Page 6 of Score to Settle
I don’t have many other friends. Despite my dad being away chasing stories most of my life, his love of journalism and his focus still rubbed off on me. But with a surname like Cassidy, I have big shoes to fill in the industry. I have to prove I’m professional, focused, and hardworking, and a good journalist in my own right. But somehow, my efforts always get read as stuck up and prickly. Like the team atSports Magazinewho love Callie but give me the side eye. It’s always been this way. Mia is the only person in the world who really gets me, and I count myself lucky to have the best human on earth by my side.
“Just my job,” I reply to Mia’s innuendo. “Talking of which, Mia, what the hell is a tight end?”
She laughs again. “Are you serious?”
My silence says it all.
“OK,” Mia says and I can hear the smile in her voice. “I’m not an expert or anything, but a tight end is the football player who does a little bit of everything. They’re like a mix between a big, strong blocker and a receiver who catches the ball. So, on one play, they might be protecting the quarterback, and on the next, they’re catching passes and scoring touchdowns. It’s kind of a do-it-all position and one Jake Sullivan is very good at. He used to play quarterback in high school but moved to a different position in college and is now tight end for the Stormhawks. Talking of high school, did Jake mention?—”
“No,” I say quickly, before another memory I don’t want rushes to the surface. “I’m one hundred percent sure no one in this family realizes I went to West Denver High and that’s the way it’s going to stay.”
“Chase will remember you.”
“Thankfully he’s not here. I’m more than happy to be Harper Cassidy, the journalist fromSports Magazine.”
“Is she all that different from Harper Cassidy, the high school girl hopelessly in love with the star football player? I quite liked that girl, you know.”
“I’ll be that girl again if you bring back your braces and your obsession with the rodeo.”
We laugh back and forth a while longer, remembering versions of ourselves that feel like different people.
“Just remember to have some fun too, Harper,” Mia says when the conversation moves back to my feature on Jake. “Work isn’t everything. You need to have a life as well.”
“Says the woman who works twelve-hour days and most weekends. Don’t worry. I think I might find this fun. Jake already thinks he’s God’s gift to the world. I’m looking forward to digging deeper to find out if there’s anything underneath.”
“Uh-oh! I recognize that tone. Poor Jake. He’s toast.”
From somewhere in the house, a door slams. I lower my voice. “I better go.”
“OK. Love you. Text me later.”
“You know I will. Love you too,” I say, catching my reflection in the mirror. My eyes are still dancing from laughing with Mia. I drop my phone on the red Stormhawks bedspread. Mia’s mention of clothes makes me look down at my tailored skirt and blouse. I’m overdressed for a family dinner on a ranch.
As I unzip my suitcase and swap my outfit for a pair of tight, stone-washed jeans and a black sweater that hugs my curves, the window draws my gaze again. In the dusk, the view beyond thepaddocks is almost lost, but I can just make out the first craggy foothills. I feel like I could walk straight into the mountains without meeting a single road, fence, or human along the way.
All my life, I’ve had pictures of the New York skyline on my walls, desperate to escape this state, but I’m still reeling from the reality of the city and there’s something comforting about this room and this view. Is this feature on Jake out of my comfort zone? Yes. Is it going to be glaringly obvious within three seconds of speaking that I don’t have a clue about football? Also yes. But maybe I can find some peace in the tranquility of the landscape while I’m stuck here.
Besides, anything has got to be better than trying to fake my way through editorial meetings and dodging Callie’s snide remarks and constant attempts to undermine me. This could be the perfect spot to work on my novel too. I have no idea what I’m doing or why I’m doing it, but a buzz of excitement still shoots through me when I think about the novel I started when I moved back to Denver. A way to fill my evenings when Mia was working or out with Edward. Mia’s right about one thing—I haven’t exactly put much effort into building a social life since I got back, but I hate the thought of seeing people I know and what they’ll think when they realize I’m back in Denver after messing up my shot in New York.
Quietly, I slip out of the bedroom. From the room next to mine, I catch the sound of a drawer opening then closing. I think of Jake, wet from the shower. I swallow and shove the image aside. I’m not a drooling teen with a major crush anymore. That version of me died the day I realized Jake wasn’t the golden boy I thought he was. Ten years on and the cruelty of his words still echo in my mind like it was yesterday:I’d rather die than meet the loser who wrote that!
I push the memory aside and head for the stairs, taking in the framed family photos on the white walls. Dylan as a baby witha man in his twenties I guess is his father. Then Jake appears and it’s the two of them and their dad for a few years, sitting on a paddock fence with the barn behind them. Then Chase joins them as a two-year-old, sporting overalls and the Afro curls I remember from high school. In the first photo, he looks uncomfortable in his adoptive father’s arms, but by the second he’s wedged in between Jake and Dylan on the fence and looks like one of the family.
With each photograph, the boys grow taller and broader and then suddenly their father is no longer with them in the shot. I feel a pang of grief for the first photo of the boys alone and the lost expressions hiding behind their smiles. Jake and I have one thing in common at least—we’ve both lost a parent. I hurry on before my own childhood memories fill my head.
Downstairs, the ranch is full of life and furniture. A home. Lived-in couches and plump cushions. Wood floors and a big fireplace in the living room.
“There you are.”
I spin around to find Joanna Sullivan pulling a stack of placemats from a sideboard that looks straight out of an old John Wayne Western. Joanna is still wearing the oversized Stormhawks jersey and apron she greeted me in a few hours ago. She’s in her fifties or early sixties with short, blonde-gray hair, a round face and body, and a knowing smile that seems to cut right through me. Mama Sullivan might look like everyone’s dream American mom, but I have the sense that’s all part of the subterfuge to draw people in. You don’t raise three high-profile NFL players without being hardworking, whip-smart, and tough as nails.
It’s on my lips to ask her a question about Jake and start getting the background to the feature, but then I remember Tim’s warning about Mama.She runs the show when it comes toher boys. And she’s not someone you want to cross.And so I ask, “Can I help set the table, Mrs. Sullivan?”
The woman laughs, a merry dancing chuckle. “In the thirty-seven years I’ve lived in this house, you’re the first person to ever offer that.” She stacks the mats in my open arms. “And call me Mama. Not even my doctor calls me Mrs. Sullivan.”
I follow her into the kitchen, already my favorite room in the house. It’s a vast, open space, with modern units lining one wall and a large, chrome stove. The long bench table stands in the center, easily long enough for three hulking football players to sit around. The décor is a mix of modern and classic, mirroring the rest of the ranch. There’s a door propped open that leads to the garden, barn, and paddocks I saw from Chase’s window.
The aromas of home cooking fill the air. I try to remember the last time I ate anything that wasn’t at a restaurant or from a takeout carton. The only thing I make in the kitchen of Mia’s apartment is grilled cheese, and I burn them more often than not.
