Page 1 of Game Changer

Prologue

Zara

Iam so done with this shit. My feet are the size of balloons, and my back is aching. As I step into my tiny flat and close the door behind me, my mind is made up to change my goddamn life.

I’ve been managing the same pub in Glasgow City Centre for the last two years and I swear it’s slowly killing me. I left University with a business degree, but it was a total waste of four years of my life. No matter how many corporate jobs I’ve applied for, I never manage to be good enough. The brewery that owned the pub I worked in as a student were looking for a new manager. I thought it would be a good idea to make a bit of extra money while I looked for something better. Unfortunately, that day hasn’t come and I’m more than ready to make a change.

It has occurred to me over the last couple of years of managing the pub, that it lacks any real personality. Owned by a faceless brewery, it’s a bog-standard pub with an ingrained alcohol and wood smell. It’s a place where the regulars look like part of the furniture, and the bar staff look like they’re losing the will to live. I try to keep my staff’s spirits up, but I have very limited control over what the business does. I’ve gone to the upper management with many ideas on how to make the place look more appealing. But every time I’m told they’ll get back to me when the budget allows for it. They haven’t got back to me once in my whole two years as manager, so if I don’t decide to move my life forward now, I never will.

My phone buzzes on the console table and Buckie’s name flashes up. His sexy smiling face looking at me from the screen. Owen Buchanan is my best friend and has been since we met at high school. Our relationship is complicated to the outside world, but to us it works. We both lead very busy lives and our time for dating and any kind of intimacy with anyone is limited. A friends with benefits relationship makes things less complicated. Well it did until I realised I wanted him around much more than simply for casual sex. That and my job are a few of the things I’m determined to change about my life.

Owen has been known as Buckie since he started high school and wanted to have a cool nickname, and it suits him. It’s a cocky nickname, and he is as cocky as they come.

Smiling, I answer the call, my belly fluttering as it always does when I see him calling me.

“Hey babe. Are you home?”

“I’m not long home. My feet are killing me, and my back is broken, but I’m sure you’ll be able to help me out with that. By the way I have exciting news to tell you.” I can’t hide my excitement. I know as soon as I tell him it will cement my decision in my mind. When it’s out in the world an idea can take shape much quicker.

“Hmm. Yeah. Um, can I come over? I really need to see you.”

“Have you gone all gentlemanly on me all of a sudden? What happened to just turning up and surprising me?”

The line is silent for a second longer than is necessary, and I get the distinct feeling there’s something wrong. “I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

I take the phone away from my ear and realise he’s hung up without even saying goodbye. Weird. And his tone was off. Normally he’d be making suggestions down the line of what we’d be getting up to later.

I kick my shoes into the hall cupboard, the cool tile on my aching feet a welcome relief. I decide that wine is in order because I have a feeling in my bones that this night may not go as I had planned.

I’m sipping on my second glass of wine as I sit at the window anticipating Buckie turning up. I’ve worked myself into a tizzy thinking about what might be up with him. I hear his Harley before I see it and crane my neck to watch him rounding the corner of my building. The noise of the bike shatters the 1am silence.

Being on the third floor of an old Glasgow tenement block, I have a good view of the street below. I watch as he parks up and makes his way towards the building. The sound of his key in the lock sends a shiver up my spine, as though his arrival is unexpected. I try to put on a smile for him as he comes into the living room, but his sullen look makes me want to die inside.

“Hey babe.”

I can’t move. The feeling of dread rising up my body has me rooted to my perch on the window seat.

“Hey,” I nod to him.

He sits on the chair opposite me and rests his elbows on his denim clad thighs, clasping his hands in front of him. His eyes bore a hole in me as he sits looking at me in silence.

“What’s your good news,” he says, breaking the most uncomfortable silence I’ve ever experienced with him.

“That can wait. What on earth is eating you? I’ve never seen you look so sad in my life. Are your parents okay?”

He lets out a long sigh and I don’t know whether to hug him or slap him and tell him to spit it out.

“They’re fine. I got some news this morning and I’ve been stewing over how to tell you all day.”

“Oh. Good or bad news?”

“It’s very good news. Like life changing good news, but it kind of affects us,” he says gesturing between us.

“Okay. Spill then.”

“Do you remember that audition I went to in London? The one for that big budget Sci-Fi movie. Well my agent called and told me they loved my audition and want to cast me.”

Well I didn’t see that coming. “Wow. Well done you. Did you get the part you wanted?” I get up and bend to give him a hug and he surprises me by pulling me down into his lap.

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