Page 14 of Final Down

I chuckle and turn my head her way, widening my eyes and mouthing, “Right?”

“Hey, what gives? No sign for me?” Whiskey interrupts, breaking up Bryce and Wyatt’s embrace.

“Bro, I can’t hold up a sign that says Whiskey. People will think I’m an alcoholic,” Bryce laughs out, bracing himself for Whiskey’s incoming body. In seconds, he’s lifted Bryce off his feet with a bullish hug.

“Yet, that’s not weird at all,” I mutter to Tasha.

She sighs to my right.

“Sadly, no. It’s not.”

Whiskey finally drops his old friend, and Bryce takes my carry-on bag from my shoulder, a chivalrous move that catches Wyatt’s eye. His brows pinch, but I shake my head. Bryce isn’t coming on to me. Those days are long gone. But every time we see him, he’s extra everything with me, like he’s making amends for being such a shithead sixteen-year-old.

“Do you have a lot of luggage?” Bryce asks over his shoulder.

Wyatt and Whiskey both groan, and Tasha punches each of them in their biceps.

“The ladies may have planned for a month,” Wyatt says, and I slap his other bicep as we follow behind Bryce toward baggage claim.

He rubs the spot, then smirks at me, winking.

Tasha and I may have overpacked a bit, but we don’t get away as two couples much. Even the trip to Texas over the summer, when the boys played in that league, was with Tasha and Whiskey’s kids. It was a different dynamic than being on our own. And when we checked the weather for this visit, it showed a swing of thirty degrees during our stay, with a chance of both extreme heat and cold rain.

This place is weird. Fitting.

Despite Wyatt’s warning that we might not be able to fit our luggage in the car, we all pile in with our bags just fine. It helps that Bryce rented an XL Escalade, which I hope the company or team is covering. I don’t remember this kind of glitzy attention rolled out for my dad when he was a free agent. Of course, it was widely understood that things like fancy cars and celebrity parties weren’t going to win over Reed Johnson. I hope the people pulling the strings now know that’s not going to impress Wyatt Stone. I, however, could get used to riding around in an Escalade.

It takes about thirty minutes to get to the new stadium, built just off the waterfront. It’s surrounded by glass buildings and brand-new storefronts with trendy restaurants and sidewalk seating in anticipation of big game-day crowds. It’s nice here, and the temperature at this very moment is very appealing. But it’s not home.

I should avoid comparisons. If we lived near the stadium in Arizona, we would be in the thick of things too. But the wide-open spaces in Arizona simply hit different.

Bryce parks in the circular drive-up right outside the business offices on the north end of the stadium. Nobody seems to be rushing to valet the car, and I can’t help but feel we’re breaking some rules by parking there. When three more outlandishly tall men dressed in dark green polos and dress slacks—the general uniform for retired NFL guys working in front offices, it seems—walk out to greet us, I relax.

“Welcome to Skyjack Stadium,” the man in the center says, stretching a hand out to shake Wyatt’s first. His hair is white, his beard peppered, and there’s something about him that feels familiar.

“Jerry, great to see you again,” Bryce says, shaking his hand before the man moves on to Whiskey. I mentally rummagethrough the context clues until my mind lands on Jerry Caswell, and my eyebrows shoot up.

“You played with my dad!” I blurt out.

The man’s gaze scrunches as it lands on me, and a second later, his lip ticks up.

“Well, goddamn. Are you Johnson’s kid? We must be getting old,” he says, stretching his arms out for a hug. I glance at Wyatt in time to catch him rolling his eyes at Whiskey. The two of them constantly joke about how the world operates on six degrees of Reed Johnson. It might very well be five. My dad’s reach is further than Kevin Bacon’s. Jerry was his tight end for two years in Detroit.

“I forgot about that connection,” Jerry says with a raspy chuckle as he takes a step back from me and elbows Wyatt’s side. “You married into royalty, Wyatt.”

“So they tell me,” Wyatt laughs out. His teeth are pushed together, his forced smile making his jaw flex. I don’t think anyone else notices how overwhelmed he is, but before it becomes obvious, I slide my hand in his and nestle into my husband’s side.

“Wyatt broke all of Daddy’s high school records,” I brag. I know it embarrasses Wyatt when I mention that fact, but it will also go a long way to separating him from my father in this crowd. He’s a standout on his own, and when I feel his bicep relax under my palm, I know he gets it.

“Well, how about we see if these guys can work out a deal so you can break the rest of them,” Jerry says, flashing Wyatt his trademark toothy grin.

Jerry leads the group of us into the offices, and we weave through a few hallways before reaching an elevator. I can tell we’re not all going to fit when everyone begins to pile in, so I hang back, partly wanting Wyatt to continue his chat with Jerry. I’m not sure what Jerry’s role is with the Portland Cyclones, butif he has any pull at all, that six degrees of Reed Johnson thing might come in handy.

“I’ll take the next one too,” Bryce says, stepping out when he realizes I’m the only one hanging back.

I make eyes at Wyatt before he can offer to trade places, silently urging him to stay put. Those jealous tendencies are deeply woven into his fabric when it comes to my history with Bryce, and though he knows there’s nothing there to worry about, his brain chemistry still reacts as if there is. I get it. I do the same whenanyoneeyes my man.

The doors close, and I exhale, the sound whooshing out of me a little heavier than I expect. I chuckle, a bit embarrassed to show how tense I was.

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