Page 19 of Home Game

I wasn’t even sure if I believed it, but for some reason, I didn’t like the idea of someone talking like that about him.

“Is he?”

“He definitely isn’t a brute,” I said. “He’s… really smart, actually, when I’ve spoken with him.”

William’s eyes went wide. “Oh, you know him? Personally, like that?”

“I’ve started working with him recently.”

William shrugged. “Well, maybe I’ve got him wrong, then. Nothing like getting to know a guy personally when it comes to judging his character. The guy certainly does have a charming face, after all.”

“He really does,” I said, still grappling with the strange urge to defend Storm. “He’s a handsome man. I don’t think he has bad intentions, even if his actions can be… wild.”

I was surprised by how much I meant what I said. It wasn’t just a public relations move, where I was hoping to make the public see Storm in a better light.

It was really how I felt.

The front door swung open and my heart rate ticked up as I glanced over.

But it was just a couple, walking in and holding hands. They walked in, smiled, and took a sweet moment to wrap their arms around each other in a quick kiss before making their way to the opposite end of the bar.

And the loneliest person of the year award goes to… Emmett Waycott.

I picked up the whiskey shot that Rush had poured for me, tossing it back. Soon, William headed over toward the pool tables and struck up a game with an older woman over there, leaving me to my confusing thoughts about Storm while Landry got lost in his phone beside me.

No. I wasn’t going to start a pity party now just because a football player had come tearing into my life like a wild animal. Did I want to start a fight with him, or did I want to defend him?

Or did I just want to stare into his frustratingly perfect eyes? It was hard to tell, now that the whiskey was acting like a truth serum in my blood.

I was just going totalkto him when he walked through those doors.

Calmly and respectfully.

I could always find a way to get along with anyone.

Over an hour later, I realized that Storm wasn’t going to show up, and somehow that thought bothered me even more than the idea of him walking through the doors.

“Dad always used to sayshowing up is half the battle of being a good person,” I said.

“I love all of your dad’s old quotes,” Landry said. “God, I miss him.”

“I miss him, too,” I said. “He’d know what to do about this whole Storm thing.”

I could really feel the whiskey in my blood, now.

“We’ll do okay,” Landry said, a little more optimistic than me.

“Have you ever seen someone skip their own celebration party?” I asked Landry, shaking my head. “Keeping everyone waiting and he doesn’t bother to show up?”

Landry had a stack of paperwork out on the bar, reviewing marketing data for Cutmore even now. It was the kind of thing that I would usually do, too—find every spare moment of time to work, even in a bar.

But tonight I couldn’t focus.

Landry glanced up and looked around. “It seems like everybody is having a great time. Don’t worry about Storm.”

“Right. I shouldn’t,” I said, and Jax, the frat boy bartender across the bar, gave me a look, smiling.

“How’s that whiskey treating you?” he said. “Too many shots?”

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