ he said.
‘“Lads” being the operative word,’ she said. ‘They’re sixteen, seventeen—technically they’re not quite adults, and most of their peers are either still in education or starting some kind of apprenticeship. I won’t insult them by calling them children, because they’re not, but they still have quite a lot of growing up to do. And, in the profession they’ve chosen, they’re all very much in the public eye. The media hounds are just waiting to tear into the behaviour of overpaid footballers, whipping up a frenzy among their readers about how badly the boys behave.’
‘That’s true,’ he said, ‘but I still don’t get what it has to do with yoga.’
‘Discipline,’ she said crisply.
‘They already have the discipline of turning up for training and doing what Archie tells them to do.’
‘Holding the yoga poses also takes discipline, and so does the breathing. So it’s good practice and it helps to underline what Archie does with them. Plus it’s good for helping to deal with stress,’ she said.
That was the bit Jared really didn’t buy into.
She clearly saw the scepticism in his expression, because she sighed. ‘Look, if they get hassled by photographers or journalists or even just someone else in a club when they’re out—someone who wants to prove himself as a big hero who can challenge a footballer and beat him up—then all they have to do is remember to breathe and it’ll help them to take everything down a notch.’
‘Hmm,’ he said, still not convinced.
She threw her hands up in apparent disgust. ‘You know what? You can think what you like, Dr Fraser. It’s not going to make any difference to my research. If you’ve got some good ideas for how the data can be used, or about different measurements that would be useful in analysing the team’s performance, then I’d be very happy to listen. But if all you’re going to do is moan and bitch, then please just go and find someone else to annoy, because I’m busy. Excuse me.’
Bailey Randall clearly didn’t like it when someone actually questioned her. And she still hadn’t convinced him of the benefits of her project. ‘Of course you are,’ he said, knowing how nasty it sounded but right at that moment not caring.
As he walked away, he was sure he heard her mutter, ‘What an ass.’
She was entitled to her opinion. He wasn’t very impressed by her, either. But they’d just have to make the best of it, for as long as it took for Archie and the team director to realise that her ‘research’ was all a load of hokum.
CHAPTER TWO (#uf2fdd143-cdc6-5b6f-8385-9e19921d7161)
‘HE’S IMPOSSIBLE. TALK about blinkered. And narrow-minded. And—and—Arrgh!’ Bailey stabbed her fork into her cake in utter frustration.
To her dismay, Joni just laughed.
‘You’re my best friend,’ Bailey reminded her. ‘You’re supposed to be supportive.’
‘I am. Of course I am,’ Joni soothed. ‘But you’re the queen of endorphins. You always see the best in people, and to see you having a hissy fit about someone—well, he’s obviously made quite an impression on you.’
‘And not a good one.’ Bailey ate a forkful of cake and then rolled her eyes at the plate. ‘Oh, come on. If I’m going to eat this stuff, it could at least reward me with a sugar rush.’
‘Maybe it just makes you grumpy.’
Bailey narrowed her eyes at her best friend. ‘Now you’re laughing at me.’
Joni reached over the table and hugged her. ‘I love you, and you’re in an almighty strop. Which doesn’t happen very often. This Jared Fraser guy has really rattled you.’
Bailey glowered. ‘Honestly. He quizzed me on every single aspect of my project.’
‘Which is better than just dismissing it.’
‘He did dismiss it, actually. He thinks the players should be doing sport-specific training.’
Joni coughed. ‘You’re the sports medicine doctor, not me. And I seem to remember you saying something about sport-specific training being the most effective.’
‘But it’s not the only kind of training they should be doing,’ Bailey said. ‘Yoga means dynamic stretches, which are more effective than static ones. And there’s the discipline of holding the pose and doing the breathing. It’s really good for the boys, and it helps them to focus.’
‘Maybe you should make Jared do the stuff with the boys,’ Joni suggested. ‘And you can make him do extra planks.’
‘Don’t tempt me.’ Bailey ate more cake. ‘Actually, Joni, that might be a good idea. He needs to chill out a bit. Downward dog and breathing—that would do the trick.’
‘I’d love to be a fly on the wall when you suggest it to him,’ Joni said.
‘No, you wouldn’t. You hate people fighting—and he really doesn’t like me.’
‘You don’t like him, either,’ Joni pointed out.
‘Well, no. Because he’s rude, arrogant and narrow-minded. With men like him around, I’m more than happy to stay single.’
They both knew that wasn’t the real reason why Bailey was resolutely single. After her life had imploded two and a half years ago, her marriage had cracked beyond repair. And Bailey still wasn’t ready to risk trying another relationship. She didn’t know if she ever would be.
‘I don’t know what to say,’ Joni said, giving her another hug, ‘except I love you and I believe in you.’
