The Game

Chapter 4-2

I blinked. “Oh. Wow. That’s terrible.”

“That’s why I’m suggesting you do something about it. Unless you’re too busy…or maybe you don’t care how the women here are treated.”

“Of course I care.”

“Then I look forward to hearing how your discussion goes. I’ll see you at the staff meeting later.”

Tiffany huffed and disappeared. I figured I’d speak to Josh about the delivery guy when he returned, but a minute later, hoodie guy passed by my door yet again. This time the pizza boxes were gone. I normally dreaded confrontation, but I was going to have to get used to it if I was going to do this job. So I walked out into the hall.

“Excuse me…”

The guy turned around.

Damn. This close he was really good looking.

Damn.reallyHe pointed to himself. “Are you talking to me?”

“Yes. Do you think we can speak for a moment?”

He flashed a megawatt smile that was pretty damn dazzling. His teeth might’ve actually gleamed a bit. No wonder this guy thought he could say and do whatever he wanted. Though being handsome certainly didn’t give him the right to harass women.

Hoodie guy followed me to my office. I stepped aside and extended my hand. “Please, come in.”

I closed the door behind me before offering my hand. “I’m Bella Keating.”

“I know who you are. I’ve seen your picture in the paper.” He clasped my hand. “Christian. It’s good to meet you.”

“Obviously this isn’t the ideal topic of conversation when you first meet someone, but I’m afraid I need to discuss a complaint I’ve received about you.”

Christian’s forehead wrinkled. “Complaint? What kind of complaint?”

“One of the employees has informed me that you’ve been harassing women here at the Bruins. She mentioned one particular instance where you made a comment about her backside.”

Christian’s eyebrows jumped. “Harassing? I don’t think so. Some of the women like to flirt, but they’re just fooling around.”

“That’s actually a common problem. One person thinks they’re flirting, but the other person feels like they’re being harassed. The line between the two can often be very blurry. Here at the Bruins, we have a zero-tolerance policy for harassment, so I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to refrain from delivering your pies here in the future. What pizza place do you work for?”

“Pizza place?”

“Yes, I’d like to know who your employer is.”

The guy’s full lips curved to a grin as he planted his hands on his hips. “You don’t know who my employer is?”

“If I did, I wouldn’t be asking.”

He chuckled and walked toward the door. “I gotta go. But it was fun meeting you, Bella.”

I couldn’t believe the audacity of this guy. He was laughing? “You know I don’t find s****l harassment funny, nor do I take approaching someone to discuss a complaint lodged against them lightly. I wasn’t going to call your boss, but I think perhaps I should, considering how flippant you’re being.”

“By all means, call her. That oughta make for an interesting conversation.” He opened my door and looked back over his shoulder. “And hey, as long as I’m harassing people, I might as well tell you that you’re much cuter than your pictures in the paper. Would you like to have dinner sometime?”

My mouth dropped open. Before I could close it, Josh returned. He lifted his chin to the delivery guy. “What’s up, Christian. I guess you met the boss?”

“Sure did. Bella here wants to know what pizza place I work for. Maybe you can fill her in. She’d also like my boss’s number. Gotta run.” Christian blew me a kiss. “Later, beautiful. By the way, your glasses are a little crooked.”

Josh held out a coffee, shaking his head. “That was weird.”

“Tell me about it.” I adjusted my glasses on my face. “I hope you know who he works for.”

Josh thumbed toward the door. “Christian?”

“Yes?”

“Well, since you own the team now, I guess he works for you.”

My nose wrinkled. “The pizza delivery guy works for the team?”

Josh studied my face. “Oh crap. You have no idea who that was, do you?”

“Uhhh…the pizza delivery guy?”

“That was Christian Knox. The starting quarterback for the Bruins and your team’s captain.”

I shut my eyes. I’m going to kill Drizella.

I’m going to kill Drizella.

“How was your first day?”

My head lolled back against the headrest the moment I pulled Miller’s car door shut. “Do you remember what happened on my first day when we worked together in college?”

“You mean Mr. Big Balls?”

“The one and only.”

“What about him?”

“My mistake with him was less embarrassing than today.”

In our sophomore year, Miller had gotten me a job at the place he worked—he did tech support for a payroll-software company. I should’ve known before I started that it was a bad idea. Clients would call in when they had a problem, and we’d share our screens, showing them the steps to get through the issue with our software. There was also a chat box on the bottom of the screen where you could see the client’s profile picture and they could see yours. Third client into my shift, this guy pops in for some help, and his profile pic shows him standing. I could see down to his mid-thigh. I swear, to this day, I still have no idea what was going on in that photo, but on my screen it looked like he had giant balls. I don’t mean a pronounced bulge. I mean two round softballs trying to escape from his pants. I managed to get through the support chat, but before we disconnected, I took a screenshot of the profile pic with my phone so I could show it to Miller. Then I thought I disconnected the guy. You can see where this is going already…

giant ballsthoughtLong story short, I proceeded to send the screenshot to Miller through our employee DM chat, where we had a lengthy discussion about whether balls could grow that big. I even did things like google conditions that could cause testicular swelling and then searched the guy on social media to see if his profile picture had been distorted somehow or if he really looked like that. Needless to say, I hadn’t actually disconnected, so Mr. Big Balls had watched everything I’d done on his screen before he called my boss. Miller and I were both fired, and my very first day became my very last.

“What could you have done that’s worse than Mr. Big Balls?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe mistake the best quarterback in the league for the pizza delivery guy and then give him a lecture on s****l harassment in the workplace.”

Miller’s eyes flashed to me and back to the road. “What the hell happened?”

“Drizella happened.”

Drizella“But how can you not recognize him? You memorized the statistics of every player on the team.”

“You know me and faces don’t mix well. I memorized his numbers, not his appearance—which, by the way, is breathtaking. The man’s jawline could make a sculptor weep.”

Miller shook his head. “I hate to tell you, but you’re not building algorithms anymore. You’re going to have to start paying attention to people. Use the tricks you’ve always used when you had to put faces together with names.”

I pouted. “I’m not a people person. I’m a mathematician.”

“Not anymore, princess. You’re a billionairess who owns an NFL team.”

“I think I want to go back to my old job. I’m done peopling.”

Miller chuckled. “You’ll get better at it. I promise.”