Chapter 2
CHAPTER
TWO
brYCE
Istop at the corner store and grab the first Colts jersey I find in my size and take it up to the register.
Baseball is okay, but it’s not my preference when it comes to sports.
I’m a football gal through and through. Always have been.
So when my best friend from college invited me to a rooftop party to watch the Chicago Colts, I had nothing to wear.
And because I am a sports lover, baseball or not, I want to look the part.
“You grabbed the last one,” the salesman says to me. “Bailey is a hot commodity right now.”
I nod.
I’m in the sports journalism network, so I know all about Easton Bailey coming to the Colts and how divided the fan base is, but all in all, I think his coming here is a good thing.
I’d print that if I covered baseball at my new job with Sportsverse Magazine, but instead, I’m covering the Chicago Tundras hockey team.
Hockey is second to football in my books, and I moved to Chicago and took my position with Sportsverse to make a name for myself, but I need to make a name for myself covering a national team.
One of the big four in Chicago. But right now, all those positions are filled and I’m probably third down on the list anyway.
So I’ll have to continue to pay my dues with the hopes it will eventually pay off and land me a spot covering a national team.
“Do you have scissors?” I ask.
He looks at me over the rim of his glasses that rest on the tip of his nose. He’s judging me as if I’m not a real fan. But nonetheless, he opens a drawer and cuts off my tag with a pair of scissors before holding the jersey out to me.
I hurriedly put it on and tie the ends to rest at my waist. He watches me with rapt attention, his judging expression evident with every raise of his eyebrow or lip.
After I pay, he holds out the receipt.
“No thanks.”
One day he’ll know who I am, and he won’t think of me as some crazy girl fan who doesn’t know stats or the players. I’m used to the judgment. Being a woman journalist covering sports, it comes with the territory.
I cross the street and follow the directions Elle gave me to the bar on the ground floor of the building Cooper lives in.
I’m forced to weave through fans in red and blue since I’m going the opposite way of the stadium entrance.
I repeat “excuse me” about a hundred times, only earning some grunts and sighs as I pass.
I stop outside the bar, staring at the three flats above the sign for Peepers Alley, then I look back down at the bar. I figured we were going to a modern bar like all the other ones around here, not one from the 1970s… maybe.
I walk in, earning a quirk of an eyebrow from the older lady behind the bar. As if it’s a flash mob coordinated event, all the stools swivel around and a bunch of old men stare at me with their beers in hand.
“Well, we’re just filled with new people today,” a man says, blatantly looking me up and down.
“Turn around, darling. Which jersey you wearing?” another man asks.
Since they kind of remind me of my grandpa, I circle around, showing off the Bailey name with pride.
Half of the men grunt.
“Never mind. New to baseball, I see.”
By the time I spin back around, they’re all facing the televisions hanging in each corner of the bar. And when I say televisions, I don’t mean flat screens.
“Actually—” I start.
“B!” Elle shouts, appearing a few feet away from me, then accosts me with a hug.
I lose my balance for a second but recover. “I just saw you last week.”
She draws back. “I know, but this is like you living here now. I’m so excited to do stuff like this all the time. I’m always the only girl with Coop and his friends.”
“Are you honestly asking me to feel sorry for you because you’re stuck with a bunch of hot professional football players all the time?” I laugh.
She slides her arm around mine, escorting me toward the end of the bar. “Ruby, this is my best friend, Bryce. Bryce, this is Ruby.”
Ruby nods. She has kind eyes even though her scowl would suggest she might not be that friendly. “I don’t serve rosé, nor do I serve seltzers.”
I glance at Elle, who laughs. “Don’t worry, my gal is a beer drinker.”
I raise my eyebrows at Elle. I’m not the keg stand, beer-bonging girl I was in college. “Um…” But it is game day and there’s something about a beer with game day food that just feels right. “A lite beer, please.”
Ruby grabs a glass, not frosted, and goes to the tap, filling the mug with just the right amount of head. I’m impressed when she places it in front of me. “It on Coop’s tab?”
“Yep,” Elle confirms, but I dig out money from my purse.
“No, let me pay.”
“B, Coop makes how much per year? He’ll buy you a beer.” Elle shakes her head at me.
But Ruby grabs my twenty. “I like you already,” she says, cashing me out at the old-school register.
She hands me back my change and I put down a tip before walking alongside Elle to wherever Cooper is sitting.
