Page 9 of Scoring Lessons

Waking up in a bed that wasn’t my own, in a city I wasn’t too familiar with, was weird, to say the least.

As soon as I opened my eyes, anxiety coiled in my chest like a fist tightening around my heart.

I’d never sat well with anxiety—I mean, who did?

I was determined not to let it ruin my day, so I got dressed and took Daisy out for a run by the lake. The sun was high in a clear blue sky, the air sharp with that early fall bite that Chicago did better than anywhere else I’d ever been. Daisy loved running, so it didn’t matter how fast my pace was; she could easily keep up.

Outrunning my anxiety was a sport I excelled in.

Landing a job with the Strikers helped with it, even if just a little. Becoming an athletic trainer for one of the best teams in the Western Conference was a dream for many, but for me, starting over was never part of the plan.

This was a good team, and they were the reigning champions from last season, after all. Under any other circumstances—ones where my life wasn’t a mess, and my chest didn’t feel hollowed out—I would have been over the moon.

I raced back as my mind ran through the million different things I needed to get done.

Find a new Pilates studio. Also find a new daycare where Daisy could stay when I inevitably started traveling for work too much. Scope out the restaurants around the area for my favorite comfort foods.

And, of course, last but certainly not least—hold the scattered pieces of my life together long enough to remember why moving was a good thing.

I was dreading that last one far too much.

I pulled out my phone mid-stride and started a list because my brain couldn’t be trusted right now, and I was so absorbed in typing that I didn’t see the person stepping out of the building entrance until I walked directly into them.

The impact knocked the phone clean out of my hand.

Daisy barked once, delighted, like this was the best thing that had happened all morning.

I stumbled back and would have gone down completely if a hand hadn’t shot out and caught my arm.

“Whoa—”

I already knew who the voice belonged to before I looked up.

Wesley Hayes stared down at me, one hand still around my forearm. His hair was slightly damp, a single dirty blond curl resting against his forehead. He wore a dark-blue cutoff tank that left nothing about his arms to the imagination—every hard line of muscle, the pronounced veins running down his forearms. And the pair of black shorts that rested against his upper thighs did nothing to hide the toned lines of his legs.

The man was annoyingly built, and he knew it.

To top it all off, he wore this smug, amused look that made me want to throat punch him. If we were being honest.

“Do you do that to everyone,” he drawled, “or am I just lucky?”

I yanked my arm back and smoothed my sculpted white workout jacket. “You stepped right in front of me!”

He bent down, picked up my phone, and held it out. “You walked into me.”

“I was…distracted.”

His eyes dropped to my half-finished to-do list on the screen then back up. One corner of his mouth lifted. “Clearly.”

“Don’t.” I snatched the phone from his hand.

Daisy, the traitor, was already sitting on his foot and gazing up at him in excitement and admiration. He glanced down at her, his smile turning wide enough to deepen his dimples, then crouched and scratched behind her ears.

“At least one of you likes me.”

“She likes everyone. It’s her fatal flaw.” I let the lie fly right out of my mouth.

“She has good taste,” he commented before giving her one last scratch.