Mr. Swoony (The Nest #3)

Chapter 51

Fifty-One

Conor

Fucking meet-and-greets. I hate them more than anything.

It’s been two weeks since my blowout with Eloise, and things have returned to normal between us. I ended up changing my phone number, and Eloise has started another social media account for her business and paused her private one for now.

I still hate that her life is being disturbed, but I’m trying to adopt her line of thinking because I wouldn’t like it if she was going through something and didn’t include me.

“You ready to be admired all day?” Eloise asks me, fixing a piece of my hair.

My hands find her hips as always, before straying down to her ass. “I like it better when you admire me.”

“You can thank me later,” Tweetie says and pats Eloise on the shoulder. “I like Twix bars.”

Eloise looks at me. “What is he talking about?”

“He had surprisingly good advice that night we were in a fight.”

“Thanks, Tweetie!” she calls.

Our social media guy, Gill, comes into the room. This guy doesn’t seem to have much of a clue. From what I’ve heard, he’s new to hockey. What he’s having us do for marketing might work for a corporation, but not a hockey team. But he did set up this meet-and-greet for us, so I guess that’s something.

“It’s time, guys,” he says.

“Give me a kiss good luck.”

Eloise presses her lips to mine and pulls away too quickly for my liking. She runs her thumb over my lips to get her lipstick off. “You’ll do great. Have fun.”

I stand and take her hand. The girls are all here, along with Bodhi. We file out of the conference room, walking down the hallway past the long line of fans here to meet us.

“Damn, this is going to be a while,” I say. “You should go.”

She squeezes my hand. “Don’t worry about me. I’m good.”

Once we reach the room, we all part from the women in our lives and sit in a line at the long table. There are piles of markers for each one of us.

“So, who won Monopoly last night?” Tweetie asks Rowan, and Rowan throws one of the marker caps at his head.

It’s a running joke that none of us have let go of yet.

Gill clears his throat in the microphone, and we all snicker like boys in grade school. “Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Meet-and-Greet Falcons style. We have some of our top players here ready to sign your stuff, take pictures, and answer any questions you might have. So, let’s get this going!” He doesn’t turn off the microphone as he tries to unclip the rope draped between the metal poles to let people in. “Shit, I should’ve practiced that.”

“Gill, the mic,” Henry says.

Gill doesn’t pay attention to him, and all we can hear is the muffle of the mic hitting the velvet rope. Then Gill continues to curse. Tweetie finally gets up, takes the mic and turns it off, then hands it back to Gill before unlocking the rope.

“Thanks.” Gill wipes his forehead with the back of his hand as though he just finished running a marathon.

The line goes smoothly, and there are a lot of kids. Our Falcons mascot keeps them entertained and asks Bodhi to help him pass out stickers and tattoos to the people in line.

I try to be engaged with every person who comes by, since I remember what it was like when my dad first took me to a meet-and-greet and how excited I was to have the sole attention of my favorite player.

Tweetie is ahead of me in the line, and one woman is asking him question after question, which holds up the line, so the three of us sit and wait. I take a moment to scan the crowd and stop on a long-haired blonde in line. She looks familiar, but before I can get a good look, she tips her head toward her bag, and her hair veils either side of her face.

I have to be seeing things. Lila has short dark hair.

Finally, the woman chatting with Tweetie moves on to me. I sign what she asks me to, smiling and greeting her, but she doesn’t seem nearly as interested in the rest of us as she was in Tweetie.

A few more people come through the line. My head is down as I sign something for someone when Tweetie asks for the person’s name in front of him, and she says it’s Lila.

My head flies up, and I rear back, her eyes locking with mine. “Hello, Pinkie.”

Tweetie glances at me as he signs the jersey she’s laid out for him. She has more in her hands. He gives me a look like “how do you know her?”

“Why are you here?” I ask, smiling and passing the item back to the person in front of me. I glance around for Eloise, but she’s nowhere in sight.

“I’d like a picture,” she says. “And if you could sign the jersey. It’s so big, I plan on sleeping in it. And spraying it with your cologne.”