“She really is a great woman. Treats the boys like they’re her own,” Elle whispers on our way back to the table.
“Her husband passed, and she inherited the bar years ago. Raised all her kids and refuses to do any upgrades. Says if someone can’t appreciate Peepers now, she doesn’t want them as patrons.
” Elle shakes her head, heading through a doorway to another room where Coop sits with his feet propped up on another chair, beer tipped back, watching a baseball game on an old TV.
“Look who I found,” Elle says.
Coop glances over his shoulder midsip. “What’s up, B?”
“Not much.” I sit down to his right and Elle brushes his feet off the chair to his left.
“You look awesome.” His gaze zeroes in on my tits.
“Eyes up here, asshole,” I say.
“Sorry, my buddy texted and asked me about your rack. For the life of me, I couldn’t remember. Now I do.”
“That’s because you’ve only ever had eyes for one of us.” I glance at Elle, whose face turns bright red and she acts as if what I say isn’t true.
Why Coop and Elle haven’t gotten together is beyond me, but she swears they’re just friends. Since they’ve each dated other people over the years and have both been okay with it, maybe they are. Who am I to judge?
“Who’s your buddy?” I ask.
I’m crossing my fingers under the table it isn’t Miles Cavanaugh.
We hung in the same circles back in San Francisco and calling us enemies is putting it nicely.
I almost didn’t take the job with Sportsverse because Miles had been traded to Chicago only months before, but this is a big city and since I’m covering the Tundras, our paths shouldn’t cross.
As long as Coop doesn’t make friends with him, that is.
“Damon Siska,” Elle answers and rolls her eyes.
“Manwhore!” I exclaim and cheers Elle with the clinking of our beer mugs before we each take a sip.
“Who’s the manwhore?” a deep voice asks from the arched entryway before walking in the room.
He’s blond and big and his smile could just evaporate my panties, but he’s Damon Siska. The man is one of the biggest players in the league.
Elle and I laugh while Coop looks at Damon. “You. Who else?”
Damon shakes his head and sits down, blatantly looking me up and down. “And you are?”
Elle and I burst out in laughter again before she says, “Damon, this is our friend Bryce.”
“What happened to your friend Bea?” he asks.
I raise my eyebrows at Elle, and she shrugs like I should have expected that response. “I am B. As in the letter B, short for Bryce.”
His head rocks back and he laughs to himself. “Shit, you must think I’m one of those dumb jocks.”
“Never.” I sip my beer and relax in my chair.
One thing about Damon is that he brings an ease and comfortableness to the room. You’d never really think I was sitting at a table with two first-round draft picks.
We talk about the upcoming season for a bit, and Damon is quick to figure out I’m not some naive girl who doesn’t know anything about sports.
“Who are you really?” he asks, sounding a little suspect.
“What does that mean?”
“How do you know so much about sports?”
Before I can answer, Coop stands. “I’m going to grab another beer from Ruby. You guys want anything?”
We all shake our heads before he leaves the room, heading toward the bar.
“She’s a sports journalist,” Elle says to explain all my sports knowledge.
Damon’s eyes widen. “Oh shit, it’s you.”
“Me?” My forehead wrinkles.
“You’re the one who writes shit about Cavanaugh. I’m not supposed to like you. You’re mean.”
I roll my eyes. “I am not mean. I just tell the truth.”
“All I know is the other night, he found out you were moving to Chicago, and he was not happy. We were out to dinner and I was really hoping to enjoy my steak, but all he could talk about was the fact you were moving here and how he needed to stay clear of you.”
Fucking Miles Cavanaugh.
I really wish that zing of electricity didn’t hit every one of my nerve endings when I think his name. It would be much easier if I actually hated him as much as I project that I do.
“Well, the feeling’s mutual.”
Elle glances at me from under her long eyelashes across the table. She knows Miles and I don’t like each other, but she doesn’t know everything. I think she’s starting to suspect there might be more than I’ve told her.
“Then don’t go up to our third floor. He’s living here now,” Damon says with a smirk.
My eyebrows rise at Elle. “Seriously?”
Elle points at the chair I’m sitting in. “He was just sitting in that chair.”
Damn it, I knew he’d invade my group. Coop is too good of a guy. He’s always taking the new guys under his wing, so it shouldn’t surprise me. Good thing I’m in the hockey realm now for my job because this city is not big enough for Miles and me to coexist.