Page 50 of Off Camera
I don’t know how the hell I missed the signs of her identity. They were all there, right in front of me and bright as fucking day.
The night at the bar when she said a work thing came up.
When she shut down after her date started talking shit about women and sports.
Casually asking about my friends who are athletes without showing any interest in getting to know them.
I’m a goddamn idiot.
It explains why Dallas and Maven acted so weird when I mentioned her name after the wedding. They knew the whole time and didn’t tell me.
I’m going tokillthem.
I shove my phone in my pocket and grab my room key, ready to head to the hotel bar. Six hours of panel discussions, reluctant socializing, a mandatory flag football tournament tomorrow, and a fuck ton of confusing thoughts swirling in my head has me needing a drink.
When I make it downstairs and see the bar empty from any conference goers who might want to chat my ear off, I sigh in relief.
I slide onto a stool at the end of the counter and reach for the drink menu. Before I can even take a look at the specials, a blonde bartender is in front of me, showing off her cleavage, and getting close enough to make me uncomfortable.
“Hi,” she says, and I barely look up. “Can I get you something?”
“A whiskey neat, please,” I say.
“Rough day?”
“Just a day.”
“You don’t strike me as a hard liquor kind of guy.”
“Guess I’m a man of surprises,” I draw out.
“Anything I can do to help?”
“Alcohol would be nice.”
She laughs like I’m the funniest guy in the world and heads for the well of liquor bottles. “I have to take care of another couple then I’ll be back.”
I pull off my glasses and pinch the bridge of my nose. I can’t tell if I want to sleep for ten hours or take ten shots. A combination of both would be nice, but with six videos to edit and post and a week to go until our first preseason game, there’s not enough time.
This drink will have to do.
A laugh comes from across the bar, and I startle at the sound.
I thought I was in here alone, but when I shove my glasses back on and scan the room, I don’t like what I find.
Avery.
Sitting on a barstool, talking to some guy.
Some guy who has a suit with shiny cufflinks and slicked-back hair.
There’s something about him I immediately don’t like. It’s the arrogance, maybe, in the way he talks with his hands and leans into her space. He’s dominating the conversation while she’s sitting there stone-faced with a stiff spine.
I guess that laugh was fake.
I watch them and try to decipher their body language. Her shoulders are angled away from him. His hand is on the counter and keeps inching closer her. I must watch them for too fucking long, because she turns her chin to the right. Her gaze meets mine, and her mouth pops open in surprise.
I narrow my eyes and pretend to scratch my nose, subtly flipping her off in the process. I expect her to throw some sass back, that same attitude she had when we were texting earlier, but she doesn’t.
