Chapter 3
Chapter Three
AJ
“ C an someone please tell me why the hell we haven’t taken off yet?” I grumble, wondering why we’re still sitting on the tarmac. I need this plane in the air so I can get my laptop on WiFi. I don’t have time to waste sitting here doing nothing.
“We’re waiting on McCabe,” Charlie Wilcott, our head coach, says from across the aisle. He must see something on my face, because he adds, “He’ll be here in five minutes. It’s fine.”
“Why wasn’t he on the bus from the arena after the game, like everyone else?” In the cabin behind us, Walsh is blasting the song the team always plays after a win, and the guys are singing along at the top of their lungs.
“Apparently, his nanny’s car is in the shop and she borrowed someone’s car, so she didn’t have Abby’s car seat. Since he’s gone for the next five days, the nanny needed him to bring her the car seat he had in his car.”
I sigh.
McCabe had texted me last night to let me know that he’d needed to leave the hospital early yesterday because his daughter was sick, and now he’s delaying our flight. I’m a “family first” kind of general manager, and I know he’s a single dad and all, but I can’t shake the feeling that he doesn’t think it’s a big deal that he left early yesterday and is making the whole plane wait for him today. Or maybe it really is his nanny’s fault in both cases. With him and his entitled attitude, it’s hard to tell.
Ronan McCabe is the kind of player who seems to think I pay him millions of dollars a year to play hockey but shouldn’t expect anything from him off the ice, even though he knows that’s not the kind of organization I’m running.
As captain, he has no problem holding other players accountable for stepping up like I’ve asked, but he doesn’t seem to hold himself to the same standard. And when he does step up, it’s with equal parts attitude and resentment.
I glance over at Wilcott. “And they couldn’t have figured this out before the game?”
Charlie just shrugs, like What can we do?
I focus my eyes back on my phone, where I’m reading today’s headlines. And when I hear McCabe come through the door to the jet, several rows behind me, loudly apologizing to his teammates as the music comes to a stop, before rushing up front to apologize to Coach Wilcott, I close my eyes and pretend to sleep.
Next to me, he explains that he would have just ordered a new car seat with overnight delivery, but he didn’t trust Lucy to install it correctly, so he had to return and switch his into her loaner car to make sure it was safe. I assume Lucy must be the nanny? He’s making her sound awfully incompetent, which, in turn, makes me wonder why he’d leave his baby with her.
When he’s done explaining the situation to Charlie, he turns toward me—I can feel him staring down at me. But I take slow, steady breaths, even as I hear Charlie chuckle like he knows exactly which avoidance strategy I’m using.
It might not be the most mature choice, but we’re in a tough negotiation period right now, and the last thing I need is any sort of confrontation with him, especially in front of everyone else.
We’ll save that for behind closed doors, like we always have.
I ’m sitting at the upscale hotel bar the next night, enjoying the overly heavy pour of a delicious Cabernet Sauvignon the bartender gave me, when Charlie walks up.
“The guys are all going to dinner together, with strict instructions to be back in their rooms by 10 p.m.,” he tells me. “Larry and I are going to grab something at a restaurant down the street. You want to join us?”
“Nah,” I say. “I’m good. But thanks for the invite.”
“Please tell me you’re not having wine for dinner.” His voice has that overly concerned tone I’d expect from a father figure—someone like Frank Hartmann—not one of my employees. It’s probably my own fault for insisting the entire Rebels organization is one big family.
“I just ordered a steak. Does that meet your approval?”
“Yes, but it wouldn’t kill you to go out and eat socially, with other people, you know.”
I tend to stick to myself on road trips, except for the very rare occasion when I can convince Lauren to come, too. There’s no real reason she needs to be on these trips, and she hates leaving her girls, but every once in a while, there’s a good reason for her to tag along—like a potential sponsor we can meet with while we’re on the road.
“Tonight is the only time while we’re here that I have any downtime,” I say, and watch as the bartender’s head turns toward us. I don’t know if he’s eavesdropping or just looking over to make sure I don’t need anything, but I drop my voice a little lower either way. “I plan to enjoy having a couple hours to myself. Besides, we’re having lunch together tomorrow, remember?”
He lets out a low grunt of acknowledgement. He’s as pleased as I am to have to share a meal with the coaching staff, GM, and owner of Carolina’s team. But Frank is old friends with their owner, and he insisted.
“Yeah, Frank said he wants the captains there tomorrow too,” Charlie says, “so I told them they’d need to come with us after our practice skate in the morning.”
