Reese already texted me that she was running a bit behind and would just meet me in the hotel’s main ballroom where they’ve set up a bar and some high-top tables, but I didn’t have it in me to make her walk into tonight’s cocktail mixer alone.
I was surprised when her name popped up on my phone screen thirty minutes ago, because that one text is about all the communication we’ve had.
We didn’t speak on this morning’s flight to Las Vegas. We sat next to each other on the plane, but Reese had her headphones in and worked the entire time.
When we arrived at the hotel, we didn’t say a word, simply gave the receptionist our IDs to check us in. Once we received our room keys, we went our separate ways, and the conference schedule kept us apart for the rest of the day.
Reese attended a few events for the owners while I went to the get-togethers for the field managers. The commissioner spoke. We listened. Then we all hung out, shooting the shit during our downtime.
I’ve got quite a few friends who manage other teams, which is the only part of this yearly conference I enjoy. We get to catch up without the pressure of a game looming over us. Sure, there are a few coaches who don’t exactly get along, but they’re all fairly good at faking it in these group settings.
It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense that this conference is held in Vegas every year. There are no major league teams here currently and the commissioner’s office is located in New York. Yet, every year, for twenty-four hours, we all gather here. And judging by the debauchery that I’ve seen some of these guys get up to over the years, I think I might be the only attendee who despises having to trek all the way out to Nevada for one night.
Personally, I can’t stand this part of the job. The ass-kissing. The showing off to other teams. By the time the cocktail mixer rolls around every year, I’ve got about an hour left in my social battery before I head back to my room for the night. I can’t remember a conference I’ve attended that I wasn’t counting down the minutes until our flight out or when I could get back to my team.
So, knowing there’s only one hour that I might get to speak to Reese after more than a week of silence, I wait in the lobby for her so we can walk in together.
This level of the Vegas hotel is reserved for the conference, which is a whole lot quieter than the casino. So, when the elevator finally dings, landing on this floor, it earns all my attention.
But even if I were surrounded by hundreds of people, even if I couldn’t hear myself think, my eyes still would’ve found her as soon as the doors opened.
Reese is standing in the elevator by herself, riffling through her tiny purse for something and not realizing that I’m standing on the other side, utterly speechless.
I’ve mostly seen my boss in business attire. But tonight, she’s wearing a dress. It’s dusty blue and cut perfectly to highlight every inch of her. A dress that I can’t decide if I’d like better on her distracting body, as it is now, or seeing it sprawled across my bedroom floor.
Okay. What the hell is wrong with me?
It doesn’t matter that she and I don’t get along most of the time. It’s becoming increasingly difficult to view my boss asonlymy boss when I haven’t felt this level of attraction to someone in years.
Not that I’d ever act on it. I respect her too much to risk her reputation or my own job for something as minor as physical attraction.
There’s also the fact that I’m older than her and also her employee. I’m self-aware enough to admit that I already know Reese would never see me in that way.
She walks out of the elevator, still looking through her purse until she finally finds the lip gloss she was searching for. She’s got the top off and the applicator partway to her lips when she looks up and finds me waiting for her.
Leaning a shoulder against the wall, hand tucked into a pocket.
A little bit hypnotized.
“Oh,” she says. “I uh... you didn’t have to wait for me.”
It’s about the most she’s said to me all week, but I’m not paying much attention to her words. I’m fixated on the way her eyes trail down my body, on the way her cheeks earn a slight flush as she takes her time looking.
I typically live in my athletic clothes and baseball pants when I’m at work, but tonight, just like the other ninety or so men in there, I’m wearing a suit.
Miller was over at my apartment this morning, and I asked her to grab me a suit from my closet so I could pack. I wasn’t at all surprised when she picked my dark green one, seeing as it’s her favorite color. And judging by the way my boss is looking at me right now, I need to thank my daughter for choosing this one.
“I uh...” I rub my palm over my beard. “I didn’t want you to walk in alone.”
That blank expression she’s worn around me all week softens in a way she rarely lets it. “That was thoughtful of you.”
There’s a moment of silence as I replay her words.
“I’m sorry,” I tease. “Was that a compliment you just accidentally let slip out?”
I watch as the smallest tic lifts the corners of her lips, but she tries to cover it by sliding the gloss over her lips, leaving a soft-pink shine in its wake.
“My bad. I won’t let it happen again.”
