Page 135 of Resisting the Running Back

I don’t want the family business, but I’m the eldest son in the prestigious Bradley family.

It’s my legacy to carry the company forward whether I want to or not.

Give it to Everleigh, third in line and the oldest daughter. She has a way better business sense than I do despite my undergraduate degree in business.

But no. It’s mine.

I don’t have much career left in me. Traded in the final year of my contract. The Bears didn’t want me anymore. The Storm will likely let me ride out my final year on the bench and then I’ll disappear into the void.

I know it’s business. I know the truth of the matter is that the Bears didn’t want to pay me. They have other problems there, too. Firing the coach midseason is usually a pretty good indicator of that, and they just hired the Eagles’ offensive coordinator. He’s cleaning house, starting with me.

I clear my throat. “I haven’t figured anything out yet. I need to go to San Diego for a few days and get the lay of the land.”

“So long as I have your assurance you’ll be around to work with me,” he says shortly.

No, Father. I won’t be.

But the good news for him, I suppose, is that he also has an office in Dallas. And Vegas. And New York.

The list goes on.

But you don’t become a magnate in commercial real estate development without taking risks and spreading out your assets, I guess.

“We’ll figure out a compromise,” I say instead of any of that.

I’m not quite ready to leave Chicago anyway. We’re finally coming out of winter, though I’m expecting a spring blizzard since we usually get hit with something when we’re not expecting it. The weather will turn to my favorite season that isn’t football season, and I don’t want to miss it.

My entire life is here in Chicago—my brothers in football, players who are no longer my teammates. A sea of women—some of whom I’ve hooked up with. My family and the Bradley Legacy.

It’s all I fucking hear about.

Okay, so maybe San Diego isn’t looking so bad.

It’s a new pond in which to cast my line away from the spotlight cast on my family—or, rather, away from the spotlight our parents work so hard to put us in.

I can’t say I’ll miss that, though I’ll miss that sense of family.

Monday night dinners cooked by my parents’ personal chef for the entire family—or at least those who can make it.

Charity events and activities in the only place I’ve ever called home.

And my own home—a penthouse in a skyscraper downtown. I glance around the place and walk over to the windows that look out over Navy Pier and Lake Michigan on one side and downtown on the other. I’m in the New Eastside, just north of Millennium Park. I run the Lakefront Trail along Lake Shore Drive daily when the weather allows.

I don’t want to give it all up. I love this city. I bleed blue and orange, have my entire life, and now I’m just supposed to…wear black and silver? Just like that?

I head over to my liquor cabinet and grab the first bottle I see. I take a healthy chug of the amber liquid as I try to come to terms with the fact that a month from now, all this will be a distant memory.

* * *

“Nice to meet you. I’m Madden Bradley,” I say, holding out a hand to shake Spencer Nash’s. We’ve met on the field before, and this is absolutely a case of game respecting game. I’m a couple years his senior. I’d peg him around thirty-two or thirty-three, and at thirty-five, I’m practically ancient for a wide receiver.

But I’m not going to let that stop me from playing my ass off.

I’m a competitor by nature, and there was a hole on this roster that was filled by me. I will do what it takes to prove that I belong here and that I deserve to be on that field when the games begin.

“Mad Brad!” Clayton Mack says, slapping me on the back. “Welcome to the Storm. Call me Clay. Or Clay Mack.”

I just got here this afternoon, and Coach Brian Dell introduces me to the other receivers along with the coaches who are in the office today. He gives me a few minutes with the men who are now my teammates in the locker room when he has his own meeting to attend to.

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