“Absolutely not.” My tone invites no disagreement, but I suspect Charlie doesn’t want his players forced into this lunch, either. Every hockey player has his own pre-game rituals, and almost all of them include an afternoon nap, followed by a series of superstitious behaviors they have to run through. Even though, obviously, they’ll all need lunch anyway, they shouldn’t be forced to sit through this ridiculous charade—especially because our goalie Colt just broke one of their player’s noses, so tempers between the players are bound to be high. “I’ll talk to Frank about it.”
Charlie just laughs and shakes his head. “Good luck with that.”
“I don’t need luck. Frank may own this team, but he pays me very well to manage it. And he’s always trusted me to know what’s best for our players.” Am I really this confident that he’ll see it my way? No. But am I certain that I can convince him? Yes.
“Alright. Well, enjoy your dinner and I’ll see you tomorrow. Should I tell our captains that they don’t need to be at that lunch?”
“I’ll let you know once I have confirmation from Frank.”
“Alright then.” He gives me a nod before turning to leave.
I scroll on my phone for a few minutes, ignoring what I sense are the curious eyes of two men farther down the bar. And when the bartender finally brings over my plate, which has a filet artfully arranged over some asparagus and mashed potatoes, my stomach grumbles so loudly I’m pretty sure the whole restaurant heard it. I can’t help it; this smells fucking fantastic, and I was on a series of calls all day, meaning I only had time for a protein bar for lunch. If we were back at the office, my assistant, Colleen, would have ordered me something so I didn’t skip a meal—because, let’s be honest, I get hangry and no one should have to deal with me when I haven’t eaten.
The bartender smiles as he sets the plate in front of me, and a row of perfectly straight teeth sink into the right side of his lip like he’s holding in a laugh. “It does smell good, doesn’t it?”
“Honestly, I’m so hungry I was about to eat my own arm. You could have brought me a bag from the closest fast-food joint and I think my stomach would have reacted the same way.”
“Luckily for you, you’ll probably enjoy this more.” He gives me a wink as he licks his lower lip, and it occurs to me that this man who looks like he was a child yesterday is flirting with me.
“Maybe I prefer fast food.”
He looks me up and down, taking in the dark hair that’s kept the perfect shade of brown with my monthly hair appointments, the smooth face that’s kept wrinkle free from regular visits to my aesthetician, the large pearls that adorn my earlobes, and the silk blouse beneath the burgundy blazer. “That would surprise me.”
“Oh yeah?”
“You seem like a woman who . . . knows what she likes.”
“I do know what I like,” I tell him, letting my lips curve up at one side. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t prefer a greasy hamburger over a filet.”
He crosses his arms and leans forward, resting his elbow on his side of the bar. “So why are you here having a seventy-dollar steak, then?”
“Seems like a waste of a perfectly good food allowance from my work if I go to McDonalds, you know?” I say as I unwrap my cutlery from the napkin and lay the cloth across my lap.
“So what do you do for work?”
I don’t know why I still haven’t found a good way to answer this question. I’m not the kind of person who throws around my job title to impress people, nor do I want to invite the questions it inevitably generates from perfect strangers. “I work in sports.”
Leaning in a bit closer, his eyes focus on my lips as I lick them—a nervous habit I’ve never quite gotten over. “Tell me more.”
I pick up my fork and knife, sinking them into my steak as I flick my eyes back up toward him. “No thanks.”
His eyebrows lift in surprise. “Are you always hesitant to talk about work?”
Yes.
“No. But you just watched me turn down dinner with my colleagues, so obviously I’m not looking for work talk.”
I watch as his pupils dilate, his eyes lingering on my mouth. I know that my lips, and the wide smile they afford me, are the physical feature I’m most known for. So his intense interest in them shouldn’t surprise me, but it still does. He’s a damn baby compared to me.
Then he stands, spreading his hands along the edge of the bar. His forearms are dusted with blonde hair over his tanned skin. The color matches the natural highlights in his slightly overgrown waves, giving him a touch of southern surfer boy charm.
“So what are you looking for?”
Such an open, honest invitation. And in the past, right after my divorce, I’d have probably taken him up on it, even though he’s easily fifteen years younger than me. But I grew tired of that long ago. Now, I just want peace. My job is stressful—hell, my whole life is stressful—and honestly, a good night’s sleep sounds way better than sex.
“Just to eat my meal alone.” I give him a sympathetic smile to soften the blow.
His lips turn up into a half smile as he nods, before turning and heading down the bar to flirt with the much younger lady at the other end. As I take the first bite of my steak, then wash it down with my wine, I know I made the right choice. Because the only thing worse than the loneliness of being divorced and forty, is the empty feeling I’m left with after meaningless, and often mediocre, sex with a stranger.