Tweetie’s eyebrows furrow, and he mouths, “What the fuck?”

Henry elbows me, but I don’t let my eyes stray from her. This is what I get for not telling the front office what the fuck has been going on.

Gill walks over. “People are getting disgruntled. You need to keep the line moving,” he whispers.

“Oh, could you take our picture?” Lila hands her phone to Gill.

“No picture,” I say.

Tweetie’s head bobs from me to her.

“I paid like everyone else. I’d like a picture.” Her voice is demanding with an undertone that says she’s going to make a scene if I don’t take the fucking picture.

“Take the picture,” Gill says through gritted teeth.

“All of us, right?” Tweetie says, standing from his chair. “Come on, guys. This lady would love a picture with all of us.”

Henry and Rowan’s chairs squeak along the floor, and I’m the only one still sitting down, glaring at her. Why the hell is she still messing with my life?

Tweetie pats my arm, and I do another scan for Eloise, still not seeing her. I call over Bodhi and the Falcon’s mascot.

“Do you know where Eloise is?” I whisper.

Bodhi shakes his head.

“Okay, thanks.”

“Picture, Pinkie.” Lila waves me over, my three best friends standing around her.

“Come on this side of me,” Tweetie says, taking one for the team so he’s next to her.

“Pinkie is my favorite. Can I have him here and then Magic on the other side? Sorry, Daddy and Tweetie, you’re good and all, but these two are my favorites.”

“Understandable.” Gill eyes me to get the fuck over to the group because people are griping about it taking so long.

“No offense taken. We’re happy to step to the outside.” Daddy holds up his hands, an unimpressed look on his face as Magic reluctantly takes the spot on Lila’s other side.

I hear laughing and see the girls come back into the room, carrying on with coffees and treats in their hands. I wait for Eloise to look up, but she doesn’t, so I walk over to the group and slide between Tweetie and Lila. She puts her hand around my waist and tugs Magic and me closer to her.

“Fucking hell,” Rowan murmurs.

“Isn’t this fun?” Tweetie says.

“Take the picture, Gill,” I say through gritted teeth.

“Oh, it turned off,” Gill says and looks at the phone as if it’s the dashboard of a space shuttle.

Lila goes over to fix the phone, and finally Kyleigh looks at us. I point at Lila’s back and then at Eloise. Kyleigh knocks Eloise’s arm and some coffee spills. She gives Kyleigh a funny look, and my sister tells her to look up.

As soon as she does, I point at the blonde sliding back between Rowan and me. Eloise narrows her eyes because I don’t think she ever got that good of a look at Lila. Now that Lila is a blonde, it’s probably harder to figure out.

“Anytime now, Gill.” Tweetie squeezes my shoulder like “hang in there, buddy, almost done.”

What feels like a lifetime later, Gill has taken the picture and hands the phone back to Lila.

“You love blondes now, so I dyed my hair. What do you think?” She presses a note into my hand, and I glance down to see an address written on it. “After she goes to bed, come over,” she whispers.

Henry overhears and glances at my hand.

I drop the note on the floor.

“Okay, we’re behind now. Let’s get things moving again,” Gill says.

But all I see is Lila walking toward Eloise as she leaves the roped off area.

“Eloise, come here,” I call.

Gill opens his mouth to object, and Tweetie tells him to read the damn room. Eloise comes over, eyes wide, and I wrap my arm around her waist until Lila is out of view.

“Just stay in the room, okay?” I ask in the nicest way possible, not wanting Eloise to think I’m trying to run her life.

“I think we might need to take some action,” she says.

“You’re right. We’ll go to the police station and file a report once I’m done here.”

She nods and kisses my cheek before she goes back to the girls.

Then I head over to the security guard stationed in the room and ask him to make sure that Lila leaves the building and isn’t allowed back in.

When I sit back down in the chair between Tweetie and Henry, I can’t concentrate on anything, knowing Lila’s not going to go away that easily.