‘You, too,’ Bailey said.
‘And I worry about you. That you’re lonely.’
‘That’s because you’re all loved up. Which is just as it should be,’ Bailey said, ‘given that it’s just under two months until you get married to Aaron. And he’s a sweetie.’
‘Even so, I worry about you, Bailey.’
‘I’m fine,’ Bailey said, forcing herself to smile. ‘Just grumpy tonight. And don’t breathe a word of this to my mum, or she’ll say that I’m attracted to Jared Fraser and I’m in denial about it.’
‘Are you?’ Joni asked.
Bailey blew out a breath. ‘You’re about the only person who could get away with asking that. No. He might be nice looking if he smiled,’ she said, ‘and to be fair he does have nice eyes. The colour of bluebells. But even if he was as sweet as Aaron, I still wouldn’t be interested. I’m fine exactly as I am. I don’t need anyone to complicate my life.’
Her words were slightly hollow, and she was pretty sure that Joni would pick up on that. But to her relief Joni didn’t push it any further, or comment on that stupid remark she’d made about bluebells.
She wasn’t attracted to Jared Fraser. She wanted to give him a good shake and tell him to open his mind a bit.
And bluebells were out of the question.
Before the next match, Bailey had a meeting with Archie to discuss the latest results from her software. As she’d half expected, Jared was there. Still playing dour, strong and silent. Well, that was his problem. She had a job to do.
‘Travis is underperforming,’ she said, showing them the graph on her laptop screen. ‘It might be that he’s had too many late nights over the last week, or it might be that he’s coming down with something—but I’d recommend that he doesn’t play as part of the team today.’
‘I’ve already assessed the squad this morning, and they’re all perfectly fit,’ Jared said.
‘A player who’s underperforming is at a greater risk of soft-tissue injury,’ she reminded him.
‘According to your theory. Which has yet to be proven, because if you pull a player off every time they do a few steps less per game, then of course he won’t get a soft-tissue injury, because he won’t actually be playing. And if you follow that through every time, you’ll end up with a really tiny pool of players. And the rest of them won’t have had enough practice to help them improve their skills.’
‘If they’re off for weeks with an injury, that’s not going to help them improve their skills, either,’ she pointed out.
‘Travis is fine.’ He folded his arms. ‘You’re making a fuss over nothing.’
‘Travis isn’t fine.’ She mirrored his defensive stance. ‘But it isn’t our call. It’s Archie’s.’
‘Fine,’ Jared said.
Archie looked at them both and sighed. ‘I’ll have a word with the lad.’
Clearly Travis was desperate to play, because Archie came back to tell them that the boy was in the team.
If Jared said ‘Told you so’, she might just punch him.
He didn’t. But it was written all over his face.
Cross, Bailey sat on the bench at the side of the pitch and texted her best friend: Jared Fraser has to be the most smug, self-satisfied man in the universe.
A few seconds later, her phone beeped. She glanced at the screen, expecting Joni to have sent her a chin-up-and-rise-above-it type of message, and was surprised to see that the message was from Jared Fraser. Why would he be texting her? He was sitting less than six feet away from her. He could lean across and talk to her. He didn’t need to resort to texting.
Curious, she opened the message. Herod?
What?
Don’t understand, she texted back. Ridiculous man. What was he on about?
Her phone beeped a few seconds later. Your message: «Herod Fraser has to be the most smug, self-satisfied man in the universe.»
Then she realised exactly what had just happened.
Oh, no.
She’d been typing so fast that she obviously hadn’t noticed her phone autocorrecting ‘Jared’ to ‘Herod’. And Jared’s name was right next to Joni’s in her phone book. When Bailey had tapped on the recipient box, she’d clearly pressed the wrong name on the screen.
So now Jared Fraser knew exactly what she thought about him.
Which could make life very awkward indeed.
Sorry, she typed back. Not that she was apologising for what she’d said. She stood by every word of that—well, bar the autocorrected name. She was only apologising for her mistake.
Didn’t mean to send that to you.
I’d already worked that one out for myself.
She sneaked a glance at him to see if she could work out how much he was going to make her pay for that little error, and was shocked to realise that he was actually smiling. He wasn’t angry or even irritated; he was amused.
There was a sudden rush of feeling in her stomach, as if champagne was fizzing through her veins instead of blood. Totally ridiculous. But when the man smiled, it changed him totally. Rather than being the dour, hard-faced, slightly intimidating man she’d instinctively disliked, he was beautiful.
Oh, help. She really couldn’t afford to let her thoughts go in that direction. For all she knew, he could be married or at least involved with someone. She knew nothing about the man, other than that he was the new youth team doctor and he didn’t believe in her research at all.
