Just knowing she was here gave me a little boost while playing. Sue me for wanting to show off a little for the girl I liked.
I turned my back to the field as my eyes scanned the crowd above. It was a sea of gray and silver. Our fans always showed up, no matter the game or the weather.
I searched for Emmie’s red hair. She couldn’t be that far up if she got tickets through her dad. I dodged a few players as I slowly walked along the sideline, gazing upward.
I caught the attention of a few fans as they waved and shouted my name. I lifted my hand in return but continued my search. My eyes skipped along, not registering the red hair until my brain caught up with my eyes.
My head whipped back to the spot, eyes meeting the stunning pair of green ones that belonged to Emmie.There she is.
Now that I found her, she was all I could see. She stood out, her gorgeous red hair framing her face in soft curls and a team jersey encasing her upper body. From here, I couldn’t see if she was wearing shorts or not, but in my mind, I could easily picture those bare legs, little pops of muscles tightening when she moved.
Emmie’s grin was contagious, and she sent me a small wave. I could care less if her father looked over and saw me making googly eyes at his daughter. Nothing else existed but her in the stands. The delusional part of my brain said she was here just for me, even though she was more likely here to support her father.
I briefly wondered why I hadn’t seen her at the games before now, but that was a question for another time.
My eyes traveled back down to the jersey she was wearing. I frowned at the double zero’s she wore. That wasn’t mynumber, or anyone else’s for that matter. Far away, it was like she knew what my frown was for because she turned around and flashed the back of the jersey.
James.
She was wearing her father’s jersey. Well, actually, it was her own last name, but I didn’t like that. Not at all. I wanted it to bemynumber,myname on her back.
A wave of possessiveness hit me. It made me want to bang on my chest and grunt like some sort of caveman. Let every man in this stadium know Emmie was mine and mine only.
The feeling was so overwhelming, I almost stumbled back a step. Never in my life did I get the urge to go caveman for a woman. Some people thought I spent a lot of time dating, but in reality, I’d only ever been with a handful of women. And I certainly never had the urge to make someone exclusively mine.
Is this what Wyatt, Landon, Trevor, and Bryton felt when they met their wives?
A hit to my side jerked my attention away from Emmie. I forgot I was on the sidelines of a game. Needing to get back to my job, I met her eyes once more. She gave me another wave, followed up with a thumbs-up.
I grinned and dipped my head. Hopefully I could see her after the game.
We won—barely.It wasn’t pretty the last quarter, but we pulled it off, and from the loud chatter in the locker room, everyone was on a winning high. I made sure to go around and talk to each player, taking a few extra minutes with therookies. I remembered my first year after I got drafted and how I felt like a fish out of water.
Jennings didn’t take the time to talk to me, but a few of the older players went out of their way to do so when I first joined the team. It was nice to have someone more seasoned tell me that I did a good job and to keep working hard. It made a huge difference, so when I made starting quarterback and captain the following year, I made it a mission to take the time to talk to all the players, rookies or not.
Since Jennings played more than I did, him and Coach were currently in the conference talking to the press.
After each game, no matter the outcome, a few selected players had to talk to the press about what happened during the game. The questions usually ranged from Why did you call this play? to Would you do anything different?
It could be tedious and frustrating at times, especially after losing a game when there were things you wished you could go back and change. At least today, I didn’t have to talk about the mistakes made. That was Jennings’s issue.
I already changed during halftime into a pair of joggers and a Titans’ T-shirt, so by the time I gathered my stuff from my cubby, it was only just after seven o’clock.
“Want to go grab a drink?” Perry asked, stuffing his cleats in his cubby next to mine.
“Sorry, I have plans,” I answered.
“Plans?” Jake piped up on the other side of me. “With a certain redhead?”
“As a matter of fact, yes.” Although she didn’t know about said plans. I was sort of just hoping she would be waiting for me outside of the locker room, and then we could go from there. I was flying by the seat of my pants.
“Are you guys official yet?” Jake’s voice was muffled as he threw on a shirt. My heart thudded in my chest at Emmiebeing officially mine, although it was too soon to say that. We’d only been on one real date—two if you count Pilates—but I planned on changing that.
“No, not yet.” I was going to take Emmie out as many times as I could before our lives got hectic in the coming weeks. Show her that I was serious and wanted more than just being friends.
“Won’t lie, she’s intimidating as hell,” Perry commented.
I nodded along. “I know. She’s so far out of my league.”
